<u>Answer:</u>
B: Spain was a weaker nation and France a stronger one.
This was the result of the Thirty Years' War.
<u>Explanation:</u>
There were various reasons, religious, territorial and commercial rivalries which led to a thirty-year war, from 1618 to 1648 in European’s history. It started with the Holy Roman emperor imposing Roman Catholic absolutism on his domains and the protest of Bohemians and Austrians to the same.
Various other political reasons kept fueling the war between Poland, Spain, Russia, Moscow. In all these conflicts, Germany suffered the most. So, it couldn’t become a unified state. At the end, peace of Westphalia recognized Europe as an organisation of equal independent states. France emerged as the strongest nation as Spain was hurt badly.
One of the main reasons why New England merchants became leading members of society is because they were able to accumulate large amounts of wealth, due to the fact that trade was quite profitable during this time.
