The sun., 1919-06-08
DR. FERRERo'S highly readable
~ lew work on Problems of Peace

DR. FERRERo'S highly readable
~ new work on Problems of Peace
Is less an arraignment Of Immediate de-
tails that have arisen demanding adjust
ment at Versailles than a retrospective
theory of the tendencies and conflicts Of
European politics which eliminated in
the great war and are responsible for its
aftermath of nationalistic perplexites.
He theories in terms of nations and pop
ular reactions rather than of individuals
and documents, following the struggle Of
what the average American calls liberty,
President Wilson calls democracy and
Ferrero as he goes along sometimes calls
universal suffrage, against autocracy, from
the French Revolution down.
The book is addressed to a wide
audience of Americans and is skilfully
written, since it compliments their knowl-
edge of history by seeming to assume that
they are familiar with everything men
TONED in DR.. Ferrero's premises, and at
the sane time takes care to inform them.
No one knows better than DR.. Ferrero
that until the great war compelled US all
to know something about flor instance)
the peoples of middle Europe, and until
the great peace began doing the same
with flor instance) the Holy Alliance,
most of use were as the brutes that perish
concerning the history Of Europe even
through the nineteenth century-except
where it came, or where the hack authors
of most of our school and college text
books were pleased to admit that it came,
in obvious touch with the history of the
United States.
Just now thoughtful Americans are
ashamed of their benighted provinciaism
in these matters and sensible of its prac-
teal disadvantages. They want "baek-
ground for the reports they read of
European or rather world events. They
will find Problems Of Peace informing
and stimulating, and will be grateful that
it keeps them free Of the usual trappings
of dates, citations, photographers, &c. At
the sane time we can imagine a critic
historian prescribing some other work for
their reading directly after it as a bal
ance if not a corrective.
The specific problem of peace in which
DR.. Ferrero is most interested is the posi-
ton of Italy, whose champion be nat
urally IS. Whether or not in expounding
it he lays undue emphasis on the "1tal-
ian question" Of early nineteenth century
diplomacy as a casual factor in the poll
cies of the third Empire, Great Britain,
and perhaps pre-Bismarckian Prussia we
leave the critie-historians to decide. That
he magnifes Louis Napoleon seems m-
questionable.
He begins with the salient statement
that ono of the first legacies of the French
revolution to the peoples was eompul-
sorry military service as a feature of a
new restlessness for predatory acquisi-
tion-tLe nations having lost faith in the
stability of old institutions and agree
ments and having become receptive to the
idea that God was on the side of the
heavier battaions. Distrust Of the ex-
periments in popular rule took refuge in
absolutlsm secured by might. This is the
general premise from which his interpre-
tations flow.
Some Of his observations upon Ger
many are to be noted. He considers that
she was awakened from q delirium Of
philosophy and art, her ablest spirits hay
ing been restricted to expression through
such "rsving"-in this context We read