IN HIS PROFOUND ANALYSIS OF THE MICROCOSMOGRAPHIA Acadernica of his time, F.M. Cornford identified among the parties the Adullamites, who ‘are dangerous, because they know what they want; and that is, all the money there is going’. He goes on to say that they ‘are not refined, like classical men. That is why they succeed in getting all the money there is going’.

Of Cambridge scientists in the 1920s, the era of sealing wax and string, this was an unduly harsh judgment, but it may be thought prophetic of today's academic world, in which scientists spend millions of pounds on research projects whose only apparent justification is peer judgment; this research is worth support because other scientists in the same field say it is.

‘EUROPE BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND THE SOVIET UNION’. This subject could have been formulated in different terms, such as: ‘Europe between East and West’ or: ‘The European states between the two empires’ or: ‘The two Europes and the two superpowers’. Europe is at the same time one geographically and culturally, divided into nations, and split into two camps. The United States and the Soviet Union are both two global and two European powers, two ordinary states and the leaders of two alliances, the standard bearers of two ideologies. If one were discussing Korea instead of Europe, one would hesitate between calling our study ‘Korea between East and West’ and ‘Korea between North and South’. Europe is that continent where political divisions seem cast in the stone of history and geography, where the opposition between East and West seems to have at the same time a geopolitical meaning (that of maritime versus continental coalition), an ideological one (liberal democracy or capitalism versus communism) and a cultural one (the Western Church versus the Eastern one, Rome versus Byzantium).

IN THE PAST TWO CENTURIES WESTERN STATES HAVE ACQUIRED many functions that before were carried out by small social entities, such as families, neighbourhoods, parishes, guilds or local communes. As these activities became the business of state agencies, they changed beyond recognition. Apprenticeship and tutoring made way for formal education in a universal and compulsory school system. Charity and mutual aid wellnigh disappeared as social security and public welfare emerged. Folk medicine, magic and home healing waned, while treatment of the sick became the monopoly of the medical profession, protected, regulated and, for the greater part, paid by public agencies.

‘GOVERNMENTAL INSTABILITY: ITS CAUSES AND CURE’ HAS stimulated a growth industry in political science. Conferences, projects and published and unpublished works attest to its attraction as a research topic as well as its centrality for the democratic process. The volatility of electorates ranks high among the presumed causes of instability. The inability of cabinets to maintain legislative majorities, often attributed to the fickle nature of mass publics, is said to lead to ineffective government. Lack of effectiveness, in turn, results in voter disaffection, loss of legitimacy and increased volatility.

The conflict between Mohammed and Marx has received a fair amount of scholarly attention; so have the occasional attempts at syncretism, fusing the two visions. The confrontation of Buddha and Marx is just as interesting, and has been explored rather less. There are certain parallels between Buddhism and Islam. Both contain a High Tradition of great, scholarly sophistication which lends itself to purification, and can constitute the banner of political and spiritual ‘Reform’ and revival. This has in fact happened within both Islam and Buddhism. But within the two most thoroughly Buddhism‐dominated societies, Mongolia and Tibet, the process was not allowed to run its course. Each of these countries has a small population, and in each case what might have been the natural internal development was distorted by the overwhelming might of a great communist power. In neither case, however, has the victory of Marx over Buddha been complete or uncontested. The crucial events did not happen simultaneously in the two countries, but happened about three decades later in Tibet than they had in Mongolia. The present article contains insights into and information about the last years of the ancien régime in Tibet, based on unique understanding and research opportunities.