Dealing with the history of Charles V, Robertsonlxii also considers the situation of the main European states at the beginning of the sixteenth century. He starts by inviting us to celebrate our differences whilst recognising what unites us.
As the institutions and events which I have endeavoured to illustrate formed the people of Europe to resemble each other, and conducted them from barbarism to refinement, in the same path, and by nearly equal steps; there were other circumstances which occasioned a difference in their political establishments, and gave rise to those peculiar modes of government, which have produced such variety in the character and genius of nations.
William Robertson, The History of the Reign of the Emperor Charles V (1769).
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