Civilization #50: Rule, Britannia!

The question we are looking at is how England became the greatest empire in human history. This is about the 19th century when the British Empire was at its peak. As you can see, it really controlled most of the world. The question then is, how did this happen? Why was England able to surpass Spain, France, Germany, the Holy Roman Empire, and Russia to become the dominant hegemon in the world?

My argument is that it has to do with the fact that throughout its history, England was forced to innovate in a more rigorous way than other nations, and a lot has to do with its geography.

The Geographic and Historical Forces of Innovation

If you look at its geography, Great Britain—this is Ireland, this is England, Wales, Scotland—is an extremely mountainous region. They have a lot of rivers, but there are no major rivers, which meant that for most of its history, Britain never had a major population center that could grow until it overwhelmed the entire geographic area. This meant that for most of its history, Britain was engaged in a process we call open competitive cooperation.

Not only that, but because this area is very mountainous and because these tribes were heavily divided amongst themselves, Britain was actually pretty easy to invade for most of its history. They had no centralized authority, so it was possible for other groups of people to come and create settlements, which is what the Vikings did, and also what the Romans, Angles, Saxons, and Jutes did.

Throughout its history, Britain underwent a series of great destructions where the elites were constantly replaced by new elites. Because Britain was poor and there was so much internal conflict, the English people were eventually forced to migrate overseas to create new opportunities. This process of colonial expansion led to the British Empire. There's a famous saying that the British Empire was founded by accident. There was no intention to create this empire, but because of these historical, geographic, and demographic forces, Britain became the world's largest empire.

Britain's Demographic History

For most of its history, because of its geography and the fact that it was poor and divided, the population of Britain stayed very flat up until the year 1000. Around that time, Europe became wealthier and engaged in a proto-industrial and agricultural revolution, which caused the population to increase.

Unfortunately, if your demographics increase but you don't have improvements in sanitation, health, and nutrition, you get something called the Black Death, which caused the entire population of Europe, including Britain, to collapse. After the Black Death, Europeans began to engage in the gunpowder revolution, and with that came industrialization and urbanization, causing the population to increase again.

However, from about the middle of the 17th century up until about 1800, the population was flat. This is what we call the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Britain was the first European nation to undergo the Industrial Revolution, which meant you had this massive migration from rural areas into urban areas, especially London.

Why would this demographic shift cause the population to stay flat?

1. Cities were unsafe. Diseases, malnutrition, and lack of sanitation caused people to die very young.
2. Migration. Because of the massive inequality in Britain, people were forced to migrate overseas to seek better opportunities, mainly to America, but also to Australia and New Zealand. So even though the Dutch were the first to discover and settle Australia and New Zealand, it was the British who, because of pressure back home, would settle there. Today, Australia and New Zealand have a British culture instead of a Dutch culture.

Starting in about the year 1800, because of improvements in nutrition and sanitation, the population exploded. This was true throughout Europe, and this is really why Europe would eventually conquer the world.

A History of Invasion and Creative Destruction

At first, we believe the British Isles were settled by an agricultural people—these are the people who built Stonehenge. Göbekli Tepe is a temple in Anatolia, in what is modern-day Turkey, that shows the human desire to settle down and found religious societies. Stonehenge is very similar; they are both astronomical calendars that measure the stars, measure time, and try to bring divine energy onto the earth in order to feed a culture. You can argue that the Göbekli Tepe culture was spreading all throughout Europe and got into the British Isles.

Eventually, these people were conquered by the Yamnaya. If you look at the DNA evidence, a lot of these people were eventually wiped out and replaced by the Yamnaya. This is a process of great destruction that would happen throughout British history.

The next major development was the Roman conquest of Britain. When the Romans conquered Britain, they brought Roman technology, which included aqueducts, irrigation, and urbanization. They also brought Roman customs, especially law. So now you have a legal tradition in Britain that continues on to today. They founded a city called Londinium, which is now modern-day London, on the River Thames, and this city would eventually become the largest city in Europe.

