This proved
an advantage to the latter. The first rough work had already
been done. What is more, the earliest navigators had so often
made themselves unpopular with the Asiatic and American and
African natives that both the English and the Dutch were
welcomed as friends and deliverers. We cannot claim any
superior virtues for either of these two races. But they were
merchants before everything else. They never allowed religious
considerations to interfere with their practical common sense.
During their first relations with weaker races, all European
nations have behaved with shocking brutality. The English and
the Dutch, however, knew better where to draw the dine. Provided
they got their spices and their gold and silver and their taxes,
they were willing to let the native live as it best pleased him.
It was not very difficult for them therefore to establish
themselves in the richest parts of the world. But as soon as
this had been accomplished, they began to fight each other for
still further possessions. Strangely enough, the colonial wars
were never settled in the colonies themselves. They were decided
three thousand miles away by the navies of the contending
countries. It is one of the most interesting principles of ancient
and modern warfare (one of the few reliable laws of
history) that ``the nation which commands the sea is also the
nation which commands the land.
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