The French Revolution was an experiment which still belonged entirely to the eighteenth century. The ideas to which the French Revolution gave rise did not, however, lead beyond the order of things that it wanted to abolish by force.
Ideas can never lead beyond an old world order but only beyond the ideas of the old world order.
Ideas cannot carry out anything at all. In order to carry out ideas men are needed who can exert practical force. Undeterred by this examination, the French Revolution gave rise to ideas which led beyond the ideas of the entire old world order. This idea, consistently developed, is the idea of the new world order . The egoism of the nation is the natural egoism of the general state system, as opposed to the egoism of the feudal classes.