After the Romans came a new group of Germanic people who used to live in Denmark and northern Germany. Because of population pressure, they were forced to migrate overseas and settle in Britain. There were three different tribes: the Angles, the Saxons, and the Jutes. Together, we collectively call them the Anglo-Saxons. At this point in history, this culture and language were no different from that of Germany. In about the year 800, they were speaking the same language, which was West Germanic, and today we call it Old English.

Again, it was fairly easy to settle down in Britain because there was no centralized authority. So, after the Anglo-Saxons came the Vikings from Denmark. Even though England has no major rivers, it still has a lot of rivers, so it was fairly easy for the Vikings with their very fast longships to come and make settlements. The Danelaw was territory that was ceded by the Anglo-Saxons to the Vikings. Now you have this merger of Viking culture with Anglo-Saxon culture.

This process of great destruction continued with the Norman Conquest of England in the year 1066. This battle is called the Battle of Hastings, in which William the Conqueror of Normandy in France came and conquered the British Isles. This is significant for two reasons.

First, the Normans were Vikings who had settled down in France in an area called Normandy. Before, the Anglo-Saxons were Germanic people, so their focus was on northern Europe. Because the Normans conquered Britain, Britain was now united with parts of France. Britain was drawn into the politics of France, which would lead to something called the Hundred Years' War, in which the English were trying to maintain their territory in France.

The second, rather significant consequence was a radical change in the English language. Before, the Anglo-Saxons spoke a Germanic language we call Old English. Now, you have a merger of the Germanic language with French and Latin. French was the language the Normans spoke, but Latin was the official language of the educated elite of Europe. Latin and French elements blended into Old English, creating a new language we call Middle English, which would give rise to Modern English.

This is significant because Middle English is a lot easier to learn than Old English. Remember, you now have a very cosmopolitan nature to Britain: Vikings, Anglo-Saxons, French, Normans—they all needed to speak one language. So the best elements of these different languages were blended into Middle English. This tradition continues today because English is the most widely spoken language in the world. Why? Because it's the easiest to learn.

You may argue that it's because we live in the Anglo-American Empire and therefore people are incentivized to learn English. But at the same time, the reason they were able to establish the Anglo-American Empire has a lot to do with the fact that English is easy to learn. Therefore, it's easier to spread soft power. When you learn a language, you're not just learning a language; you're also learning a culture and a history. This is what we call soft power, and the British did this better than anyone else. Now, the Americans do this better than anyone else. But it starts with the Norman Conquest in 1066.

The Magna Carta and the British Constitution

What's really important about Britain is that it really never had centralized authority. Maybe now and then you had a great king like Alfred the Great, but it was never centralized because the king could never assert authority over the different fiefs. Whenever a king tried to do that, the nobles would get together and rebel.

In 1215, King John tried to impose taxes on the nobles to finance wars in France. The English were trying to maintain their territory in France, which created a lot of conflict with the French themselves. They fought a lot of wars, and you need money to pay for these wars. So King John was trying to make the nobles pay taxes. What the nobles did—and this is a consistent pattern throughout British history—is they rebelled and forced King John to sign a document called the Magna Carta, the Great Charter.

The Great Charter is significant because it severely limits the power of the king. This has happened throughout human history before, where nobles rebel and force a compromise with the king. But this is the first time that this was written down and became part of the British tradition. This would become part of what we call the British Constitution. What makes the British Constitution unique is that it's not a written-down document like the U.S. Constitution; it is a set of traditions and norms. This begins with the Magna Carta.

It's a very old document, so most of the clauses don't really apply today, but there are a few that do.

Clause 10 deals with debt owed to Jewish moneylenders. At this time, Europe was entirely Catholic, and the Catholic religion did not allow for something called usury—charging interest on debt—because it went against the teachings of the Church and was socially destructive. Debt is extremely profitable, so the way the king and nobility got around this taboo was to get Jews to lend out money and charge interest, and then the king would get part of that. Jews were heavily disliked anyway because they engaged in money lending, and the king also got them to collect taxes. Throughout European history, Jews have been the scapegoats for the elite. They were the ones who charged usury, collected taxes, and engaged in businesses for the nobles. Why did Jews agree to do this? Because the king and nobles provided them with protection.

