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Title  An Introduction to the History of Western Europe

Author  James Harvey Robinson

Release Date  July 12  2008  EBook  26042 

Language  English

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 Illustration  PAGE FROM AN ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT 




  AN INTRODUCTION TO THE

  HISTORY OF WESTERN EUROPE


  BY

  JAMES HARVEY ROBINSON

  PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY


   History is no easy science 
  its subject  human society 
  is infinitely complex  

  FUSTEL DE COULANGES


  GINN   COMPANY

  BOSTON · NEW YORK · CHICAGO · LONDON




  ENTERED AT STATIONERS  HALL

  COPYRIGHT  1902  1903
  BY JAMES HARVEY ROBINSON

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
  612 1


  The Athenæum Press

  GINN   COMPANY · PROPRIETORS ·
  BOSTON · U S A 




PREFACE


In introducing the student to the history of the development of European
culture  the problem of proportion has seemed to me  throughout  the
fundamental one  Consequently I have endeavored not only to state
matters truly and clearly but also to bring the narrative into harmony
with the most recent conceptions of the relative importance of past
events and institutions  It has seemed best  in an elementary treatise
upon so vast a theme  to omit the names of many personages and conflicts
of secondary importance which have ordinarily found their way into our
historical text books  I have ventured also to neglect a considerable
number of episodes and anecdotes which  while hallowed by assiduous
repetition  appear to owe their place in our manuals rather to accident
or mere tradition than to any profound meaning for the student of the
subject 

The space saved by these omissions has been used for three main
purposes  Institutions under which Europe has lived for centuries  above
all the Church  have been discussed with a good deal more fullness than
is usual in similar manuals  The life and work of a few men of
indubitably first rate importance in the various fields of human
endeavor  Gregory the Great  Charlemagne  Abelard  St  Francis 
Petrarch  Luther  Erasmus  Voltaire  Napoleon  Bismarck  have been
treated with care proportionate to their significance for the world 
Lastly  the scope of the work has been broadened so that not only the
political but also the economic  intellectual  and artistic achievements
of the past form an integral part of the narrative 

I have relied upon a great variety of sources belonging to the various
orders in the hierarchy of historical literature  it is happily
unnecessary to catalogue these  In some instances I have found other
manuals  dealing with portions of my field  of value  In the earlier
chapters  Emerton s admirable  Introduction to the Middle Ages 
furnished many suggestions  For later periods  the same may be said of
Henderson s careful  Germany in the Middle Ages  and Schwill s clear and
well proportioned  History of Modern Europe   For the most recent
period  I have made constant use of Andrews  scholarly  Development of
Modern Europe   For England  the manuals of Green and Gardiner have been
used  The greater part of the work is  however  the outcome of study of
a wide range of standard special treatises dealing with some short
period or with a particular phase of European progress  As examples of
these  I will mention only Lea s monumental contributions to our
knowledge of the jurisprudence of the Church  Rashdall s  History of the
Universities in the Middle Ages   Richter s incomparable  Annalen der
Deutschen Geschichte im Mittelalter   the  Histoire Générale   and the
well known works of Luchaire  Voigt  Hefele  Bezold  Janssen  Levasseur 
Creighton  Pastor  In some cases  as in the opening of the Renaissance 
the Lutheran Revolt  and the French Revolution  I have been able to form
my opinions to some extent from first hand material 

My friends and colleagues have exhibited a generous interest in my
enterprise  of which I have taken constant advantage  Professor E H 
Castle of Teachers College  Miss Ellen S  Davison  Dr  William R 
Shepherd  and Dr  James T  Shotwell of the historical department of
Columbia University  have very kindly read part of my manuscript  The
proof has been revised by my colleague  Professor William A  Dunning 
Professor Edward P  Cheyney of the University of Pennsylvania  Dr 
Ernest F  Henderson  and by Professor Dana C  Munro of the University of
Wisconsin  To all of these I am much indebted  Both in the arduous
preparation of the manuscript and in the reading of the proof my wife
has been my constant companion  and to her the volume owes innumerable
rectifications in arrangement and diction  I would also add a word of
gratitude to my publishers for their hearty coöperation in their
important part of the undertaking 

The  Readings in European History   a manual now in preparation  and
designed to accompany this volume  will contain comprehensive
bibliographies for each chapter and a selection of illustrative
material  which it is hoped will enable the teacher and pupil to broaden
and vivify their knowledge  In the present volume I have given only a
few titles at the end of some of the chapters  and in the footnotes I
mention  for collateral reading  under the heading  Reference   chapters
in the best available books  to which the student may be sent for
additional detail  Almost all the books referred to might properly find
a place in every high school library 

  J H R 

  COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 
  January 12  1903 




CONTENTS


  CHAPTER                                                            PAGE

  I       THE HISTORICAL POINT OF VIEW                                  1

  II      WESTERN EUROPE BEFORE THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS                 8

  III     THE GERMAN INVASIONS AND THE BREAK UP OF THE
          ROMAN EMPIRE                                                 25

  IV      THE RISE OF THE PAPACY                                       44

  V       THE MONKS AND THE CONVERSION OF THE GERMANS                  56

  VI      CHARLES MARTEL AND PIPPIN                                    67

  VII     CHARLEMAGNE                                                  77

  VIII    THE DISRUPTION OF CHARLEMAGNE S EMPIRE                       92

  IX      FEUDALISM                                                   104

  X       THE DEVELOPMENT OF FRANCE                                   120

  XI      ENGLAND IN THE MIDDLE AGES                                  133

  XII     GERMANY AND ITALY IN THE TENTH AND ELEVENTH CENTURIES       148

  XIII    THE CONFLICT BETWEEN GREGORY VII AND HENRY IV               164

  XIV     THE HOHENSTAUFEN EMPERORS AND THE POPES                     173

  XV      THE CRUSADES                                                187

  XVI     THE MEDIÆVAL CHURCH AT ITS HEIGHT                           201

  XVII    HERESY AND THE FRIARS                                       216

  XVIII   THE PEOPLE IN COUNTRY AND TOWN                              233

  XIX     THE CULTURE OF THE MIDDLE AGES                              250

  XX      THE HUNDRED YEARS  WAR                                      277

  XXI     THE POPES AND THE COUNCILS                                  303

  XXII    THE ITALIAN CITIES AND THE RENAISSANCE                      321

  XXIII   EUROPE AT THE OPENING OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY              354

  XXIV    GERMANY BEFORE THE PROTESTANT REVOLT                        369

  XXV     MARTIN LUTHER AND HIS REVOLT AGAINST THE CHURCH             387

  XXVI    COURSE OF THE PROTESTANT REVOLT IN GERMANY  1521 1555       405

  XXVII   THE PROTESTANT REVOLT IN SWITZERLAND AND ENGLAND            421

  XXVIII  THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION  PHILIP II                         437

  XXIX    THE THIRTY YEARS  WAR                                       465

  XXX     STRUGGLE IN ENGLAND FOR CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT           475

  XXXI    THE ASCENDENCY OF FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV                    495

  XXXII   RISE OF RUSSIA AND PRUSSIA                                  509

  XXXIII  THE EXPANSION OF ENGLAND                                    523

  XXXIV   THE EVE OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION                            537

  XXXV    THE FRENCH REVOLUTION                                       558

  XXXVI   THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC                                   574

  XXXVII  NAPOLEON BONAPARTE                                          592

  XXXVIII EUROPE AND NAPOLEON                                         606

  XXXIX   EUROPE AFTER THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA                         625

  XL      THE UNIFICATION OF ITALY AND GERMANY                        642

  XLI     EUROPE OF TO DAY                                            671

  LIST OF BOOKS                                                       689

  INDEX                                                               691




LIST OF MAPS


                                                              PAGE
   1  The Roman Empire at its Greatest Extent                  8 9

   2 The Barbarian Inroads                                   26 27

   3 Europe in the Time of Theodoric                            31

   4 The Dominions of the Franks under the Merovingians         37

   5 Christian Missions                                         63

   6 Arabic Conquests                                           71

   7 The Empire of Charlemagne                               82 83

   8 Treaty of Verdun                                           93

   9 Treaty of Mersen                                           95

  10 Fiefs and Suzerains of the Counts of Champagne            113

  11 France at the Close of the Reign of Philip Augustus       129

  12 The Plantagenet Possessions in England and France         141

  13 Europe about A D 1000                                 152 153

  14 Italian Towns in the Twelfth Century                      175

  15 Routes of the Crusaders                               190 191

  16 The Crusaders  States in Syria                            193

  17 Ecclesiastical Map of France in the Middle Ages           205

  18 Lines of Trade and Mediæval Towns                     242 243

  19 The British Isles                                     278 279

  20 Treaty of Bretigny  1360                                  287

  21 French Possessions of the English King in 1424            294

  22 France under Louis XI                                 298 299

  23 Voyages of Discovery                                      349

  24 Europe in the Sixteenth Century                       358 359

  25 Germany in the Sixteenth Century                      372 373

  26 The Swiss Confederation                                   422

  27 Treaty of Utrecht                                     506 507

  28 Northeastern Europe in the Eighteenth Century             513

  29 Provinces of France in the Eighteenth Century             539

  30 Salt Tax in France                                        541

  31 France in Departments                                 568 569

  32 Partitions of Poland                                      584

  33 Europe at the Height of Napoleon s Power              614 615

  34 Europe in 1815                                        626 627

  35 Races of Austro Hungary                                   649

  36 Europe of To day                                      666 667




FULL PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS


     I PAGE FROM AN ILLUMINATED MANUSCRIPT       Frontispiece 

    II FAÇADE OF RHEIMS CATHEDRAL             Facing page  264

   III INTERIOR OF EXETER CATHEDRAL           Facing page  266

    IV BRONZE STATUES OF PHILIP THE GOOD AND CHARLES
       THE BOLD AT INNSBRUCK                  Facing page  300

     V BRONZE DOORS OF THE CATHEDRAL AT PISA          
                                                       342 343
    VI GHIBERTI S DOORS AT FLORENCE                   

   VII GIOTTO S MADONNA                               
                                                       346 347
  VIII HOLY FAMILY BY ANDREA DEL SARTO                




INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF WESTERN EUROPE




CHAPTER I

THE HISTORICAL POINT OF VIEW


 Sidenote  The scope of history  

1  History  in the broadest sense of the word  is all that we know about
everything that man has ever done  or thought  or hoped  or felt  It is
the limitless science of past human affairs  a subject immeasurably vast
and important but exceedingly vague  The historian may busy himself
deciphering hieroglyphics on an Egyptian obelisk  describing a mediæval
monastery  enumerating the Mongol emperors of Hindustan or the battles
of Napoleon  He may explain how the Roman Empire was conquered by the
German barbarians  or why the United States and Spain came to blows in
1898  or what Calvin thought of Luther  or what a French peasant had to
eat in the eighteenth century  We can know something of each of these
matters if we choose to examine the evidence which still exists  they
all help to make up history 

 Sidenote  Object of this volume  

The present volume deals with a small but very important portion of the
history of the world  Its object is to give as adequate an account as is
possible in one volume of the chief changes in western Europe since the
German barbarians overcame the armies of the Roman Empire and set up
states of their own  out of which the present countries of France 
Germany  Italy  Austria  Spain  the Netherlands  and England have
slowly grown  There are  however  whole libraries upon the history of
each of these countries during the last fifteen hundred years  and it
requires a volume or two to give a tolerably complete account of any
single important person  like St  Francis  Cromwell  Frederick the
Great  or Napoleon  Besides biographies and general histories  there are
many special treatises upon the Church and other great institutions 
upon the literature  art  philosophy  and law of the various countries 
It is obvious  therefore  that only a very few of the historical facts
known to scholars can possibly find a place in a single volume such as
this  One who undertakes to condense what we know of Europe s past 
since the times of Theodosius and Alaric  into the space of six hundred
pages assumes a very grave responsibility  The reader has a right to ask
not only that what he finds in the book shall be at once true and
clearly stated  but that it shall consist  on the whole  of the most
important and useful of all the things which might have been selected
from the well nigh infinite mass of true things that are known 

We gain practically nothing from the mere enumeration of events and
dates  The student of history wishes to know how people lived  what were
their institutions  which are really only the habits of nations   their
occupations  interests  and achievements  how business was transacted in
the Middle Ages almost without the aid of money  how  later  commerce
increased and industry grew up  what a great part the Christian church
played in society  how the monks lived and what they did for mankind  In
short  the object of an introduction to mediæval and modern European
history is the description of the most significant achievements of
western civilization during the past fifteen hundred years   the
explanation of how the Roman Empire of the West and the wild and unknown
districts inhabited by the German races have become the Europe of
Gladstone and Bismarck  of Darwin and Pasteur 

In order to present even an outline of the great changes during this
long period  all that was exceptional and abnormal must be left out  We
must fix our attention upon man s habitual conduct  upon those things
that he kept on doing in essentially the same way for a century or so 
Particular events are important in so far as they illustrate these
permanent conditions and explain how the western world passed from one
state to another 

 Sidenote  We should study the past sympathetically  

We must learn  above all  to study sympathetically institutions and
beliefs that we are tempted at first to declare absurd and unreasonable 
The aim of the historian is not to prove that a particular way of doing
a thing is right or wrong  as  for instance  intrusting the whole
government to a king or forbidding clergymen to marry  His object is to
show as well as he can how a certain system came to be introduced  what
was thought of it  how it worked  and how another plan gradually
supplanted it  It seems to us horrible that a man should be burned alive
because he holds views of Christianity different from those of his
neighbors  Instead  however  of merely condemning the practice  we must 
as historical students  endeavor to see why practically every one in the
thirteenth century  even the wisest and most tender hearted  agreed that
such a fearful punishment was the appropriate one for a heretic  An
effort has  therefore  been made throughout this volume to treat the
convictions and habits of men and nations in the past with
consideration  that is  to make them seem natural and to show their
beneficent rather than their evil aspects  It is not the weakness of an
institution  but the good that is in it  that leads men to adopt and
retain it 

 Sidenote  Impossibility of dividing the past into clearly defined
periods  

 Sidenote  All general changes take place gradually  

2  It is impossible to divide the past into distinct  clearly defined
periods and prove that one age ended and another began in a particular
year  such as 476  or 1453  or 1789  Men do not and cannot change their
habits and ways of doing things all at once  no matter what happens  It
is true that a single event  such as an important battle which results
in the loss of a nation s independence  may produce an abrupt change in
the government  This in turn may encourage or discourage commerce and
industry and modify the language and the spirit of a people  Yet these
deeper changes take place only very gradually  After a battle or a
revolution the farmer will sow and reap in his old way  the artisan will
take up his familiar tasks  and the merchant his buying and selling  The
scholar will study and write and the household go on under the new
government just as they did under the old  So a change in government
affects the habits of a people but slowly in any case  and it may leave
them quite unaltered 

The French Revolution  at the end of the eighteenth century  was
probably the most abrupt and thoroughgoing change in the habits of a
nation of which we have any record  But we shall find  when we come to
study it  that it was by no means so sudden in reality as is ordinarily
supposed  Moreover  the innovators did not even succeed in permanently
altering the form of government  for when the French  after living under
a monarchy for many centuries  set up a republic in 1792  the new
government lasted only a few years  The nation was monarchical by habit
and soon gladly accepted the rule of Napoleon  which was more despotic
than that of any of its former kings  In reorganizing the state he
borrowed much from the discarded monarchy  and the present French
republic still retains many of these arrangements 

 Sidenote  The unity or continuity of history  

This tendency of mankind to do  in general  this year what it did last 
in spite of changes in some one department of life   such as
substituting a president for a king  traveling by rail instead of on
horseback  or getting the news from a newspaper instead of from a
neighbor   results in what is called the  unity  or  continuity of
history   The truth that no abrupt change has ever taken place in all
the customs of a people  and that it cannot  in the nature of things 
take place  is perhaps the most fundamental lesson that history teaches 

Historians sometimes seem to forget this principle  when they claim to
begin and end their books at precise dates  We find histories of Europe
from 476 to 918  from 1270 to 1492  as if the accession of a capable
German king in 918  or the death of a famous French king in 1270  or the
discovery of America  marked a general change in European affairs  In
reality  however  no general change took place at these dates or in any
other single year  It would doubtless have proved a great convenience to
the readers and writers of history if the world had agreed to carry out
a definite programme and alter its habits at precise dates  preferably
at the opening of each century  But no such agreement has ever been
adopted  and the historical student must take things as he finds them 
He must recognize that nations retain their old customs while they adopt
new ones  and that a portion of a nation may advance while a great part
of it stays behind 

 Sidenote  Meaning of the term  Middle Ages   

3  We cannot  therefore  hope to fix any year or event which may
properly be taken as the beginning of that long period which followed
the downfall of the Roman state in western Europe and which is commonly
called the Middle Ages  Beyond the northern and western boundaries of
the Roman Empire  which embraced the whole civilized world from the
Euphrates to Britain  mysterious peoples moved about whose history
before they came into occasional contact with the Romans is practically
unknown  These Germans  or barbarians  as the Romans called them  were
destined to put an end to the Roman Empire in the West  They had first
begun to make trouble about a hundred years before Christ  when a great
army of them was defeated by the Roman general  Marius  Julius Cæsar
narrates  in polished Latin  familiar to all who have begun the study of
that language  how fifty years later he drove back other bands  Five
hundred years elapsed  however  between these first encounters and the
founding of German kingdoms within the boundaries of the Empire  With
their establishment the Roman government in western Europe may be said
to have come to an end and the Middle Ages to have begun 

Yet it would be a great mistake to suppose that this means that the
Roman civilization suddenly disappeared at this time  As we shall see 
it had gradually changed during the centuries following the golden age
of Augustus  who died A D  14  Long before the German conquest  art and
literature had begun to decline toward the level that they reached in
the Middle Ages  Many of the ideas and conditions which prevailed after
the coming of the barbarians were common enough before   even the
ignorance and want of taste which we associate particularly with the
Middle Ages 

The term  Middle Ages  is  then  a vague one  It will be used in this
volume to mean  roughly speaking  the period of nearly a thousand years
that elapsed between the opening of the fifth century  when the disorder
of the barbarian invasions was becoming general  and the fourteenth
century  when Europe was well on its way to retrieve all that had been
lost since the break up of the Roman Empire 

 Sidenote  The  dark ages   

It used to be assumed  when there was much less interest in the period
than there now is  that with the disruption of the Empire and the
disorder that followed  practically all culture perished for centuries 
that Europe entered upon the  dark ages   These were represented as
dreary centuries of ignorance and violence in marked contrast to the
civilization of the Greeks and Romans on the one hand  and to the
enlightenment of modern times on the other  The more careful studies of
the last half century have made it clear that the Middle Ages were not
 dark  in the sense of being stagnant and unproductive  On the contrary 
they were full of movement and growth  and we owe to them a great many
things in our civilization which we should never have derived from
Greece and Rome  It is the purpose of the first nineteen chapters of
this manual to describe the effects of the barbarian conquests  the
gradual recovery of Europe from the disorder of the successive
invasions  and the peculiar institutions which grew up to meet the needs
of the times  The remaining chapters will attempt to show how mediæval
institutions  habits  and ideas were supplanted  step by step  by those
which exist in Europe to day 

 Illustration  THE ROMAN EMPIRE AT ITS GREATEST EXTENT 




CHAPTER II

WESTERN EUROPE BEFORE THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS


 Sidenote  Extent of the Roman Empire  

4  No one can hope to understand the Middle Ages who does not first
learn something of the Roman Empire  within whose bounds the Germans set
up their kingdoms and began the long task of creating modern Europe 

At the opening of the fifth century there were no separate  independent
states in western Europe such as we find on the map to day  The whole
territory now occupied by England  France  Spain  and Italy formed at
that time only a part of the vast realms ruled over by the Roman emperor
and his host of officials  As for Germany  it was still a region of
forests  familiar only to the barbarous and half savage tribes who
inhabited them  The Romans tried in vain to conquer this part of Europe 
and finally had to content themselves with keeping the German hordes out
of the Empire by means of fortifications and guards along the Rhine and
Danube rivers 

 Sidenote  Great diversity of races included within the Empire  

The Roman Empire  which embraced southern and western Europe  western
Asia  and even the northern portion of Africa  included the most diverse
peoples and races  Egyptians  Arabs  Jews  Greeks  Germans  Gauls 
Britons  Iberians   all alike were under the sovereign rule of Rome  One
great state embraced the nomad shepherds who spread their tents on the
borders of Sahara  the mountaineers in the fastnesses of Wales  and the
citizens of Athens  Alexandria  and Rome  heirs to all the luxury and
learning of the ages  Whether one lived in York or Jerusalem  Memphis
or Vienna  he paid his taxes into the same treasury  he was tried by the
same law  and looked to the same armies for protection 

 Illustration  Remains of a Roman Aqueduct  now used as a Bridge  near
Nîmes  Southern France 

 Sidenote  Bonds which held the Empire together  

At first it seems incredible that this huge Empire  which included
African and Asiatic peoples as well as the most various races of Europe
in all stages of civilization  could have held together for five
centuries instead of falling to pieces  as might have been expected 
long before the barbarians came in sufficient strength to establish
their own kingdoms in its midst  When  however  we consider the bonds of
union which held the state together it is easy to understand the
permanence of the Empire  These were   1  the wonderfully organized
government which penetrated to every part of the realm and allowed
little to escape it   2  the worship of the emperor as the incarnation
of the government   3  the Roman law in force everywhere   4  the
admirable roads and the uniform system of coinage which encouraged
intercommunication  and  lastly   5  the Roman colonies and the teachers
maintained by the government  for through them the same ideas and
culture were carried to even the most distant parts of the Empire 

 Sidenote  The Roman government attempted to regulate everything  

Let us first glance at the government and the emperor  His decrees were
dispatched throughout the length and breadth of the Roman dominions 
whatsoever pleased him became law  according to the well known principle
of the Roman constitution  While the cities were permitted some freedom
in the regulation of their purely local affairs  the emperor and his
innumerable and marvelously organized officials kept an eye upon even
the humblest citizen  The Roman government  besides maintaining order 
administering justice  and defending the boundaries  assumed many other
responsibilities  It watched the grain dealers  butchers  and bakers 
saw that they properly supplied the public and never deserted their
occupation  In some cases it forced the son to follow the profession of
his father  If it could have had its way  it would have had every one
belong to a definite class of society  and his children after him  It
kept the unruly poorer classes quiet in the towns by furnishing them
with bread  and sometimes with wine  meat  and clothes  It provided
amusement for them by expensive entertainments  such as races and
gladiatorial combats  In a word  the Roman government was not only
wonderfully organized  so that it penetrated to the utmost confines of
its territory  but it attempted to guard and regulate almost every
interest in life 

 Sidenote  The worship of the emperor  

Every one was required to join in the worship of the emperor because he
stood for the majesty of the Roman dominion  The inhabitants of each
province might revere their particular gods  undisturbed by the
government  but all were obliged as good citizens to join in the
official sacrifices to the deified head of the state  The early
Christians were persecuted  not only because their religion was
different from that of their fellows  but because they refused to offer
homage to the image of the emperor and openly prophesied the downfall of
the Roman state  Their religion was incompatible with what was then
deemed good citizenship  inasmuch as it forbade them to express the
required veneration for the government 

 Sidenote  The Roman law  

As there was one government  so there was one law for all the civilized
world  Local differences were not considered  the same principles of
reason  justice  and humanity were believed to hold whether the Roman
citizen lived upon the Euphrates or the Thames  The law of the Roman
Empire is its chief legacy to posterity  Its provisions are still in
force in many of the states of Europe to day  and it is one of the
subjects of study in our American universities  It exhibited a humanity
unknown to the earlier legal codes  The wife  mother  and infant were
protected from the arbitrary power of the head of the house  who  in
earlier centuries  had been privileged to treat the members of his
family as slaves  It held that it was better that a guilty person should
escape than that an innocent person should be condemned  It conceived
humanity  not as a group of nations and tribes  each with its peculiar
institutions and legal customs  but as one people included in one great
empire and subject to a single system of law based upon reason and
equity 

 Illustration  A Fortified Roman Gateway at Treves 

 Sidenote  Roads and public works  

Magnificent roads were constructed  which enabled the messengers of the
government and its armies to reach every part of the Empire with
incredible speed  These highways made commerce easy and encouraged
merchants and travelers to visit the most distant portions of the realm 
Everywhere they found the same coins and the same system of weights and
measures  Colonies were sent out to the confines of the Empire  and the
remains of great public buildings  of theaters and bridges  of sumptuous
villas and baths at places like Treves  Cologne  Bath  and Salzburg
indicate how thoroughly the influence and civilization of Rome
penetrated to the utmost parts of the territory subject to her rule 

 Sidenote  The same culture throughout the Roman Empire  

The government encouraged education by supporting at least three
teachers in every town of any considerable importance  They taught
rhetoric and oratory and explained the works of the great writers  The
Romans  who had no marked literary or artistic ability  had adopted the
culture of the Greeks  This was spread abroad by the government teachers
so that an educated man was pretty sure to find  even in the outlying
parts of the great Empire  other educated men with much the same
interests and ideas as his own  Everywhere men felt themselves to be not
mere natives of this or that land but citizens of the world 

 Sidenote  Loyalty to the Empire and conviction that it was eternal  

During the four centuries from the first emperor  Augustus  to the
barbarian invasions we hear of no attempt on the part of its subjects to
overthrow the Empire or to secede from it  The Roman state  it was
universally believed  was to endure forever  Had a rebellious nation
succeeded in throwing off the rule of the emperor and establishing its
independence  it would only have found itself outside the civilized
world 

 Sidenote  Reasons why the Empire lost its power to defend itself
against the Germans  

5  Just why the Roman government  once so powerful and so universally
respected  finally became unable longer to defend its borders and gave
way before the scattered attacks of the German peoples  who never
combined in any general alliance against it  is a very difficult
question to answer satisfactorily  The inhabitants of the Empire appear
gradually to have lost their energy and self reliance and to have become
less and less prosperous  This may be explained partially at least by
the following considerations   1  the terrible system of taxation  which
discouraged and not infrequently ruined the members of the wealthier
classes   2  the existence of slavery  which served to discredit honest
labor and demoralized the free workingmen   3  the steady decrease of
population   4  the infiltration of barbarians  who prepared the way for
the conquest of the western portion of the Empire by their
fellow barbarians 

 Sidenote  Oppressive taxation  

It required a great deal of money to support the luxurious court of the
emperors and their innumerable officials and servants  and to supply
 bread and circuses  for the populace of the towns  All sorts of taxes
and exactions were consequently devised by ingenious officials to make
up the necessary revenue  The crushing burden of the great land tax  the
emperor s chief source of income  was greatly increased by the
pernicious way in which it was collected  The government made a group of
the richer citizens in each of the towns permanently responsible for the
whole amount due from all the landowners within their district  It was
their business to collect the taxes and make up any deficiency  it
mattered not from what cause  This responsibility and the weight of the
taxes themselves ruined so many landowners that the government was
forced to decree that no one should desert his estates in order to
escape the exactions  Only the very rich could stand the drain on their
resources  The middle class sank into poverty and despair  and in this
way the Empire lost just that prosperous class of citizens who should
have been the leaders in business enterprises 

 Sidenote  Slavery  

The sad plight of the poorer laboring classes was largely due to the
terrible institution of slavery which prevailed everywhere in ancient
times  So soon as the Romans had begun to conquer distant provinces the
number of slaves greatly increased  For six or seven centuries before
the barbarian invasions every kind of labor fell largely into their
hands in both country and town  There were millions of them  A single
rich landholder might own hundreds and even thousands  and it was a poor
man that did not have several at least 

 Sidenote  The villa  

Land was the only highly esteemed form of wealth in the Roman Empire  in
spite of the heavy taxes imposed upon it  Without large holdings of land
no one could hope to enjoy a high social position or an honorable office
under the government  Consequently the land came gradually into the
hands of the rich and ambitious  and the small landed proprietor
disappeared  Great estates called  villas  covered Italy  Gaul  and
Britain  These were cultivated and managed by armies of slaves  who not
only tilled the land  but supplied their master  his household  and
themselves with all that was needed on the plantation  The artisans
among them made the tools  garments  and other manufactured articles
necessary for the whole community  or  family   as it was called  Slaves
cooked the food  waited on the proprietor  wrote his letters  and read
to him  To a head slave the whole management of the villa was intrusted 
A villa might be as extensive as a large village  but all its members
were under the absolute control of the proprietor of the estate  A
well organized villa could supply itself with everything that it needed 
and found little or no reason for buying from any outsider 

