But even the arts of a small minority in society can still echo the thunder of the earthquakes which shake all humanity. The literature and arts of o… - Eric Hobsbawm

Words are witnesses which often speak louder than documents. Let us consider a few English words, which were invented or gained their modern meanings, substantially in the period of sixty years with which this volume deals. They are such words as 'industry', 'industrialist', 'factory,' middle class,' 'working class,' and 'socialism.' They include 'aristocracy,' as well as 'railway,' 'liberal' and 'conservative' as political terms, 'nationality,' 'scientist,' and 'engineer,' 'proletariat,' and (economic) 'crisis'.

As capitalism and bourgeois society triumphed, the prospects of alternatives to it receded, in spite of the emergence of popular politics and labour movements. These prospects could hardly have seemed less promising in, say 1872–3. And yet within a very few years the future of the society that had triumphed so spectacularly once again seemed uncertain and obscure, and movements to replace it or to overthrow it had once again to be taken seriously. We must therefore consider these movements for radical social and political change as they existed in the third quarter of the nineteenth century.

'Europe' had been on the defensive for a millennium. Now, for half a millennium, it conquered the world. Both observations make it impossible to sever European history from world history.