Over time, you had this huge problem where even nobles owed money to the Jews, and the problem of debt created a lot of social tension. In the Magna Carta, it says very explicitly that yes, you still owe money to Jews, but if you die, your heir does not have to pay interest, because the problem with debt is not the principal but the interest. If you want to understand World War II and the Holocaust, it starts way back here.

The two most important clauses in the Magna Carta that still apply today are 39 and 40.

• Clause 39: "No free man shall be seized or imprisoned... except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land." This creates a new principle in British law we call due process. This means that if you commit a crime, you are still guaranteed a trial by jury before you are punished.
• Clause 40: "To no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right or justice." This means that no one is above the law.

Clause 39 establishes the idea of due process. Clause 40 establishes the idea of the rule of law. Everyone is guaranteed due process. Not even the king has the power and authority to take away due process from someone. This establishes the British common law tradition and becomes the basis for the American Constitution.

The Hundred Years' War and the Rise of the Tudors

Because of the Norman Conquest, Britain was now forced to defend its territory in France, leading to a series of disastrous wars called the Hundred Years' War. There are certain very important figures that emerge from this war, the most famous being Joan of Arc, a French mystic teenager who led the French armies to victory against the British and their allies.

During this time, there was also a civil war fought in Britain called the War of the Roses between the House of York and the House of Lancaster. The Game of Thrones television series is actually based on this civil war. It went on for a long time, was very deadly, and almost destroyed Britain. Eventually, a man named Richard of York, Richard III, emerged victorious.

But he had a problem. His family, the House of York, had to borrow a lot of money from overseas—the Florentines, the Medici—to finance the war. Once he became king, he thought, "Well, I'm king, and I don't have to pay you back." Now the bankers were angry at him. And if bankers are angry at you, you have a problem, because what bankers will do in this circumstance is finance an invasion of your country.

The Medici, the Florentine bankers, sponsored a man named Henry Tudor, who was of the House of Lancaster but grew up in France. They sponsored him to invade England and defeat Richard III. This established the House of Tudor. Henry Tudor became Henry VII, and his son became Henry VIII, one of the most famous kings in British history.

He's famous because he decided to negate the authority of the Pope. He decided, "I'm the king. I don't have to listen to anyone, even the Pope." This came to pass because Henry VIII was trying to divorce Catherine of Aragon, and the Pope would not agree. So Henry VIII decided to set up his own church, called the Church of England, and separate himself from the Vatican.

There's only one difference between the Church of England and the Catholic Church: the Catholic Church swears loyalty to the Pope, while the Church of England swears loyalty to the King of England. That's it. The customs, the doctrine, and the rituals are all the same.

The English Reformation and the Elizabethan Era

Henry VIII would have a very famous daughter called Queen Elizabeth I. Because of the Reformation, there was a huge religious civil war going on between Catholics and Protestants. Elizabeth is so consequential because she was on the throne for over 40 years. What makes her extremely significant is that she brought stability to England by sympathizing with the Protestants but also by working with the Catholics. Even though there were all these Catholic conspiracies against her to install a Catholic monarch, she was still able to resist these rebellions and establish a pretty stable nation.

During her reign, Shakespeare wrote his plays. Without Shakespeare, there would be no English language. If there's no English language, you can also argue there would be no British Empire.

Sir Francis Drake was the most famous pirate at this time and a trusted deputy of Elizabeth. Elizabeth had a policy of piracy. England was poor, Spain was rich. So what do you do? You steal from the rich and give to the poor. That's what Sir Francis Drake did.

The Rise of the British Navy

At this time, England was emerging as a naval power and was going to surpass both Spain and France to become the dominant navy in the world. As you know, it's really the navy that allowed the British Empire to control the world.