 Sidenote  Slavery brings labor into disrepute  

Quite naturally  freemen came to scorn all manual labor and even trade 
for these occupations were associated in their minds with the despised
slave  Seneca  the philosopher  angrily rejects the suggestion that the
practical arts were invented by a philosopher  they were  he declares 
 thought out by the meanest bondman  

 Sidenote  Competition of slaves fatal to the freeman  

Slavery did more than bring manual labor into disrepute  it largely
monopolized the market  Each great household where articles of luxury
were in demand relied upon its own host of dexterous and efficient
slaves to produce them  Moreover  the owners of slaves frequently hired
them out to those who needed workmen  or permitted them to work for
wages  and in this way brought them into a competition with the free
workman which was fatal to him 

 Sidenote  Improved condition of the slaves and their emancipation  

It cannot be denied that a notable improvement in the condition of the
slaves took place during the centuries immediately preceding the
barbarian invasions  Their owners abandoned the horrible subterranean
prisons in which the farm hands were once miserably huddled at night 
The law  moreover  protected the slave from some of the worst forms of
abuse  first and foremost  it deprived his master of the right to kill
him  Slaves began to decrease in numbers before the German invasions  In
the first place  the supply had been cut off after the Roman armies
ceased to conquer new territory  In the second place  masters had for
various reasons begun to emancipate their slaves on a large scale 

 Sidenote  The freedman  

The freed slave was called a  freedman   and was by no means in the
position of one who was born free  It is true that he was no longer a
chattel  a mere thing  but he had still to serve his former master   who
had now become his patron   for a certain number of days in the year  He
was obliged to pay him a part of his earnings and could not marry
without his patron s consent 

 Sidenote  The coloni  

 Sidenote  Resemblance between the coloni and the later serfs  

Yet  as the condition of the slaves improved  and many of them became
freedmen  the state of the poor freeman only became worse  In the towns 
if he tried to earn his living  he was forced to mingle with those
slaves who were permitted to work for wages and with the freedmen  and
he naturally tended to sink to their level  In the country the free
agricultural laborers became  coloni   a curious intermediate class 
neither slave nor really free  They were bound to the particular bit of
land which some great proprietor permitted them to cultivate and were
sold with it if it changed hands  Like the mediæval  serf   they could
not be deprived of their fields so long as they paid the owner a certain
part of their crop and worked for him during a period fixed by the
customs of the domain upon which they lived  This system made it
impossible for the farmer to become independent  or for his son to be
better off than he  The coloni and the more fortunate slaves tended to
fuse into a single class  for the law provided that  like the coloni 
certain classes of country slaves were not to be taken from the field
which they had been accustomed to cultivate but were to go with it if it
was sold  1 

Moreover  it often happened that the Roman proprietor had a number of
dependents among the less fortunate landowners in his neighborhood 
These  in order to escape the taxes and gain his protection as the times
became more disorderly  surrendered their land to their powerful
neighbor with the understanding that he should defend them and permit
them to continue during their lifetime to cultivate the fields  the
title to which had passed to him  On their death their children became
coloni  This arrangement  as we shall find  serves in a measure to
explain the feudalism of later times 

 Sidenote  Depopulation  

When a country is prosperous the population tends to increase  In the
Roman Empire  even as early as Augustus  a falling off in numbers was
apparent  which was bound to sap the vitality of the state  War  plague 
the evil results of slavery  and the outrageous taxation all combined to
hasten the depopulation  for when it is hard to make a living  men are
deterred from marrying and find it difficult to bring up large families 

 Sidenote  Infiltration of Germans into the Empire  

In order to replenish the population great numbers of the Germans were
encouraged to settle within the Empire  where they became coloni 
Constantine is said to have called in three hundred thousand of a
single people  Barbarians were enlisted in the Roman legions to keep out
their fellow Germans  Julius Cæsar was the first to give them a place
among his soldiers  The expedient became more and more common  until 
finally  whole armies were German  entire tribes being enlisted under
their own chiefs  Some of the Germans rose to be distinguished generals 
others attained important positions among the officials of the
government  In this way it came about that a great many of the
inhabitants of the Roman Empire were Germans before the great invasions 
The line dividing the Roman and the barbarian was growing indistinct  It
is not unreasonable to suppose that the influx of barbarians smoothed
the way for the break up of the western part of the Empire  Although
they had a great respect for the Roman state  they must have kept some
of their German love of individual liberty and could have had little
sympathy for the despotism under which they lived 

 Sidenote  Decline of literature and art  

6  As the Empire declined in strength and prosperity and was gradually
permeated by the barbarians  its art and literature fell far below the
standard of the great writers and artists of the golden age of Augustus 
The sculpture of Constantine s time was far inferior to that of
Trajan s  Cicero s exquisitely finished style lost its charm for the
readers of the fourth and fifth centuries  and a florid  inferior
species of oratory took its place  Tacitus  who died about A D  120  is
perhaps the latest of the Latin authors whose works may be ranked among
the classics  No more great men of letters arose  Few of those who
understand and enjoy Latin literature to day would think of reading any
of the poetry or prose written after the beginning of the second
century 

 Sidenote  Reliance upon mere compendiums  

During the three hundred years before the invasions those who read at
all did not ordinarily take the trouble to study the classics  but
relied upon mere collections of quotations  and for what they called
science  upon compendiums and manuals  These the Middle Ages inherited 
and it was not until the time of Petrarch  in the fourteenth century 
that Europe once more reached a degree of cultivation which enabled the
more discriminating scholars to appreciate the best productions of the
great authors of antiquity  both Greek and Latin  2 

 Sidenote  Preparation for Christianity  

In spite of the general decline of which we have been speaking  the
Roman world appeared to be making progress in one important respect 
During the first and second centuries a sort of moral revival took place
and a growing religious enthusiasm showed itself  which prepared the way
for the astonishingly rapid introduction of the new Christian religion 
Some of the pagan philosophers had quite given up the old idea which we
find in Homer and Virgil  that there were many gods  and had reached an
elevated conception of the one God and of our duty toward Him   Our
duty   writes the philosopher Epictetus at the end of the first century 
 is to follow God      to be of one mind with Him  to devote ourselves
to the performance of His commands   The emperor Marcus Aurelius  d 
180  expresses similar sentiments in his  Meditations   3  the notes
which he wrote for his own guidance  There was a growing abhorrence for
the notorious vices of the great cities  and an ever increasing demand
for pure and upright conduct  The pagan religions taught that the souls
of the dead continued to exist in Hades  but the life to come was
believed to be a dreary existence at best 

 Sidenote  Promises of Christianity  

Christianity brought with it a new hope for all those who would escape
from the bondage of sin  of which the serious minded were becoming more
and more conscious  It promised  moreover  eternal happiness after death
to all who would consistently strive to do right  It appealed to the
desires and needs of all kinds of men and women  For every one who
accepted the Gospel might look forward in the next world to such joy as
he could never hope to experience in this 

 Sidenote  Christianity and paganism tend to merge into one another  

 Sidenote  Boethius  

The new religion  as it spread from Palestine among the Gentiles  was
much modified by the religious ideas of those who accepted it  A group
of Christian philosophers  who are known as the early fathers  strove to
show that the Gospel was in accord with the aspirations of the best of
the pagans  In certain ceremonies the former modes of worship were
accepted by the new religion  From simple beginnings the church
developed a distinct priesthood and an elaborate service  In this way
Christianity and the higher forms of paganism tended to come nearer and
nearer to each other as time went on  In one sense  it is true  they met
like two armies in mortal conflict  but at the same time they tended to
merge into one another like two streams which had been following
converging courses  At the confluence of the streams stands Boethius  d 
about 524   the most gifted of the later Roman writers  His beautiful
book   The Consolation of Philosophy   was one of the most popular works
during the Middle Ages  when every one believed that its author was a
Christian  4  Yet there is nothing in the book to indicate that he was
more than a religious pagan  and some scholars doubt if he ever fully
accepted the new religion 

 Sidenote  The primitive  or apostolic  church  

7  We learn from the letters of St  Paul that the earliest Christian
communities found it necessary to have some organization  They chose
certain officers  the bishops  that is to say  overseers  and the
presbyters or elders  but St  Paul does not tell us exactly what were
the duties of these officers  There were also the deacons  who appear to
have had the care of the poor of the community  The first Christians
looked for the speedy coming of Christ before their own generation
should pass away  Since all were filled with enthusiasm for the Gospel
and eagerly awaited the last day  they did not feel the need of an
elaborate constitution  But as time went on the Christian communities
greatly increased in size  and many joined them who had little or none
of the original fervor and spirituality  It became necessary to develop
a regular system of church government in order to control the erring and
expel those who brought disgrace upon their religion by notoriously bad
conduct 

 Sidenote  The  catholic   or universal  church  

A famous little book   The Unity of the Church   by Bishop Cyprian  d 
258  gives us a pretty good idea of the Church a few decades before the
Christian religion was legalized by Constantine  This and other sources
indicate that the followers of Christ had already come to believe in a
 Catholic   i e   a universal  Church which embraced all the communities
of true believers wherever they might be  To this one universal Church
all must belong who hoped to be saved  5 

 Sidenote  Organization of the church before Constantine  

A sharp distinction was already made between the officers of the Church 
who were called the  clergy   and the people  or  laity   To the clergy
was committed the government of the Church as well as the instruction of
its members  In each of the Roman cities was a bishop  and at the head
of the country communities  a priest  Latin   presbyter    who had
succeeded to the original elders  presbyters  mentioned in the New
Testament  Below the bishop and the priest were the lower orders of the
clergy   the deacon and sub deacon   and below these the so called minor
orders  the acolyte  exorcist  reader  and doorkeeper  The bishop
exercised a certain control over the priests within his territory  It
was not unnatural that the bishops in the chief towns of the Roman
provinces should be especially influential in church affairs  They came
to be called  archbishops   and might summon the bishops of the
province to a council to decide important matters 

 Sidenote  The first general council  325  Position of the Bishop of
Rome during this period  

In 311 the emperor Galerius issued a decree placing the Christian
religion upon the same legal footing as paganism  Constantine  the first
Christian emperor  carefully enforced this edict  In 325 the first
general council of Christendom was called together under his auspices at
Nicæa  It is clear from the decrees of this famous assembly that the
Catholic Church had already assumed the form that it was to retain down
to the present moment  except that there is no explicit recognition of
the Bishop of Rome as the head of the whole church  Nevertheless  there
were a number of reasons  to be discussed later  why the Bishop of Rome
should sometime become the acknowledged ruler of western Christendom 
The first of the Roman bishops to play a really important part in
authentic history was Leo the Great  who did not take office until
440  6 

 Sidenote  The Church in the Theodosian Code  

Constantine s successors soon forbade pagan practices and began to issue
laws which gave the Christian clergy important privileges  In the last
book of the Theodosian Code  a great collection of the laws of the
Empire  which was completed in 438  all the imperial decrees are to be
found which relate to the Christian Church and the clergy  We find that
the clergy  in view of their holy duties  were exempted from certain
onerous offices and from some of the taxes which the laity had to pay 
They were also permitted to receive bequests  The emperors themselves
richly endowed the Church  Their example was followed by rulers and
private individuals all through the Middle Ages  so that the Church
became incredibly wealthy and enjoyed a far greater income than any
state of Europe  The clergy were permitted to try certain cases at law 
and they themselves had the privilege of being tried in their own church
courts for minor criminal offenses  This last book of the Code begins
with a definition of the Trinity  and much space is given to a
description of the different kinds of unbelievers and the penalties
attached to a refusal to accept the religion of the government  7 

 Sidenote  The Church survives the Empire  

In these provisions of the Theodosian Code the later mediæval Church is
clearly foreshadowed  The imperial government in the West was soon
overthrown by the barbarian conquerors  but the Catholic Church
conquered and absorbed the conquerors  When the officers of the Empire
deserted their posts the bishops stayed to meet the on coming invader 
They continued to represent the old civilization and ideas of order  It
was the Church that kept the Latin language alive among those who knew
only a rude German dialect  It was the Church that maintained some
little education in even the darkest period of confusion  for without
the ability to read Latin its services could not have been performed and
its officers could not have carried on their correspondence with one
another 

 Sidenote  The Eastern Empire  

8  Although the Roman Empire remained one in law  government  and
culture until the Germans came in sufficient force to conquer the
western portions of it  a tendency may nevertheless be noticed some time
before the conquest for the eastern and western portions to drift apart 
Constantine  who established his supremacy only after a long struggle
with his rivals  hoped to strengthen the vast state by establishing a
second capital  which should lie far to the east and dominate a region
very remote from Rome  Constantinople was accordingly founded in 330 on
the confines of Europe and Asia  8  This was by no means supposed to
destroy the unity of the Empire  Even when Theodosius the Great arranged
 395  that both his sons should succeed him  and that one should rule
in the West and one in the East  he did not intend to divide the Empire 
It is true that there continued to be thereafter two emperors  each in
his own capital  but they were supposed to govern one empire conjointly
and in  unanimity   New laws were to be accepted by both  The writers of
the time do not speak of two states but continue to refer to  the
Empire   as if the administration were still in the hands of one ruler 
Indeed the idea of one government for all civilized mankind did not pass
away but continued to influence men during the whole of the Middle Ages 

Although it was in the eastern part of the Empire that the barbarians
first got a permanent foothold  the emperors at Constantinople were able
to keep a portion of the old possessions of the Empire under their rule
for centuries after the Germans had completely conquered the West  When
at last the eastern capital of the Empire fell  it was not into the
hands of the Germans  but into those of the Turks  who have held it
since 1453 

There will be no room in this volume to follow the history of the
Eastern Empire  although it cannot be entirely ignored in studying
western Europe  Its language and civilization had always been Greek  and
owing to this and the influence of the Orient  its culture offers a
marked contrast to that of the Latin West  which was adopted by the
Germans  Learning never died out in the East as it did in the West  nor
did art reach so low an ebb 

 Sidenote  Constantinople the most wealthy and populous city of Europe
during the early Middle Ages  

For some centuries after the disruption of the Roman Empire in the West 
the capital of the Eastern Empire enjoyed the distinction of being the
largest and most wealthy city of Europe  Within its walls could be found
the indications of a refinement and civilization which had almost
disappeared in the Occident  Its beautiful buildings  its parks and
paved streets  filled the traveler from the West with astonishment 
When  during the Crusades  the western peoples were brought into
contact with the learning and culture of Constantinople they were
greatly and permanently impressed by them 


     General Reading   For an outline of the history of the Roman Empire
     during the centuries immediately preceding the barbarian invasions 
     see BOTSFORD   History of Rome   WEST   Ancient History to the
     Death of Charlemagne   MYERS   Rome  Its Rise and Fall   or MOREY 
      Outlines of Roman History    all with plenty of references to
     larger works on the subject  The best work in English on the
     conditions in the Empire upon the eve of the invasions is DILL 
      Roman Society in the Last Century of the Western Empire 
      Macmillan   2 00   HATCH   The Influence of Greek Thought upon the
     Christian Church   Williams   Norgate   1 00   and RENAN   The
     Influence of Rome on the Development of the Catholic Church 
      Williams   Norgate   1 00   are very important for the advanced
     student  The best of the numerous editions of Gibbon s great work 
      The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire   which covers the whole
     history of the Middle Ages  is that edited by Bury  The Macmillan
     Company  7 vols    14 00  




CHAPTER III

THE GERMAN INVASIONS AND THE BREAK UP OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE


 Sidenote  The Huns force the Goths into the Empire  Battle of
Adrianople  378  

9  Previous to the year 375 the attempts of the Germans to penetrate
into the Empire appear to have been due to their love of adventure 
their hope of enjoying some of the advantages of their civilized
neighbors  or the need of new lands for their increasing numbers  And
the Romans  by means of their armies  their walls  and their guards  had
up to this time succeeded in preventing the barbarians from violently
occupying their territory  But suddenly a new force appeared which
thrust the Germans out upon the weakened Empire  The Huns  a Mongolian
folk from central Asia  swept down upon the Goths  who were a German
tribe settled upon the Danube  and forced a part of them to seek shelter
across the river  within the boundaries of the Empire  Here they soon
fell out with the imperial officials  and a great battle was fought at
Adrianople in 378 in which the Goths defeated and slew the emperor 
Valens  The Germans had now not only broken through the boundaries of
the Empire  but they had also learned that they could defeat the Roman
legions  The battle of Adrianople may  therefore  be said to mark the
beginning of the conquest of the western part of the Empire by the
Germans  For some years  however  after the battle of Adrianople the
various bands of West Goths  or Visigoths  as they are often
called  were induced to accept the terms offered by the emperor s
officials and some of the Goths agreed to serve as soldiers in the Roman
armies 

 Illustration  THE BARBARIAN INROADS 

 Sidenote  Alaric takes Rome  410  

Before long one of the German chieftains  Alaric  became dissatisfied
with the treatment that he received  He collected an army  of which the
nucleus consisted of West Goths  and set out for Italy  Rome fell into
his hands in 410 and was plundered by his followers  Alaric appears to
have been deeply impressed by the sight of the civilization about him 
He did not destroy the city  hardly even did serious damage to it  and
he gave especial orders to his soldiers not to injure the churches or
take their property  9 

 Sidenote  West Goths settle in southern Gaul and Spain  

Alaric died before he could find a satisfactory spot for his people to
settle upon permanently  After his death the West Goths wandered into
Gaul  and then into Spain  which had already been occupied by other
barbarian tribes   the Vandals and Suevi  These had crossed the Rhine
into Gaul four years before Alaric took Rome  for three years they
devastated the country and then proceeded across the Pyrenees  When the
West Goths reached Spain they quickly concluded peace with the Roman
government  They then set to work to fight the Vandals  with such
success that the emperor granted them a considerable district  419  in
southern Gaul  where they established a West Gothic kingdom  Ten years
after  the Vandals moved on into Africa  where they founded a kingdom
and extended their control over the western Mediterranean  Their place
in Spain was taken by the West Goths who  under their king  Euric
 466 484   conquered a great part of the peninsula  so that their
kingdom extended from the Loire to the Straits of Gibraltar  10 

 Sidenote  General dismemberment of the Empire in fifth century  

It is quite unnecessary to follow the confused history of the movements
of the innumerable bands of restless barbarians who wandered about
Europe during the fifth century  Scarcely any part of western Europe was
left unmolested  even Britain was conquered by German tribes  the Angles
and Saxons 

 Sidenote  Attila and the Huns  

 Sidenote  Battle of Châlons  451  

 Sidenote  Founding of Venice  

To add to the universal confusion caused by the influx of the German
tribes  the Huns  the Mongolian people who had first pushed the West
Goths into the Empire  now began to fill western Europe with terror 
Under their chief  Attila    the scourge of God   as the trembling
Romans called him   the savage Huns invaded Gaul  But the Roman
inhabitants and the Germans joined against the invaders and defeated
them in the battle of Châlons  in 451  After this rebuff Attila turned
to Italy  But the impending danger was averted  Attila was induced by an
embassy  headed by Pope Leo the Great  to give up his plan of marching
upon Rome  Within a year he died and with him perished the power of the
Huns  who never troubled Europe again  Their threatened invasion of
Italy produced one permanent result however  for it was then that
fugitives from the cities of northeastern Italy fled to the sandy islets
just off the Adriatic shore and founded the town which was to grow into
the beautiful and powerful city of Venice  11 

 Sidenote  The  fall  of the Empire in the West  476  

 Sidenote  Odoacer  

10  The year 476 has commonly been taken as the date of the  fall  of
the Western Empire and of the beginning of the Middle Ages  What
happened in that year was this  Since Theodosius the Great  in 395  had
provided that his two sons should divide the administration of the
Empire between them  most of the emperors of the West had proved weak
and indolent rulers  The barbarians wandered hither and thither pretty
much at their pleasure  and the German troops in the service of the
Empire amused themselves setting up and throwing down puppet emperors 
In 476 the German mercenaries in the Roman army demanded that a third
part of Italy be given to them  On the refusal of this demand  Odoacer 
their leader  banished the last of the western emperors  whose name was 
by the irony of fate  Romulus Augustus the Little  to a villa near
Naples  Then Odoacer sent the insignia of empire to the eastern emperor
with the request that he be permitted to rule Italy as the emperor s
delegate  thus putting an end to the line of the western emperors  12 

 Sidenote  Theodoric conquers Odoacer and establishes the kingdom of the
East Goths in Italy  

It was not  however  given to Odoacer to establish an enduring German
kingdom on Italian soil  for he was conquered by the great Theodoric 
the king of the East Goths  or Ostrogoths   Theodoric had spent ten
years of his early youth in Constantinople and had thus become familiar
with Roman life  Since his return to his people he had been alternately
a dangerous enemy and an embarrassing friend to the eastern emperor  The
East Goths  under his leadership  had harassed and devastated various
parts of the Eastern Empire  and had once threatened the capital itself 
The emperor had repeatedly conciliated him by conferring upon him
various honors and titles and by making large grants of money and land
to his people  It must have been a great relief to the government when
Theodoric determined to lead his people to Italy against Odoacer   If I
fail   Theodoric said to the emperor   you will be relieved of an
expensive and troublesome friend  if  with the divine permission  I
succeed  I shall govern in your name and to your glory  the Roman Senate
and that part of the Empire delivered from slavery by my victorious
arms  

The struggle between Theodoric and Odoacer lasted for several years  but
Odoacer was finally shut up in Ravenna and surrendered  only to be
treacherously slain a few days later by Theodoric s own hand  493   13 

 Sidenote  The East Goths in Italy  

The attitude of the East Goths toward the people already in possession
of the land and toward the Roman culture is significant  Theodoric put
the name of the eastern emperor on the coins that he issued and did
everything in his power to insure the emperor s approval of the new
German kingdom  Nevertheless  although he desired that the emperor
should sanction his usurpation  Theodoric had no idea of being really
subordinate to Constantinople 

 Illustration  Interior of a Church at Ravenna  built in Theodoric s
Time 

The invaders appropriated one third of the land for themselves  but this
was done with discretion and no disorder appears to have resulted 
Theodoric maintained the Roman laws and institutions  which he greatly
admired  The old offices and titles were retained  and Goth and Roman
lived under the same Roman law  Order was restored and learning
encouraged  In Ravenna  which Theodoric chose for his capital  beautiful
buildings that date from his reign still exist 

 Sidenote  The East Goths were Arian heretics  

On his death in 526  Theodoric left behind him an admirably organized
state  but it had one conspicuous weakness  The Goths  although
Christians  were unorthodox according to the standard of the Italian
Christians  They had been converted by eastern missionaries  who taught
them the Arian heresy earlier prevalent at Constantinople  This
doctrine  which derived its name from Arius  a presbyter of Alexandria
 d  336   had been condemned by the Council of Nicæa  The followers of
Arius did not have the same conception of Christ s nature and of the
relations of the three members of the Trinity as that sanctioned at
Rome  The East Goths were  therefore  not only barbarians   which might
have been forgiven them   but were guilty  in the eyes of the orthodox
Italians  of the unpardonable offense of heresy  Theodoric himself was
exceptionally tolerant for his times  His conviction that  we cannot
command in matters of religion because no one can be compelled to
believe against his will   showed a spirit alien to the traditions of
the Roman Empire and the Roman Church  which represented the orthodox
belief 

 Sidenote  The German kingdoms of Theodoric s time  

11  While Theodoric had been establishing his kingdom in Italy with such
enlightenment and moderation  what is now France was coming under the
control of the most powerful of the barbarian peoples  the Franks  who
were to play a more important rôle in the formation of modern Europe
than any of the other German races  Besides the kingdoms of the East
Goths and the Franks  the West Goths had their kingdom in Spain  the
Burgundians had established themselves on the Rhone  and the Vandals in
Africa  Royal alliances were concluded between the reigning houses of
these nations  and for the first time in the history of Europe we see
something like a family of nations  living each within its own
boundaries and dealing with one another as independent powers  It
seemed for a few years as if the process of assimilation between Germans
and Romans was going to make rapid progress without involving any
considerable period of disorder and retrogression 

 Illustration  Map of Europe in the Time of Theodoric 

 Sidenote  Extinction of Latin literature  

 Sidenote  Boethius  

But no such good fortune was in store for Europe  which was now only at
the beginning of the turmoil from which it was to emerge almost
completely barbarized  Science  art  and literature could find no
foothold in the shifting political sands of the following centuries 
Boethius  14  whom Theodoric put to death  in 524 or 525  for alleged
treasonable correspondence with the emperor  was the last Latin writer
who can be compared in any way with the classical authors in his style
and mastery of the language  He was a scholar as well as a poet  and his
treatises on logic  music  etc   were highly esteemed by following
generations 

 Sidenote  Cassiodorus and his manuals  

Theodoric s distinguished Roman counselor  Cassiodorus  d  575   to
whose letters we owe a great part of our knowledge of the period  busied
himself in his old age in preparing text books of the liberal arts and
sciences   grammar  arithmetic  logic  geometry  rhetoric  music  and
astronomy  His manuals were intended to give the uninstructed priests a
sufficient preparation for the study of the Bible and of the doctrines
of the Church  His absurdly inadequate and  to us  silly treatment of
these seven important subjects  to which he devotes a few pages each 
enables us to estimate the low plane to which learning had fallen in
Italy in the sixth century  Yet his books were regarded as standard
treatises in these great fields of knowledge all through the Middle
Ages  So mediæval Europe owed these  and other text books upon which she
was dependent for her knowledge  to the period when Latin culture was
coming to an end 

 Sidenote  Scarcely any writers in western Europe during the sixth 
seventh  and eighth centuries  

A long period of gloom now begins  Between the time of Theodoric and
that of Charlemagne three hundred years elapsed  during which scarcely a
writer was to be found who could compose  even in the worst of Latin  a
chronicle of the events of his day  15  Everything conspired to
discourage education  The great centers of learning  Carthage  Rome 
Alexandria  Milan  were partially destroyed by the barbarians or the
Arabs  The libraries which had been kept in the temples of the gods were
often annihilated  along with the pagan shrines  by Christian
enthusiasts  who were not sorry to see the heathen literature disappear
with the heathen religion  Shortly after Theodoric s death the eastern
emperor withdrew the support which the government had hitherto granted
to public teachers and closed the great school at Athens  The only
important historian of the sixth century was the half illiterate
Gregory  Bishop of Tours  d  594   whose whole work is unimpeachable
evidence of the sad state of intellectual affairs  He at least heartily
appreciated his own ignorance and exclaims  in incorrect Latin   Woe to
our time  for the study of letters has perished from among us  

 Sidenote  Justinian destroys the kingdoms of the Vandals and the East
Goths  

12  The year after Theodoric s death one of the greatest of the emperors
of the East  Justinian  527 565   came to the throne at
Constantinople  16  He undertook to regain for the Empire the provinces
in Africa and Italy that had been occupied by the Vandals and East
Goths  His general  Belisarius  overthrew the Vandal kingdom in northern
Africa in 534  but it was a more difficult task to destroy the Gothic
rule in Italy  However  in spite of a brave defense  the Goths were so
completely defeated in 553 that they agreed to leave Italy with all
their movable possessions  What became of the remnants of the race we do
not know  They had been too few to maintain their control over the mass
of the Italians  who were ready  with a religious zeal which cost them
dear  to open their gates to the hostile armies of Justinian 

 Sidenote  The Lombards occupy Italy  

The destruction of the Gothic kingdom was a disaster for Italy 
Immediately after the death of Justinian the country was overrun anew 
by the Lombards  the last of the great German peoples to establish
themselves within the bounds of the former Empire  They were a savage
race  a considerable part of which was still pagan  and the Arian
Christians among them appear to have been as hostile to the Roman Church
as their unconverted fellows  The newcomers first occupied the region
north of the Po  which has ever since been called Lombardy after them 
and then extended their conquests southward  Instead of settling
themselves with the moderation and wise statesmanship of the East Goths 
the Lombards chose to move about the peninsula pillaging and massacring 
Such of the inhabitants as could  fled to the islands off the coast  The
Lombards were unable  however  to conquer all of Italy  Rome  Ravenna 
and southern Italy continued to be held by the Greek empire  As time
went on  the Lombards lost their wildness  accepted the orthodox form of
Christianity  and gradually assimilated the civilization of the people
among whom they lived  Their kingdom lasted over two hundred years 
until it was overthrown by Charlemagne 

 Sidenote  The Franks  their importance and their method of conquest  

13  None of the German peoples of whom we have so far spoken  except the
Franks  ever succeeded in establishing a permanent kingdom  Their states
were overthrown in turn by some other German nation  by the Eastern
Empire  or  in the case of the West Gothic kingdom in Spain  by the
Mohammedans  The Franks  to whom we must now turn  were destined not
only to conquer most of the other German tribes but even to extend their
boundaries into districts inhabited by the Slavs 

