Excerpt from Modern European Civilization: A Textbook for Secondary Schools A large part of a book on Europe during the three cen turies since 1648 can wisely be devoted to the history of the last fifty years or to a study of conditions in the early twentieth century. The author regrets that the limits of this volume have forced him to omit a great deal of material that he has used for years with his own students. In deciding what to discard and what to keep, he has tried to select those topics of permanent value which are also most vital to a comprehension of problems likely to arise during the next five or ten years. It has been nec essary to retain some material, on the youngest and most aggressive of the nations, which most of us would have preferred to omit. Unless we know the history of middle Europe during the last century and study carefully condi tions in those countries and characteristics of those peoples, we shall fail absolutely to understand why the world has been involved in a terrible war since 1914 and what peace conditions are likely to be permanent. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com 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.