The major innovation of the English was how they fought at sea. Traditionally, you fought naval battles by ramming the enemy, boarding the ship, and then killing everyone. That's what the Romans did. The English decided that was silly because they were always outnumbered and outmanned. So they pioneered long-range cannon warfare, where from a distance of a few hundred meters, you would blast your enemy with cannons.

There were lots of problems with this. You could possibly sink your own ship because the cannons were very heavy. You could also blow up your own ship because the cannons were very explosive. Also, the cannons weren't very accurate. But the English persisted, even though you can make the argument that this type of warfare was unsustainable. In the beginning, the way they fought was terrible. But the thing about the British that made them very similar to the Romans is that they were relentless. They were willing to suffer heavy casualties, major setbacks, and major failures and still persist until they eventually won. That's the mentality of the British. That's very Roman.

In 1588 came the battle of the Spanish Armada. This is something that's heavily celebrated in England because, for the English, it marks the day when the British Navy reigned supreme over the seas. This is the day the Spanish Armada was conquered and destroyed by the English. What's important for us to remember is that a year later, in 1589, the Spanish would defeat the English, and the English would suffer tens of thousands of casualties. These wars went back and forth. There was no one time when the British suddenly became dominant. What mattered was persistence and resilience. In that respect, the English were far superior to their European adversaries.

The King James Bible and the Pilgrims

Queen Elizabeth died, and King James of Scotland inherited the English throne. Now Scotland and England were united. What's significant about King James is that he produced something called the King James Holy Bible. This is something the Protestants had been demanding for a long time. The difference between Protestants and Catholics is that Catholics are not allowed to read the Bible; the priests tell the parishioners what to believe. Protestants believe that everyone must read the Bible. The King James Bible was the first time that the Bible was mass-produced for everyone. This spread Protestantism very quickly throughout the British Isles. Also, with the Bible, you've now standardized the language. Now you can make a transition from Middle English to the Modern English language we speak today.

The year 1620 is significant because it's the year when the Pilgrims on the Mayflower moved to America to found a new colony, a new civilization, a new empire that would take over the world.

What is the difference between the Puritans and the Pilgrims?

When you have diversity in England, even though it's a small place, a lot of control is localized. If you cross from one village to the next, the culture can be very different. This feudal system created a lot of diversity, which impacted the religious outlook.

England was Catholic, and then Henry VIII turned it into the Church of England. But then new ideas, basically Calvinism, came in from Europe. Calvinism was important because England was the first to industrialize, the first to have a middle class, and the first to have merchants. Merchants preferred Calvinism to Catholicism. In the Catholic religion, you have to give all your money to the church. But in a Calvinist religion, you have to keep your money for yourself. So Calvinism became a much more popular religion in Britain as it began to industrialize, and the middle class was rising in power.

The problem was the response to the Church of England. It wasn't Catholic, but it was using a lot of Catholic principles. The Calvinists were fanatics; they believed everyone should be a Calvinist, everyone should believe in hard work, and the Pope was evil. So the Calvinists were not very tolerant. There were two major responses to the Church of England: reform and dissolution.

• The Puritans: The idea of reform was that the Church of England was fine, but there were certain things within it that were too much like the Catholic Church. If we get rid of these things, we'll be good. These people were called the Puritans. Within the reform movement, you had different factions. Some wanted to replace the governance structure because the Church of England was controlled by the king, and they believed we should all be obedient to God, not the king. Some wanted everyone to read the Bible. Some wanted to change the nature of the priesthood.
• The Pilgrims (Separatists): Then you had a minority who were extremely violent and fanatical and believed, "No, let's just get rid of the Church of England, period, because there should be no earthly authority before God." These people we call Separatists. They would become the Pilgrims. The king persecuted these people, seeing them as a threat. They were outlawed, and many were executed. So a lot of them fled to America to practice their religion and found a new one. The Pilgrims are the ones who fled. The Puritans are the ones who would stay and eventually engage in the civil war and overthrow the king.

While this was happening, there was also a counter-reaction. There were Catholics who wanted to return England to the Catholic fold. You also had other people called the Arminians who wanted to maintain the Church of England as it was. You had all these massive factions emerging, all in conflict over religion, and religion was a proxy for economic class as well. The middle class supported reform, while many nobles and the king supported or sympathized with the Catholic religion.