When the Franks are first heard of in history they were settled along
the lower Rhine  from Cologne to the North Sea  Their method of getting
a foothold in the Empire was essentially different from that which the
Goths  Lombards  and Vandals had adopted  Instead of severing their
connection with Germany and becoming an island in the sea of the Empire 
they conquered by degrees the territory about them  However far they
might extend their control  they remained in constant touch with the
barbarian reserves behind them  In this way they retained the warlike
vigor that was lost by the races who were completely surrounded by the
enervating influences of Roman civilization 

In the early part of the fifth century they had occupied the district
which constitutes to day the kingdom of Belgium  as well as the regions
east of it  In 486  seven years before Theodoric founded his Italian
kingdom  they went forth under their great king  Clovis  a name that
later grew into Louis   and defeated the Roman general who opposed them 
They extended their control over Gaul as far south as the Loire  which
at that time formed the northern boundary of the kingdom of the West
Goths  Clovis then enlarged his empire on the east by the conquest of
the Alemanni  a German people living in the region of the Black
Forest  17 

 Illustration  A Frankish Warrior 

 Sidenote  Conversion of Clovis  496  and its consequences  

The battle in which the Alemanni were defeated  496  is in one respect
important above all the other battles of Clovis  Although still a pagan
himself  his wife was an orthodox Christian convert  In the midst of the
conflict  as he saw his line giving way  he called upon Jesus Christ and
pledged himself to be baptized in His name if He would help the Franks
to victory over their enemies  He kept his word and was baptized
together with three thousand of his warriors  His conversion had the
most momentous consequences for Europe  All the other German peoples
within the Empire were Christians  but they were all Arian heretics  and
to the orthodox Christians about them they seemed worse than heathen 
This religious difference had prevented the Germans and Romans from
inter marrying and had retarded their fusion in other ways  But with the
conversion of Clovis  there was at least one barbarian leader with whom
the Bishop of Rome could negotiate as with a faithful son of the
Church  It is from the orthodox Gregory of Tours that most of our
knowledge of Clovis and his successors is derived  In Gregory s famous
 History of the Franks   the cruel and unscrupulous king appears as
God s chosen instrument for the extension of the Catholic faith  18 
Certainly Clovis quickly learned to combine his own interests with those
of the Church  and the alliance between the pope and the Frankish kings
was destined to have a great influence upon the history of western
Europe 

 Sidenote  Conquests of Clovis  

To the south of Clovis  new acquisitions in Gaul lay the kingdom of the
Arian West Goths  to the southeast that of another heretical German
people  the Burgundians  Gregory of Tours reports him as saying   I
cannot bear that these Arians should be in possession of a part of Gaul 
Let us advance upon them with the aid of God  after we have conquered
them let us bring their realms into our power   So zealous was the newly
converted king that he speedily extended his power to the Pyrenees  and
forced the West Goths to confine themselves to the Spanish portion of
their realm  The Burgundians became a tributary nation and soon fell
completely under the rule of the Franks  Then Clovis  by a series of
murders  brought portions of the Frankish nation itself  which had
previously been independent of him  under his scepter 

 Sidenote  Character of Frankish history  

14  When Clovis died in 511 at Paris  which he had made his residence 
his four sons divided his possessions among them  Wars between rival
brothers  interspersed with the most horrible murders  fill the annals
of the Frankish kingdom for over a hundred years after the death of
Clovis  Yet the nation continued to develop in spite of the unscrupulous
deeds of its rulers  It had no enemies strong enough to assail it  and a
certain unity was preserved in spite of the ever shifting distribution
of territory among the members of the royal house  19 

 Sidenote  Extent of the Frankish kingdoms in the sixth century  

The Frankish kings succeeded in extending their power over pretty nearly
all the territory that is included to day in France  Belgium  and the
Netherlands  as well as over a goodly portion of western Germany  By
555  when Bavaria had become tributary to the Frankish rulers  their
dominions extended from the Bay of Biscay to a point east of Salzburg 
Considerable districts that the Romans had never succeeded in conquering
had been brought into the developing civilization of western Europe 

 Illustration  The Dominions of the Franks under the Merovingians 

 Sidenote  Division of the Frankish territory into Neustria  Austrasia 
and Burgundy  

As a result of the divisions of the Frankish lands  fifty years after
the death of Clovis three Frankish kingdoms appear on the map  Neustria 
the western kingdom  with its center at Paris or Soissons  was inhabited
mainly by the older Romanized people among whom the Franks had settled 
To the east was Austrasia  with Metz and Aix la Chapelle as its chief
cities  This region was completely German in its population  In these
two there was the prophecy of the future France and Germany  Lastly 
there was the old Burgundian realm  Of the Merovingian kings  as the
line descended from Clovis was called  the last to rule as well as reign
was Dagobert  d  638   who united the whole Frankish territory once more
under his scepter 

 Sidenote  The Frankish nobility  

A new danger  however  threatened the unity of the Frankish kingdom 
namely  the aspirations of the powerful nobles  In the earliest accounts
which we have of the Germans there appear to have been certain families
who enjoyed a recognized preëminence over their companions  In the
course of the various conquests there was a chance for the skillful
leader to raise himself in the favor of the king  It was only natural
that those upon whom the king relied to control distant parts of the
realm should become dangerously ambitious and independent 

 Sidenote  The Mayors of the Palace  

 Sidenote  Foundation of the power of Charlemagne s family  the
so called Carolingians  

Among the positions held by the nobility none was reputed more honorable
than those near the king s person  Of these offices the most influential
was that of the Major Domus  or Mayor of the Palace  who was a species
of prime minister  After Dagobert s death these mayors practically ruled
in the place of the Merovingian monarchs  who became mere  do nothing
kings     rois fainéants   as the French call them  The Austrasian Mayor
of the Palace  Pippin of Heristal  the great grandfather of Charlemagne 
succeeded in getting  in addition to Austrasia  both Neustria and
Burgundy under his control  In this way he laid the foundation of his
family s renown  Upon his death  in 714  his task of consolidating and
defending the vast territories of the Franks devolved upon his more
distinguished son  Charles Martel  i e   the Hammer  20 

 Sidenote  Fusion of the barbarians and the Roman population  

15  As one looks back over the German invasions it is natural to ask
upon what terms the newcomers lived among the old inhabitants of the
Empire  how far they adopted the customs of those among whom they
settled  and how far they clung to their old habits  These questions
cannot be answered very satisfactorily  so little is known of the
confused period of which we have been speaking that it is impossible to
follow closely the amalgamation of the two races 

 Sidenote  The number of the barbarians  

Yet a few things are tolerably clear  In the first place  we must be on
our guard against exaggerating the numbers in the various bodies of
invaders  The writers of the time indicate that the West Goths  when
they were first admitted to the Empire before the battle of Adrianople 
amounted to four or five hundred thousand persons  including men  women 
and children  This is the largest band reported  and it must have been
greatly reduced before the West Goths  after long wanderings and many
battles  finally settled in Spain and southern Gaul  The Burgundians 
when they appear for the first time on the banks of the Rhine  are
reported to have had eighty thousand warriors among them  When Clovis
and his army were baptized the chronicler speaks of  over three
thousand  soldiers who became Christians upon that occasion  This would
seem to indicate that the Frankish king had no larger force at this
time 

Undoubtedly these figures are very meager and unreliable  But the
readiness with which the Germans appear to have adopted the language and
customs of the Romans would tend to prove that the invaders formed but a
small minority of the population  Since hundreds of thousands of
barbarians had been assimilated during the previous five centuries  the
great invasions of the fifth century can hardly have made an abrupt
change in the character of the population 

 Sidenote  Contrast between spoken and written Latin  

The barbarians within the old empire were soon speaking the same
conversational Latin which was everywhere used by the Romans about
them  21  This was much simpler than the elaborate and complicated
language used in books  which we find so much difficulty in learning
nowadays  The speech of the common people was gradually diverging more
and more  in the various countries of southern Europe  from the written
Latin  and finally grew into French  Spanish  Italian  and Portuguese 
But the barbarians did not produce this change  for it had begun before
they came and would have gone on without them  They did no more than
contribute a few convenient words to the new languages 

The Germans appear to have had no dislike for the Romans nor the Romans
for them  except as long as the Germans remained Arian Christians  Where
there was no religious barrier the two races intermarried freely from
the first  The Frankish kings did not hesitate to appoint Romans to
important positions in the government and in the army  just as the
Romans had long been in the habit of employing the barbarians  In only
one respect were the two races distinguished for a time   each had its
particular law 

 Sidenote  The Roman and the German law  

The West Goths in the time of Euric were probably the first to write
down their ancient laws  using the Latin language  Their example was
followed by the Franks  the Burgundians  and later by the Lombards and
other peoples  These codes make up the  Laws of the Barbarians   which
form our most important source of knowledge of the habits and ideas of
the Germans at the time of the invasions  22  For several centuries
following the conquest  the members of the various German tribes appear
to have been judged by the laws of the particular people to which they
belonged  The older inhabitants of the Empire  on the contrary 
continued to have their lawsuits decided according to the Roman law 
This survived all through the Middle Ages in southern Europe  where the
Germans were few  Elsewhere the Germans  more primitive ideas of law
prevailed until the thirteenth or fourteenth century  A good example of
these is the picturesque mediæval ordeal by which the guilt or innocence
of a suspected person was determined 

 Sidenote  Mediæval trials  

The German laws did not provide for the trial  either in the Roman or
the modern sense of the word  of a suspected person  There was no
attempt to gather and weigh evidence and base the decision upon it  Such
a mode of procedure was far too elaborate for the simple minded Germans 
Instead of a regular trial  one of the parties to the case was
designated to prove that his assertions were true by one of the
following methods   1  He might solemnly swear that he was telling the
truth and get as many other persons of his own class as the court
required  to swear that they believed that he was telling the truth 
This was called  compurgation   It was believed that the divine
vengeance would be visited upon those who swore falsely   2  On the
other hand  the parties to the case  or persons representing them  might
meet in combat  on the supposition that Heaven would grant victory to
the right  This was the so called  wager of battle    3  Lastly  one or
other of the parties might be required to submit to the  ordeal  in one
of its various forms  He might plunge his arm into hot water  or carry a
bit of hot iron for some distance  and if at the end of three days he
showed no ill effects  the case was decided in his favor  He might be
ordered to walk over hot plowshares  and if he was not burned  it was
assumed that God had intervened by a miracle to establish the
right  23  This method of trial is but one example of the rude
civilization which displaced the refined and elaborate organization of
the Romans 

 Sidenote  The task of the Middle Ages  

16  The account which has been given of the conditions in the Roman
Empire  and of the manner in which the barbarians occupied its western
part  makes clear the great problem of the Middle Ages  The Germans  no
doubt  varied a good deal in their habits and spirit  The Goths differed
from the Lombards  and the Franks from the Vandals  but they all agreed
in knowing nothing of the art  literature  and science which had been
developed by the Greeks and adopted by the Romans  The invaders were
ignorant  simple  vigorous people  with no taste for anything except
fighting and bodily comfort  Such was the disorder that their coming
produced  that the declining civilization of the Empire was pretty
nearly submerged  The libraries  buildings  and works of art were
destroyed and there was no one to see that they were restored  So the
western world fell back into a condition similar to that in which it had
been before the Romans conquered and civilized it  24 

The loss was  however  temporary  The barbarians did not utterly destroy
what they found  but utilized the ruins of the Roman Empire in their
gradual construction of a new society  They received suggestions from
the Roman methods of agriculture  When they reached a point where they
needed them  they used the models offered by Roman roads and buildings 
In short  the great heritage of skill and invention which had been
slowly accumulated in Egypt  Phœnicia  and Greece  and which formed a
part of the culture which the Romans diffused  did not wholly perish 

 Sidenote  Loss caused by the coming of the barbarians regained during
Middle Ages  

It required about a thousand years to educate the new race  but at last
Europe  including districts never embraced in the Roman Empire  caught
up once more with antiquity  When  in the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries  first Italy  and then the rest of Europe  awoke again to the
beauty and truth of the classical literature and began to emulate the
ancient art  the process of educating the barbarians may be said to have
been completed  Yet the Middle Ages had been by no means a sterile
period  They had added their part to the heritage of the West  From the
union of two great elements  the ancient civilization  which was
completely revived at the opening of the sixteenth century  and the
vigor and the political and social ideals of the Germans  a new thing
was formed  namely  our modern civilization 


     General Reading   By far the most exhaustive work in English upon
     the German invasions is HODGKIN   Italy and her Invaders    very
     bulky and costly  8 vols    36 50   The author has  however  given
     some of the results of his work in his excellent  Dynasty of
     Theodosius   Clarendon Press   1 50   and his  Theodoric the Goth 
      G P  Putnam s Sons   1 50   SERGEANT   The Franks   G P  Putnam s
     Sons   1 50   gives more than is to be found on the subject in
     either Emerton or Oman 




CHAPTER IV

THE RISE OF THE PAPACY


 Sidenote  The greatness of the Church  

17  While the Franks were slowly developing the strength which
Charlemagne employed to found the most extensive realm that has existed
in Europe since the Roman Empire  another government  whose power was
far greater  whose organization was far more perfect  and whose vitality
was infinitely superior to that of the Frankish empire  namely  the
Christian Church  was steadily extending its sway and establishing the
foundations of its later supremacy 

We have already seen how marvelously the Christian communities founded
by the apostles and their fellow missionaries multiplied until  by the
middle of the third century  writers like Cyprian came to conceive of a
 Catholic   or all embracing  Church  We have seen how Constantine first
made Christianity legal  and how his successors worked in the interest
of the new religion  how carefully the Theodosian Code safeguarded the
Church and the Christian clergy  and how harshly those were treated who
ventured to hold another view of Christianity from that sanctioned by
the government  25 

We must now follow this most powerful and permanent of all the
institutions of the later Roman Empire into the Middle Ages  We must
stop a moment to consider the sources of its power  and then see how the
Western  or Latin  portion of Christendom fell apart from the Eastern 
or Greek  region and came to form a separate institution under the
longest and mightiest line of rulers that the world has ever seen  the
Roman bishops  We shall see how a peculiar class of Christians  the
monks  developed  how they joined hands with the clergy  how the monks
and the clergy met the barbarians  subdued and civilized them  and then
ruled them for centuries 

 Sidenote  Sources of the Church s power  

The tremendous power of the Church in the Middle Ages was due  we may be
sure  to the way in which it adapted itself to the ideas and needs of
the time  for no institution can flourish unless it meets the wants of
those who live under it 

 Sidenote  Contrast between pagan and Christian ideas  

One great source of the Church s strength lay in the general fear of
death and judgment to come  which Christianity had brought with it  The
Greeks and Romans of the classical period thought of the next life  when
they thought of it at all  as a very uninteresting existence compared
with that on this earth  One who committed some signal crime might
suffer for it after death with pains similar to those of the hell in
which the Christians believed  But the great part of humanity were
supposed to lead in the next world a shadowy existence  neither sad nor
glad  Religion  even to the devout pagan  was mainly an affair of this
life  the gods were to be propitiated with a view to present happiness
and success 

Since no satisfaction could be expected in the next life  it was
naturally deemed wise to make the most of this one  The possibility of
pleasure ends  so the poet Horace urges  when we join the shades below 
as we all must do soon  Let us  therefore  take advantage of every
harmless pleasure and improve our brief opportunity to enjoy the good
things of earth  We should  however  be reasonable and temperate 
avoiding all excess  for that endangers happiness  Above all  we should
not worry uselessly about the future  which is in the hands of the gods
and beyond our control  Such were the convictions of the majority of
thoughtful pagans 

 Sidenote  Other worldliness of mediæval Christianity  

Christianity opposed this view of life with an entirely different one 
It laid persistent emphasis upon man s existence after death  which it
declared infinitely more important than his brief sojourn in the body 
Under the influence of the Church this conception of life had gradually
supplanted the pagan one in the Roman world  and it was taught to the
barbarians  The other worldliness became so intense that thousands gave
up their ordinary occupations and pleasures altogether  and devoted
their entire attention to preparation for the next life  They shut
themselves in lonely cells  and  not satisfied with giving up most of
their natural pleasures  they inflicted bodily suffering upon themselves
by hunger  cold  and stripes  They trusted that in this way they might
avoid some of the sins into which they were prone to fall  and that  by
self inflicted punishment in this world  they might perchance escape
some of that reserved for them in the next  As most of the writers and
teachers of the Middle Ages belonged to this class of what may be called
professional Christians  i e   the monks  it was natural that their kind
of life should have been regarded  even by those who continued to live
in the world  as the ideal one for the earnest Christian 

 Sidenote  The Church the one agent of salvation  

The barbarians were taught that their fate in the next world depended
largely upon the Church  Its ministers never wearied of presenting the
momentous alternative which faced every man so soon as this fleeting
earthly existence should be over   the alternative between eternal bliss
and perpetual  unspeakable physical torment  Only those who had been
duly baptized could hope to reach heaven  but baptism washed away only
past sins and did not prevent constant relapse into new ones  These 
unless their guilt was removed through the instrumentality of the
Church  would surely drag the soul down to perdition 

 Sidenote  Miracles a source of the Church s power  

The divine power of the Church was  furthermore  established in the eyes
of the people by the miraculous works which her saints were constantly
performing  They healed the sick and succored those in distress  They
struck down with speedy and signal disaster those who opposed the Church
or treated her holy rites with contempt  To the reader of to day the
frequency of the miracles recorded in mediæval writings seems
astonishing  The chronicles and biographies are filled with accounts of
them  and no one appears to have doubted their common occurrence  26 

 Sidenote  The Church and the Roman government  

18  The chief importance of the Church for the student of mediæval
history does not lie  however  in its religious functions  vital as they
were  but rather in its remarkable relations to the civil government  At
first the Church and the imperial government were on a friendly footing
of mutual respect and support  So long as the Roman Empire remained
strong and active there was no chance for the clergy to free themselves
from the control of the emperor  even if they had been disposed to do
so  He made such laws for the Church as he saw fit and the clergy did
not complain  The government was  indeed  indispensable to them  It
undertook to root out paganism by destroying the heathen shrines and
preventing heathen sacrifices  and it harshly punished those who refused
to accept the teachings sanctioned by the Church 

 Sidenote  The Church begins to seek independence  

But as the barbarians came in and the great Empire began to fall apart 
there was a growing tendency among the churchmen in the West to resent
the interference of rulers whom they no longer respected  They managed
gradually to free themselves in large part from the control of the civil
government  They then proceeded themselves to assume many of the duties
of government  which the weak and disorderly states into which the Roman
Empire fell were unable to perform properly  In 502  a church council at
Rome declared a decree of Odoacer s null and void  on the ground that no
layman had a right to interfere in the affairs of the Church  One of the
bishops of Rome  Pope Gelasius I  d  496  briefly stated the principle
upon which the Church rested its claims  as follows   Two powers govern
the world  the priestly and the kingly  The first is indisputably the
superior  for the priest is responsible to God for the conduct of even
the emperors themselves   Since no one denied that the eternal interests
of mankind  which devolved upon the Church  were infinitely more
important than those matters of mere worldly expediency which the state
regulated  it was natural for the clergy to hold that  in case of
conflict  the Church and its officers  rather than the king  should have
the last word 

 Sidenote  The Church begins to perform the functions of government  

It was one thing  however  for the Church to claim the right to regulate
its own affairs  it was quite another for it to assume the functions
which the Roman government had previously performed and which our
governments perform to day  such as the maintenance of order  the
management of public education  the trial of lawsuits  etc  It did not 
however  exactly usurp the prerogatives of the civil power  but rather
offered itself as a substitute for it when no efficient civil government
any longer existed  For there were no states  in the modern sense of the
word  in western Europe for many centuries after the final destruction
of the Roman Empire  The authority of the various kings was seldom
sufficient to keep their realms in order  There were always many
powerful landholders scattered throughout the kingdom who did pretty
much what they pleased and settled their grudges against their fellows
by neighborhood wars  Fighting was the main business as well as the
chief amusement of the noble class  The king was unable to maintain
peace and protect the oppressed  however anxious he may have been to do
so 

Under these circumstances  it naturally fell to the admirably organized
Church to keep order  when it could  by threats or persuasion  to see
that sworn contracts were kept  that the wills of the dead were
administered  and marriage obligations observed  It took the defenseless
widow and orphan under its protection and dispensed charity  it promoted
education at a time when few laymen  however rich and noble  pretended
even to read  These conditions serve to explain why the Church was
finally able greatly to extend the powers which it had enjoyed under the
Roman Empire  and why it undertook functions which seem to us to belong
to the state rather than to a religious organization 

 Sidenote  Origin of papal power  

19  We must now turn to a consideration of the origin and growth of the
supremacy of the popes  who  by raising themselves to the head of the
Western Church  became in many respects more powerful than any of the
kings and princes with whom they frequently found themselves in bitter
conflict 

 Sidenote  Prestige of the Roman Christian community  

While we cannot discover  either in the Acts of the Council of Nicæa or
in the Theodosian Code  compiled more than a century later  any
recognition of the supreme headship of the Bishop of Rome  there is
little doubt that he and his flock had almost from the very first
enjoyed a leading place among the Christian communities  The Roman
Church was the only one in the West which could claim the distinction of
having been founded by the immediate followers of Christ   the  two most
glorious apostles  

 Sidenote  Belief that Peter was the first Bishop of Rome  

The New Testament speaks repeatedly of Paul s presence in Rome  and
Peter s is implied  There had always been  moreover  a persistent
tradition  accepted throughout the Christian Church  that Peter was the
first Bishop of Rome  While there is no complete documentary proof for
this belief  it appears to have been generally accepted at least as
early as the middle of the second century  There is  certainly  no
conflicting tradition  no rival claimant  The  belief itself   whether
or not it corresponds with actual events  is indubitably a fact  and a
fact of the greatest historical importance  Peter enjoyed a certain
preëminence among the other apostles and was singled out by Christ upon
several occasions  In a passage of the New Testament which has affected
political history more profoundly than the edicts of the most powerful
monarch  Christ says   And I say also unto thee  That thou art Peter 
and upon this rock I will build my church  and the gates of hell shall
not prevail against it  And I will give unto thee the keys of the
kingdom of heaven  and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be
bound in heaven  and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be
loosed in heaven   27 

 Sidenote  The Roman Church the mother church  

It was thus natural that the Roman Church should early have been looked
upon as the mother church in the West  Its doctrines were considered the
purest  since they had been handed down from its exalted founders  When
there was a difference of opinion in regard to the truth of a particular
teaching  it was natural that all should turn to the Bishop of Rome for
his view  Moreover  the majesty of the capital of the world helped to
exalt its bishop above his fellows  It was long  however  before all the
other bishops  especially those in the large cities  were ready to
accept unconditionally the authority of the Bishop of Rome  although
they acknowledged his leading position and that of the Roman community 

 Sidenote  Obscurity of early bishops of Rome  

We know comparatively little of the bishops of Rome during the first
three centuries of the Church s existence  Even as the undisputed heads
of their persecuted sect  they could not have begun to exercise the
political influence which they later enjoyed  until Christianity had
gained the ascendancy and the power of the Empire had become greatly
weakened 

 Sidenote  Period of the Church fathers  

We are  however  much better instructed in regard to the Church of the
fourth and early fifth centuries  because the century following the
Council of Nicæa was  in the history of church literature  what the
Elizabethan era was in that of England  It was the era of the great
 fathers  of Christian theology  to whom all theologians since have
looked back as to the foremost interpreters of their religion  Among the
chief of these were Athanasius  d  373   to whom is attributed the
formulation of the creed of the Orthodox Church as opposed to the
Arians  against whom he waged unremitting war  Basil  d  379   the
promoter of the monastic life  Ambrose  Bishop of Milan  d  397   Jerome
 d  420   who prepared a new Latin version of the Scriptures  which
became the standard  Vulgate  edition  and  above all  Augustine
 354 430   whose voluminous writings have exercised an unrivaled
influence upon the minds of Christian thinkers since his day 

Since the church fathers were chiefly interested in matters of doctrine 
they say little of the organization of the Church  and it is not clear
from their writings that the Bishop of Rome was accorded as yet the
supreme and dominating position which the popes later enjoyed 
Nevertheless  Augustine calls a contemporaneous Bishop of Rome the  head
of the Western Church   and almost immediately after his death one
ascended the episcopal chair at Rome whose ambition  energy  and
personal bravery were a promise of those qualities which were to render
his successors the kings of kings 

 Sidenote  Leo the Great  440 461  

 Sidenote  Decree of Valentinian III  

With the accession of Leo the Great  440 461  the history of the papacy
may  in one sense  be said to have begun  At his instance  Valentinian
III  the emperor of the West  issued a decree in 445 declaring the power
of the Bishop of Rome supreme  by reason of Peter s merits and apostolic
headship  and by reason of the majesty of the city of Rome  He commanded
that the bishops throughout the West should receive as law all that the
Bishop of Rome sanctioned  and that any bishop refusing to answer a
summons to Rome should be forced to obey by the imperial governor  But a
council at Chalcedon  six years later  raised new Rome on the Bosphorus
 Constantinople  to an ecclesiastical equality with old Rome on the
Tiber  The bishops of both cities were to have a co superiority over all
the other prelates  This decree was  however  never accepted in the
Western or Latin Church  which was gradually separating from the Eastern
or Greek Church whose natural head was Constantinople  28  Although the
powers to which Leo laid claim were not as yet even clearly stated and
there were times of adversity to come when for years they appeared an
empty boast  still his emphatic assertion of the supremacy of the Roman
bishop was a great step toward bringing the Western Church under a
single head 

 Sidenote  Duties that devolved upon the early popes  

Not long after the death of Leo the Great  Odoacer put an end to the
western line of emperors  Then Theodoric and his East Goths settled in
Italy  only to be followed by still less desirable intruders  the
Lombards  During this tumultuous period the people of Rome  and even of
all Italy  came to regard the pope as their natural leader  The emperor
was far away  and his officers  who managed to hold a portion of central
Italy around Rome and Ravenna  were glad to accept the aid and counsel
of the pope  In Rome the pope watched over the elections of the city
officials and directed in what manner the public money should be spent 
He had to manage and defend the great tracts of land in different parts
of Italy which from time to time had been given to the bishopric of
Rome  He negotiated with the Germans and even directed the generals sent
against them 

 Sidenote  Gregory the Great  590 604  

20  The pontificate of Gregory the Great  one of the half dozen most
distinguished heads that the Church has ever had  shows how great a part
the papacy could play  Gregory  who was the son of a rich Roman senator 
was appointed by the emperor to the honorable office of prefect  He
began to fear  however  that his proud position and fine clothes were
making him vain and worldly  His pious mother and his study of the
writings of Augustine  Jerome  and Ambrose led him  upon the death of
his father  to spend all his handsome fortune in founding seven
monasteries  One of these he established in his own house and subjected
himself to such severe discipline and deprivations that his health never
entirely recovered from them  He might  in his enthusiasm for
monasticism  have brought himself to an early grave if the pope had not
commanded him to undertake a difficult mission to Constantinople  there
he had his first opportunity to show his great ability in conducting
delicate negotiations 

 Sidenote  Ancient Rome becomes mediæval Rome  

When Gregory was chosen pope  in 590  and most reluctantly left his
monastery  ancient Rome  the capital of the Empire  was already
transforming itself into mediæval Rome  the capital of Christendom  The
temples of the gods had furnished materials for the many Christian
churches  The tombs of the apostles Peter and Paul were soon to become
the center of religious attraction and the goal of pilgrimages from
every part of western Europe  Just as Gregory assumed office a great
plague was raging in the city  In true mediæval fashion  he arranged a
solemn procession in order to obtain from heaven a cessation of the
pest  Then the archangel Michael was seen over the tomb of Hadrian 29 
sheathing his fiery sword as a sign that the wrath of the Lord had been
turned away  With Gregory we leave behind us the history of the Rome of
Cæsar and Trajan and enter upon that of Innocent III and Leo X 

 Sidenote  Gregory s writings  

Gregory enjoyed an unrivaled reputation during the Middle Ages as a
writer  He is reckoned with Augustine  Ambrose  and Jerome as one of the
four great Latin  fathers  of the Church  His works show  however  how
much less cultivated his period was than that of his predecessors  His
most popular book was his  Dialogues   a collection of accounts of
miracles and popular legends  It is hard to believe that it could have
been composed by the greatest man of the time and that it was designed
for adults  In his commentary on Job  Gregory warns the reader that he
need not be surprised to find mistakes in grammar  since in dealing with
so high a theme a writer should not stop to make sure whether his cases
and tenses are right  30 

