The Reign of Queen Anne FinePaper Ed Author:Justin McCarthy General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1905 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: 1702 ANNE'S INHERITANCE OF WAR 25 CHAPTER III WHAT THE QUEEN CAME TO -- ABROAD Queen Anne came in for an inheritance of Continental war. The sovereignty created by William the Third had been born in bitterness and nurtured in convulsion. The political principles of his time had not allowed William to settle steadily down to the work of keeping his own kingdom safe and strong against any efforts which might be made by the dethroned Stuarts. Even so great a soldier and statesman as he might have found it hard business enough to make efficient preparation against all such attempts and possibilities, and at the same time to foster and watch over the internal prosperity of his new kingdom. It was his fate to have to take part in a great Continental war which may be said to have involved the whole of the European States at one time or another in the Ing struggle. That war, of which we shall have to speak more fully a little later, was not one which, according to the ideas of the present day, had any direct bearing on the interests of England. Some impulse was undoubtedly given to the war spirit in England by the utterly unwise provocation which came from the King of France when he recognised the son of the exiled James the Second as the legitimate sovereign of England. But even if no such provocation had been given, it may be regarded as almost certain that, under the conditions of the times, England would have been drawn into the great struggle which was then convulsing the Continent for the maintenance of what was called the balance of power. That was the struggle which Queen Anne inherited, and she ass...« less