The English Civil War and the Glorious Revolution

Back in England, a civil war was now raging. It started again when the king tried to impose too much authority over the nobles, but there was also a religious dimension to it because the Puritans wanted to impose a religious state on everyone. The fanatics at this stage were the Puritans. The Puritans emerged triumphant under the leadership of Oliver Cromwell, and he established something called the Commonwealth of England. This was a disaster. It didn't work out well because it went against British tradition. The idea of the Puritans was to establish a religious, centralized theocracy, but England had always been pretty independent and autonomous.

After Cromwell died, the Commonwealth went away, and the nobles reinstated a new king, Charles II. After he died, James II took the throne. The problem with James II was that he was a Catholic. Many English were afraid that he would move too close to France, Spain, and the Vatican—Britain's enemies.

So, the nobles invited a Dutch king, William of Orange, who was of British blood, to come to England in the year 1688. William of Orange brought about 10,000 soldiers to Britain. This was an invasion—the very last invasion that succeeded in Britain. King James had a larger army, but he was not very decisive or effective, so a lot of his army deserted him. His army sort of dissipated, and he was allowed to go to France. William of Orange was very quickly able to assume the throne.

This is called the Glorious Revolution. It is significant because it established, for the first time officially, the sovereignty of Parliament over the king. Now it was official: Parliament was the ultimate authority in Britain, and the king was a figurehead.

How much power did the English monarch really have?

The thing about the British is that because it's a system based on tradition, there's a lot of flexibility built into it. Depending on the personality of the king, the king could have a lot of power. For example, Henry VIII was a very powerful king, considered one of the most powerful in the world. Why? First of all, he was a huge guy and extremely charismatic. He was very good at winning friends among the nobles and building alliances. Also, he was in power for a long, long time—over 50 years. So he was able to slowly insert his protégés into positions of authority. He was also very popular because he took England away from the Catholic Church.

The power of the king is not written down. A lot of his power has to do with his personality, his longevity, his alliances, and his charisma. There are a lot of different factors in place. That's why the British think their constitution is the most perfect in the world—because it's not written down. They're not actually constrained by words. There are traditions that allow the constitution to be living, flexible, and pertinent to the present. The English are extremely proud of their constitution.

After the Glorious Revolution, a major reform was that the king could not be Catholic. If you were heir to the throne but Parliament suspected you had Catholic sympathies, they would replace you with someone else. Parliament had that power. There was a deep fear of the Catholic religion among the English people because a Catholic king could draw on the French, the Vatican, and the Spanish as allies in his suppression of the nobles and the middle class.

The Glorious Revolution is also significant because it would now allow Britain to energize the middle class. If you were middle class, you now had an incentive to work hard because there were patents and trademarks. There was an incentive for you to get rich. This would lead, of course, to the Industrial Revolution. The Glorious Revolution was one of the main contributing factors to the Industrial Revolution in Britain.

The Financial Revolution: The Bank of England

This is also significant because in 1694, the Bank of England was established. I can't emphasize enough what a huge deal this is.

Before, if you were a king and you wanted to fight a war, you would borrow money from the rich. Charles II borrowed a lot of money to fight wars from the goldsmiths of London, including a group of Jews, and then he refused to pay it back. Now you have a problem: a credit crisis, a trust crisis. If the king refuses to pay back the rich for their loan, why would the king ever be able to raise funds again?

Parliament solved this problem. Because Parliament was now the central authority in the land, you were not lending money to the king; you were lending money to the nation. If a king dies or is deposed, you're screwed. You're not getting your money back. But if you lend money to the nation, the people, through Parliament, then you are always guaranteed to get your money back unless England gets conquered. But we know because of the navy, England cannot be conquered.

So not only were the rich willing to lend money to the nation to finance wars, but also foreigners, especially the Dutch. The Dutch were very wealthy and needed a safe place to put their money. Where was the safest place in the world to put your money now? England. If you were in the Netherlands, you could be conquered by the French or the Germans. But if your gold went to London, no one would be able to touch that.