 Illustration  The Castle San Angelo  formerly the Tomb of the Emperor
Hadrian 

 Sidenote  Gregory as a statesman  

Gregory s letters show clearly what the papacy was coming to mean for
Europe when in the hands of a really great man  While he assumed the
humble title of  Servant of the servants of God   which the popes still
use  Gregory was a statesman whose influence extended far and wide  It
devolved upon him to govern the city of Rome   as it did upon his
successors down to the year 1870   for the eastern emperor s control had
become merely nominal  He had also to keep the Lombards out of central
Italy  which they failed to conquer largely on account of the valiant
defense of the popes  These duties were functions of the civil power 
and in assuming them Gregory may be said to have founded the temporal
power of the popes 

 Sidenote  Gregory s missionary undertakings  

Beyond the borders of Italy  Gregory was in constant communication with
the emperor  with the rulers of Austrasia  Neustria  and Burgundy 
Everywhere he used his influence to have good clergymen chosen as
bishops  and everywhere he watched over the interests of the
monasteries  But his chief importance in the history of the papacy is
attributable to the missionary enterprises which he undertook  through
which the great countries which were one day to be called England 
France  and Germany were brought under the sway of the Roman Church and
its head  the pope 

Gregory was  as we have seen  an enthusiastic monk  and he naturally
relied chiefly upon the monks in his great work of converting the
heathen  Consequently  before considering his missionary achievements 
we must glance at the origin and character of the monks  who are so
conspicuous throughout the Middle Ages 


     General References   There is no satisfactory history of the
     mediæval Church in one volume  Perhaps the best short account in
     English is FISHER   History of the Christian Church   Charles
     Scribner s Sons   3 50   MOELLER   History of the Christian
     Church   Vols  I II  Swan Sonnenschein   4 00 a vol    is a dry but
     very reliable manual with full references to the literature of the
     subject  ALZOG   Manual of Universal Church History   Clarke 
     Cincinnati  3 vols    10 00   is a careful presentation by a
     Catholic scholar  MILMAN   History of Latin Christianity   although
     rather old  is both scholarly and readable  and is to be found in
     most libraries  GIESELER   Ecclesiastical History   5 vols   now
     out of print  but not difficult to obtain   is really a great
     collection of the most interesting extracts from the sources  with
     very little indeed from the author s hand  This and Moeller are
     invaluable to the advanced student  HATCH   Growth of Church
     Institutions   Whittaker   1 50   gives an admirably simple account
     of the most important phases of the organization of the Church 




CHAPTER V

THE MONKS AND THE CONVERSION OF THE GERMANS


 Sidenote  Importance of the monks as a class  

21  It would be difficult to overestimate the variety and extent of the
influence that the monks exercised for centuries in Europe  The proud
annals of the Benedictines  Franciscans  Dominicans  and Jesuits contain
many a distinguished name  The most eminent philosophers  scientists 
historians  artists  poets  and statesmen may be found among their
ranks  Among those whose achievements we shall study later are The
Venerable Bede  Boniface  Abelard  Thomas Aquinas  Roger Bacon  Fra
Angelico  Savonarola  Luther  Erasmus   all these  and many others who
have been leaders in various branches of human activity  were monks 

 Sidenote  Monasticism appealed to many different classes  

The strength of monasticism lay in its appeal to many different classes
of persons  The world became a less attractive place as the successive
invasions of the barbarians brought ever increasing disorder  The
monastery was the natural refuge not only of the spiritually minded  but
of those of a studious or contemplative disposition who disliked the
life of a soldier and were disinclined to face the dangers and
uncertainties of the times  The monastic life was safe and peaceful  as
well as holy  Even the rude and unscrupulous warriors hesitated to
destroy the property or disturb the life of those who were believed to
enjoy Heaven s special favor  The monastery furnished  too  a refuge for
the disconsolate  an asylum for the disgraced  and food and shelter for
the indolent who would otherwise have had to earn their living  There
were  therefore  many motives which helped to fill the monasteries 
Kings and nobles  for the good of their souls  readily gave land upon
which to found colonies of monks  and there were plenty of remote spots
in the mountains and forests to tempt the recluse 

 Sidenote  Necessity for the regulation of monastic life  

Monastic communities first developed on a large scale in Egypt in the
fourth century  Just as the Germans were winning their first great
victory at Adrianople  St  Jerome was engaged in showing the advantages
of the ascetic Christian life  which was a new thing in the West  In the
sixth century monasteries multiplied so rapidly in western Europe that
it became necessary to establish definite rules for the numerous
communities which proposed to desert the ordinary ways of the world and
lead a peculiar life apart  The monastic regulations which had been
drawn up in the East did not answer the purpose  for the climate of the
West and the temperament of the Latin peoples differed too much from
those of the Orient  Accordingly St  Benedict drew up  about the year
526  a sort of constitution for the monastery of Monte Cassino  in
southern Italy  of which he was the head  This was so sagacious  and so
well met the needs of the monastic life  that it was rapidly accepted by
the other monasteries and gradually became the  rule  according to which
all the western monks lived  31 

 Sidenote  The Rule of St  Benedict  

The Rule of St  Benedict is as important as any constitution that was
ever drawn up for a state  It is for the most part natural and
wholesome  It provides that  since every one is not fitted for the
ascetic life  the candidate for admission to the monastery shall pass
through a period of probation  called the  novitiate   before he is
permitted to take the solemn and irrevocable vow  The brethren shall
elect their head  the  abbot   whom they must obey unconditionally in
all that is not sinful  Along with prayer and meditation  the monks are
to work at manual occupations and cultivate the soil  They shall also
read and teach  Those who were incapacitated for outdoor work were
assigned lighter tasks  such as copying books  The monk was not
permitted to own anything in his own right  he pledged himself to
perpetual and absolute poverty  and everything he used was the property
of the convent  Along with the vows of obedience and poverty  he also
took that of chastity  which bound him never to marry  For not only was
the single life considered more holy than the married  but the monastic
organization would  of course  have been impossible unless the monks
remained single  Aside from these restrictions  the monks were commanded
to live rational and natural lives and not to abuse their bodies or
sacrifice their physical vigor by undue fasting in the supposed interest
of their souls  These sensible provisions were directed against the
excesses of asceticism  of which there had been many instances in the
East 

 Sidenote  The monks copy  and so preserve  the Latin authors  

The influence of the Benedictine monks upon Europe is incalculable  From
their numbers no less than twenty four popes and forty six hundred
bishops and archbishops have been chosen  They boast almost sixteen
thousand writers  some of great distinction  Their monasteries furnished
retreats where the scholar might study and write in spite of the
prevailing disorder of the times  The copying of books  as has been
said  was a natural occupation of the monks  Doubtless their work was
often done carelessly  with little heart and less understanding  But 
with the great loss of manuscripts due to the destruction of libraries
and the indifference of individual book owners  it was most essential
that new copies should be made  Even poor and incorrect ones were better
than none  It was the monks who prevented the loss of a great part of
Latin literature  which  without them  would probably have reached us
only in scanty remains 

 Sidenote  The monks aid in the material development of Europe  

The monks also helped to rescue honest manual labor  which they believed
to be a great aid to salvation  from the disrepute into which slavery
had brought it in earlier times  They set the example of careful
cultivation on the lands about their monasteries and in this way
introduced better methods into the regions where they settled  They
entertained travelers at a time when there were few or no inns and so
increased the intercourse between the various parts of Europe  32 

 Sidenote  The regular and secular clergy  

The Benedictine monks  as well as later monastic orders  were ardent and
faithful supporters of the papacy  The Roman Church  which owes much to
them  appreciated the aid which they might furnish and extended to them
many of the privileges enjoyed by the clergy  Indeed the monks were
reckoned as clergymen and were called the  regular  clergy because they
lived according to a  regula   or rule  to distinguish them from the
 secular  clergy  who continued to live in the world   saeculum   and
took no monastic vows 

 Sidenote  Monks and secular clergy supplement each other  

The Church  ever anxious to maintain as far reaching a control over its
subjects as that of the Roman Empire  whose power it inherited  could
hardly expect its busy officers  with their multiform duties and
constant relations with men  to represent the ideal of contemplative
Christianity which was then held in higher esteem than the active life 
The secular clergy performed the ceremonies of the Church  administered
its business  and guarded its property  while the regular clergy
illustrated the necessity of personal piety and self denial  Monasticism
at its best was a monitor standing beside the Church and constantly
warning it against permitting the Christian life to sink into mere
mechanical and passive acceptance of its ceremonies as all sufficient
for salvation  It supplied the element of personal responsibility and
spiritual ambition upon which Protestantism has laid so much stress 

 Sidenote  The monks as missionaries  

22  The first great service of the monks was their missionary labors  To
these the later strength of the Roman Church is in no small degree due 
for the monks made of the unconverted Germans not merely Christians  but
also dutiful subjects of the pope  The first people to engage their
attention were the heathen Germans who had conquered the once Christian
Britain 

 Sidenote  Early Britain  

The islands which are now known as the kingdom of Great Britain and
Ireland were  at the opening of the Christian era  occupied by several
Celtic peoples of whose customs and religion we know almost nothing 
Julius Cæsar commenced the conquest of the islands  55 B C    but the
Romans never succeeded in establishing their power beyond the wall which
they built  from the Clyde to the Firth of Forth  to keep out the wild
Celtic tribes of the North  Even south of the wall the country was not
completely Romanized  and the Celtic tongue has actually survived down
to the present day in Wales 

 Sidenote  Saxons and Angles conquer Britain  

At the opening of the fifth century the barbarian invasions forced Rome
to withdraw its legions from Britain in order to protect its frontiers
on the continent  The island was thus left to be gradually conquered by
the Germans  mainly Saxons and Angles  who came across the North Sea
from the region south of Denmark  Almost all record of what went on
during the two centuries following the departure of the Romans has
disappeared  No one knows the fate of the original Celtic inhabitants of
England  It is unlikely that they were  as was formerly supposed  all
killed or driven to the mountain districts of Wales  More probably they
were gradually lost among the dominating Germans with whom they merged
into one people  The Saxon and Angle chieftains established petty
kingdoms  of which there were seven or eight at the time when Gregory
the Great became pope 

 Sidenote  Conversion of Britain  

Gregory  while still a simple monk  had been struck with the beauty of
some Angles whom he saw one day in the slave market of Rome  When he
learned who they were he was grieved that such handsome beings should
still belong to the kingdom of the Prince of Darkness  and  had he been
permitted  he himself would have gone as a missionary to their people 
Upon becoming pope he sent forty monks to England from one of the
monasteries that he had founded  placing a prior  Augustine  at their
head and designating him in advance as Bishop of England  The heathen
king of Kent  in whose territory the monks landed with fear and
trembling  597   had a Christian wife  the daughter of a Frankish king 
Through her influence the monks were kindly received and were assigned
an ancient church at Canterbury  dating from the Roman occupation before
the German invasions  Here they established a monastery  and from this
center the conversion  first of Kent and then of the whole island  was
gradually effected  Canterbury has always maintained its early
preëminence and may still be considered the religious capital of
England  33 

 Illustration  Ancient Church of St  Martin s  Canterbury 

 Sidenote  The Irish monks  

Augustine and his monks were not  however  the only Christians in the
British Isles  Britain had been converted to Christianity when it was a
Roman province  and some of the missionaries  led by St  Patrick  d 
about 469   had made their way into Ireland and established a center of
Christianity there  When the Germans overran Britain and reheathenized
it  the Irish monks and clergy were too far off to be troubled by the
barbarians  They knew little of the traditions of the Roman Church and
diverged from its customs in some respects  They celebrated Easter upon
a different date from that observed by the Roman Church and employed a
different style of tonsure  Missionaries from this Irish church were
busy converting the northern regions of Britain  when the Roman monks
under Augustine began their work in the southern part of the island 

 Sidenote  Conflict between the Roman Church and the Irish monks  

There was sure to be trouble between the two parties  The Irish clergy 
while they professed great respect for the pope and did not wish to be
cut off from the rest of the Christian Church  were unwilling to abandon
their peculiar usages and accept those sanctioned by Rome  Nor would
they recognize as their superior the Archbishop of Canterbury  whom the
pope had made the head of the British church  The pope  on his part 
felt that it was all important that these isolated Christians should
become a part of the great organization of which he claimed to be the
head  Neither party would make any concessions  and for two generations
each went its own way  cherishing a bitter hostility toward the other 

 Sidenote  Victory of Roman Church  

At last the Roman Church won the victory  as it so often did in later
struggles  In 664  through the influence of the king of Northumbria who
did not wish to risk being on bad terms with the pope  the Roman
Catholic form of faith was solemnly recognized in an assembly at Whitby 
and the leader of the Irish missionaries sadly withdrew to Ireland 

 Illustration  Map of Christian Missions 

The king of Northumbria  upon opening the Council of Whitby  said  that
it was proper that those who served one God should observe one rule of
conduct and not depart from one another in the ways of celebrating the
holy mysteries  since they all hoped for the same kingdom of heaven  
That a remote island of Europe should set up its traditions against the
customs sanctioned by the rest of Christendom appeared to him highly
unreasonable  This faith in the necessary unity of the Church is one of
the secrets of its strength  England became a part of the ever growing
territory embraced in the Catholic Church and remained as faithful to
the pope as any other Catholic country  down to the defection of Henry
VIII in the early part of the sixteenth century 

 Sidenote  Early culture in England  

 Sidenote  The Venerable Bede  

The consolidation of the rival churches in Great Britain was followed by
a period of general enthusiasm for Rome and its literature and culture 
Lindisfarne  Wearmouth  and other English monasteries became centers of
learning unrivaled perhaps in the rest of Europe  A constant intercourse
was maintained with Rome  Masons and glassmakers were brought across the
Channel to replace the wooden churches of Britain by stone edifices in
the style of the Romans  The young clergy were taught Latin and
sometimes Greek  Copies of the ancient classics were brought from the
continent and reproduced  The most distinguished man of letters of the
seventh and early eighth centuries was the English monk Bæda  often
called The Venerable Bede  673 735   from whose admirable history of the
Church in England most of our information about the period is
derived  34 

 Sidenote  Irish missionaries on the continent  

 Sidenote  St  Columban and St  Gall  

23  From England missionaries carried the enthusiasm for the Church back
across the Channel  In spite of the conversion of Clovis and the
wholesale baptism of his soldiers  the Franks  especially those farthest
north  had been very imperfectly Christianized  A few years before
Augustine landed in Kent  St  Columban  one of the Irish missionaries
of whom we have spoken  landed in Gaul  He went from place to place
founding monasteries and gaining the respect of the people by his rigid
self denial and by the miracles that he performed  He even penetrated
among the still wholly pagan Alemanni about the Lake of Constance  When
driven away by their pagan king  he turned his attention to the Lombards
in northern Italy  where he died in 615  35  St  Gall  one of his
followers  remained near the Lake of Constance and attracted about him
so many disciples and companions that a great monastery grew up which
was named after him and became one of the most celebrated in central
Europe  Other Irish missionaries penetrated into the forests of
Thuringia and Bavaria  The German church looks back  however  to an
English missionary as its real founder 

 Sidenote  St  Boniface  the apostle to the Germans  

In 718  about a hundred years after the death of St  Columban  St 
Boniface  an English monk  was sent by the pope as an apostle to the
Germans  After four years spent in reconnoitering the field of his
future labors  he returned to Rome and was made a missionary bishop 
taking the same oath of obedience to the pope that the bishops in the
immediate vicinity of Rome were accustomed to take  Indeed absolute
subordination to the pope was a part of Boniface s religion  and he
became a powerful agent in promoting the supremacy of the Roman see 

Under the protection of the powerful Frankish mayor of the palace 
Charles Martel  Boniface carried on his missionary work with such zeal
that he succeeded in bringing all the older Christian communities which
had been established by the Irish missionaries under the papal control 
as well as in converting many of the more remote German tribes who
still clung to their old pagan beliefs  His energetic methods are
illustrated by the story of how he cut down the sacred oak of Odin at
Fritzlar  in Hesse  and used the wood to build a chapel  around which a
monastery soon grew up  In 732 Boniface was raised to the dignity of
Archbishop of Mayence and proceeded to establish  in the newly converted
region  the German bishoprics of Salzburg  Regensburg  Würzburg  Erfurt 
and several others  this gives us some idea of the geographical extent
of his labors 

 Sidenote  Boniface reforms the church in Gaul and brings it into
subjection to the pope  

After organizing the German church he turned his attention  with the
hearty approval of the pope and the support of the Frankish rulers  to a
general reformation of the church in Gaul  Here the clergy were sadly
demoralized  and the churches and monasteries had been despoiled of much
of their property in the constant turmoil of the time  Boniface
succeeded  with the help of Charles Martel  in bettering affairs  and
through his efforts the venerable church of Gaul  almost as old as that
of Rome itself  was brought under the supremacy of the pope  In 748 the
assembled bishops of Gaul bound themselves to maintain the Catholic
unity of faith and follow strictly the precepts of the vicar of St 
Peter  the pope  so that they might be reckoned among Peter s sheep 


     General Reading   The best history of the monks to be had in
     English is MONTALEMBERT   The Monks of the West from St  Benedict
     to St  Bernard   Longmans  Green   Co   6 vols    15 00   The
     writer s enthusiasm and his excellent style make his work very
     attractive  The advanced student will gain much from TAYLOR 
      Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages   The Macmillan Company 
      1 75   Chapter VII  on the origin and spirit of monasticism  See
     also HARNACK   Monasticism   Scribners  50 cents   The works on
     church history referred to at the end of the preceding chapter all
     contain some account of the monks 




CHAPTER VI

CHARLES MARTEL AND PIPPIN


 Sidenote  Charles Martel  Frankish mayor of the palace  714 741  

24  Just as the pope was becoming the acknowledged head of the Western
Church  the Frankish realms came successively under the rule of two
great statesmen  Charles Martel and his son Pippin the Short  who laid
the foundation of Charlemagne s vast empire 

 Sidenote  Difficulty of holding together a kingdom in the early Middle
Ages  

The difficulties which Charles Martel had to face were much the same as
those which for centuries to follow confronted the sovereigns of western
Europe  The great problem of the mediæval ruler was to make his power
felt throughout his whole territory in spite of the many rich and
ambitious officials  bishops  and abbots who eagerly took advantage of
all the king s weaknesses and embarrassments to make themselves
practically supreme in their respective districts 

 Sidenote  Origin of counts and dukes  

The two classes of officers of which we hear most were the counts
 Latin   comites   and the dukes  Latin   duces    A count ordinarily
represented the king within the district comprised in an old
municipality of the Empire  Over a number of counts the king might place
a duke  Both of these titles were borrowed by the Germans from the names
of Roman officials  While the king appointed  and might dismiss  these
officers when he pleased  there was a growing tendency for them to hold
their positions for life 

We find Charles fighting the dukes of Aquitaine  Bavaria  and Alemannia 
each of whom was endeavoring to make the territory which he was deputed
to rule in the king s interest a separate and independent country under
his own supremacy  By successive campaigns against these rebellious
magnates  Charles succeeded in reuniting all those outlying districts
that tended to forget or ignore their connection with the Frankish
empire 

 Sidenote  Charles and his bishops  

The bishops proved almost  if not quite  as troublesome to the mayor of
the palace as the dukes  and later the counts  It is true that Charles
kept the choice of the bishops in his own hands and refused to give to
the clergy and people of the diocese the privilege of electing their
head  as the rules of the Church prescribed  But when a bishop had once
got possession of the lands attached to the bishopric and exercised the
wide powers and influence which fell to him  he was often tempted 
especially if he were a nobleman  to use his privileged position to
establish a practically independent principality  The same was true of
the heads of powerful monasteries  These dangerous bishops and abbots
Charles deposed in wholesale fashion  He substituted his own friends for
them with little regard to the rules of the Church  for instance  he
bestowed on his nephew the three bishoprics of Paris  Rouen  and Bayeux 
besides two monasteries  The new incumbents were  however  no better
than the old  they were  indeed  in spite of their clerical robes  only
laymen  who continued to fight and hunt in their customary manner 

The most famous of Charles  deeds was his decisive defeat of the
advancing Mohammedans who were pressing into Gaul from Spain  Before
speaking of this a word must be said of the invaders and their religion 
for the Saracens  as the followers of Mohammed were commonly called 
will come into our story of western Europe now and then  especially
during the Crusades 

 Sidenote  Mohammed  571 632  

25  Just as Gregory the Great was dying in Rome  leaving to his
successors a great heritage of spiritual and temporal influence  a young
Arab in far off Mecca was meditating upon the mysteries of life and
laying the foundation of a religious power rivaling even that of the
popes  Before the time of Mohammed the Arabs had played no important
part in the world s history  The scattered tribes were at war with one
another  and each worshiped its own gods  when it worshiped at all  But
when the peoples of the desert accepted Mohammed as their prophet and
his religion as theirs  they became an irresistible force for the
dissemination of the new teaching and for the subjugation of the world 

 Sidenote  The Hejira  622  

Mohammed came of a good family  but was reduced by poverty to enter the
employ of a rich widow  named Kadijah  who fell in love with him and
became his wife  She was his first convert and kept up his courage when
few among his fellow townsmen in Mecca would believe in his visions or
accept the teachings which he claimed to receive direct from the angel
Gabriel  Finally he discovered that his many enemies were planning to
kill him  so he fled to the neighboring town of Medina  where he had
friends  His flight  the Hejira   which took place in the year 622  was
taken by his followers as the beginning of a new era   the year one  as
Mohammedans reckon time  A war ensued between the people of Mecca and
those in and about Medina who supported Mohammed  It was eight years
before he reëntered Mecca  the religious center of Arabia  with a
victorious army  Before his death in 632 he had received the adhesion of
all the Arab chiefs  and his faith  Islam  which means  submission to
God    was accepted throughout the Arabian peninsula 

 Sidenote  The Koran and the religion of Mohammed  

Mohammed was accustomed to fall into a trance from time to time  after
which he would recite to his eager listeners the messages which he
received from Heaven  These were collected into a volume shortly after
his death  and make up the Koran  the Bible of the Mohammedan  36  This
contains all the fundamental beliefs of the new religion  as well as the
laws under which the faithful were to live  It proclaims one God   the
Lord of the worlds  the merciful  the compassionate   and Mohammed as
his prophet  It announces a day of judgment in which each shall receive
his reward for the deeds done in the flesh  and either be admitted to
paradise or banished to an eternally burning hell  Those who die
fighting for the sacred cause shall find themselves in a high garden 
where   content with their past endeavors   they shall hear no foolish
word and shall recline in rich brocades upon soft cushions and rugs and
be served by surpassingly beautiful maidens  Islam has much in common
with Judaism and Christianity  Jesus even has a place in it  but only as
one of the prophets  like Abraham  Moses  and others  who have brought
religious truth to mankind 

The religion of Mohammed was simpler than that of the mediæval Christian
Church  It provided for no priesthood  nor for any elaborate rites and
ceremonies  Five times a day the faithful Mohammedan must pray  always
with his face turned toward Mecca  One month in the year he must fast
during the daytime  If he is educated  he will know the Koran by heart 
The mosque is a house of prayer and the place for the reading of the
Koran  no altars or images are permitted in it 

 Sidenote  Mohammedan conquests  

Mohammed s successor assumed the title of caliph  Under him the Arabs
went forth to conquer the great territories to the north of them 
belonging to the Persians and the Roman emperor at Constantinople  They
met with marvelous success  Within ten years after Mohammed s death the
Arabs had established a great empire with its capital at Damascus  from
whence the caliph ruled over Arabia  Persia  Syria  and Egypt  In the
following decades new conquests were made all along the coast of Africa 
and in 708 Tangier was taken and the Arabs could look across the Straits
of Gibraltar to Spain  37 

 Illustration  Map of Arabic Conquests 

 Sidenote  The Arabs in Spain  

The kingdom of the West Goths was in no condition to defend itself when
a few Arabs and a much larger number of Berbers  inhabitants of northern
Africa  ventured to cross over  Some of the Spanish towns held out for a
time  but the invaders found allies in the numerous Jews who had been
shamefully treated by their Christian countrymen  As for the innumerable
serfs who worked on the great estates of the aristocracy  a change of
landlords made very little difference to them  In 711 the Arabs and
Berbers gained a great battle  and the peninsula was gradually overrun
by new immigrants from Africa  In seven years the Mohammedans were
masters of almost the whole region south of the Pyrenees  They then
began to cross into Gaul and took possession of the district about
Narbonne  For some years the duke of Aquitaine kept them in check  but
in 732 they collected a large army  defeated the duke near Bordeaux 
advanced to Poitiers  where they burned the church  and then set out for
Tours 

 Sidenote  Battle of Tours  732  

Charles Martel at once sent out a summons to all who could bear arms
and  in the same year  met and repulsed the Mohammedans near Tours  We
know very little indeed of the details of the conflict  but it is
certain that the followers of Mohammed retreated and that they never
made another attempt to conquer western Europe 

 Sidenote  Pippin and Carloman  

 Sidenote  Abdication of Carloman  

26  Charles was able  before his death in 741  to secure the succession
to his office of mayor of the palace for his two sons  Pippin and
Carloman  The brothers left the nominal king on the throne  but he had
nothing to do  as the chronicler tells us   but to be content with his
name of king  his flowing hair and long beard  to sit on his throne and
play the ruler  listening to the ambassadors who came from all
directions  and giving them the answers that had been taught him  as if
of his own sovereign will  In reality  however  he had nothing but the
royal name and a beggarly income at the will of the mayor of the
palace   The new mayors had succeeded in putting down all opposition
when  to the astonishment of every one  Carloman abdicated and assumed
the gown of a monk  Pippin took control of the whole Frankish dominion 
and we find the unusual statement in the Frankish annals that  the whole
land enjoyed peace for two years   749 750  

 Sidenote  Pippin assumes the crown with the approbation of the pope 
752  

Pippin now felt himself strong enough to get rid of the  do nothing 
king altogether and assume for himself the nominal as well as the real
kingship of the Franks  It was  however  a delicate matter to depose
even a quite useless monarch  so he determined to consult the head of
the Church  To Pippin s query whether it was fitting that the
Merovingian king of the Franks  having no power  should continue to
reign  the pope replied   It seems better that he who has the power in
the state should be king and be called king  rather than he who is
falsely called king  

It will be noticed that the pope in no sense created Pippin king  as
later writers claimed  He sanctioned a usurpation which was practically
inevitable and which was carried out with the approbation of the
Frankish nation  Raised on the shields of the counts and dukes  anointed
by St  Boniface  and blessed by the pope  Pippin became in 752 the first
king of the Carolingian family  which had already for several
generations ruled the Franks in all but name 

 Sidenote  A new theory of kingship  

This participation of the pope brought about a very fundamental change
in the theory of kingship  The kings of the Germans up to this time had
been military leaders selected  or holding their office  by the will of
the people  or at least of the aristocracy  Their rule had had no divine
sanction  but only that of general acquiescence backed up by sufficient
skill and popularity to frustrate the efforts of rivals  By the
anointing of Pippin in accordance with the ancient Jewish custom  first
by St  Boniface and then by the pope himself   a German chieftain was  
as Gibbon expresses  it  transformed into the Lord s anointed   The pope
uttered a dire anathema of divine vengeance against any one who should
attempt to supplant the holy and meritorious race of Pippin  It became a
 religious  duty to obey the king  He came to be regarded by the Church 
when he had duly received its sanction  as God s representative on
earth  Here we have the basis of the later idea of monarchs  by the
grace of God   against whom  however bad they might be  it was not
merely a political offense  but a sin  to revolt 

27  The sanction of Pippin s usurpation by the pope was but an
indication of the good feeling between the two greatest powers in the
West   the head of the ever strengthening Frankish state and the head of
the Church  This good feeling quickly ripened into an alliance 
momentous for the history of Europe  In order to understand this we must
glance at the motives which led the popes to throw off their allegiance
to their ancient sovereigns  the emperors at Constantinople  and turn
for help to Pippin and his successors 

 Sidenote  Controversy over the veneration of images and pictures   the
so called iconoclastic controversy  

For more than a century after the death of Gregory the Great his
successors continued to remain respectful subjects of the emperor  They
looked to him for occasional help against the Lombards in northern
Italy  who showed a disposition to add Rome to their possessions  In
725  however  the emperor Leo III aroused the bitter opposition of the
pope by issuing a decree forbidding the usual veneration of the images
of Christ and the saints  The emperor was a thoughtful Christian and
felt keenly the taunts of the Mohammedans  who held all images in
abhorrence and regarded the Christians as idolaters  He therefore
ordered all sacred images throughout his empire to be removed from the
churches  and all figures on the church walls to be whitewashed over 
This aroused serious opposition even in Constantinople  and the farther
west one went  the more obstinate became the resistance  The pope
refused to obey the edict  for he held that the emperor had no right to
interfere with practices hallowed by the Church  He called a council
which declared all persons excommunicated who should  throw down 
destroy  profane or blaspheme the holy images   The opposition of the
West was successful  and the images kept their places  38 

