And therefore Europe is so ruined that if private persons were in the position of the governments of our continent, the richest of them would not have enough to live on.

We are poor though we have the wealth and trade of the whole world.'

“That was written almost 150 years ago. The picture seems drawn from the world of to-day. One thing only has changed-the form of government. In Montesquieu's time it was said that the cause of the maintenance of great armaments was the despotic power of kings, who made war in the hope of augmenting by conquest their personal revenues and gaining glory. People used to say then: 'Ah, if only people could elect those who would have the right to refuse governments the soldiers and the money — then there would be an end to military politics.