The Bank of England allowed Britain to borrow money from its people, from foreigners, and from the future by printing money and issuing war bonds. Therefore, Britain had infinite financing. This is the main reason why Britain was able to defeat Napoleon. It took seven wars, seven coalitions, to defeat Napoleon. Each of these coalitions was financed by Britain. Once Napoleon was defeated, Britain became the hegemon of the world. It became the British Empire. No one could now challenge the might of Britain.

Central banking allows you to mortgage your nation's future in the pursuit of total war. It allows you to weaponize the trust and confidence of your people. But there's a problem with this innovation. Once you commit to a war, once you raise debt and commit to war, you're forced to fight the war until the very bitter end. If you lose the war, your nation goes bankrupt.

That's why Britain refused to ever compromise with Napoleon. Napoleon said to Britain, "Hey guys, I control all of Europe. Let's talk peace. Let's just trade peacefully." And Britain said, "No, we can't do that because we lent a lot of money to the Austrians, the Prussians, the Germans, and the Russians in order to defeat you. If we sign a deal of peace, all that money is now gone, and we, the Bank of England, the British nation, are completely wiped out."

If Britain fights a war, it does so through financing and debt. But because it does so through debt, it has to fight the war until it wins. It can never, ever compromise. It can never, ever surrender. This is important because this explains what happened in World War I, World War II, and it also explains American foreign policy.

The British Enlightenment: A Philosophy of Pragmatism

You can have new ideas, but you have to justify these new ideas. You have to explain the innovation through philosophy to the people. Britain at this time was famous for its political philosophers.

Thomas Hobbes lived through the English Civil War. He saw all the chaos and destruction and wrote a book called Leviathan to justify why Britain returned to a monarchy instead of maintaining a commonwealth. He's trying to explain why there's government, so he gives the idea that we were born in a state of nature, free to do whatever we want. Why would we give up this freedom to have government? The answer is because the state of nature sucks. You can be killed, things will be stolen from you, and there will be no innovation. So no matter how bad government is, it's absolutely necessary.

In such condition, there is no place for industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving, and removing, such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

John Locke was writing during the time of the Glorious Revolution. He was a supporter of Parliament and the revolution. In 1689, he published the Second Treatise of Government. In it, he basically explains that Hobbes is right: we are born in a state of nature and we do need government. But when we're born in a state of nature, we are born with certain inalienable rights. These three rights are the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of property. The proper function of government is to maintain our rights. If the government does not do that, then we have the freedom to rebel against it.

Hobbes is saying government is necessary; you can never challenge it because things will get much worse. Locke is saying government is only legitimate if it guarantees us our inalienable rights. Locke is considered the founder of liberalism, and his ideas will become the basis for the U.S. Constitution.

British vs. European Enlightenment

The British Enlightenment is very different from the European Enlightenment of Rousseau, Kant, and Voltaire. There are three major differences between British and European political philosophy.

To summarize the difference: the Europeans were always asking, "What is good? What is right?" The British, and later the Americans, only ask, "What works? What is the least worst world we can live in?" The British are practical and utilitarian, whereas the Europeans are romantic and idealistic. Rousseau's thinking will give us the philosophies of communism and Nazism. Locke's ideas will give us the U.S. Constitution. This is part of the Anglo-American political tradition, while the other becomes the European tradition.

The Founders of British Liberalism

Jeremy Bentham is the founder of something called utilitarianism. Bentham agreed with Locke that we need a more liberal, progressive society, but for him, it was a question of how you mathematically and logically come to that point. He developed the idea that there are two principles that govern the universe and motivate us: the pleasure principle and the pain principle.

If something makes us happy, it's inherently good. If something makes us feel pain, it's inherently bad. We should structure a society that mathematically calculates the amount of pain and pleasure we produce and then maximize the pleasure and reduce the pain. If you do that, you get to the same point as Locke, where people should be guaranteed liberty and allowed to do whatever they want as long as it doesn't harm other people.