 Sidenote  The popes and the Lombards  

 Sidenote  The pope turns to the Franks for aid  


In spite of their abhorrence of the iconoclastic Leo and his successors 
the popes did not give up all hope that the emperors might aid them in
keeping the Lombards out of Rome  At last a Lombard ruler arose 
Aistulf  a  son of iniquity   who refused to consider the prayers or
threats of the head of the Church  In 751 Aistulf took Ravenna and
threatened Rome  He proposed to substitute his supremacy for that of the
eastern emperor and make of Italy a single state  with Rome as its
capital  This was a critical moment for the peninsula  Was Italy  like
Gaul  to be united under a single German people and to develop  as
France has done  a characteristic civilization  The Lombards had
progressed so far that they were not unfitted to organize a state that
should grow into a nation  But the head of the Church could not consent
to endanger his independence by becoming the subject of an Italian king 
It was therefore the pope who prevented the establishment of an Italian
kingdom at this time and who continued for the same reason to stand in
the way of the unification of Italy for more than a thousand years 
until he was dispossessed of his realms not many decades ago by Victor
Emmanuel  After vainly turning in his distress to his natural protector 
the emperor  the pope had no resource but to appeal to Pippin  upon
whose fidelity he had every reason to rely  He crossed the Alps and was
received with the greatest cordiality and respect by the Frankish
monarch  who returned to Italy with him and relieved Rome  754  

 Sidenote  Pippin subdues the Lombards  

No sooner had Pippin recrossed the Alps than the Lombard king  ever
anxious to add Rome to his possessions  again invested the Eternal City 
Pope Stephen s letters to the king of the Franks at this juncture are
characteristic of the time  The pope warmly argues that Pippin owes all
his victories to St  Peter and should now hasten to the relief of his
successor  If the king permits the city of the prince of the apostles to
be lacerated and tormented by the Lombards  his own soul will be
lacerated and tormented in hell by the devil and his pestilential
angels  These arguments proved effective  Pippin immediately undertook a
second expedition to Italy  from which he did not return until the
kingdom of the Lombards had become tributary to his own  as Bavaria and
Aquitaine already were 

 Sidenote  Donation of Pippin  

Pippin  instead of restoring to the eastern emperor the lands which the
Lombards had recently occupied  handed them over to the pope   on
exactly what terms we do not know  since the deed of cession has
disappeared  In consequence of these important additions to the former
territories of St  Peter  the popes were thereafter the nominal rulers
of a large district in central Italy  extending across the peninsula
from Ravenna to a point well south of Rome  If  as many writers have
maintained  Pippin recognized the pope as the sovereign of this
district  we find here the first state that was destined to endure into
the nineteenth century delimited on the map of Europe  A map of Italy as
late as the year 1860 shows the same region still marked  States of the
Church  

 Sidenote  Significance of Pippin s reign  

The reign of Pippin is remarkable in several ways  It witnessed the
strengthening of the kingly power in the Frankish state  which was soon
to embrace most of western Europe and form the starting point for the
development of the modern countries of France  Germany  and Austria  It
furnishes the first instance of the interference of a northern prince in
the affairs of Italy  which was destined to become the stumbling block
of many a later French and German king  Lastly  the pope had now a state
of his own  which  in spite of its small size  proved one of the most
important and permanent in Europe 

Pippin and his son Charlemagne saw only the strength and not the
disadvantage that accrued to their title from the papal sanction  It is
none the less true  as Gibbon says  that  under the sacerdotal monarchy
of St  Peter  the nations began to resume the practice of seeking  on
the banks of the Tiber  their kings  their laws  and the oracles of
their fate   We shall have ample evidence of this as we proceed 


     General Reading   For Mohammed and the Saracens  GILMAN   The
     Saracens   G P  Putnam s Sons   1 50   Gibbon has a famous chapter
     on Mohammed and another upon the conquests of the Arabs  These are
     the fiftieth and fifty first of his great work  See also MUIR 
      Life of Mohammed   Smith  Elder   Co    4 50  




CHAPTER VII

CHARLEMAGNE


28  Charlemagne is the first historical personage among the German
peoples of whom we have any satisfactory knowledge  39  Compared with
him  Theodoric  Charles Martel  Pippin  and the rest are but shadowy
figures  The chronicles tell us something of their deeds  but we can
make only the vaguest inferences in regard to their character and
temperament 

 Sidenote  Charlemagne s personal appearance  

The appearance of Charlemagne  as described by his secretary  so exactly
corresponds with the character of the king as exhibited in his great
reign  that it is worthy of attention  He was tall and stoutly built 
his face was round  his eyes were large and keen  his nose somewhat
above the common size  his expression bright and cheerful  Whether he
stood or sat  his form was full of dignity  for the good proportion and
grace of his body prevented the observer from noticing that his neck was
rather short and his person somewhat too stout  His step was firm and
his aspect manly  his voice was clear  but rather weak for so large a
body  He was active in all bodily exercises  delighted in riding and
hunting  and was an expert swimmer  His excellent health and his
physical alertness and endurance can alone explain the astonishing
swiftness with which he moved about his vast realm and conducted
innumerable campaigns in widely distant regions in startlingly rapid
succession 

 Sidenote  His education  his attitude toward learning  and his public
spirit  

Charles was an educated man and one who knew how to appreciate and
encourage scholarship  When at dinner he had some one read to him  he
delighted especially in history and in St  Augustine s  City of God   He
could speak Latin well and understood Greek readily  He tried to learn
to write  but began too late in life and got no farther than signing his
name  He called scholarly men to his court  took advantage of their
learning  and did much toward reëstablishing a regular system of public
instruction  He was also constantly occupied with buildings and other
public works calculated to adorn and benefit his kingdom  He himself
planned the remarkable cathedral at Aix la Chapelle and showed the
greatest interest in its furnishings  He commenced two palaces of
beautiful workmanship  one near Mayence and the other at Nimwegen  in
Holland  and had a long bridge constructed across the Rhine at Mayence 

 Sidenote  The Charlemagne of romance  

The impression which his reign made upon men s minds grew even after his
death  He became the hero of a whole cycle of romantic but wholly
unhistoric adventures and achievements which were as devoutly believed
for centuries as his most authentic deeds  In the fancy of an old monk
in the monastery of St  Gall  40  writing of Charlemagne not long after
his death  the king of the Franks swept over Europe surrounded by
countless legions of soldiers who formed a very sea of bristling steel 
Knights of superhuman valor formed his court and became the models for
the chivalrous spirit of the following centuries  Distorted but
imposing  the Charlemagne of poetry meets us all through the Middle
Ages 

A study of Charlemagne s reign will substantiate our first impression
that he was a truly remarkable person  one of the greatest figures in
the world s records and deservedly the hero of the Middle Ages  To few
men has it been given to influence so profoundly the course of European
progress  We shall consider him first as a conqueror  then as an
organizer and creator of governmental institutions  and lastly as a
promoter of culture and enlightenment 

 Sidenote  Charlemagne s idea of a great Christian empire  

29  It was Charlemagne s ideal to bring all the German peoples together
into one great Christian empire  and he was wonderfully successful in
attaining his end  Only a small portion of what is now called Germany
was included in the kingdom ruled over by Pippin  Frisia and Bavaria had
been Christianized  and their native rulers had been induced by the
efforts of Charlemagne s predecessors and of the missionaries 
especially Boniface  to recognize formally the overlordship of the
Franks  Between these two half independent countries lay the unconquered
Saxons  They were as yet pagans and appear to have still clung to much
the same institutions as those under which they lived when the Roman
historian Tacitus described them seven centuries earlier 

 Sidenote  The conquest of the Saxons  

The Saxons occupied the region beginning somewhat east of Cologne and
extending to the Elbe  and north to where the great cities of Bremen and
Hamburg are now situated  The present kingdom of Saxony would hardly
have come within their boundaries  The Saxons had no towns or roads and
were consequently very difficult to conquer  as they could retreat  with
their few possessions  into the forests or swamps as soon as they found
themselves unable to meet an invader in the open field  Yet so long as
they remained unconquered they constantly threatened the Frankish
kingdom  and the incorporation of their country was essential to the
rounding out of its boundaries  Charlemagne never undertook  during his
long military career  any other task half so serious as the subjugation
of the Saxons  and it occupied his attention for many years  Nine
successive rebellions had to be put down  and it was finally owing
rather to the Church than to Charlemagne s military prowess that the
great task was brought to a successful issue 

 Sidenote  Conversion of the Saxons  

Nowhere do we find a more striking example of the influence of the
Church than in the reliance that Charlemagne placed upon it in his
dealings with the Saxons  He deemed it quite as essential that after a
rebellion they should promise to honor the Church and be baptized as
that they should pledge themselves to remain true and faithful vassals
of the king  He was in quite as much haste to found bishoprics and
abbeys as to build fortresses  The law for the newly conquered Saxon
lands  issued sometime between 775 and 790  provides the same death
penalty for him who  shall have shown himself unfaithful to the lord
king   and him who  shall have wished to hide himself unbaptized and
shall have scorned to come to baptism and shall have wished to remain a
pagan   Charlemagne believed the Christianizing of the Saxons so
important a part of his duty that he decreed that all should suffer
death who entered a church by violence and carried off anything by
force  or even failed to abstain from meat during Lent  41  No one 
under penalty of heavy fines  was to make vows  in the pagan fashion  at
trees or springs  or partake of any heathen feasts in honor of the
demons  as the Christians termed the heathen deities   or fail to
present infants for baptism before they were a year old 

For the support of the local churches  those who lived in the parish
were to give toward three hundred acres of land and a house for the
priest   Likewise  in accordance with the mandate of God  we command
that all shall give a tithe of their property and labor to the churches
and the priests  let the nobles as well as the freemen  likewise the
serfs  according to that which God shall have given to each Christian 
return a part to God  

 Sidenote  Coöperation of the civil government and the Church  

These provisions are characteristic of the theory of the Middle Ages
according to which the civil government and the Church went hand in hand
in ordering and governing the life of the people  Defection from the
Church was regarded by the state as quite as serious a crime as treason
against itself  While the claims of the two institutions sometimes
conflicted  there was no question in the minds either of the king s
officials or of the clergy that both the civil and ecclesiastical
government were absolutely necessary  neither class ever dreamed that
they could get along without the other 

 Sidenote  Foundation of towns in northern Germany  

Before the Frankish conquest the Saxons had no towns  Now  around the
seat of the bishop  or about a monastery  men began to collect and towns
and cities to grow up  Of these the chief was Bremen  which is still one
of the most important ports of Germany 

 Sidenote  Charlemagne becomes king of the Lombards  

30  Pippin  it will be remembered  had covenanted with the papacy to
protect it from its adversaries  The king of the Lombards had taken
advantage of Charlemagne s seeming preoccupation with his German affairs
to attack the city of Rome again  The pope immediately demanded the aid
of Charlemagne  who prepared to carry out his father s pledges  He
ordered the Lombard ruler to return the cities that he had taken from
the pope  Upon his refusal to do this  Charlemagne invaded Lombardy in
773 with a great army and took Pavia  the capital  after a long siege 
The Lombard king was forced to become a monk  and his treasure was
divided among the Frankish soldiers  Charlemagne then took the extremely
important step  in 774  of having himself recognized by all the Lombard
dukes and counts as king of the Lombards 

 Illustration  THE EMPIRE OF CHARLEMAGNE 

 Sidenote  Aquitaine and Bavaria incorporated in Charlemagne s empire  

The considerable provinces of Aquitaine and Bavaria had never formed an
integral part of the Frankish realms  but had remained semi independent
under their native dukes up to the time of Charlemagne  Aquitaine  whose
dukes had given Pippin much trouble  was incorporated into the Frankish
state in 769  As for the Bavarians  Charlemagne felt that so long as
they remained under their duke he could not rely upon them to defend the
Frankish empire against the Slavs  who were constantly threatening the
frontiers  So he compelled the duke of Bavaria to surrender his
possessions  shut him up in a monastery  and proceeded to portion out
the duchy among his counts  He thus added to his realms the district
that lay between his new Saxon conquest and the Lombard kingdom 

 Sidenote  Foreign policy of Charlemagne  

31  So far we have spoken only of the relations of Charlemagne with the
Germans  for even the Lombard kingdom was established by the Germans  He
had  however  other peoples to deal with  especially the Slavs on the
east  who were one day to build up the kingdoms of Poland  Bohemia  and
the vast Russian empire  and  on the opposite boundary of his dominion 
the Arabs in Spain  Against these it was necessary to protect his
realms  and the second part of Charlemagne s reign was devoted to what
may be called his foreign policy  A single campaign in 789 seems to have
sufficed to subdue the Slavs  who lay to the north and east of the
Saxons  and to force the Bohemians to acknowledge the supremacy of the
Frankish king and pay tribute to him 

 Sidenote  The marches and margraves  

The necessity of insuring the Frankish realms against any new uprising
of these non German nations led to the establishment  on the confines of
the kingdom  of  marches   i e   districts under the military control of
counts of the march  or  margraves   42  Their business was to prevent
any hostile incursions into the interior of the kingdom  Much depended
upon the efficiency of these men  in many cases they founded powerful
families and later helped to disintegrate the Empire by establishing
themselves as practically independent rulers 

 Sidenote  Charlemagne in Spain  

At an assembly that Charlemagne held in 777  ambassadors appeared before
him from certain disaffected Mohammedans  They had fallen out with the
emir of Cordova 43  and now offered to become the faithful subjects of
Charlemagne if he would come to their aid  In consequence  he undertook
his first expedition to Spain in the following year  The district north
of the Ebro was conquered by the Franks after some years of war  and
Charlemagne established the Spanish March  44  In this way he began that
gradual expulsion of the Mohammedans from the peninsula which was to be
carried on by slowly extending conquests until 1492  when Granada  the
last Mohammedan stronghold  fell  45 


 Sidenote  Charlemagne crowned emperor by the pope  

32  But the most famous of all the achievements of Charlemagne was his
reëstablishment of the Western Empire in the year 800  It came about in
this wise  Charlemagne went to Rome in that year to settle a controversy
between Pope Leo III and his enemies  To celebrate the satisfactory
adjustment of the dispute  the pope held a solemn service on Christmas
day in St  Peter s  As Charlemagne was kneeling before the altar during
this service  the pope approached him and set a crown upon his head 
saluting him  amid the acclamation of those present  as  Emperor of the
Romans  

 Sidenote  Charlemagne merited the title of emperor  

The reasons for this extraordinary act  which Charlemagne afterward
persistently asserted took him completely by surprise  are given in one
of the Frankish histories  the  Chronicles of Lorsch   as follows   The
name of Emperor had ceased among the Greeks  for they were enduring the
reign of a woman  Irene   wherefore it seemed good both to Leo  the
apostolic pope  and to the holy fathers  the bishops  who were in
council with him  and to all Christian men  that they should name
Charles  king of the Franks  as Emperor  For he held Rome itself  where
the ancient Cæsars had always dwelt  in addition to all his other
possessions in Italy  Gaul and Germany  Wherefore  as God had granted
him all these dominions  it seemed just to all that he should take the
title of Emperor  too  when it was offered to him at the wish of all
Christendom  

Charlemagne appears to have accepted gracefully the honor thus thrust
upon him  Even if he had no right to the imperial title  there was an
obvious propriety and expediency in granting it to him under the
circumstances  Before his coronation by the pope he was only king of the
Franks and the Lombards  but his conquests seemed to entitle him to a
more comprehensive designation which should include his outlying
dependencies  Then the imperial power at Constantinople had been in the
hands of heretics  from the standpoint of the Western Church  ever since
Emperor Leo issued his edict against the veneration of images  What was
still worse  the throne had been usurped  shortly before the coronation
of Charlemagne  by the wicked Irene  who had deposed and blinded her
son  Constantine VI  The coronation of Charlemagne was  therefore  only
a recognition of the real political conditions in the West  46 

 Sidenote  Continuity of the Roman Empire  

The empire now reëstablished in the West was considered to be a
continuation of the Roman Empire founded by Augustus  Charlemagne was
reckoned the immediate successor of Constantine VI  whom Irene had
deposed  Yet  in spite of this fancied continuity  it is hardly
necessary to say that the position of the new emperor had little in
common with that of Marcus Aurelius or Constantine  In the first place 
the eastern emperors continued to reign in Constantinople for centuries 
quite regardless of Charlemagne and his successors  In the second place 
the German kings who wore the imperial crown after Charlemagne were
generally too weak really to rule over Germany and northern Italy  to
say nothing of the rest of western Europe  Nevertheless  the Western
Empire  which in the twelfth century came to be called the Holy Roman
Empire  endured for over a thousand years  It came to an end only in
1806  when the last of the emperors  wearied of his empty if venerable
title  laid down the crown 

 Sidenote  The title of emperor a source of trouble to the German
rulers  

The assumption of the title of emperor was destined to make the German
rulers a great deal of trouble  It constantly led them into futile
efforts to maintain a supremacy over Italy  which lay without their
natural boundaries  Then the circumstances under which Charlemagne was
crowned made it possible for the popes to claim  later  that it was they
who had transferred the imperial power from the old eastern line of
emperors to the Carolingian house  and that this was a proof of their
right to dispose of the crown as they pleased  The difficulties which
arose necessitated many a weary journey to Rome for the emperors  and
many unworthy conflicts between the temporal and spiritual heads of
Christendom 

 Sidenote  Charlemagne s system of government  

33  The task of governing his vast and heterogeneous dominions taxed
even the highly gifted and untiring Charlemagne  it quite exceeded the
capacity of his successors  The same difficulties continued to exist
that had confronted Charles Martel and Pippin   above all a scanty royal
revenue and over powerful officials who were prone to neglect the
interests and commands of their sovereign  Charlemagne s distinguished
statesmanship is nowhere so clearly seen as in his measures for
extending his control to the very confines of his realms 

 Sidenote  Charlemagne s farms  

His income  like that of all mediæval rulers  came chiefly from his
royal estates  as there was no system of general taxation such as had
existed under the Roman Empire  He consequently took the greatest care
that his numerous plantations should be well cultivated and that not
even a turnip or an egg which was due him should be withheld  An
elaborate set of regulations for his farms is preserved  which sheds
much light upon the times  47 

 Sidenote  Origin of titles of nobility  

The officials upon whom the Frankish kings were forced to rely chiefly
were the counts  the  hand and voice of the king  wherever he could not
be in person  They were to maintain order  see that justice was done in
their district  and raise troops when the king needed them  On the
frontier were the counts of the march  or margraves  marquises   already
mentioned  These titles  together with that of duke  still exist as
titles of nobility in Europe  although they are no longer associated
with governmental duties except where their holders have the right to
sit in the upper house of parliament 

 Sidenote  The  missi dominici   

To keep the counts in order  Charlemagne appointed royal commissioners
 the  missi dominici    whom he dispatched to all parts of his realm to
investigate and report to him how things were going in the districts
assigned to them  They were sent in pairs  a bishop and a layman  so
that they might act as a check on one another  Their circuits were
changed each year so that they should have no chance to enter into
conspiracy with the counts whom it was their special business to
watch  48 

The revival of the Roman Empire in the West made no difference in
Charlemagne s system of government  except that he required all his
subjects above twelve years of age to take a new oath of fidelity to him
as emperor  He held important assemblies of the nobles and prelates
each spring or summer  where the interests of the Empire were
considered  With the sanction of his advisers  he issued an
extraordinary series of laws  called  capitularies   a number of which
have been preserved  With the bishops and abbots he discussed the needs
of the Church  and above all the necessity of better schools for both
the clergy and laity  The reforms which he sought to introduce give us
an opportunity of learning the condition in which Europe found itself
after four hundred years of disorder 

 Sidenote  The dark century before Charlemagne  

34  Charlemagne was the first important king since Theodoric to pay any
attention to book learning  which had fared badly enough since the death
of Boethius  three centuries before  About 650 the supply of papyrus had
been cut off  owing to the conquest of Egypt by the Arabs  and as paper
had not yet been invented there was only the very expensive parchment to
write upon  While this had the advantage of being more durable than
papyrus  its cost discouraged the multiplication of copies of books  The
eighth century  that immediately preceding Charlemagne s coronation  is
declared by the learned Benedictine monks  in their great history of
French literature  to have been the most ignorant  the darkest  and the
most barbarous period ever seen  at least in France  The documents of
the Merovingian period often indicate great ignorance and carelessness
on the part of those who wrote them out 

 Sidenote  The elements of learning preserved by the Church  

Yet  in spite of this dark picture  there was promise for the future  It
was evident  even before Charlemagne s time  that the world was not to
continue indefinitely in the path of ignorance  Latin could not be
forgotten  for that was the language of the Church and all its official
communications were in that tongue  The teachings of the Christian
religion had to be gathered from the Bible and other books  and the
church services formed a small literature by themselves  Consequently it
was absolutely necessary that the Church should maintain some sort of
education in order to perform its complicated services and conduct the
extensive duties which devolved upon it  All the really efficient church
officers  whatever their nationality  must have been able to read the
Latin classics  if they were so inclined  Then there were the
compilations of ancient knowledge already mentioned  49  which 
incredibly crude and scanty as they were  kept up the memory of the
past  They at least perpetuated the names of the various branches of
knowledge and contained  for example  enough about arithmetic and
astronomy to help the isolated churchman to calculate each year the date
of Easter 

 Sidenote  Two letters of Charlemagne s respecting the neglect of
education among the clergy  

Charlemagne was the first temporal ruler to realize the serious neglect
of education  even among the clergy  and we have two interesting letters
from him  written before he was made emperor  relating to this subject 
In one to an important bishop  he says   Letters have been written to us
frequently in recent years from various monasteries  stating that the
brethren who dwelt therein were offering up holy and pious supplications
in our behalf  We observed that the sentiments in these letters were
exemplary but that the form of expression was uncouth  because what true
devotion faithfully dictated to the mind  the tongue  untrained by
reason of neglect of study  was not able to express in a letter without
mistakes  So it came about that we began to fear lest  perchance  as the
skill in writing was less than it should be  the wisdom necessary to the
understanding of the Holy Scriptures was also much less than was
needful  We all know well that  although errors of speech are dangerous 
errors of understanding are far more dangerous  Therefore  we exhort you
not merely not to  neglect  the study of letters  but with a most humble
mind  pleasing to God  earnestly to devote yourself to study  in order
that you may be able the more easily and correctly to penetrate the
mysteries of the Holy Scriptures  

In the other letter he says   We have striven with watchful zeal to
advance the cause of learning which has been almost forgotten through
the negligence of our ancestors  and by our own example  we invite all
those who can  to master the studies of the liberal arts  In this
spirit  God aiding us  we have already carefully corrected all the books
of the Old and New Testaments  corrupted by the ignorance of the
copyists  

 Illustration  An Example of the Style of Writing used in the Books of
Charlemagne s Time 50  

It seemed to Charlemagne that it was the duty of the Church not only to
look after the education of its own officers but to provide the
opportunity of at least an elementary education for the people at large 
In accordance with this conviction  he issued  789  an admonition to the
clergy to gather together the children both of freemen and serfs in
their neighborhood and establish schools  in which the boys may learn to
read   51 

 Sidenote  Establishment of monastery schools and the  school of the
palace   

It would be impossible to say how many of the innumerable abbots and
bishops established schools in accordance with Charlemagne s
recommendations  It is certain that famous centers of learning existed
at Tours  Fulda  Corbie  Orleans  and other places during his reign 
Charlemagne further promoted the cause of education by the establishment
of the famous  school of the palace  for the instruction of the sons of
his nobles and of his own children  He placed the Englishman  Alcuin  at
the head of the school  and called distinguished men from Italy and
elsewhere as teachers  The best known of these was the historian  Paulus
Diaconus  who wrote a history of the Lombards  to which we owe most of
what we know about them 

Charlemagne appears to have been particularly impressed with the
constant danger of mistakes in copying books  a task frequently turned
over to ignorant and careless persons  After recommending the founding
of schools  he continues   Correct carefully the Psalms  the signs used
in music  the  Latin  grammar  and the religious books used in every
monastery or bishopric  since those who desire to pray to God properly
often pray badly because of the incorrect books  And do not let your
boys misread or miswrite them  If there is any need to copy the Gospel 
Psalter or Missal  let men of maturity do the writing with great
diligence   These precautions were amply justified  for a careful
transmission of the literature of the past was as important as the
attention to education  It will be noted that Charlemagne made no
attempt to revive the learning of Greece and Rome  He deemed it quite
sufficient if the churchmen would learn their Latin well enough to read
the missal and the Bible intelligently 

The hopeful beginning that was made under Charlemagne in the revival of
education and intellectual interest was destined to prove disappointing
in its immediate results  It is true that the ninth century produced a
few noteworthy men who have left works which indicate acuteness and
mental training  But the break up of Charlemagne s empire  the struggles
between his descendants  the coming of new barbarians  and the disorder
caused by the unruly feudal lords  who were not inclined to recognize
any master  all conspired to keep the world back for at least two
centuries more  Indeed  the tenth and the first half of the eleventh
centuries seem  at first sight  little better than the seventh and
eighth  Yet ignorance and disorder never were quite so prevalent after 
as they were before  Charlemagne 


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CHAPTER VIII

THE DISRUPTION OF CHARLEMAGNE S EMPIRE


 Sidenote  Louis the Pious succeeds Charlemagne  

35  It was a matter of great importance to the world whether
Charlemagne s extensive empire was  after his death  to remain one or to
fall apart  He himself appears to have had no expectation that it would
hold together  for in 806 he divided it up in a very arbitrary manner
among his three sons  We do not know whether he was led thus to undo his
life s work simply because the older tradition of a division among the
king s sons was as yet too strong to permit him to hand down all his
possessions to his eldest son  or because he believed it would be
impossible to keep together so vast and heterogeneous a realm  However
this may have been  the death of his two eldest sons left only Louis 
who succeeded his father both as king and emperor 

 Sidenote  Partition of Charlemagne s empire among the sons of Louis the
Pious  

Louis the Pious had been on the throne but a few years before he took up
the all important problem of determining what share each of his sons
should have in the empire after his death  As they were far too
ambitious to submit to the will of their father  we find no less than
six different partitions between the years 817 and 840  We cannot stop
to trace these complicated and transient arrangements  or the rebellions
of the undutiful sons  who set the worst possible example to the
ambitious and disorderly nobles  On the death of Louis the Pious  in
840  his second son  Louis the German  was in possession of Bavaria and
had at various times been recognized as ruler of most of those parts of
the empire now included in Germany  The youngest son  Charles the Bald 
had all the western portion of the Frankish possessions  while
Lothaire  the eldest  had been designated as emperor and ruled over
Italy and the district lying between the possessions of the younger
brothers  Charles and Louis promptly combined to resist the attempts of
Lothaire to assert his superiority as emperor  and defeated him at
Fontenay  841   The treaty of Verdun  which followed  is one of the most
memorable in the history of western Europe  52 

 Illustration  Map of Treaty of Verdun 

 Sidenote  Treaty of Verdun  843  

In the negotiations which led up to the treaty of Verdun there appears
to have been entire agreement among the three parties that Italy should
go to Lothaire  Aquitaine to Charles the Bald  and Bavaria to Louis the
German  The real difficulty lay in the disposal of the rest of the
empire  It seemed appropriate that the older brother  as emperor  should
have  in addition to Italy  the center of the Frankish dominions 
including the capital  Aix la Chapelle  A state of the most artificial
kind  extending from Rome to northern Holland  was thus created  which
had no natural unity of language or custom  Louis the German was
assigned  in addition to Bavaria  the country north of Lombardy and
westward to the Rhine  As for Charles the Bald  his realm included a
great part of what is France to day  as well as the Spanish March and
Flanders 

36  The great interest of the treaty of Verdun lies in the tolerably
definite appearance of a western and an eastern Frankish kingdom  one of
which was to become France and the other Germany  In the kingdom of
Charles the Bald the dialects spoken by the majority of the people were
derived directly from the spoken Latin  and in time developed into
Provençal and French  In the kingdom of Louis the German  on the other
hand  both people and language were German  The narrow strip of country
between these regions  which fell to Lothaire  came to be called
 Lotharii regnum   or kingdom of Lothaire  53  This name was perverted
in time into Lotharingia and  later  into Lorraine  It is interesting to
note that this territory has formed a part of the debatable middle
ground over which the French and Germans have struggled so obstinately
down to our own day 

