BEFORE THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
Since the Thirty Years' War the Empire had so lost all directive power that it left the rulers of diminutive states to govern unchecked by imperial restraint. These minor despots were in some cases well disposed and capable, but too often they were destitute of German spirit and were chiefly bent upon making their courts tawdry copies of the splendors of Versailles.
Out of this crowd of feeble little states, long overshadowed by the great House of Hapsburg, Prussia emerged in the eighteenth century, and from being merely the Electorate of Brandenburg became the powerful Kingdom of Prussia. But although the genius of Frederick the Great had won for Prussia a foremost place in Europe, Germany as a whole counted for little beside France and England. The greatest rival of Prussia was Austria. For generations the House of Hapsburg, while ruling Austria, had at the same time stood at the head of the German Empire. For a brief interval (1742–45) the Elector of Bavaria had held the dignity of Emperor, but at his death it was immediately given to Francis I, the husband of Maria Theresa, and after him to Joseph II. With the enfeebled German Empire, however, we need not longer concern ourselves, for its days of usefulness were past and its end was near. But the Austrian monarchy had a vigorous though troubled life, and ranked as one of the greatest powers of the eighteenth century. In the course of the eighteenth century Austria lost and gained territory, but she gained more than she lost. In 1772, Austria shared with Russia and Prussia in the dismemberment of Poland. In Italy Austria held the Duchies of Milan and Mantua and the Principality of Castiglione; and a member of the Lorraine branch of the House of Austria was the ruler of Tuscany. In the Low Countries the Catholic provinces — substantially the modern Belgium, — were under Austrian sovereignty.
Beyond question these were great and important possessions. But the most marked characteristic of Austria as contrasted with France was that it was not a compact and homogeneous country inhabited by a people speaking the
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