e foreign entanglements, including the war of the Spanish
Succession, the war of the Austrian Succession, and the Seven Years'
War, and the internal measures, of reform and otherwise, undertaken by
the successive sovereigns, especially Maria Theresa (1740-1780) and
Joseph II. (1780-1790). For Austria the net result of the wars was the
loss of territory and also of influence, among the states of the
Empire, if not among those of all Europe. On the side of internal
affairs it may be observed simply that Maria Theresa became virtually
the founder of the unified Austrian state, and that, in social
conditions generally, the reign of this sovereign marks more largely
than that of any other the transition in the Hapsburg dominions from
mediaeval to modern times. Unlike her doctrinaire son and successor,
Joseph, Maria Theresa was of an eminently practical turn of mind. She
introduced innovations, but she clothed them with the vestments of
ancient institutions. She made the government more than ever
autocratic, but she did not interfere with the nominal privileges of
the old estates. In Hungary the constitution was left untouched, but
during the forty years of the reign the Diet was assembled only four
times, and government was, in effect, by royal decree. Joseph II.
assumed the throne in 1780 bent primarily upon a policy of "reform
from above." Utterly unacquainted with the actual condition of his
dominions and unappreciative of the difficulties inherent in their
administration, the new sovereign set about the sweeping away of the
entire existing order and the substituting of a governmental scheme
which was logical enough, to be sure, but entirely impracticable. The
attempt, as was inevitable, failed utterly.

*490. Austria and France, 1789-1815.*--Leopold II. inherited, in 1790, a
dominion substantially as it was at the death of Maria Theresa. Prior
to his accession Leopold had acquired a reputation for liberalism, but
apprehension aroused by the revolution in France was of itself
sufficient to turn him promptly into the traditional paths of Austrian
autocracy. His reign was brief (1790-1792), but that of his son and
successor, Francis II., which continued through the revolutionary
epoch, was essentially a continuation of it, and from first to (p. 445)
last there was maintained with complete success that relentless
policy of "stability" so conspicuously associated later with the name
of Metternich. Hardly any portion of Eu