Excerpt from The Growth of British Policy, Vol. 2: An Historical Essay<br><br>There can be no question that an advance was made when the fantastic system which drew a whole nation in the train of a single family was discarded. But, as English history has always abhorred extremes, the im provement was less manifest, because the old system had been less abusive than it might have been in another country. In particular our policy did not become more peaceful, but decidedly more warlike, by becoming national.<br><br>Peace and non-intervention pushed to an extreme had long been the established tradition of English policy. From the first outbreak of rebellion in the Netherlands against Philip II to the conclusion of the Treaties of Westphalia, England had intervened only and barely as much (if we except the age of Buckingham) as was necessary for her own safety.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.