"The Christian inspiration from Chateaubriand and the love for nature underline Banning's romantic character. At the same time, Banning shared in the colonial ideology of Brialmont and Lambermont, which seemed rather based on a positivist principle: the 'struggle for life' of little Belgium. Emile Banning developed another positivist variant based on the inequality of races and peoples. Each race or people, which in the course of history had established a territory for itself, largely determined its historical fate, but could also suffer its fate. Banning thus formed a vision of history based on the organic needs of peoples. The Germanic race was at the same time the great example for Banning because of their growing self-esteem and romantic nation-building, and the great ogre, because their recent state growth could have negative territorial consequences for small Belgium."