Abstract
Before the year succeeding the First World War, and reaching back to the time of Pitt, the great classic enunciator of British foreign policy, historians had enjoyed the phenomenon of a mighty power whose continental foreign policy held no deep mysteries. It was a clear, pragmatic Realpolitik. England found her greatness by dominating successively larger segments of the less highly developed parts of the world. In obtaining her empire, the insular kingdom had skillfully seized the opportunities presented by continental wars. During the Napoleonic Wars, the British Empire again was obliged to lead the battle against a nation aspiring to European hegemony; a hegemony that could form a power bloc able to threaten Britain's maritime predominance, and suffer the nation of shopkeepers to trade only on continental terms.