[Sidenote: Ambitious Foreign Policy of Peter the Great]
Internal reforms were but one-half of Peter's ambitious program. To him Russia owes not only the abolition of the streltsi, the loss of the independence of the Church, the Europeanization of manners and customs, and the firm establishment of autocracy, but also the pronouncement and enforcement of an elaborate scheme of foreign aggrandizement. On one hand, the tsar showed a lively interest in the exploration and colonization of Siberia and in the extension of Russian dominion around the Caspian Sea and towards the Persian Empire. On the other hand,—and this, for our purposes, is far more important,—he was resolved to make the cultural and commercial connection between Russia and Europe strong and intimate, to open a way to the west by gaining outlets on both the Black and Baltic seas—"windows" to the west, as he termed them.
On the Baltic Sea, Sweden blocked him; toward the Black Sea, the Ottoman power hemmed him in. It was, therefore, against Sweden and Turkey that Peter the Great waged war. It seemed to him a matter of dire necessity for the preservation of European civilization in Russia that he should defeat one or both of these states. Against the Turks, as events proved, he made little headway; against the Swedes he fared better.
In order that we may understand the nature of the momentous conflict between Russia and Sweden in the first quarter of the eighteenth century, it will be necessary at this point to notice the parallel development of Sweden.
SWEDEN AND THE CAREER OF CHARLES XII
[Sidenote: Sweden a Great Power in the Seventeenth Century]
It will be recalled that a century before Peter the Great, the remarkable Gustavus Adolphus had aimed to make the Baltic a Swedish lake. To his own kingdom, lying along the western shore of that sea, and to the dependency of Finland, he had added by conquest the eastern provinces of Karelia, Ingria, Esthonia, and Livonia [Footnote: Livonia, occupied by Gustavus Adolphus during the Polish War of 1621-1629, was not formally relinquished by Poland until 1660. Esthonia had been conquered by the Swedes in 1561, but Russia did not renounce her pretensions to this province until 1617.], and his successful interference in the Thirty Years' War had given Sweden possession of western Pomerania and the mouths of the Elbe, Oder, and Weser rivers and a considerable influence in German affairs. For many years after the death of Gustavus Adolphus, Sweden was the recognized leader of continental Protestantism, and her trade on the Baltic grew and thrived. The exports of Russia and Poland found a convenient outlet through the Swedish port of Riga, and those of the northern Germanics were frequently dispatched on Swedish vessels from Stettin or Stralsund.
Repeated efforts were made by Denmark, Poland, and Brandenburg to break the commercial monopoly which Sweden enjoyed upon the Baltic and to deprive her of her conquests, but for a long time in vain. Victory continued to attend Swedish arms and a general treaty in 1660 confirmed her dominion. At that time Sweden was not only a military power of the first magnitude but also one of the largest states of Europe, possessing about twice as much area as present-day Sweden. Her area embraced a land-surface 7000 square miles larger than the modern German Empire. All the islands and the greater part of the coast of the Baltic belonged to her. Stockholm, the capital, lay in the very center of the empire, whose second city was Riga, on the other side of the sea. In politics, in religion, and in trade, Sweden was feared and respected.
[Sidenote: Elements of Weakness in Sweden's Position]
Yet the greatness of Sweden in the seventeenth century was more apparent than real. Her commerce provoked the jealousy of all her neighbors. Her dependencies across the Baltic were difficult to hold: peopled by Finns, Russians, Poles, Germans, and Danes, their bond with Sweden was essentially artificial, and they usually sympathized, naturally enough, with their sovereign's enemies. They, therefore, imposed on the mother country the duty of remaining a military monarchy, armed from head to foot for every possible emergency. For such a tremendous destiny Sweden was quite unfitted. Her wide territory was very sparsely populated, and her peasantry were very poor. Only the French alliance gave her solid backing in the Germanies, and, with the decline of the fortunes of Louis XIV and the rise of Prussia and Russia, she was bound to lose her leadership in the North.