But it was not now the Crecy in which English and French knights had met in a more coloured age, in a battle that was rather a tournament.  It was a league of all knights for the remains of all knighthood, of all brotherhood in arms or in arts, against that which is and has been radically unknightly and radically unbrotherly from the beginning.  Much was to happen after—­murder and flaming folly and madness in earth and sea and sky; but all men knew in their hearts that the third Prussian thrust had failed, and Christendom was delivered once more.  The empire of blood and iron rolled slowly back towards the darkness of the northern forests; and the great nations of the West went forward; where side by side as after a long lover’s quarrel, went the ensigns of St. Denys and St. George.

NOTE ON THE WORD “ENGLISH"

The words “England” and “English” as used here require a word of explanation, if only to anticipate the ire of the inevitable Scot.  To begin with, the word “British” involves a similar awkwardness.  I have tried to use it in the one or two cases that referred to such things as military glory and unity:  though I am sure I have failed of full consistency in so complex a matter.  The difficulty is that this sense of glory and unity, which should certainly cover the Scotch, should also cover the Irish.  And while it is fairly safe to call a Scotsman a North Briton (despite the just protest of Stevenson), it is very unsafe indeed to call an Irishman a West Briton.  But there is a deeper difficulty.  I can assure the Scot that I say “England,” not because I deny Scottish nationality, but because I affirm it.  And I can say, further, that I could not here include Scots in the thesis, simply because I could not include them in the condemnation.  This book is a study, not of a disease but rather of a weakness, which has only been predominant in the predominant partner.  It would not be true, for instance, to say either of Ireland or Scotland that the populace lacked a religion; but I do think that British policy as a whole has suffered from the English lack of one, with its inevitable result of plutocracy and class contempt.