In 1701 the Duke of Anjou was peacefully proclaimed king as Philip V. Louis XIV. on hearing this boasted that “Il n’y a plus de Pyrenees.” This Bourbon succession in Spain changed the European system, and henceforth we have England, Holland, and Austria, as opposed to France and Spain.
The Duke of Marlborough, who combined the qualities of a general, diplomatist, and minister skilfully together, was the leader of the Second Grand Alliance against the Houses of Bourbon.
The inability of France to defend the Spanish Empire, followed by the War of the Spanish Succession, paved the way for the Peace of Utrecht (1713). By this treaty the Bourbons lost Italy and the Low Countries, but retained the throne of Spain, thus still leaving that country open to the influence of France. Hence the permanent alliance of France and Spain was formed in the eighteenth century.
Meanwhile Holland had fallen into decay through internal exhaustion caused by her struggle against foreign enemies; thus England had taken her place as the great maritime and colonial power. Thus we see the struggle between England and France (supported by Spain) for the oceanic world in the eighteenth century.
By the Utrecht Treaty, France ceded to England Newfoundland, Arcadia, and Hudson’s Bay territory, while Spain also ceded Gibraltar, the Minorca Island, and the Asiento, the occupation of the two former making another bitter enemy to England.
Spain had already a hatred of English trade with her colonies in America, so that only a single English ship was conceded by the Treaty of Utrecht, giving thereby only a limited right of trade in South America to England. But this was evaded by a vast system of smuggling which arose and proved a constant source of dispute between England and Spanish revenue officers and rendered peace almost impossible.
In 1733 the first secret _pacte de famille_ had been concluded between France and Spain for the ruin of English maritime trade. The American coast was keenly watched, and the result was “The Jenkins’ Ear War,” 1739.
Charles VI., having no son, established an order of succession by the Pragmatic Sanction, signed by nearly all the European Powers, by which his daughter, Maria Theresa, was to succeed to all the hereditary dominions of Hapsburg. But on his death two claimants appeared on the scene—the Elector of Bavaria and Philip V. of Spain.