PREFACE TO PART 2
This book describes the confrontation that took place in Europe and America at
the time of the French Revolution and the wars that accompanied it. Though it can
be read independently, the book is a sequel to one published in 1959 under the
same title, but subtitled “The Challenge,” as the present one is subtitled “The
Struggle.” The connecting thought is that in the years from about 1760 to 1791 or
1792, the period of the earlier volume, revolutionary movements against aristo-
cratic forms of society made themselves evident in many countries, but that except
in America they were either crushed or, as in France and Poland in 1791, were of
very doubtful success, so that a “challenge” had been issued which awaited resolu-
tion by further “struggle.” The present volume traces the fortunes of both revolu-
tion and counter- revolution to about the year 1800. By that time, it is argued, al-
though counter- revolutionary or aristocratic forces had prevailed in some
countries, the new or democratic view had established itself, in a way less than
ideal, against attempts of its adversaries to put it down.
The reader can judge whether “democratic revolution” is an appropriate term for
the transformations here recounted. Reasons for using it are given at the outset of
the earlier volume, and will be apparent at many places in the present one. I have
tried to take note of criticisms raised against the plan of the work after publication
of the first volume. Some have thought that my interpretations are too purely po-
litical, and give inadequate attention to social or economic realities. Others, doubt-
ing the feasibility of a comparative view of so many countries, have stressed the
distinctive peculiarity of the situation in England, France, or America. Many have
questioned whether there was any real revolution except the actual French Revolu-
tion, which, they fear, is minimized when seen as part of a wider revolutionary
disturbance. Here also it is for the reader to judge; but I do not think I have
slighted the national peculiarity of any country, and I do not see how anyone, upon
reading the present volume, can think the importance of the French Revolution to
be understated.
It has been difficult or impossible to find, in English, any account of certain
areas of Europe at this time, and notably of the Batavian, Cisalpine, and Helvetic
Republics. I have therefore adopted a regional arrangement, hoping to give a con-
crete picture of each of these revolutionary states in turn, as well as of Britain and
Ireland, Poland and Eastern Europe, Germany and America—and of course