of existing political questions. Thus, he naturally devoted himself mainly to recent history, especially the relations between England and other states. His Life and Times of Stein, a valuable narrative of the anti-Napoleonic revolt, led by Prussia mainly at Heinrich Friedrich Karl von und zum Stein's instigation, was written under German influence and shows little of the style of his short essays. Its length, its colourlessness and the space that it devotes to subsidiary matters render it unattractive. The Expansion of England (1883) Far otherwise was Seeley's The Expansion of England (1883). Written in his best manner, that essay answered to his theory that history should be used for a practical purpose and pointed out how and why Britain gained its colonies and India, the character of the British Empire and the light in which it should be regarded. As a historical essay, the book was a fine composition, and its defence of the empire was then very persuasive. His defence consisted largely of the claim that British rule was in India's best interest. Seeley also questioned the usefulness of India to the power and security of Britain and even claimed that there was 'no doubt' that India vastly increased the responsibilities and dangers to Britain. The book contains this much-quoted statement: "we seem, as it were, to have conquered half the world in a fit of absence of mind." It appeared at an opportune time and did much to make Englishmen regard the colonies not as mere appendages but as an expansion of the British state as well as of British nationality and to remind them of the value of the empire in the East. The essay was reprinted ten times in the year in which it was published and many more times in later years. Seeley was rewarded for public service by being made a Knight of the Order of St Michael and St George, on the recommendation of Lord Rosebery. In the spring of 1883, Seeley started a debate over the Tripos bachelor's honours exam at Cambridge, wishing it to concentrate on political history, but historians Frederick William Maitland, George Walter Prothero, Henry Melvill Gwatkin and Mandell Creighton argued for a broader more scientific approach, reaching a compromise emphasising the reading of primary sources, requiring a compulsory paper on "Political Science", with required readings including "Introduction to Political Science" (1896) by Seeley and "The Elements of Politics"