¹ Napoleon I to the King of Prussia, November 10, 1804, Correspondance de Napoléon I^er (Paris, 1862), X, 60Google Scholar, No. 8170.

² J. J. Rüdorffer (Kurt Riezler); cited in Topf, Erich, “England und Russland an den Türkischen Meerengen,” Zeitschrift für Geopolitik, 1928, II, 665Google Scholar.

³ The present German school of “Geopolitik” has abandoned to a certain degree the strict geographic determinism of Ratzel, but only to be tempted by a metaphysics which views geography as a last cause. As the word indicates, the adherents are not only engaged in a study of the geographic conditioning of political phenomena; they are also engaged in advocating policy, which is hardly a scientific endeavor. Probably the best statement of their position was given in 1928 by the four editors of the Zeitschrift fur Geopolitik: “Die Geopolitik ist die Lehre von der Erdgebundenheit der politischen Vorgänge. Sie fusst auf der breiten Grundlage der Geographie, insbesondere der Politischen Geographie als der Lehre von den politischen Raumorganismen und ihrer Struktur … Die Geopolitik will Rüstzeug zum politischen Handeln liefern und Wegweiser im politischen Leben sein. Damit wird sie zur Kunstlehre, die die praktische Politik bis zur hotwendigen Stelle des Absprungs vom festen Boden zu leiten fähig ist. Nur so wird dieser Sprung vom Wissen zum Können und nicht vom Nichtwissen aus erfolgen, woher er sicher weiter und gefährlicher ist. Die Geopolitik will und muss zum geographischen Gewissendes Staates werden.” [Cited in Hennig, Richard, Geopolitik (Leipzig, 1931), p. 9Google Scholar.]

To this determinism the French school, founded by Vidal de la Blache and continued by Brunhes and Vallaux and now by Febvre, opposes its “possibilism,” taking into account the possible modification of geography by men, and the many other factors which unite with the geographic in determining human destiny: “The true and only geographical problem is that of the utilization of possibilities.” [Lucien Febvre, A Geographical Introduction to History (New York, 1925), p. 349.Google Scholar] “… the most perfect morphological type involves no certain effects.” [Henri Berr, “Foreword” to Febvre, op. cit., p. xii.]

It is perhaps somewhere between this last statement and the determinism of Ratzel that we would chart our course. Geography does not determine, but it does condition; it not only offers possibilities for use, it demands that they be used; man's only freedom lies in his capacity to use well or ill or to modify for better or worse those possibilities.

⁴ Newbigin, Marion, The Mediterranean Lands (New York, 1924), p. 149Google Scholar.

⁵ Maull, Otto, Politische Geographie (Berlin, 1925), pp. 498–499Google Scholar.

⁶ Semple, E. C., American History and Its Geographic Conditions (New York 1903), p. 47Google Scholar.

⁷ Bienstock, Gregory, The Struggle for the Pacific (London, 1937), p. 93Google Scholar.

⁸ Ibid.

⁹ Kobayashi, T., La Société Japonaise (Paris, 1914), p. 84Google Scholar, note. In this connection the following table is interesting:

¹⁰ Vogel disputes the generally accepted conclusion that the decline of the Hanseatic cities was due to the discovery of America and of the sea route to India, and attributes it rather to the political disintegration of Germany and the inability of the German imperial power to protect Hanseatic political interests. [Vogel, W., Die Entstehung des modernen Weltstaalensystems (Berlin, 1929), pp. 62–63.Google Scholar]

¹¹ The second and concluding instalment of this article will appear in the April issue of this Review. Man. Ed.