Woods: Racial Limitation of Bolshevism 



189 



periods were not, of course, entirely 

 devoted to absolute lawlessness. To 

 measure them intensively would be a 

 long drawn-out labor. But these 

 words and these descriptions are un- 

 doubtedly such as well describe the 

 periods to which they are attached. 

 They are merely the phrases used by 

 standard historians and here repro- 

 duced just as found. No modifying or 

 ameliorating clauses have been omitted. 



Now, if we turn to a summary of the 

 history of England during a similar 

 period (c. 1461— c. 1801), we find that 

 there are no periods in which the word 

 anarchy is used by historians as applic- 

 able to a description of the condition of 

 national affairs, or to a characterization 

 of the spirit of the times. Earlier than 

 this we do find an occasional period of 

 anarchy, as, for instance, under the 

 reign of Stephen (1135-1154), the brief 

 uprising under Wat Tyler (1381), which 

 lasted only two or three weeks,- and 

 Jack Cade's Rebellion, during the reign 

 of Henry VI. But these are the only 

 instances during the four centuries that 

 followed the Norman Conquest. No 

 materials are at hand to enable me to 

 state just how much anarchy took place 

 in Russia during these earlier times, but 

 I imagine that there was much more 

 than in England. 



Scotland was long a backward -coun- 

 try. Civil wars, border raids, plots, 

 conspiracies, turmoil, and unsettled 

 conditions are encountered frequently 

 enough in the fifteenth and sixteenth 

 centuries, but all this is different from 

 anarchy, and I do not find the word 

 anarchy used at all by historians as 

 applicable to early Scottish history. 

 It seems rather that they always kept to 

 group or clan formation. The organiza- 

 tion of the whole was broken into parts, 

 but the organizations remained and the 

 lower orders always followed their lead- 

 ers. The history of Scotland shows that 

 it was not merely because Russia was 

 a backward country that she indulged 

 in so much anarchy. 



Sweden, a good example of a Nordic 

 country, shows no periods of anarchy 

 during these centuries.- General dis- 

 content and suffering, disorder, religious 



2 1525-1792, ibid., pp. 354-358. 



and personal warfare, misfortune and 

 poverty, lethargy, and even national 

 humiliation, are some of the descriptive 

 phrases picturing the dark aspects of 

 Sweden's history, which occurred from 

 time to time, but never the word 

 anarchy. 



Denmark in its history is nearly free 

 from anything approaching extreme 

 lawlessness. We find only during the 

 interregnum, 1533-1534, civil wars, 

 violences, and cruelties. The same 

 may be said for Holland. Party strug- 

 gles, persecutions, financial exhaustion 

 were not unknown, but except for the 

 brief period, 1747-1751, characterized 

 by internal commotion and some up- 

 risings, there were no lapses on the part 

 of the Dutch from the maintenance 

 of organized government. 



Also Prussia has scarcely ever before 

 known the meaning of being without a 

 recognized and ordered government. 

 During most of her history it has been 

 her fate to be under strong monarchical 

 leadership. There were only two dis- 

 tinctly weak Hohenzollerns from 1415 to 

 the death of Frederick the Great in 

 1786. Under George William (1619- 

 1640), during the Thirty Years' War, 

 the nation was brought to bankruptcy, 

 political dissolution, and internal law- 

 lessness. 



In this question of anarchistic ten- 

 dencies as shown in history, France 

 presents an intermediate position be- 

 tween Slavic Russia and the strictly 

 Nordic countries just described. The 

 anarchy of the French Revolution is, 

 of course, enough in itself to place France 

 below the Nordic countries in a record 

 for good behavior on law-abiding 

 grounds. There were not many pe- 

 riods of anarchy earlier than this unless 

 we go back to ages earlier than are here 

 considered. Subsequent to the middle 

 of the fifteenth century there was at 

 least one time during the reign of Henry 

 III when bands of lawless adventurers 

 overran the land. 



Thus a survey of Anglo-Teutonic 

 history from the middle of the fifteenth 

 century to the beginning of the nine- 

 teenth brings out the fact that Nordic 

 races have not been appealed to by an- 



