[714]. I speak of the separation as accidental, not because the forces then at work did not make it almost inevitable, but because altered economic theories and scientific discoveries, the latter largely eliminating the extremely important elements, in the original problem, of time and distance, occurred a half-century after the separation took place. Had they occurred sooner, they might have prevented it, as they have been largely instrumental in holding the remainder of the empire together and greatly adding to it. The influence of free-trade, steam, and electricity has been of vast importance in imperial politics.
[715]. Cf. E. A. Freeman, Greater Greece and Greater Britain (London, 1886); C. P. Lucas, Greater Rome and Greater Britain (Oxford, 1912).
[716]. J. R. Seeley, Expansion of England (London, 1884), pp. 110 ff.
[717]. The beginnings of the discussion were noted in an earlier chapter. For the view at the end of the 19th century, cf. C. P. Lucas's Introduction, in Lewis, Government of Dependencies (Oxford, 1891), pp. xlv ff.
[718]. E. M[isselden], The Circle of Commerce or the Ballance of Trade (London, 1623), p. 131.
[719]. Thomas Mun, England's Treasure by Forraign Trade, 1664 (ed. New York, 1910), p. 7. Cf. J. R. McCulloch, A Short Collection of Early English Tracts on Commerce (London, 1856), p. vi.
[720]. Mun, England's Treasure, p. 14. In his defense of the East India Company, he advanced upon his predecessors in advocating the export of bullion, if, as a direct result, a larger amount could be shown to be imported. Cf. chaps. V and VI of his Considerations on the East India Trade (London, 1701); reprinted in Early English Tracts, pp. 1-49.
[721]. England's Interest and Improvement, 1663; reprint, Johns Hopkins University, 1907, p. 35.
[722]. G. L. Beer, The Old Colonial System (New York, 1912), vol. I, p. 37.
[723]. Mims, Colbert's West Indian Policy, pp. 8, 315, 319, 335.