This attitude is evident from his whole policy and from many of his speeches, particularly that of February 19, 1878. The Peace Conference at The Hague, 1899, is a striking evidence of the trend. The hopes concentrated in it and the eagerness with which its proceedings were watched by the nations indicate the general desire for a new era. Particulars respecting the Conference will be found in the following chapters. This unifying tendency is likewise attested by the increasing sympathy of peoples for one another. The press daily tells the world the world's story, makes the nations better acquainted with each other, and creates an interest in their condition. Who can now be indifferent to a famine in Ireland, Russia, or India? The feeling that we are denizens of the same world and citizens of a common humanity creates a universal family relationship. Whether or not the world ever becomes one in language or religion, already the ties are such between the members of the human family as to make the limits of the largest State seem narrow and to increase the unity of the world's thought, and feeling, and movement. Every age decreases the number of the dwarfs who cannot look over the hedge of their nationality and see the great world beyond. CHAPTER XXI INTERNATIONAL REQUIREMENTS 317. The process which takes place in the development of political institutions is similar to what we have found to prevail in societies generally: movement from the simple to the compound and complex, differentiation, and then unification of the differentiated parts. As States develop in different places they assume various forms with different functions and organs, and acquire an endless variety of social content. An interesting study is afforded by a comparison of States, wherein they agree and differ; how they attract and repel each other; how each goes its own way and yet in doing so crosses the paths of others; how they co-operate and yet antagonise one another. What unifying bonds underlie the fiftyfour independent States which now exist in the world? Much in their relations remains unsettled if not chaotic. The sphere in which a State professes to move somehow and somewhere cuts the spheres of other States, perhaps the spheres of all. Suppose we regard mankind as the one sphere which includes the fifty-four spheres of the States. What unites these States within humanity? Has humanity only these fifty-four spheres, or are there human beings which are not included in them? There are great movements which are not political, so that the consideration of the State leaves unanswered some of the weightiest problems of social evolution. The problems thus presented, owing to their great complexity, naturally come last. They involve larger gen |