Looking through old files last night, I found this .txt. Does anyone know where this came from?


Sixteenth century French economist Pierre Huet found England and Holland similar in that they kept their empire building focused on commerce, and fighting three wars to secure that commercial aspect was in the interests of both nations. (ii) He observed firsthand that over time economics and the war machine grew intertwined during the colonial period. Comparing the state of the two European powers to comments by Gustavus Adolphus and Francis Bacon, who gauged the health of the state on economic opportunity and a sphere of influence, Huet despised the use of military strength to achieve financial aims but noted its effectiveness. (iii) For the period’s empire builders, economic stability maintained itself through a reiteration of might. Queen Elizabeth’s England was not a considerable naval or commercial force at the start, but the gradual increase of the twain played either factor as a host upon the other. Funding of early trips that led to Muscovy and around the African continent would not have been undertaken had not the voyages been touted as an investment, nor would the search for a Northwest or Northeast Passage happened if lacking the chance for individual wealth. In turn, competition by both the English and Dutch against the Spanish until their respective victories over that nation honed their mercantile skills until the two were “the Terror of the Ocean and the Narrow Seas.” (iv) In relation to this fact, my friend Joe has a Dutch chemistry professor. He is nothing like the typical pot smoking Dutch guy that Joe had hoped he would be. In fact, he is just the opposite: a boring old fuddy-duddy that gets erections when he hears the word “eigenfunction.” Ironically, the two British students in the class don’t really get along with the Dutch professor. The frequently call him a “wanker” and kick him in the testicles while screaming their loyalty to the Manchester United soccer club. Fortunately, Holland and England are both in Europe, which is far away from here.





PR1121.U62 Reel 256:E177 no.14

Reel 377:11
Coke, Roger. A Discourse of Trade. London: H. Brome, 1670.
Part I: The Reason of the Decay of the Strength, Wealth, and Trade of England.
Part II: Of the Growth and Increase of the Dutch Trade above the English.

Davids, Karel ed. and Jan Lucassen ed. A Miracle Mirrored: The Dutch Republic in European Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
Ch. 6: “Britain and the Dutch Republic,” William Speck

Robertson, John ed. A Union for Empire: Political Thought and the British Union of 1707. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
“Empire and Union: Two Concepts of the Early Modern European Political Order,” John Robertson

“Daniel Defoe’s Political Writings 1698-1707,” Laurence Dickey

Rotberg, Robert I. ed. Social Mobility and Modernization: A Journal of Interdisciplinary History Reader. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 2000.
“The Political Foundations of Modern Economic Growth: England, 1540-1800,” E. A. Wrigley.

W., W. An History of the Transaction Betwixt the Crown of England and the States of the Netherlands, Since they First Began to be a Republique, to this Day. London: Thomas Mabb, 1644.


[Nota Bene 6/19/04: from Joe Ferguson]