every 3
days.) We have further to consider the increased speed of communication.
Distance no longer exists for the telegraph; "the entire civilised world
has become a large room in which we can all talk with one another."

Such changes cannot fail to influence social life. In earlier times, any
thought of union or federation between the various states of Europe
remained utopian, were it only on account of the difficulty and slowness
of communications. As Nicolai says, a state cannot extend to infinite
proportions; it must be able to act promptly upon the different parts of
its organism. To a certain extent, therefore, its size is a function of
the rapidity of communications. In prehistoric times, a traveller could
cover only about 12 miles a day; when wheeled traffic became
established, the daily postal journey extended to 60 miles, and in the
later days of mail-coach development, this distance was more than
doubled; towards 1850, the railway service was able to cover 375 miles a
day; modern trains range to 1,250 miles a day; an express service
covering 6,000 miles or more a day is already within the scope of
technical possibilities. For barbarians, the country was limited to a
mountain valley. The states that existed at the close of the middle
ages, states which have not greatly varied down to our times, were
adapted in size to the possibilities of the mail coach. Now, such petty
states are far too small. The modern man will no longer consent to be
restricted in this way. He is continually crossing frontiers. He wants
vast states, like those of America, Australia, Russia, or South Africa.
We look forward to the days when, be it only for material reasons like
the foregoing, the whole world will be a single state. Nothing that we
can do will check this evolution; the change will come whether we like
it or not. We can now understand that all earlier attempts to unite the
nations of Europe, all those initiated in the middle ages and continued
down to the nineteenth century, were rendered impossible of achievement
by the lack of suitable material conditions. With the best will in the
world, their realisation was impossible. But the requisite conditions
exist to-day, and we may say that the organisation of contemporary
Europe no longer corresponds to its biological development. Willy-nilly,
Europe will have to adapt itself to the new conditions. The days of
European unity have come. And the days of world-wide unity are at
ha