 Sidenote  The Strasburg oaths  

We have a curious and important evidence of the difference of language
just referred to  in the so called Strasburg oaths  842   Just before
the settlement at Verdun  the younger brothers had found it advisable to
pledge themselves  in an especially solemn and public manner  to support
one another against the pretensions of Lothaire  First  each of the two
brothers addressed his soldiers in their own language  absolving them
from their allegiance to him should he desert his brother  Louis then
took the oath in what the chronicle calls the  lingua romana   so that
his brother s soldiers might understand him  and Charles repeated his
oath in the  lingua teudisca  for the benefit of Louis  soldiers  54 
Fortunately the texts of both of these oaths have been preserved  They
are exceedingly interesting and important as furnishing our earliest
examples  except some lists of words  of the language spoken by the
common people  which was only just beginning to be written  Probably
German was very rarely written before this time  as all who could write
at all wrote in Latin  The same is true of the old Romance tongue  from
which modern French developed   which had already drifted far from the
Latin 

 Illustration  Map of Treaty of Mersen 

 Sidenote  New divisions of the empire corresponding to France  Germany 
and Italy  

37  When Lothaire died  855  he left Italy and the middle kingdom to his
three sons  By 870 two of these had died  and their uncles  Charles the
Bald and Louis the German  did not hesitate to appropriate the middle
kingdom and divide it between them by the treaty of Mersen  Italy was
left to Lothaire s only surviving son  together with the imperial crown 
which was to mean nothing  however  for a hundred years to come  The
result was that  as early as 870  western Europe was divided into three
great districts which corresponded with startling exactness to three
important states of modern Europe  i e   France  Germany  and Italy 

 Sidenote  The empire temporarily reunited under Charles the Fat  

Louis the German was succeeded in the East Frankish kingdom by his son 
Charles the Fat  In 884  owing to the death of the sons and the
grandsons of Charles the Bald  there was no one to represent his line
except a child of five years  So the aristocracy of the West Frankish
kingdom invited Charles the Fat to become their king  In this way it
came about that the whole empire of Charlemagne was reunited for two or
three years under a single ruler  55 

 Sidenote  Charles the Fat and the Northmen  

Charles the Fat was ill and proved an incompetent emperor  entirely
unequal to the serious task of governing and protecting his vast
territories  His weakness was especially shown in his pusillanimous
treaties with the Northmen  When Paris was making an heroic defense
against them under its count  Odo  Charles  instead of marching at the
head of an army to relieve it  agreed to pay the invaders seven hundred
pounds of silver if they would raise the siege  They were then permitted
to take up their winter quarters far inland  in Burgundy  where they
proceeded to burn and pillage at will 

 Sidenote  Charles the Fat deposed and succeeded by Arnulf  

This degrading agreement so disgusted the West Frankish nobility that
they were glad to join a conspiracy set on foot by Charles  nephew  the
brave Arnulf of Carinthia  who had resolved to supplant his inefficient
uncle  Charles was deposed and deserted by all his former supporters in
887  No one  except Napoleon  has ever again succeeded in bringing the
eastern  western  and southern parts of Charlemagne s empire under his
control  even for a brief period  Arnulf  although enjoying the title of
emperor  could scarcely hope to be recognized as king in all parts of
the Frankish empire  Even nominal unity was no longer possible  As one
of the chronicles of the time puts it   While Arnulf was frittering away
his time  many little kingdoms grew up  

 Sidenote  Origin of the kingdom of Burgundy  or Arles  

In the West Frankish territory the nobility of the northern part chose
Odo  the hero of the siege of Paris  as their king  but in the south
another enterprising nobleman  Count Boso of Vienne  succeeded in
inducing the pope to crown him king of a certain district on the Rhone
which included Provence  Immediately after Boso s death a large
territory about the Lake of Geneva  which he had hoped to win for
himself  became a separate kingdom under its own ruler  This region and
that which Boso ruled to the south were later united into the kingdom of
Burgundy  or  as it is often called  Arles 

Even before the deposition of Charles the Fat  many of the counts and
other important landowners began to take advantage of the weakness of
their king to establish themselves as the rulers of the districts about
them  although they did not assume the title of king  In the
East Frankish kingdom the various German peoples whom Charlemagne had
managed to control  especially the Bavarians and Saxons  began to revive
their old national independence  In Italy the disruption was even more
marked than in the north  57 

 Sidenote  Causes of disruption  

 Sidenote  Poor roads  

38  It is clear  from what has been said  that none of the rulers into
whose hands the fragments of Charlemagne s empire fell  showed himself
powerful and skillful enough to govern properly a great territory like
that embraced in France or Germany to day  The difficulties in the way
of establishing a well regulated state  in the modern sense of the word 
were almost insurmountable  In the first place  it was well nigh
impossible to keep in touch with all parts of a wide realm  The
wonderful roads which the Romans had built had generally fallen into
decay  for there was no longer a corps of engineers maintained by the
government to keep them up and repair the bridges  In those parts of
Charlemagne s possessions that lay beyond the confines of the old Roman
Empire  the impediments to travel must have been still worse than in
Gaul and on the Rhine  there not even the vestiges of Roman roads
existed 

 Sidenote  Scarcity of money for paying government officers and
maintaining armies  

In addition to the difficulty of getting about  the king had to contend
with the scarcity of money in the Middle Ages  This prevented him from
securing the services of a great corps of paid officials  such as every
government finds necessary to day  Moreover  it made it impossible for
him to support the standing army which would have been necessary to
suppress the constant insubordination of his officials and of the
powerful and restless nobility  whose chief interest in life was
fighting 

 Sidenote  New invasions   the Northmen  Slavs  Hungarians  and
Saracens  

The disintegration of the Frankish empire was hastened by the continued
invasions from all sides  From the north  Denmark  Norway  and
Sweden  came the Scandinavian pirates  the Northmen  58  They were
skillful and daring seamen  who not only harassed the coast of the North
Sea  but made their way up the rivers  plundering and burning towns
inland as far as Paris  On the eastern boundary of the empire the
Germans were forced to engage in constant warfare with the Slavs  Before
long the Hungarians  a savage race  began their terrible incursions into
central Germany and northern Italy  From the south came the Saracens 
who had got possession of Sicily  in 827   and terrorized southern Italy
and France  even attacking Rome itself 

 Sidenote  Growing power and independence of the great landed
proprietor  

39  In the absence of a powerful king with a well organized army at his
back  each district was left to look out for itself  Doubtless many
counts  margraves  bishops  and other great landed proprietors who were
gradually becoming independent princes  earned the loyalty of the people
about them by taking the lead in defending the country against its
invaders and by establishing fortresses as places of refuge when the
community was hard pressed  These conditions serve to explain why such
government as continued to exist during the centuries following the
deposition of Charles the Fat was necessarily carried on mainly  not by
the king and his officers  but by the great landholders  The grim
fortresses of the mediæval lords  which appeared upon almost every point
of vantage throughout western Europe during the Middle Ages  would not
have been tolerated by the king  had he been powerful enough to destroy
them  They plainly indicate that their owners were practically
independent rulers 

When the traveler in France or Germany comes upon the picturesque ruins
of a mediæval castle  perched upon some rocky cliff  accessible from one
side only  and commanding the surrounding country  he cannot but see
that those massive walls  with their towers and battlements  their moat
and drawbridge  were never intended as a dwelling place for the peaceful
household of a private citizen  but rather as the fortified palace of a
ruler  We can picture the great hall crowded with armed retainers  who
were ready to fight for the proprietor when he was disposed to attack a
neighboring lord  and who knew that below were the dungeons to which the
lord might send them if they ventured to rebel against his authority 

 Illustration  Mediæval Fortress  showing Moat and Drawbridges 

 Sidenote  The landed proprietor and the manor  

In order to understand the position of the mediæval noble and the origin
of feudalism we must consider the situation of the great landowners  A
large part of western Europe in the time of Charlemagne appears to have
been divided up into great estates  resembling the Roman villas  Just
how these originated we do not know  These estates  or  manors   as they
were called  were cultivated mainly by serfs  who were bound to the land
and were under the control of its proprietor  They tilled such part of
the estate as the owner reserved for his own particular use  and
provided for his needs and their own without the necessity of buying
much from the outside  When we speak of a mediæval landowner we mean one
who held one or more of these manors  which served to support him and
left him free to busy himself fighting with other proprietors in the
same position as himself  59 

 Sidenote  Immunities  

It had been common even before Charlemagne s time to grant to
monasteries and churches  and even to individuals  an extraordinary
privilege which exempted their lands from the presence or visits of
government officials  No public officer with the power to hear cases 
exact fines  obtain lodging or entertainment for the king and his
followers when traveling about  or make requisitions of any kind  was to
enter the lands or villages belonging to the monastery or person
enjoying the  immunity   These exemptions were evidently sought with a
view to getting rid of the exactions of the king s officials and
appropriating the various fines and fees  rather than with the purpose
of usurping governmental prerogatives  But the result was that the
monasteries or individuals who were thus freed from the requisitions of
the government were left to perform its functions   not  however  as yet
in their own right  but as representatives of the king  60  It is not
hard to see how those who enjoyed this privilege might  as the central
power weakened  become altogether independent  It is certain that a
great many landowners who had been granted no exemption from the
jurisdiction of the king s officers  and a great many of the officers
themselves  especially the counts and margraves  gradually broke away
altogether from the control of those above them and became the rulers of
the regions in which they lived 

 Sidenote  Tendency to hereditary offices  

The counts were in a particularly favorable position to usurp for their
own benefit the powers which they were supposed to exercise for the
king  Charlemagne had chosen his counts and margraves in most cases from
the wealthy and distinguished families of his realms  As he had little
money  he generally rewarded their services by grants of estates  which
only served to increase their independence  They gradually came to look
upon their office and their land as private property  and they were
naturally disposed to hand it on to their sons after them  Charlemagne
had been able to keep control of his agents by means of the  missi  
After his death his system fell into disuse and it became increasingly
difficult to get rid of inefficient or rebellious officers 

 Sidenote  Forces opposed to disruption  viz   partial survival of royal
authority and feudalism  

Yet we must not infer that the state ceased to exist altogether during
the centuries of confusion that followed the break up of Charlemagne s
empire  or that it fell entirely apart into little local governments
independent of each other  In the first place  a king always retained
some of his ancient majesty  He might be weak and without the means to
enforce his rights and to compel his more powerful subjects to meet
their obligations toward him  Yet he was  after all  the  king  
solemnly anointed by the Church as God s representative on earth  He was
always something more than a feudal lord  The kings were destined to get
the upper hand before many centuries in England  France  and Spain  and
finally in Italy and Germany  and to destroy the castles behind whose
walls their haughty nobles had long defied the royal power 

 Sidenote  Feudalism  

In the second place  the innumerable independent landowners were held
together by  feudalism   One who had land to spare granted a portion of
it to another person on condition that the one receiving the land should
swear to be true to him and perform certain services   such as fighting
for him  giving him counsel  and lending aid when he was in particular
difficulties  In this way the relation of lord and vassal originated 
All lords were vassals either of the king or of other lords  and
consequently all were bound together by solemn engagements to be loyal
to one another and care for one another s interests  Feudalism served
thus as a sort of substitute for the state  Private arrangements between
one landowner and another took the place of the weakened bond between
the subject and his king 

The feudal form of government and the feudal system of holding land are
so different from anything with which we are now familiar that it is
difficult for us to understand them  Yet unless we do understand them  a
great part of the history of Europe during the past thousand years will
be well nigh meaningless  61 




CHAPTER IX

FEUDALISM


 Sidenote  Feudalism the outgrowth of prevailing conditions and earlier
customs  

40  Feudalism was the natural outcome of the peculiar conditions which
prevailed in western Europe during the ninth and tenth centuries  Its
chief elements were not  however  newly invented or discovered at that
period but were only combined in order to meet the demands of the times 
It will be well  therefore  to consider briefly those customs in the
later Roman Empire and among the invading Germans which suggest  1  the
habit of the mediæval landowner of granting his land to others in such a
way that  while he retained the title  they became  to most intents and
purposes  the real owners  and  2  the relation of lord and vassal 

 Sidenote  Conditions of landholding in the later Roman Empire  

 Sidenote  The  beneficium   

We have seen how  before the barbarian inroads  the small landowners in
the Roman Empire had often found it to their advantage to give up the
title to their land to more powerful neighboring proprietors  62  The
scarcity of labor was such that the new owner  while extending the
protection of his name over the land  was glad to permit the former
owner to continue to till it  rent free  much as if it still belonged to
him  With the invasions of the barbarians the lot of the defenseless
small landholder became worse  He had a new resource  however  in the
monasteries  The monks were delighted to accept any real estate which
the owner  for the good of his soul and to gain the protection of the
saint to whom the monastery church was dedicated  felt moved to turn
over to them on the understanding that the abbot should permit the
former owner to continue to cultivate his fields  Though he no longer
owned the land  he still enjoyed its products and had only to pay a
trifling sum each year in recognition of the monastery s ownership  63 
The use  or  usufruct   of the land which was thus granted by the
monastery to its former owner was called a  beneficium   The same term
was applied to the numerous grants which churches made from their vast
possessions for limited periods and upon various conditions  We also
find the Frankish kings and other great landowners disposing of their
lands in a similar fashion  The  beneficium  forms the first stage in
the development of mediæval landowning 

 Sidenote  The origin of the relationship of lord and vassal  

Side by side with the  beneficium  grew up another institution which
helps to explain the relation of lord and vassal in later times  Under
the later Roman Empire the freeman who owned no land and found himself
unable to gain a living might become the dependent of some rich and
powerful neighbor  who agreed to feed  clothe  and protect him on
condition that he should engage to be faithful to his patron   love all
that he loved and shun all that he shunned   64 

 Sidenote  The  comitatus   

The invading Germans had a custom that so closely resembled this Roman
one that scholars have found it impossible to decide whether we should
attribute more influence to the Roman or to the German institution in
the development of feudalism  We learn from Tacitus that the young
German warriors were in the habit of pledging their fidelity to a
popular chieftain  who agreed to support his faithful followers if they
would fight at his side  The  comitatus   as Tacitus named this
arrangement  was not regarded by the Germans as a mere business
transaction  but was looked upon as honorable alike to lord and man 
Like the later relation of vassal and lord  it was entered upon with a
solemn ceremony and the bond of fidelity was sanctioned by an oath  The
obligations of mutual aid and support established between the leader and
his followers were considered most sacred 

 Sidenote  Combination of the  comitatus  and the  beneficium  produces
feudal land tenure  

While there was a great difference between the homeless and destitute
fellow who became the humble client of a rich Roman landowner  and the
noble young German warrior who sat at the board of a distinguished
military leader  both of these help to account for the later feudal
arrangement by which one person became the  man   or faithful and
honorable dependent  of another  When  after the death of Charlemagne 
men began to combine the idea of the  comitatus  with the idea of the
 beneficium   and to grant the usufruct of parcels of their land on
condition that the grantee should be true  loyal  and helpful to them 
that is  become their  vassal   we may consider that the feudal system
of landowning was coming into existence  65 

 Sidenote  Gradual development of feudalism  

 Sidenote  The fief  

 Sidenote  Infeudation and subinfeudation  

 Sidenote  Vassal and subvassal  

41  Feudalism was not established by any decree of a king or in virtue
of any general agreement between all the landowners  It grew up
gradually and irregularly without any conscious plan on any one s part 
simply because it seemed convenient and natural under the circumstances 
The owner of vast estates found it to his advantage to parcel them out
among vassals who agreed to accompany him to war  attend his court 
guard his castle upon occasion  and assist him when he was put to any
unusually great expense  Land granted upon the terms mentioned was said
to be  infeudated  and was called a  fief   One who held a fief might
himself become a lord by granting a portion of his fief to a vassal upon
terms similar to those upon which he held of his lord or suzerain  66 
This was called  subinfeudation   and the vassal of a vassal was called
a  subvassal  or  subtenant   There was still another way in which the
number of vassals was increased  The owners of small estates were
usually in a defenseless condition  unable to protect themselves against
the insolence of the great nobles  They consequently found it to their
advantage to put their land into the hands of a neighboring lord and
receive it back from him as a fief  They thus became his vassals and
could call upon him for protection 

It is apparent  from what has been said  that  all through the Middle
Ages  feudalism continued to grow  as it were   from the top and bottom
and in the middle all at once    1  Great landowners carved out new
fiefs from their domains and granted them to new vassals   2  Those who
held small tracts brought them into the feudal relation by turning them
over to a lord or monastery  whose vassals they became   3  Finally any
lord might subinfeudate portions of his estate by granting them as fiefs
to those whose fidelity or services he wished to secure  By the
thirteenth century it had become the rule in France that there should be
 no land without its lord   This corresponded pretty closely to the
conditions which existed at that period throughout the whole of western
Europe 

 Sidenote  The hereditary character of fiefs and its consequences  

It is essential to observe that the fief  unlike the  beneficium   was
not granted for a certain number of years  or for the life of the
grantee  to revert at his death to the owner  On the contrary  it became
hereditary in the family of the vassal and passed down to the eldest son
from one generation to another  So long as the vassal remained faithful
to his lord and performed the stipulated services  and his successors
did homage and continued to meet the conditions upon which the fief had
originally been granted  neither the lord nor his heirs could rightfully
regain possession of the land  No precise date can be fixed at which it
became customary to make fiefs hereditary  it is safe  however  to say
that it was the rule in the tenth century  67 

The kings and great nobles perceived clearly enough the disadvantage of
losing control of their lands by permitting them to become hereditary
property in the families of their vassals  But the feeling that what the
father had enjoyed should pass to his children  who  otherwise  would
ordinarily have been reduced to poverty  was so strong that all
opposition on the part of the lord proved vain  The result was that
little was left to the original and still nominal owner of the fief
except the services and dues to which the practical owner  the vassal 
had agreed in receiving it  In short  the fief came really to belong to
the vassal  and only a shadow of his former proprietorship remained in
the hands of the lord  Nowadays the owner of land either makes some use
of it himself or leases it for a definite period at a fixed money rent 
But in the Middle Ages most of the land was held by those who neither
really owned it nor paid a regular rent for it and yet who could not be
deprived of it by the original owner or his successors 

 Sidenote  Subvassals of the king not under his control  

Obviously the great vassals who held directly of the king became almost
independent of him as soon as their fiefs were granted to them in
perpetuity  Their vassals  since they stood in no feudal relation to the
king  escaped the royal control altogether  From the ninth to the
thirteenth century the king of France or the king of Germany did not
rule over a great realm occupied by subjects who owed him obedience as
their lawful sovereign  paid him taxes  and were bound to fight under
his banner as the head of the state  As a feudal landlord himself  he
had a right to demand fidelity and certain services from those who were
his vassals  But the great mass of the people over whom he nominally
ruled  whether they belonged to the nobility or not  owed little to the
king directly  because they lived upon the lands of other feudal lords
more or less independent of him 

Enough has been said of the gradual and irregular growth of feudalism to
make it clear that complete uniformity in feudal customs could hardly
exist within the bounds of even a small kingdom  much less throughout
the countries of western Europe  Yet there was a remarkable resemblance
between the institutions of France  England  and Germany  so that a
description of the chief features of feudalism in France  where it was
highly developed  will serve as a key to the general situation in all
the countries we are studying 

 Sidenote  The fief the central institution of feudalism  

 Sidenote  Homage  

42  The fief  Latin   feudum   was the central institution of feudalism
and the one from which it derives its name  In the commonest acceptance
of the word  the fief was land  the perpetual use of which was granted
by its owner  or holder  to another person  on condition that the one
receiving it should become his vassal  The one proposing to become a
vassal knelt before the lord and rendered him  homage  68  by placing
his hands between those of the lord and declaring himself the lord s
 man  for such and such a fief  Thereupon the lord gave his vassal the
kiss of peace and raised him from his kneeling posture  Then the vassal
took the oath of fidelity upon the Bible  or some holy relic  solemnly
binding himself to fulfill all his duties toward his lord  This act of
rendering homage by placing the hands in those of the lord and taking
the oath of fidelity was the first and most essential obligation of the
vassal and constituted the  feudal bond   For a vassal to refuse to do
homage for his fief when it changed hands  was equivalent to a
declaration of revolt and independence 

 Sidenote  Obligations of the vassal  Military service  

 Sidenote  Money fiefs  

The obligations of the vassal varied greatly  69  Sometimes homage meant
no more than that the vassal bound himself not to attack or injure his
lord in honor or estate  or oppose his interests in any other manner 
The vassal was expected to join his lord when there was a military
expedition on foot  although it was generally the case that the vassal
need not serve at his own expense for more than forty days  The rules 
too  in regard to the length of time during which a vassal might be
called upon to guard the castle of his lord varied almost infinitely 
The shorter periods of military service proved very inconvenient to the
lord  Consequently it became common in the thirteenth century for the
king and the more important nobles to secure a body of soldiers upon
whom they could rely at any time  and for any length of time  by
creating money fiefs  A certain income was granted to a knight upon
condition that the grantee should not only become a vassal of the lord
but should also agree to fight for him whenever it was necessary 

 Sidenote  Other feudal obligations  

 Sidenote  Money payments  


Besides the military service due from the vassal to his lord  he was
expected to attend the lord s court when summoned  There he sat with
other vassals to hear and pronounce upon those cases in which his
peers  i e   his fellow vassals  were involved  70  Moreover  he had to
give the lord the benefit of his counsel when required  and attend him
upon solemn occasions  Under certain circumstances vassals had to make
money payments to their lord  as well as serve him in person  as  for
instance  when the fief changed hands through the death of the lord or
of the vassal  when the fief was alienated  when the lord was put to
extra expense by the necessity of knighting his eldest son or providing
a dowry for his daughter  or when he was in captivity and was held for a
ransom  Lastly  the vassal might have to entertain his lord should the
lord come his way  There are amusingly detailed accounts  in some of the
feudal contracts  of exactly how often the lord might come  how many
followers he might bring  and what he should have to eat 

 Illustration  A Mediæval Castle near Klagenfurt  Austria 

 Sidenote  Different classes of fiefs  

There were fiefs of all kinds and of all grades of importance  from that
of a duke or count  who held directly of the king and exercised the
powers of a practically independent prince  down to the holding of the
simple knight  whose bit of land  cultivated by peasants or serfs  was
barely sufficient to enable him to support himself and provide the horse
upon which he rode to perform his military service for his lord 

 Sidenote  The nobility  

 Sidenote  Their privileges  

In order to rank as a noble in mediæval society it was  in general 
necessary to be the holder of land for which only such services were due
as were considered honorable  and none of those which it was customary
for the peasant or serf to perform  The noble must  moreover  be a free
man and have at least sufficient income to maintain himself and his
horse without any sort of labor  The nobles enjoyed certain privileges
which set them off from the non noble classes  Many of these privileges
were perpetuated in France  and elsewhere on the continent  down to the
time of the French Revolution  and in Italy and Germany  into the
nineteenth century  The most conspicuous privilege was a partial
exemption from taxation 

 Sidenote  Difficulty of classifying the nobles  

It is natural to wish to classify the nobility and to ask just what was
the difference  for example  between a duke  a count  and a marquis 
Unfortunately there was no fixed classification  at least before the
thirteenth century  A count  for instance  might be a very inconspicuous
person  having a fief no larger than the county of Charlemagne s time 
or he might possess a great many of the older counties and rank in power
with a duke  In general  however  it may be said that the dukes  counts 
bishops  and abbots who held directly from the king were of the highest
rank  Next to them came an intermediate class of nobles of the second
order  generally subvassals of the king  and below these the simple
knights 

 Sidenote  Feudal registers  

43  The great complexity of the feudal system of land tenure made it
necessary for the feudal lords to keep careful registers of their
possessions  Very few of these registers have been preserved  but we are
so fortunate as to have one of the count of Champagne  dating from the
early thirteenth century  This gives us an idea of what feudalism really
was in practice  and shows how impossible it is to make a satisfactory
map of any country during the feudal period 

 Illustration  Fiefs and Suzerains of the Counts of Champagne 

 Sidenote  Growth of the possessions of the counts of Champagne typical
of the period  

At the opening of the tenth century we find in the chronicles of the
time an account of a certain ambitious count of Troyes  Robert by name 
who died in 923 while trying to wrest the crown of France from Charles
the Simple  His county passed to his son in law  who already held  among
other possessions  the counties of Château Thierry and Meaux  His son 
in turn  inherited all three counties and increased his dominions by
judicious usurpations  This process of gradual aggrandizement went on
for generation after generation  until there came to be a compact
district under the control of the counts of Champagne  as they began to
call themselves at the opening of the twelfth century  It was in this
way that the feudal states in France and Germany grew up  Certain lines
of feudal lords showed themselves able  partly by craft and violence 
and partly  doubtless  by good fortune  to piece together a considerable
district  in much the same way as we shall find that the king of France
later pieced together France itself 

 Sidenote  The register of the counts of Champagne illustrates the
complexity of feudal relations  

The register referred to above shows that the feudal possessions of the
counts of Champagne were divided into twenty six districts  each of
which centered about a strong castle  We may infer that these divisions
bore some close relation to the original counties which the counts of
Champagne had succeeded in bringing together  All these districts were
held as fiefs of other lords  For the greater number of his fiefs the
count rendered homage to the king of France  but he was the vassal of no
less than nine other lords beside the king  A portion of his lands 
including probably his chief town of Troyes  he held of the duke of
Burgundy  Châtillon  Épernay  and some other towns  he held as the  man 
of the Archbishop of Rheims  He was also the vassal of the Archbishop of
Sens  of four other neighboring bishops  and of the abbot of the great
monastery of St  Denis  To all of these persons he had pledged himself
to be faithful and true  and when his various lords fell out with one
another it must have been difficult to see where his duty lay  Yet his
situation was similar to that of all important feudal lords 

The chief object  however  of the register was to show not what the
count owed to others but what his own numerous vassals owed to him  It
appears that he subinfeudated his lands and his various sources of
income to no less than two thousand vassal knights  The purpose of the
register is to record the terms upon which each of these knights held
his fief  Some simply rendered the count homage  some agreed to serve
him in war for a certain length of time each year  others to guard his
castle for specified periods  A considerable number of the vassals of
the count held lands of other lords  there being nothing to prevent a
subvassal from accepting a fief directly from the king  or from any
other neighboring noble landholder  So it happened that several of the
vassals of the counts of Champagne held of the same persons of whom the
count himself held 

 Sidenote  The infeudation of other things than land  

It is evident that the counts of Champagne were not contented with the
number of vassals that they secured by subinfeudating their land  The
same homage might be rendered for a fixed income  or for a certain
number of bushels of oats to be delivered each year by the lord  as for
the use of land  So money  houses  wheat  oats  wine  chickens  were
infeudated  and even half the bees which might be found in a particular
forest  It would seem to us the simpler way to have hired soldiers
outright  but in the thirteenth century the traditions of feudalism were
so strong that it seemed natural to make vassals of those whose aid was
desired  The mere promise of a money payment would not have been
considered sufficiently binding  The feudal bond of homage served to
make the contract firmer than it would otherwise have been 

 Illustration  The arrow indicates a lord of whom the vassal held one or
more fiefs  

It is clear  then  that no such regular hierarchy existed as some
historians have imagined  beginning with the king and ending with the
humblest knight included in the feudal aristocracy  The fact that
vassals often held of a number of different lords made the feudal
relations infinitely complex  The diagram on page 115  while it may not
exactly correspond to the situation at any given moment  will serve to
illustrate this complexity 

 Sidenote  The feudal system maintained only by force  

44  Should one confine one s studies of feudalism to the rules laid down
by the feudal lawyers and the careful descriptions of the exact duties
of the vassal which are to be found in the contracts of the period  one
might conclude that everything had been so minutely and rigorously fixed
as to render the feudal bond sufficient to maintain order and liberty 
But one has only to read a chronicle of the time to discover that  in
reality  brute force governed almost everything outside of the Church 
The feudal obligations were not fulfilled except when the lord was
sufficiently powerful to enforce them  The bond of vassalage and
fidelity  which was the sole principle of order  was constantly broken
and faith was violated by both vassal and lord  71 

 Sidenote  The breaking of the feudal bond  

It often happened that a vassal was discontented with his lord and
transferred his allegiance to another  This he had a right to do under
certain circumstances  as  for instance  when his lord refused to see
that justice was done him in his court  But such changes were generally
made merely for the sake of the advantages which the faithless vassal
hoped to gain  The records of the time are full of accounts of refusal
to do homage  which was the commonest way in which the feudal bond was
broken  So soon as a vassal felt himself strong enough to face his
lord s displeasure  or realized that the lord was a helpless minor  he
was apt to declare his independence by refusing to recognize the feudal
superiority of the one from whom he had received his land 

