By Jonathan Power

Writing in 1751, Voltaire described Europe as “a kind of great republic, divided into several states, some monarchical, the others mixed but all corresponding with one another. They all share the same religious foundation, even though they are divided into several confessions. They all have the same principles of public law and politics unknown in other parts of the world.”

Seventy-five years ago, on 1 January, in a way that Charlemagne, Voltaire, William Penn, and Gladstone—the early advocates of European unity—could only have dreamed of, a united Europe became a reality with the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community by Germany, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Italy. Since then, it has expanded from six founding members to the current European Union of 27 countries, most of which share a single currency.

War, time and again, has interrupted Europe’s pursuit of harmony. Centuries of civil and international conflict have pitted the French against the Germans, the British against the French, the Spanish and Germans, the Russians against the Swedes, the French and Germans, the Czechs against the Poles, the Spaniards against the Spaniards, and Gentiles against Jews—reaching its dreadful climax in World War II.

As Jan Morris wrote in her superb Fifty Years of Europe: “Great cities........

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