John Stuart Mill, Bentham's disciple, is considered the most significant political philosopher of the past 200 years. He is the founder of what we call classical liberalism. The very basis of classical liberalism is that people should be free to do whatever they want as long as it doesn't hurt anyone. Also, people should be allowed to say whatever they want because free, open debate is what allows for society to progress. Mill took the principles of utilitarianism and refined them to explain why classical liberalism is the best philosophy. Classical liberalism would include women's rights, prison reform, and a more egalitarian society.

Mill also explained that pleasure is not what you think it is. There are different types of pleasure: short-term pleasure and long-term pleasure.

• Short-term pleasure is eating ice cream every day or watching TikTok videos.
• Long-term pleasure is having a healthy body that allows you to climb mountains and enjoy life more, or being able to read Shakespeare and Dante.

Just because you enjoy something today doesn't mean it's good for you. We have the capacity to understand the difference. Long-term pleasure is what he refers to as happiness. The purpose of life is to be happy, not necessarily to seek pleasure.

Summary: The Three Pillars of the British Empire

These are the reasons why the British Empire came to conquer the world. Its history, geography, and demographics forced it to engage in a continuous series of innovations. This innovation would allow it to eventually dominate the entire world. Even though the British Empire is gone, we still have the British Commonwealth—nations that speak English, believe British culture is the best in the world, and believe that working together in a community will be beneficial for all. That's a legacy we still have of the British Empire.

There are many reasons why the British Empire came to dominate the world, but the three things I want to highlight are:

1. The Royal Navy: Its main purpose was not to engage in war and conquest but to maintain global trade. Britain was the first nation to industrialize, so it was producing a lot of finished goods and needed markets. The British Navy's main purpose was to open up new markets and maintain safe trade routes against pirates to facilitate global trade. This made Britain extremely wealthy.
2. The Bank of England: I cannot stress enough how important this innovation was. The Bank of England was private, controlled by rich stockholders, but it had the powers of a central bank: to print money, issue currency, and sell bonds. This was the easiest way to raise money quickly.
3. The English Language: The development of English, the world's easiest language to learn. Most languages require you to grow up in a place to speak them well. But English is different; you can learn it at any age and still have a pretty good command of the language. This was a huge innovation.

Why was England able to achieve these three major innovations and not other places?

• Open Cooperative Competition: Historically, civilizations developed on a major river (China on the Yangtze, Egypt on the Nile). A major river allows you to build a settlement, expand your population through irrigation, and eventually become a dominant civilization. Britain is different. There are no major rivers, so the population is constant. You don't need to conquer new territory, just protect your own. But because the population is so diffused and limited, it allows for foreign conquest.
• Creative Destruction: This foreign conquest allows for creative destruction, where the elite is constantly being replaced by a new elite that brings in new ideas. This is the main factor driving innovation in Britain.
• Colonial Expansion: The English were forced to migrate overseas and settle permanently in Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, and other places.

Because of this constant process of innovation, Britain developed a navy, a bank, and a new language that was fairly easy to learn. This is the history of the British Empire.

How did a nation founded by religious separatists become a multicultural empire?

America is a coalition of conflicts; it is a melting pot of differences. There are two dominant strands in the founding of America. There's the Pilgrim strand, which is puritanical and sought to create a theocracy. But there's also an Enlightenment strand, which believed they were founding a new empire based on reason. The religion for them was Deism. Most of the Founding Fathers—Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, George Washington—were Deists. They wanted to found a tolerant, multicultural empire.

These are two dominant strands in America. If you want to understand what's happening in America today, you need to understand that it's these two strands that have always been present and have now come into conflict with each other. You have on the left multiculturalists like Barack Obama who believe America is great because it welcomes immigrants. And you have people on the conservative side who say, "No, America is great because we are Christian." They believe America is losing its Christianity due to multiculturalism and therefore must close its borders and reassert the Christian faith. Because of this conflict, America is probably headed towards a civil war.