 Sidenote  War the law of the feudal world  

We may say that war  in all its forms  was the law of the feudal world 
War formed the chief occupation of the restless aristocracy who held the
land and exercised the governmental control  The inveterate habits of a
military race  the discord provoked by ill defined rights or by
self interest and covetousness  all led to constant bloody struggles in
which each lord had for his enemies all those about him  An enterprising
vassal was likely to make war at least once  first  upon each of his
several lords  secondly  upon the bishops and abbots with whom he was
brought into contact  and whose control he particularly disliked 
thirdly  upon his fellow vassals  and lastly  upon his own vassals  The
feudal bonds  instead of offering a guarantee of peace and concord 
appear to have been a constant cause of violent conflict  Every one was
bent upon profiting by the permanent or temporary weakness of his
neighbor  This chronic dissension extended even to members of the same
family  the son  anxious to enjoy a part of his heritage immediately 
warred against his father  younger brothers against older  and nephews
against uncles who might seek to deprive them of their rights 

In theory  the lord could force his vassals to settle their disputes in
an orderly and righteous manner before his court  But often he was
neither able nor inclined to bring about a peaceful adjustment  and he
would frequently have found it embarrassing to enforce the decisions of
his own court  So the vassals were left to fight out their quarrels
among themselves and found their chief interest in life in so doing  War
was practically sanctioned by law  The great French code of laws of the
thirteenth century and the Golden Bull  a most important body of law
drawn up for Germany in 1356  did not prohibit neighborhood war  but
merely provided that it should be conducted in a decent and gentlemanly
way 

 Sidenote  Tourneys and jousts  

The jousts  or tourneys  were military exercises  play wars  to fill out
the tiresome periods which occasionally intervened between real
wars  72  They were  in fact  diminutive battles in which whole troops
of hostile nobles sometimes took part  These rough plays called down the
condemnation of the popes and councils  and even of the kings  The
latter  however  were too fond of the sport themselves not to forget
promptly their own prohibitions  73 

 Sidenote  Disastrous effects of feudal warfare generally recognized  

 Sidenote  The  Truce of God   

45  The disastrous nature of the perpetual feudal warfare and the
necessity of some degree of peace and order  had already become apparent
even as early as the eleventh century  In spite of all the turmoil 
mankind was making progress  Commerce and enlightenment were increasing
in the older towns and preparing the way for the development of new
ones  Those engaged in peaceful pursuits could not but find the
prevailing disorder intolerable  The Church was untiring  as it was
fitting that it should be  in its efforts to secure peace  and nothing
redounds more to the honor of the bishops than the  Truce of God   This
prohibited all hostilities from Thursday night until Monday morning  as
well as upon all of the numerous fast days  74  The church councils and
the bishops required the feudal lords to take an oath to observe the
weekly truce  and  by means of the dreaded penalty of excommunication 
met with some success  With the opening of the Crusades in 1096  the
popes undertook to effect a general pacification by diverting the
prevailing warlike spirit against the Turks 

At the same time the king  in France and England at least  was becoming
a power that made for order in the modern sense of the word  He
endeavored to prevent the customary resort to arms to settle every sort
of difficulty between rival vassals  By increasing the military force
that he had at his command he compelled the submission of cases of
dispute to his tribunals  But even St  Louis  d  1270   who made the
greatest efforts to secure peace  did not succeed in accomplishing his
end  The gradual bettering of conditions was due chiefly to general
progress and to the development of commerce and industry  which made the
bellicose aristocracy more and more intolerable 


     General Reading   The older accounts of feudalism  such as that
     given by Guizot or Hallam  should be avoided as the reader is
     likely to be misled by them  The earlier writers appear  from the
     standpoint of recent investigations  to have been seriously
     mistaken upon many important points  In French  LUCHAIRE   Manuel
     des Institutions Françaises   Hachette   Co   Paris   3 00   and
     ESMEIN   Cours Élémentaire d Histoire du Droit Français    2 00  
     are excellent 

     In English there is EMERTON S Chapter XIV on  Feudal Institutions 
     in his  Mediæval Europe   and ADAMS   Civilization   Chapter IX 
     devoted especially to the origin of feudalism  CHEYNEY gives a
     selection of documents relating to the subject in  Translations and
     Reprints   Vol  IV  No  3 




CHAPTER X

THE DEVELOPMENT OF FRANCE


 Sidenote  Importance of studying the beginnings of the modern European
states  

46  There is no more interesting or important phase of mediæval history
than the gradual emergence of the modern national state from the feudal
anarchy into which the great empire of Charlemagne fell during the
century after his death  No one should flatter himself that he has
grasped the elements of the history of western Europe unless he can
trace in a clear  if general  way the various stages by which the states
which appear now upon the map of Europe  the French republic  the German
Empire  Austria Hungary  and the kingdoms of Italy  Great Britain  and
Spain  have grown out of the disorganized Europe of the ninth century 

It might be inferred from what has been said in the preceding chapters
that the political history of western Europe during the two or three
centuries following the deposition of Charles the Fat was really only
the history of innumerable feudal lords  Yet even if the kings of
mediæval Europe were sometimes less powerful than some of their mighty
subjects  still their history is more important than that of their
vassals  It was the kings  and not their rivals  the dukes and counts 
who were to win in the long run and to establish national governments in
the modern sense of the term  It was about them that the great European
states  especially France  Spain  and England  grew up 

 Sidenote  Struggle between the Carolingians and the house of Odo  

As we have seen  the aristocracy of the northern part of the
West Frankish kingdom chose  in 888  as their king  in place of the
incompetent Charles the Fat  the valiant Odo  Count of Paris  Blois 
and Orleans  He was a powerful lord and held extensive domains besides
the regions he ruled as count  But  in spite of his advantageous
position  he found it impossible to exert any real power in the southern
part of his kingdom  Even in the north he met with constant opposition 
for the nobles who elected him had no idea of permitting him to
interfere much with their independence  Charles the Simple  the only
surviving grandson of Charles the Bald  75  was eventually elected king
by a faction opposed to Odo 

 Sidenote  Election of Hugh Capet  the first of the Capetians  987 996  

For a hundred years the crown passed back and forth between the family
of Odo and that of Charlemagne  The counts of Paris were rich and
capable  while the later Carolingians were poor and unfortunate  The
latter finally succumbed to their powerful rivals  who definitely took
possession of the throne in 987  when Hugh Capet was elected king of the
Gauls  Bretons  Normans  Aquitanians  Goths  Spaniards  and Gascons   in
short  of all those peoples who were to be welded  under Hugh s
successors  into the great French nation 

 Sidenote  The West Frankish kingdom comes to be called France  

Hugh inherited from his ancestors the title of Duke of France  which
they had enjoyed as the military representatives of the later
Carolingian kings in  France   which was originally a district north of
the Seine  Gradually the name France came to be applied to all the
dominions which the dukes of France ruled as kings  We shall hereafter
speak of the West Frankish kingdom as France 

 Sidenote  Difficulty of establishing the royal power  

It must not be forgotten  however  that it required more than two
centuries after Hugh s accession for the French kings to create a real
kingdom which should include even half the territory embraced in the
France of to day  For almost two hundred years the Capetians made little
or no progress toward real kingly power  In fact  matters went from bad
to worse  Even the region which they were supposed to control as
counts  their so called  domain   melted away in their hands 
Everywhere hereditary lines of usurping rulers sprang up whom it was
impossible to exterminate after they had once taken root  The Capetian
territory bristled with hostile castles  permanent obstacles to commerce
between the larger towns and intolerable plagues to the country people 
In short  the king of France  in spite of the dignity of his title  no
longer dared to move about his own narrow domain  He to whom the most
powerful lords owed homage could not venture out of Paris without
encountering fortresses constructed by noble brigands  who were the
terror alike of priest  merchant  and laborer  Without money or
soldiers  royalty vegetated within its diminished patrimony  It retained
a certain prestige in distant fiefs situated on the confines of the
realm and in foreign lands  but at home it was neither obeyed nor
respected  The enemy s lands began just outside the capital  76 

 Sidenote  Formation of small independent states in France  

47  The tenth century was the period when the great fiefs of Normandy 
Brittany  Flanders  and Burgundy took form  These  and the fiefs into
which the older duchy of Aquitaine fell  developed into little nations 
each under its line of able rulers  Each had its own particular customs
and culture  some traces of which may still be noted by the traveler in
France  These little feudal states were created by certain families of
nobles who possessed exceptional energy or statesmanship  By conquest 
purchase  or marriage  they increased the number of their fiefs  By
promptly destroying the castles of those who refused to meet their
obligations  they secured their control over their vassals  By granting
fiefs of land or money to subvassals  they gained new dependents 

 Sidenote  Normandy  

Of these subnations none was more important or interesting than
Normandy  The Northmen had been the scourge of those who lived near the
North Sea for many years before one of their leaders  Rollo  or Hrolf  
agreed to accept from Charles the Simple  in 911  a district on the
coast  north of Brittany  where he and his followers might peacefully
settle  Rollo assumed the title of Duke of the Normans and introduced
the Christian religion among his people  For a considerable time the
newcomers kept up their Scandinavian traditions and language  Gradually 
however  they appropriated such culture as their neighbors possessed 
and by the twelfth century their capital  Rouen  was one of the most
enlightened cities of Europe  Normandy became a source of infinite
perplexity to the French kings when  in 1066  Duke William the Conqueror
added England to his possessions  for he thereby became so powerful that
his suzerain could hardly hope to control the Norman dukes any longer 

 Sidenote  Brittany  

The isolated peninsula of Brittany  inhabited by a Celtic people of the
same race as the early inhabitants of Britain  had been particularly
subject to the attacks of the Scandinavian pirates  It seemed at one
time as if the district would become an appendage of Normandy  But in
938 a certain valiant Alain of the Twisted Beard arose to deliver it
from the oppression of the strangers  The Normans were driven out  and
feudalism replaced the older tribal organization in what was hereafter
to be called the duchy of Brittany  It was not until the opening of the
sixteenth century that this became a part of the French monarchy 

 Sidenote  Origin of the Flemish towns  

The pressure of the Northmen had an important result in the low
countries between the Somme and the Scheldt  The inhabitants were driven
to repair and seek shelter in the old Roman fortifications  They thus
became accustomed to living in close community  and it was in this way
that the Flemish towns  Ghent  Bruges  etc   originated  which became in
time famous centers of industry and trade  The founders of the great
families of the district first gained their influence in defending the
country against the Scandinavian pirates  The counts of Flanders aspired
to rule the region  but the lesser counts within their territory were
pretty independent of them  so private wars were frequent and bloody 

 Sidenote  Burgundy  

Burgundy is a puzzling name because it is applied to several different
parts of the territory once included in the kingdom founded by the
Burgundians  which Clovis made tributary to his expanding Frankish
kingdom  Toward the end of the ninth century we first hear of a  duke 
of Burgundy as being appointed military representative of the king  as
all dukes originally were  in a large district west of the Saône  The
dukes of Burgundy never succeeded in establishing sufficient control
over their vassals to render themselves independent  and consequently
they always freely recognized the sovereignty of the French kings  We
shall meet the name Burgundy later 

 Sidenote  Possessions of the duke of Aquitaine and of the counts of
Toulouse and Champagne  

The ancient duchy of Aquitaine  later Guienne   including a large part
of what is now central and southern France  was abolished in 877  but
the title of Duke of Aquitaine was conferred by the king upon a certain
family of feudal lords  who gradually extended their power over Gascony
and northward  To the southeast  the counts of Toulouse had begun to
consolidate a little state which was to be the seat of the extraordinary
literature of the troubadours  The county of Champagne has already been
considered in the discussion of feudalism 

This completes the survey of the countries over which Hugh Capet and his
immediate successors strove to rule  All those districts to the east of
the Saône and the Rhone which now form a part of France were amalgamated
 in 933  into the kingdom of Arles  or Burgundy  77  which in 1032 fell
into the hands of the German king 

 Sidenote  Complicated position of the Capetian kings  

48  The position of the Capetian rulers was a complicated one  As counts
of Paris  Orleans  etc   they enjoyed the ordinary rights of a feudal
lord  as dukes of France  they might exercise a vague control over the
district north of the Seine  as suzerains of the great feudal
princes   the duke of Normandy  the counts of Flanders  Champagne  and
the rest   they might require homage and certain feudal services from
these great personages  But besides all these rights as feudal lords
they had other rights as kings  They were crowned and consecrated by the
Church  as Pippin and Charlemagne had been  They thus became  by God s
appointment  the protectors of the Church and the true fountain of
justice for all who were oppressed or in distress throughout their
realms  Therefore they were on a higher plane in the eyes of the people
than any of the great vassals  Besides the homage of their vassals  they
exacted an oath of fidelity from all whom they could reach 

The great vassals  on the other hand  acted on the theory that the king
was simply their feudal lord  As for the king himself  he accepted both
views of his position and made use both of the older theory of kingship
and of his feudal suzerainty to secure more and more control over his
realms  For over three hundred years the direct male line of the
Capetians never once failed  It rarely happened  moreover  that the
crown was left in the weak hands of a child  By the opening of the
fourteenth century there was no doubt that the king  and not the feudal
lords  was destined to prevail 

 Sidenote  Louis the Fat  1108 1137  

 Sidenote  Philip Augustus  1180 1223  

The first of the kings of France to undertake with success the serious
task of conquering his own duchy was Louis the Fat  1108 1137   He was
an active soldier and strove to keep free the means of communication
between the different centers of his somewhat scattered feudal domains
and to destroy the power of the usurping castellans in his fortresses 
But he made only a beginning  it was reserved for his famous grandson 
Philip Augustus  1180 1223   to make the duchy of France into a real
kingdom 

 Sidenote  The Plantagenets in France  

 Sidenote  Henry II  

49  Philip had a far more difficult problem to face than any of the
preceding kings of his house  Before his accession a series of those
royal marriages which until recently exercised so great an influence
upon political history  had brought most of the great fiefs of central 
western  and southern France into the hands of the king of England 
Henry II  who now ruled over the most extensive realm in western Europe 
Henry II was the son of William the Conqueror s granddaughter
Matilda  78  who had married one of the great vassals of the French
kings  the count of Anjou and Maine  79  Henry  therefore  inherited
through his mother all the possessions of the Norman kings of
England   namely  England  the duchy of Normandy  and the suzerainty
over Brittany   and through his father the counties of Maine and Anjou 
Lastly  through his own marriage with Eleanor  the heiress of the dukes
of Guienne  as Aquitaine was now called   he possessed himself of pretty
much all of southern France  including Poitou and Gascony  Henry II  in
spite of his great importance in English history  was as much French as
English  both by birth and sympathies  and gave more than half his time
and attention to his French possessions 

 Sidenote  Philip and the Plantagenets  

It thus came about that the king of France suddenly found a new and
hostile state  under an able and energetic ruler  erected upon his
western borders  It included more than half the territory in which he
was recognized as king  The chief business of Philip s life was an
incessant war upon the Plantagenets  in which he was constantly aided by
the strife among his enemies themselves  Henry II divided his French
possessions among his three sons  Geoffrey  Richard  and John 
delegating to them such government as existed  Philip took advantage of
the constant quarrels of the brothers among themselves and with their
father  He espoused  in turn  the cause of Richard the Lion Hearted
against his father  of John Lackland  the youngest brother  against
Richard  and so on  Without these family discords the powerful monarchy
of the Plantagenets might have annihilated the royal house of France 
whose narrow dominions it closed in and threatened on all sides 

 Sidenote  Richard the Lion Hearted  

So long as Henry II lived there was little chance of expelling the
Plantagenets or of greatly curtailing their power  but with the
accession of his reckless son  Richard I  called the Lion Hearted  80 
the prospects of the French king brightened wonderfully  Richard left
his kingdom to take care of itself  while he went upon a crusade to the
Holy Land  He persuaded Philip to join him  but Richard was too
overbearing and masterful  and Philip too ambitious  to make it possible
for them to agree for long  The king of France  who was physically
delicate  was taken ill and was glad of the excuse to return home and
brew trouble for his powerful vassal  When Richard himself returned 
after several years of romantic but fruitless adventure  he found
himself involved in a war with Philip  in the midst of which he died 

 Sidenote  John loses the French possessions of his house  

Richard s younger brother  John  who enjoys the reputation of being the
most despicable of English kings  speedily gave Philip a good excuse for
seizing a great part of the Plantagenet lands  John was suspected of
conniving at the brutal murder of his nephew Arthur  the son of
Geoffrey   to whom the nobles of Maine  Anjou  and Touraine had done
homage  He was also guilty of the less serious offense of carrying off
and marrying a lady betrothed to one of his own vassals  Philip  as
John s suzerain  summoned him to appear at the French court to answer
the latter charge  Upon John s refusal to appear or to do homage for his
continental possessions  Philip caused his court to issue a decree
confiscating almost all of the Plantagenet lands  leaving to the English
king only the southwest corner of France 

Philip found little difficulty in possessing himself  not only of the
valley of the Loire  but of Normandy itself  which showed no
disinclination to accept him in place of the Plantagenets  whom the
Normans associated with continual exactions  Six years after Richard s
death the English kings had lost all their continental fiefs except
Guienne  The Capetian domain was  for the first time  the chief among
the great feudal states of France  both in wealth and extent  It should
be observed that Philip  unlike his ancestors  was no longer merely
 suzerain  of the new conquests  but was himself duke of Normandy  and
count of Anjou  of Maine  etc  The boundaries of his domain  that is 
the lands which he himself controlled directly as feudal lord  now
extended to the sea 

 Sidenote  Philip strengthens the royal power as well as increases the
royal domain  

50  Philip not only greatly increased the extent of the royal domain 
but strengthened his control over all classes of his subjects as well 
He appears  also  to have fully realized the importance of the towns
which had begun to develop a century earlier  There were several
important ones in the districts he annexed  and these he took especial
pains to treat with consideration  He extended his protection  and at
the same time his authority  over them and in this way lessened the
influence and resources of the feudal lords within whose territories the
towns lay 

 Sidenote  Appanages  

The chief innovation of Philip s son  Louis VIII  was the creation of
 appanages   These were fiefs assigned to his younger sons  one of whom
was made count of Artois  another  count of Anjou and Maine  a third 
count of Auvergne  This has generally been regarded by historians as a
most unfortunate reënforcement of the feudal idea  It not only retarded
the consolidation of the kingdom but opened the way to new strife
between the members of the royal family itself 

 Sidenote  Louis IX  1226 1270  

 Sidenote  Settlement of question of the English king s possessions in
France  1258  

The long reign of Philip s grandson  Louis IX  or St  Louis  1226 1270  
is extremely interesting from many standpoints  St  Louis himself is
perhaps the most heroic and popular figure in the whole procession of
French monarchs  and his virtues and exploits have been far more amply
recorded than those of any of his predecessors  But it is only his part
in the consolidation of the French monarchy that immediately concerns
us  After a revolt of the barons of central France in alliance with the
king of England  which Louis easily put down  he proceeded  in a most
fair minded and Christian spirit  to arrange a definite settlement with
the Plantagenets  The king of England was to do him homage for the duchy
of Guienne  Gascony  and Poitou and surrender every claim upon the rest
of the former possessions of the Plantagenets on the continent 

 Illustration  Map of France at the Close of the Reign of Philip
Augustus 

 Sidenote  The  baillis  serve to increase the king s power  

Besides these important territorial adjustments  Louis IX did much to
better the system of government and strengthen the king s power  Philip
Augustus had established a new kind of officer  the  baillis   who
resembled the  missi  of Charlemagne  They were supported by a salary
and frequently shifted from place to place so that there should be no
danger of their taking root and establishing powerful feudal families 
as had happened in the case of the counts  who were originally royal
officers  Louis adopted and extended the institution of the  baillis  
In this way he kept his domains under his control and saw that justice
was done and his revenue properly collected 

 Sidenote  Government of Louis IX  

Before the thirteenth century there was little government in France in
the modern sense of the word  The king relied for advice and aid  in the
performance of his simple duties as ruler  upon a council of the great
vassals  prelates  and others about his person  This council was
scarcely organized into a regular assembly  and it transacted all the
various kinds of governmental business without clearly distinguishing
one kind from another  In the reign of Louis IX this assembly began to
be divided into three bodies with different functions  There was  first 
the king s council to aid him in conducting the general affairs of the
kingdom  secondly  a chamber of accounts  a financial body which
attended to the revenue  and lastly  the  parlement   a supreme court
made up of those trained in the law  which was becoming ever more
complicated as time went on  Instead  as hitherto  of wandering about
with the king  the parlement took up its quarters upon the little island
in the Seine at Paris  where the great court house   Palais de Justice  
still stands  A regular system of appeals from the feudal courts to the
royal courts was established  This served greatly to increase the king s
power in distant parts of his realms  It was decreed further that the
royal coins should alone be used in the domains of the king  and that
his money should be accepted everywhere else within the kingdom
concurrently with that of those of his vassals who had the privilege of
coinage 

 Sidenote  Philip the Fair  1285 1314  the first absolute ruler of
France  

The grandson of St  Louis  Philip the Fair  is the first example of a
French king who had both the will and the means to play the rôle of an
absolute monarch  He had inherited a remarkably well organized
government compared with anything that had existed since the time of
Charlemagne  He was surrounded by a body of lawyers who had derived
their ideas of the powers and rights of a prince from the Roman law 
They naturally looked with suspicion upon everything that interfered
with the supreme power of the monarch  and encouraged the king to bring
the whole government into his own hands regardless of the privileges of
his vassals and of the clergy 

 Sidenote  The commons  or third estate  summoned to the Estates
General  1302  

Philip s attempt to force the clergy to contribute from their wealth to
the support of the government led to a remarkable struggle with the
pope  of which an account will be given in a later chapter  With the
hope of gaining the support of the whole nation in his conflict with the
head of the Church  the king summoned a great council of his realm in
1302  He included for the first time the representatives of the towns in
addition to the nobles and prelates  whom the king had long been
accustomed to consult  At the same period that the French Estates
General  81  or national assembly  was taking form through the addition
of representatives of the commons  England was creating its Parliament 
The two bodies were  however  to have a very different history  as will
become clear later 

By the sagacious measures that have been mentioned  the French monarchs
rescued their realms from feudal disruption and laid the foundation for
the most powerful monarchy of western Europe  However  the question of
how far the neighboring king across the Channel should extend his power
on the continent remained unanswered  The boundary between France and
England was not yet definitely determined and became  during the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries  the cause of long and disastrous
wars  from which France finally emerged victorious  We must now turn
back to trace the development of her English rival  82 




CHAPTER XI

ENGLAND IN THE MIDDLE AGES


 Sidenote  Importance of England in the history of western Europe  

51  The country of western Europe whose history is of greatest interest
to English speaking peoples is  of course  England  From England the
United States and the vast English colonies have inherited their
language and habits of thought  much of their literature  and many
peculiarities of their laws and institutions  In this volume it will
not  however  be possible to study England except in so far as it has
played a part in the general development of Europe  This it has greatly
influenced by its commerce  industry  and colonies  as well as by the
example it has set of permitting the people to participate with the king
in the government 

 Sidenote  Overlordship of Wessex  

 Sidenote  Invasions of the Danes  Their defeat by Alfred the Great 
871 901  

The conquest of the island of Britain by the German Angles and Saxons
has already been spoken of  as well as the conversion of these pagans to
Christianity by the representatives of the Roman Church  The several
kingdoms founded by the invaders were brought under the overlordship of
the southern kingdom of Wessex 83  by Egbert  a contemporary of
Charlemagne  But no sooner had the long continued invasions of the
Germans come to an end and the country been partially unified  than the
Northmen  or Danes  as the English called them   who were ravaging
France  began to make incursions into England  Before long they had made
permanent settlements and conquered a large district north of the
Thames  They were defeated  however  in a great battle by Alfred the
Great  the first English king of whom we have any satisfactory
knowledge  He forced the Danes to accept Christianity and established 
as the boundary between them and his own kingdom of Wessex  a line
running from London across the island to Chester 

 Sidenote  Alfred fosters the development of the English language  

Alfred was as much interested in education as Charlemagne had been  He
called in learned monks from the continent and from Wales as teachers of
the young men  He desired that all those born free  who had the means 
should be forced to learn English thoroughly  and that those who
proposed to enter the priesthood should learn Latin as well  He himself
translated Boethius   Consolation of Philosophy  and other works from
the Latin into English  and doubtless encouraged the composition of the
famous  Anglo Saxon Chronicle   the first history written in a modern
language  84 

 Sidenote  England from the death of Alfred the Great to the Norman
Conquest  901 1066  

The formation of the kingdoms of Denmark  Sweden  and Norway at the end
of the ninth century caused many discontented Scandinavian chieftains to
go in search of adventure  so that the Danish invasions continued for
more than a century after Alfred s death  901   and we hear much of the
Danegeld  a tax levied to buy off the invaders when necessary  Finally a
Danish king  Cnut  succeeded in making himself king of England in 1017 
The Danish dynasty maintained itself only for a few years  Then a last
weak Saxon king  Edward the Confessor  held nominal sway for a score of
years  Upon his death in 1066  William  Duke of Normandy  claimed the
crown and became king of England  The Norman Conquest closes what is
called the Saxon period of English history  during which the English
nation may be said to have taken form  Before considering the
achievements of William the Conqueror we must glance at the condition of
England as he found it 

 Sidenote  Great Britain at the accession of William the Conqueror  

The map of Great Britain at the accession of William the Conqueror has
the same three great divisions which exist to day  The little kingdoms
had disappeared and England extended north to the Tweed  which separated
it  as it now does  from the kingdom of Scotland  On the west was Wales 
inhabited then  as it is still  by descendants of the native Britons  of
whom only a small remnant had survived the German invasions  The Danes
had been absorbed into the mass of the population and all England
recognized a single king  The king s power had increased as time went
on  although he was bound to act in important matters only with the
consent of a council  Witenagemot  made up of high royal officials 
bishops  and nobles  The kingdom was divided into shires  85  as it
still is  and each of these had a local assembly  a sort of parliament
for the dispatch of local matters 

After the victory of the papal party at the Council of Whitby  86  the
Church had been thoroughly organized and the intercourse of the clergy
with the continent served  as we have seen  to keep England from
becoming completely isolated  Although the island was much behind some
other portions of Europe in civilization  the English had succeeded in
laying the foundations for the development of a great nation and an
admirable form of government 

 Sidenote  Feudalism in England  

England was not  however  to escape feudalism  The Normans naturally
brought with them their own feudal institutions  but even before their
coming many suggestions of feudalism might have been discovered  Groups
of shires had been placed under the government of earls who became
dangerous rivals of the kings  and the habit of giving churchmen the
right to govern  to a large extent  those who lived upon their vast
estates recalls the conditions in the Frankish empire during the same
period  The great landed proprietor in England exercised much the same
powers over those about him that the feudal lords enjoyed upon the other
side of the Channel 

 Sidenote  The struggle for the English crown between Earl Harold and
Duke William of Normandy  

52  As has been said  William of Normandy claimed that he was entitled
to the English crown  he even assumed that all who refused to
acknowledge him in England were traitors  We are  however  somewhat in
the dark as to the basis of his claim  There is a story that he had
visited the court of Edward the Confessor and had become his vassal on
condition that  should Edward die childless  he was to designate William
as his successor  But Harold  Earl of Wessex  who had consolidated his
power before the death of Edward by securing the appointment of his
brothers to three of the other great earldoms  assumed the crown and
paid no attention to William s demand that he should surrender it 

 Sidenote  The pope favors William s claim  

 Sidenote  Battle of Senlac  1066  William I crowned at London  

William thereupon appealed to the pope  promising that if he came into
possession of England  he would see that the English clergy submitted to
the authority of the Roman bishop  Consequently the pope  Alexander II 
condemned Harold and blessed in advance any expedition that William
might undertake to assert his rights  The conquest of England therefore
took on the character of a sort of holy war  and as the expedition had
been well advertised  many adventurers flocked to William s standard 
The Norman cavalry and archers proved superior to the English forces 
who were on foot and were so armed that they could not fight to
advantage except at close range  Harold was killed in the memorable
battle of Senlac 87  and his army defeated  In a few weeks a number of
influential nobles and several bishops agreed to accept William as their
king  and London opened its gates to him  He was crowned on Christmas
day  1066  at Westminster 

We cannot trace the history of the opposition and the revolts of the
great nobles which William had to meet within the next few years  His
position was rendered doubly difficult by troubles which he encountered
on the continent as duke of Normandy  Suffice it to say that he
succeeded in maintaining himself against all his enemies  88 

