Most history texts inevitably tend to be voluminous, and the wealth of detail which they are likely to contain, while important and even in some respects essential, had the effect of burdening the student's memory and blurring the outlines of the total picture that is formed form reading them. An outline is not a substitute for a text. Its function is to simplify and clarify by emphasizing the essentials, arranged in such a way as to bring out the 'outline' of a skeleton." -- From the preface.

List of maps : Topographic map of Europe ; The Hapsburg supremacy, 1526-1648 ; State religions in Europe about 1560 ; Europe in 1648 ; The expansion of France during the XVII and XVIII centuries ; Europe after the Treaty of Utrecht ; The growth of Prussia, 1614-1795 ; Expansion of European Russia in the Eighteenth century ; The partitions of Poland, 1772-1795 ; Power changes in Central and Eastern Europe, 1660-1795 ; European overseas empires about 1700 ; Europe at the height of Napoleon's power ; Europe, 1815-1859.

Part I. The emergence of modern Europe (to 1660). Introduction. Europe in 1500 -- The Renaissance -- The Age of Discovery and the Commercial Revolution -- The Reformation -- The Spanish century -- Spain, France and the Empire -- The English Revolutions (to 1660) -- Part II. The state system of Europe and the emancipation of European thought. The age of Louis XIV -- The transformation of Austria and the rise of Prussia -- Rearrangements in Eastern Europe -- Competition for empire -- The Enlightenment -- Part III. The era of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Episode. The French Revolution -- Napoleonic Europe -- part IV. Epilogue. The struggles between liberalism and reaction.