[Footnote 1: Cambridge Modern History, vol. x. p. 521.]
[Footnote 2: Ibid. vol. xi. p. 693.]
As a frontier State, a link between the Latin and Teutonic races to both of which her peoples are akin, Belgium offers an extremely interesting study of the national idea at work. The peoples of Germany and France, which have been perpetually at war with each other since the times of Julius Caesar, have almost always met on her fair and prosperous plains to fight their battles, since she is geographically the gateway from one to the other. Neither could afford to let the other occupy her territory, and so she has won her independence as a State; both have constantly threatened her existence in times past, and so have forced upon her bi-lingual population that consciousness of common interests which if strong enough may become as firm a basis for national unity as actual community of nationality.
It should be noticed further that it has become the practice in recent times to guarantee the neutrality of small frontier States like Belgium which lie at the mercy of their greater neighbours, a practice intended not only to preserve the integrity of such States but also to prevent the frequent occurrence of war by closing, as it were, the military gate between the hostile countries.[1] It remains to be seen whether the violation of these principles by Germany has the effect of strengthening them in the future, rather than the reverse. In any case, we may expect to see attempts to apply the same principles to other parts of Europe. Already the northern and southern ends of the frontier between Germany and France are neutralised by the existence of Belgium and Switzerland; why, it may be asked, should not the whole frontier be treated in the same way by neutralising the disputed territory of Alsace-Lorraine? Perhaps, too, a neutral Poland would form a useful buffer between Germany and Russia. Such neutralisation, it should be noted, need not necessarily carry with it independence. Poland and Alsace-Lorraine might form part of Russia and France respectively, and still be neutralised by a guarantee of other powers. A precedent exists for this in the terms of the cession of the Ionian Islands to Greece in 1864, while Savoy, though a province of France, is technically neutralised territory.[2] Cases like these, however, it must be admitted, are extremely anomalous and could hardly stand the strain of a serious war. But, then, as recent experience has shown us, not even independent neutralised States are safe when all Europe is aflame. The truth is that the whole conception of neutrality implies the existence of some power above and beyond the State, it may be simply a group of powerful States who are able to impose their will upon the rest of Europe, it may be a general Congress, like the Congress of Vienna. Since the Concert of Europe disappeared and gradually gave place to the two opposing alliances of great powers, there has been no such authority in the civilised world. The results are before us in the ruined cities and starving population of violated Belgium.
[Footnote 1: The neutralisation of sovereign States is very recent in origin. Switzerland and Luxembourg are the only other instances. The former was neutralised in 1815, the latter in 1867.]
[Footnote 2: Cambridge Modern History, xi. 642. See for the whole question of neutralised States, Lawrence, Principles of International Law, §§ 246-248.]
As independent States, therefore, small nations can only survive, in the long run, if their neutrality is permanently guaranteed by some international authority, which is itself permanently capable of enforcing its decrees upon recalcitrant States. Sovereignty and independence, however, are not, as we have seen, essential to full nationhood, provided the nation possesses a certain amount of "home-rule" and regards the government under which it lives as a true expression of its genius and will. For example, from 1809 till the setting in of Russian reaction in 1899, the Finnish nation enjoyed all the privileges of complete nationhood except actual sovereignty. There is, therefore, a future for small nations, either as autonomous protégés of great powers, like Russia, or as partners in some commonwealth of nations, like the British Empire.
But there is yet another consideration to be faced. Why, it is asked, should we trouble ourselves about the preservation of small nationalities at all? "The State is power," and it is only the really powerful State, therefore, that can and ought to survive. There is something laughable in the idea of a small State; it is weakness trying to pose as strength. And as for nations which have lost their independence and have bowed to the yoke of the conqueror, their fate is incorporation. How can they hope or expect to retain their separate existence and their peculiar culture when they have surrendered the power upon which these privileges depend? "No nation can permit the Jews to have a double nationality"; and the same applies to Poles, Finns, Alsatians, Irishmen, and Belgians.[1] This is the point of view of Bernhardi, Treitschke, and the German Government. This is the theory which is said to justify the practice of Prussianisation, Russianisation, Magyarisation, and so on. It raises the whole question of the value and significance to civilisation of the existence of small nations. Treitschke, of course, and his school are convinced that they possess neither value nor significance. In small States there is developed that beggarly frame of mind which judges the State by the taxes that it raises; there is completely lacking in small States the ability of the great State to be just; all real masterpieces of poetry and art arose upon the soil of great nationalities—such are a few of Treitschke's dogmatic utterances on this subject.[2] But it is not merely the Germans who think small beer of small nationalities. Listen to Sir John Seeley: "The question whether large states or small states are best is not one which can be answered or ought to be discussed absolutely. We often hear abstract panegyrics upon the happiness of small states. But observe that a small state among small states is one thing, and a small state among large states quite another. Nothing is more delightful to read of than the bright days of Athens and Florence, but those bright days lasted only so long as the states with which Athens and Florence had to do were states on a similar scale of magnitude. Both states sank at once as soon as large country states of consolidated strength grew up in their neighbourhood. The lustre of Athens grew pale as soon as Macedonia arose, and Charles V. speedily brought to an end the great days of Florence. Now if it be true that a larger type of state than any hitherto known is springing up in the world, is not this a serious consideration for those states which rise only to the old level of magnitude?"[3] The answer to which is, "Yes, indeed, if the good old plan That he should take who has the power, And he should keep who can
is to be the guiding principle in European politics of the future." But surely Sir John Seeley's argument, though undoubtedly telling as regards the sovereign independence of small States, tells for and not against the preservation of small nations. Was it to the interest of the world as a whole that Athens and Florence should be crushed? Is it not true, in spite of Treitschke, that the great things of earth have been the product of small peoples? We owe our conceptions of law to a city called Rome, our finest output of literature and art to small communities like Athens, Florence, Holland, and Elizabethan England, our religion to an insignificant people who inhabited a narrow strip of land in the Eastern Mediterranean. And small nations are as valuable to the world to-day as they have ever been. Denmark has enriched our educational experience by the establishment of her famous high schools, which we can hardly imagine her doing had she been a province of Prussia; Norway has given us the greatest of modern dramatists, Henrik Ibsen; and Belgium has not only produced Maeterlinck and Verhaeren, but is industrially the most highly developed country on the continent. The world cannot afford to do without her small peoples, who must be either independent or autonomous if they are to find adequate expression for their national genius, if they are to obtain proper conditions in which "to live, think, love, and labour for the benefit of all." Can we guarantee to them this freedom? That is one of the great questions which this war will settle.[4]
[Footnote 1: See Selections from Treitschke, translated by A.L. Gowans, pp. 17-20, 58-61.]