Note 714 — Chapter XII · THE THEORY OF EMPIRE

I speak of the separation as accidental, not because the forces then at work did not make it almost inevitable, but because altered economic theories and scientific discoveries, the latter largely eliminating the extremely important elements, in the original problem, of time and distance, occurred a half-century after the separation took place. Had they occurred sooner, they might have prevented it, as they have been largely instrumental in holding the remainder of the empire together and greatly adding to it. The influence of free-trade, steam, and electricity has been of vast importance in imperial politics.