 Sidenote  William s wise policy in England  

William s policy in regard to England exhibited profound statesmanship 
He introduced the Norman feudalism to which he was accustomed  but took
good care that it should not weaken his power  The English who had
refused to join him before the battle of Senlac were declared traitors 
but were permitted to keep their lands upon condition of receiving them
from the king as his vassals  The lands of those who actually bore arms
against him at Senlac  or in later rebellions  including the great
estates of Harold s family  were confiscated and distributed among his
faithful followers  both Norman and English  though naturally the
Normans among them far outnumbered the English 

 Sidenote  He insures the supremacy of the crown without interfering
with English customs  

 Sidenote  William requires oath of fidelity from his subvassals  

William declared that he did not propose to change the English customs
but to govern as Edward the Confessor  the last Saxon king whom he
acknowledged  had done  He tried to learn English  maintained the
Witenagemot  and observed English practices  But he was a man of too
much force to submit to the control of his people  While he appointed
counts or earls in some of the shires  now come to be called
 counties    he controlled them by means of other royal officers called
 sheriffs   He avoided giving to any one person a great many estates in
a single region  so that no one should become inconveniently powerful 
Finally  in order to secure the support of the smaller landholders and
to prevent combinations against him among the greater ones  he required
every landholder in England to take an oath of fidelity directly to him 
We read in the  Anglo Saxon Chronicle   1086    After that he went about
so that he came  on the first day of August  to Salisbury  and there
came to him his wise men  i e   counselors   and all the landowning men
of property there were over all England  whosesoever men they were  and
all bowed down to him and became his men  and swore oaths of fealty to
him that they would be faithful to him against all other men  

 Sidenote  Domesday Book  

William s anxiety to have a complete knowledge of his whole kingdom is
indicated by a remarkable historical document  the so called  Domesday
Book   This is a register of the lands throughout England  indicating
the value of each parcel  the serfs and stock upon it  the name of its
holder and of the person who held it before the Conquest  This
government report contained a vast amount of information which was
likely to prove useful to William s taxgatherers  It is still valuable
to the historian  although unfortunately he is not able in every case to
interpret its terms satisfactorily 

 Sidenote  William the Conqueror and the Church  

William s policy in regard to the Church indicates a desire to advance
its interests in conjunction with his own  He called Lanfranc  an
Italian who had been at the head of the famous monastery of Bec in
Normandy  to the archbishopric of Canterbury  The king permitted the
clergy to manage their own affairs and established bishops  courts to
try a variety of cases  But homage was exacted from a bishop as from a
lay vassal  and William refused to permit the pope to interfere in
English affairs without his permission in each particular case  No papal
legate was to enter the land without the king s sanction  No papal
decree should be received in the English Church without his consent  nor
his servants be excommunicated against his will  When Gregory VII
demanded that he should become his vassal for the land that he had
conquered under the papal auspices  William promptly refused 

 Sidenote  General results of the Norman Conquest  

It is clear that the Norman Conquest was not a simple change of dynasty 
A new element was added to the English people  We cannot tell how many
Normans actually emigrated across the Channel  but they evidently came
in considerable numbers  and their influence upon the English court and
government was very great  A century after William s arrival the whole
body of the nobility  the bishops  abbots  and government officials  had
become practically all Norman   Besides these  the architects and
artisans who built the castles and fortresses  and the cathedrals 
abbeys  and parish churches  whose erection throughout the land was such
a marked characteristic of the period  were immigrants from Normandy 
Merchants from the Norman cities of Rouen and Caen came to settle in
London and other English cities  and weavers from Flanders were settled
in various towns and even rural districts  For a short time these
newcomers remained a separate people  but before the twelfth century was
over they had become for the most part indistinguishable from the great
mass of English people amongst whom they had come  They had nevertheless
made that people stronger  more vigorous  more active minded  and more
varied in their occupations and interests   Cheyney   89 

 Illustration  Norman Gateway at Bristol  England 

 Sidenote  William Rufus  1087 1100  and Henry I  1100 1135  

 Sidenote  Civil war ending in the accession of Henry II  1154 1189  

53  The Conqueror was followed by his sons  William Rufus and Henry I 
Upon the death of the latter the country went through a terrible period
of civil war  for some of the nobility supported the Conqueror s
grandson Stephen  and some his granddaughter Matilda  After the death of
Stephen  when Henry II  Matilda s son  90  was finally recognized in
1154 by all as king  he found the kingdom in a melancholy state  The
nobles had taken advantage of the prevalent disorder to erect castles
without royal permission and establish themselves as independent rulers 
Mercenaries had been called in from the continent by the rivals for the
throne  and had become a national plague 

 Sidenote  Henry s difficulties and his success in meeting them  

Henry at once adopted vigorous measures  He destroyed the illegally
erected fortresses  sent off the mercenaries  and deprived many earls
who had been created by Stephen and Matilda of their titles  Henry II s
task was a difficult one  He had need of all his indefatigable energy
and quickness of mind to restore order in England and at the same time
rule the wide realms on the continent which he had either inherited or
gained through his marriage with the heiress of the dukes of
Guienne  91  Although he spent the greater part of his reign across the
Channel  he still found time to be one of the greatest of all England s
rulers 

 Sidenote  His reforms in the judicial system  

 Sidenote  The grand jury  

In order that he might maintain his prerogatives as judge of disputes
among his subjects and avoid all excuse for the private warfare  which
was such a persistent evil on the continent  he undertook to improve and
reform the system of royal courts  He arranged that his judges should
make regular circuits throughout the country  so that they might try
cases on the spot at least once a year  He established the famous Court
of King s Bench to try all other cases which came under the king s
jurisdiction  This was composed of five judges from his council  two
clergymen  and three laymen  We find  too  the beginning of our grand
jury in a body of men in each neighborhood who were to be duly sworn in 
from time to time  and should then bring accusations against such
malefactors as had come to their knowledge 

 Illustration  The Plantagenet Possessions in England and France 

 Sidenote  Trial by jury  

 Sidenote  The common law  

As for the petty or smaller jury  which actually tried the accused  its
origin and history are obscure  It did not originate with Henry II  but
he systematized trial by jury and made it a settled law of the land
instead of an exceptional favor  The plan of delegating the duty of
determining the guilt or innocence of a suspected person to a dozen
members of the community who were sworn to form their opinion without
partiality was very different from the earlier systems  It resembled
neither the Roman trial  where the judges made the decision  nor the
mediæval compurgation and ordeals  where God was supposed to pronounce
the verdict  In all legal matters the decisions of Henry s judges were
so sagacious and consistent that they became the basis of the common law
which is still used in all English speaking countries 

 Sidenote  Henry II and Thomas à Becket  

 Sidenote  Becket as chancellor  

Henry s reign was embittered by the famous struggle with Thomas à
Becket  which illustrates admirably the peculiar dependence of the
monarchs of his day upon the churchmen  Becket was born in London  He
early entered one of the lower orders of the Church  but grew up in the
service of the crown  and was able to aid Henry in gaining the throne 
Thereupon the new king made him his chancellor  Becket proved an
excellent minister and defended the king s interest even against the
Church  of which he was also an officer  He was fond of hunting and of
warlike enterprises and maintained a brilliant court from the revenues
of the numerous church benefices which he held  It appeared to Henry
that there could be no better head for the English clergy than his
sagacious and worldly chancellor  He therefore determined to make him
Archbishop of Canterbury  The kings of that time often chose their most
efficient officers from among the prelates  Lanfranc  for example  had
been the Conqueror s chief minister  There were several good reasons for
this practice  The clergy were not only far better educated than laymen
but they were also not ordinarily dangerous as military leaders  nor
could their offices become hereditary 

 Sidenote  Made Archbishop of Canterbury  Becket defends the cause of
the Church against the king  

In appointing Becket Archbishop of Canterbury  Henry intended to insure
his own complete control of the Church  He proposed to bring clerical
criminals before the royal courts and punish them like other offenders 
to make the bishops meet all the feudal obligations  and to prevent
appeals to the pope  Becket  however  immediately resigned his
chancellorship  gave up his gay life  and opposed every effort of the
king to reduce the independence of the Church  After a haughty assertion
of the supremacy of the spiritual power over the secular government 
Thomas fled from the wrathful and disappointed monarch to France and the
protection of the pope 

 Sidenote  Murder of Becket and Henry s remorse  

In spite of a patched up reconciliation with the king  Becket proceeded
to excommunicate or suspend some of the great English prelates and  as
Henry believed  was conspiring to rob his son of the crown  In a fit of
anger  Henry exclaimed among his followers   Is there no one to avenge
me of this miserable clerk   Unfortunately certain knights took the rash
expression literally  and Becket was murdered in Canterbury cathedral 
whither he had returned  The king had really had no wish to resort to
violence  and his sorrow and remorse when he heard of the dreadful deed 
and his terror at the consequences  were most genuine  The pope proposed
to excommunicate the king  Henry  however  made peace with the papal
legates by the solemn assertion that he had never wished the death of
Thomas and by promising to return to Canterbury all the property which
he had confiscated  to send money to aid in the capture of the Holy
Sepulcher at Jerusalem  and to undertake a crusade himself  92 

 Sidenote  Richard the Lion Hearted  1189 1199  

 Sidenote  John  1199 1216  

54  Henry s later years were troubled by the machinations of Philip
Augustus of France and by the quarrels and treason of his own sons  of
which some account has already been given  93  He was followed by his
son  the picturesque Richard the Lion Hearted  one of the most romantic
figures of the Middle Ages  He was  however  a poor ruler  who spent but
a few months of his ten years  reign in England  He died in 1199 and was
succeeded by his brother John  from all accounts one of the most
detestable persons who has ever worn a crown  His reign was 
nevertheless  a notable one in the annals of England  In the first
place  he lost a great part of the possessions of his house upon the
continent  Normandy  Brittany  Anjou  etc    secondly  he was forced by
a revolt of his people  who refused to endure his despotism any longer 
to grant the Great Charter  The loss of his lands across the Channel has
already been described  it remains only to speak of the winning of the
Great Charter of English liberties  94 

 Sidenote  The granting of the Great Charter  1215  

When  in 1213  John proposed to lead his English vassals across the
water in order to attempt to reconquer his lost possessions  they
refused to accompany him on the ground that their feudal obligations did
not bind them to fight outside of their country  Moreover  they showed a
lively discontent with John s despotism and his neglect of those limits
of the kingly power which several of the earlier Norman kings had
solemnly recognized  In 1214 a number of the barons met and took a
solemn oath to compel the king  by arms if necessary  to confirm a
charter containing the things which  according to English traditions  a
king might not do  It proved necessary to march against John  whom the
insurgent nobles met at Runnymede  not far from London  Here on the 15th
of June  1215  they forced him to swear to observe the rights of the
nation  as they conceived them  which they had carefully written out 

 Sidenote  The provisions of the Charter and its importance  

The Great Charter is perhaps the most famous document in the history of
government  95  its provisions furnish a brief and comprehensive
statement of the burning governmental questions of the age  It was
really the whole nation  not merely the nobles  who concluded this great
treaty with a tyrannous ruler  The rights of the commoner are guarded as
well as those of the noble  As the king promises to observe the
liberties and customs of his vassals and not to abuse his feudal
prerogatives  so the vassals agree to observe the rights of their men 
The merchant is not to be deprived of his goods for small offenses  nor
the farmer of his wagon and implements  The king is to impose no tax 
beside the three stated feudal aids  96  except by the consent of the
great council of the nation  This is to include the prelates and greater
barons and all who hold directly of the king 

There is no more notable clause in the Charter than that which provides
that no one is to be arrested or imprisoned or deprived of his property
unless he be immediately sent before a court of his peers for trial  To
realize the importance of this  we must recollect that in France  down
to 1789  the king exercised such unlimited powers that he could order
the arrest of any one he pleased  and could imprison him for any length
of time without bringing him to trial  or even informing him of the
nature of his offense  The Great Charter provided further that the king
should permit merchants to move about freely and should observe the
privileges of the various towns  nor were his officers longer to
exercise despotic powers over those under them 

 The Great Charter is the first great public act of the nation after it
has realized its own identity  the consummation of the work for which
unconsciously kings  prelates  and lawyers have been laboring for a
century  There is not a word in it that recalls the distinctions of race
and blood  or that maintains the differences of English and Norman law 
It is in one view the summing up of a period of national life  in
another the starting point of a new period  not less eventful than that
which it closes   Stubbs  

In spite of his solemn confirmation of the Charter  John  with his
accustomed treachery  made a futile attempt to abrogate his engagements 
but neither he nor his successors ever succeeded in getting rid of the
document  Later there were times when the English kings evaded its
provisions and tried to rule as absolute monarchs  But the people always
sooner or later bethought them of the Charter  which thus continued to
form an effective barrier against permanent despotism in England 

 Sidenote  Henry III  1216 1272  

55  During the long reign of John s son  Henry III  England began to
construct her Parliament  an institution which has not only played a
most important rôle in English history  but has also served as the model
for similar bodies in almost every civilized state in the world  Henry s
fondness for appointing foreigners to office  his anxiety to enjoy
powers which he had not the intelligence or energy to justify by the use
he made of them  and his willingness to permit the pope to levy taxes in
England  led the nobles to continue their hostility to the crown  The
nobles and the people of the towns  who were anxious to check the
arbitrary powers of the king  joined forces in what is known as the War
of the Barons  They found a leader in the patriotic Simon de Montfort 
who proved himself a valiant and unselfish defender of the rights of the
nation 

 Sidenote  The English Parliament  

The older Witenagemot of Saxon times  as well as the Great Council of
the Norman kings  was a meeting of nobles  bishops  and abbots  which
the king summoned from time to time to give him advice and aid  and to
sanction important governmental undertakings  During Henry s reign its
meetings became more frequent and its discussions more vigorous than
before  and the name  Parliament  began to be applied to it 

 Sidenote  Simon de Montfort summons the commons to Parliament  

In 1265 a famous Parliament was held  where  through the influence of
Simon de Montfort  a most important new class of members  the
 commons   was present  which was destined to give it its future
greatness  In addition to the nobles and prelates  the sheriffs were
ordered to summon two simple knights from each county and two citizens
from each of the more flourishing towns to attend and take part in the
discussions 

 Sidenote  The Model Parliament of Edward I  1295  

Edward I  the next king  definitely adopted this innovation  He
doubtless called in the representatives of the towns because the
townspeople were becoming rich and he wished to have an opportunity to
ask them to make grants to meet the expenses of the government  He also
wished to obtain the approval of all classes when he determined upon
important measures affecting the whole realm  Since the Model Parliament
of 1295  the commons  or representatives of the people  have always been
included along with the clergy and nobility when the national assembly
of England has been summoned  We shall see later how the present houses
of Lords and Commons came into existence under Edward s son 

 Sidenote  England in the fourteenth century  

From the reign of Edward I we are  as a distinguished English historian
has well said   face to face with modern England  Kings  Lords  Commons 
the courts of justice      the relations of Church and State  in a great
measure the framework of society itself  have all taken the shape which
they still essentially retain   Green   The English language was 
moreover  about to become the speech we use to day 




CHAPTER XII

GERMANY AND ITALY IN THE TENTH AND ELEVENTH CENTURIES


 Sidenote  Contrast between the development of Germany and France  

56  The history of the kingship in the eastern  or German  part of
Charlemagne s empire is very different from that in France  which was
reviewed in a previous chapter  After a struggle of four hundred years 
it had become clear by the thirteenth century that the successors of
Louis the German  Charlemagne s grandson  could not make of Germany a
kingdom such as St  Louis left to his descendants  From the thirteenth
century down to Napoleon s time there was no Germany in a political
sense  but only a great number of practically independent states  great
and small  It was but a generation ago that  under the leadership of
Prussia   a kingdom unknown until many centuries after Charlemagne s
time   the previously independent kingdoms  principalities  and free
towns were formed into the federation now known as the German empire 

 Sidenote  Stem duchies  

The map of the eastern part of Charlemagne s empire a century after his
death indicates that the whole region had fallen into certain large
divisions ruled over by dukes  who  in Saxony and Bavaria at least  were
kings in all but name  97  Just how these duchies originated is
something of a mystery  but two things at least are clear which help to
explain their appearance  In the first place  under the weak successors
of Louis the German  the old independent spirit of the various peoples 
or  stems   that Charlemagne had been able to hold together  once more
asserted itself and they gladly returned to the leadership of their own
chiefs  In the second place  they were driven to do this by the constant
attacks from without  first of the Northmen and the Moravians  a Slavic
people  then of the terrible Hungarian horsemen who penetrated more than
once as far west as France  As there was no competent central power to
defend the people  it was natural that they should look to their local
leaders for help and guidance 

 Sidenote  Henry I  919 936  

These  stem duchies   as the Germans call them  prevented the German
kings from getting a firm hold on their realms  The best that they could
do was to bring about a sort of confederation  Consequently  when the
German aristocracy chose the strong Henry I  of the ducal house of
Saxony  98  as their king in 919  he wisely made no attempt to deprive
the several dukes of their power  He needed their assistance in the task
of dealing with the invaders who were pressing in on all sides  He
prepared the way for the later subjugation of the Slavs and the final
repulse of the Hungarians  but he left to his famous son  Otto I  the
task of finally disposing of the invaders and attempting to found a real
kingdom 

 Sidenote  Otto the Great  936 973  

The reign of Otto I  936 973   called the Great  is one of the most
extraordinary in the history of Germany  He made no attempt to abolish
the duchies  but he succeeded in getting all of them into the hands of
his sons  brothers  or near relatives  as well as in reducing the power
of the dukes  For example  he made his brother Henry duke of Bavaria 
after forgiving him for two revolts  His scholarly brother  Archbishop
Bruno of Cologne  99  he made duke of Lorraine in the place of his
faithless son in law  Conrad  who had rebelled against him  Many of the
old ducal families either died out or lost their heritage by
unsuccessful revolt  None of them offered a long succession of able
rulers  The duchies consequently fell repeatedly into the hands of the
king  who then claimed the right to assign them to whom he wished 

In the middle of the tenth century the northern and eastern boundaries
of Germany were as yet very ill defined  The Slavic peoples across the
Elbe  many of whom were still pagans  were engaged in continual attacks
upon the borders of Saxony  Otto I did more than fight these tribes  he
established dioceses  such as Brandenburg  Havelberg  etc   in a
district which is now the political center of the German empire  and
greatly forwarded the Christianizing and colonization of the tract
between the Elbe and the Oder 

 Sidenote  Final defeat of the Hungarians  

 Sidenote  Beginnings of Hungary and Austria  

Moreover  he put an end forever to the invasions of the Hungarians  He
defeated them in a great battle near Augsburg  955  and pursued them to
the confines of Germany  The Hungarians  or Magyars as they are commonly
called  then settled down in their own territory and began to lay the
foundations of that national development which makes them one of the
most important factors in the eastern portion of Europe to day  A region
which had belonged to the Bavarian duchy was organized as a separate
district  the Austrian  Mark   i e   March   and became the nucleus of
the Austrian empire 

 Sidenote  Otto interferes in Italian affairs  

57  The most noteworthy  however  of Otto s acts was his interference in
Italian affairs  which led to his assuming the imperial crown which
Charlemagne had worn  There is no more gloomy chapter in European
history than the experiences of Italy and the papacy after the
deposition of Charles the Fat in 887  We know little of what went on 
but we hear of the duke of Spoleto  the marquis of Friuli  and
Burgundian princes from across the Alps  assuming the Italian crown at
different times  The Mohammedan invasions added to the confusion  so
that Germany and France  in spite of their incessant wars  appear
almost tranquil compared with the anarchy in Italy  100  Three Italian
kings were crowned emperor by the popes during the generation following
the deposition of Charles the Fat  Then for a generation the title of
emperor disappeared altogether in the West  until it was again assumed
by the German Otto 

 Sidenote  Otto is crowned emperor  962  

Italy was a tempting field of operations for an ambitious ruler  Otto
first crossed the Alps in 951  married the widow of one of the ephemeral
Italian kings  and  without being formally crowned  was generally
acknowledged as king of Italy  The revolt of his son compelled him to
return to Germany  but a decade later the pope called him to his
assistance  Otto answered the summons promptly  freed the pope from his
enemies  and was crowned emperor at Rome in 962 

 Sidenote  Important results for Germany of the coronation of Otto the
Great  

The coronation of Otto the Great  like that of Charlemagne  was a
momentous event in mediæval history  By assuming the imperial crown he
imposed so great a burden on his successors  the German kings  that they
finally succumbed beneath it  For three centuries they strove to keep
Germany together and at the same time control Italy and the papacy 
After interminable wars and incalculable sacrifices  they lost all 
Italy escaped them  the papacy established its complete independence 
and Germany  their rightful patrimony  instead of growing into a strong
monarchy  fell apart into weak little states 

 Sidenote  Example of emperor s trouble in controlling popes and Italian
affairs  

Otto s own experiences furnish an example of the melancholy results of
his relations with the pope  to whom he owed his crown  Hardly had he
turned his back before the pope began to violate his engagements  It
became necessary for the new emperor to hasten back to Rome and summon a
council for the deposition of the pontiff  whose conduct certainly
furnished ample justification  But the Romans refused to accept a pope
chosen under Otto s auspices  and he had to return again to Rome and
besiege the city before his pope was acknowledged  A few years later 
still a third expedition was necessary in order to restore another of
the emperor s popes who had been driven out of Rome by the local
factions 

 Illustration  EUROPE ABOUT A D  1000 

The succeeding emperors had usually to make a similar series of costly
and troublesome journeys to Rome   a first one to be crowned  and then
others either to depose a hostile pope or to protect a loyal one from
the oppression of neighboring lords  These excursions were very
distracting  especially to a ruler who left behind him in Germany a
rebellious nobility that always took advantage of his absence to revolt 

 Sidenote  The Holy Roman Empire  

Otto s successors dropped their old title of King of the East Franks as
soon as they had been duly crowned by the pope at Rome  and assumed the
magnificent and all embracing designation   Emperor Ever August of the
Romans   101  Their  Holy Roman Empire   as it came to be called later 
which was to endure  in name at least  for more than eight centuries 
was obviously even less like that of the ancient Romans than was
Charlemagne s  As  kings  of Germany and Italy they had practically all
the powers that they enjoyed as  emperors   except the fatal right that
they claimed of taking part in the election of the pope  We shall find
that  instead of making themselves feared at home and building up a
great state  the German emperors wasted their strength in a long
struggle with the popes  who proved themselves in the end incomparably
the stronger  and eventually reduced the Empire to a mere shadow 

58  We have no space to speak of the immediate successors of Otto the
Great  102  Like him they had to meet opposition at home as well as the
attacks of their restless neighbors  especially the Slavs  The Empire is
usually considered to have reached its height under Conrad II
 1024 1039  and Henry III  1039 1056   the first two representatives of
the new Franconian line which succeeded the Saxon house upon its
extinction in 1024 

 Sidenote  Conrad II  1024 1039  

 Sidenote  Poland  

By an amicable arrangement the kingdom of Burgundy came into the hands
of Conrad II in 1032  This large and important territory long remained a
part of the Empire  serving to render intercourse between Germany and
Italy easier  and forming a barrier between Germany and France  On the
eastern borders of the Empire the Slavs had organized the kingdom of
Poland in the latter half of the tenth century  and its kings  although
often at war with the emperor  generally acknowledged his suzerainty 
Conrad  following the policy of Otto the Great  endeavored to bring as
many of the stem duchies as possible into the hands of his son and
successor  Henry III  who was made duke of Franconia  Swabia  and
Bavaria  This was the firmest of all foundations for the kingly power 

 Sidenote  Henry III  1039 1056  

Notwithstanding the energy and ability of Conrad II and Henry III  the
fact that the Empire stands forth as the great power of western Europe
during the first half of the eleventh century is largely due to the
absence of any strong rivals  The French kings had not yet overcome the
feudal disruption  and although Italy objected to the control of the
emperor  it never could agree to combine against him 

 Sidenote  Henry III and the Church  

59  The most important question that Henry III had to face was that of a
great reform of the Church  This was already under way and it was bound 
if carried out  to destroy the control of the emperors not only over
the papacy but also over the German bishops and abbots  whom they had
strengthened by grants of land and authority with the special purpose of
making them the chief support of the monarchy  The reform was not
directed particularly against the emperor  but he was  as will become
apparent  more seriously affected by the changes proposed by the
reforming party than any other of the European rulers 

 Sidenote  Wealth of the Church  

In order to understand the reform and the long struggle between the
emperors and the popes which grew out of it  we must stop a moment to
consider the condition of the Church in the time of Henry III  It seemed
to be losing all its strength and dignity and to be falling apart  just
as Charlemagne s empire had dissolved into feudal bits  This was chiefly
due to the vast landed possessions of the clergy  Kings  princes  and
rich landowners had long considered it meritorious to make donations to
bishoprics and monasteries  so that a very considerable portion of the
land in western Europe had come into the hands of churchmen 

 Sidenote  The church lands drawn into the feudal system  

When landowners began to give and receive land as fiefs the property of
the Church was naturally drawn into the feudal relations  A king  or
other proprietor  might grant fiefs to churchmen as well as to laymen 
The bishops became the vassals of the king or of other feudal lords by
doing homage for a fief and swearing fidelity  just as any other vassal
would do  An abbot sometimes placed his monastery under the protection
of a neighboring lord by giving up his land and receiving it back again
as a fief 

 Sidenote  Fiefs held by churchmen not hereditary  

One great difference  however  existed between the church lands and the
ordinary fiefs  According to the law of the Church  the bishops and
abbots could not marry and so could have no children to whom they might
transmit their property  Consequently  when a landholding churchman
died  some one had to be chosen in his place who should enjoy his
property and perform his duties  The rule of the Church had been  from
time immemorial  that the clergy of the diocese should choose the
bishop  their choice being ratified by the people  As the church law
expresses it   A bishop is therefore rightly appointed in the church of
God when the people acclaim him who has been elected by the common vote
of the clergy   As for the abbots  they were  according to the rule of
St  Benedict  to be chosen by the members of the monastery 

 Sidenote  Bishops and abbots practically chosen by the feudal lords  

In spite of these rules the bishops and abbots had come  in the tenth
and eleventh centuries  to be selected  to all intents and purposes  by
the various kings and feudal lords  It is true that the outward forms of
a regular   canonical   election were usually permitted  but the feudal
lord made it clear whom he wished chosen  and if the wrong person was
elected  he simply refused to hand over to him the lands attached to the
bishopric or abbey  The lord could in this way control the choice of the
prelates  for in order to become a real bishop or abbot one had not only
to be elected  he had also to be solemnly  invested  with the
appropriate powers of a bishop or abbot and with his lands 

 Sidenote  Investiture  

Since  to the worldly minded  the spiritual powers attached to church
offices possessed little attraction if no property went along with them 
the feudal lord was really master of the situation  When his appointee
was duly chosen he proceeded to the  investiture   The new bishop or
abbot first became the  man  of the feudal lord by doing him homage  and
then the lord transferred to him the lands and rights attached to the
office  No careful distinction appears to have been made between the
property and the spiritual prerogatives  The lord often conferred both
by bestowing upon a bishop the ring and the crosier  the emblems of
religious authority  It seemed shocking enough that the lord  who was
often a rough soldier  should dictate the selection of the bishops  but
it was still more shocking that he should audaciously assume to confer
spiritual powers with spiritual emblems  Yet even worse things might
happen  since sometimes the lord  for his greater convenience  had
himself made bishop 

 Sidenote  Attitude of the Church towards its property  

 Sidenote  Attitude of the king  

The Church itself naturally looked at the property attached to a
benefice as a mere incident and considered the spiritual prerogatives
the main thing  And since the clergy alone could rightly confer these 
it was natural that they should claim the right to bestow ecclesiastical
offices  including the lands   temporalities   attached to them  upon
whomsoever they pleased without consulting any layman whatever  Against
this claim the king might urge that a simple minister of the Gospel  or
a holy monk  was by no means necessarily fitted to manage the interests
of a feudal state  such as the great archbishoprics and bishoprics  and
even the abbeys  had become in Germany and elsewhere in the eleventh
century 

 Sidenote  Complicated position of the bishops in Germany and
elsewhere  

In short  the situation in which the bishops found themselves was a very
complicated one   1  As an officer of the Church  the bishop had certain
ecclesiastical and religious duties within the limits of his diocese  He
saw that parish priests were properly selected and ordained  he tried
certain cases in his court  and performed the church ceremonies   2  He
managed the lands which belonged to the bishopric  which might  or might
not  be fiefs   3  As a vassal of those who had granted lands to the
bishopric upon feudal terms  he owed the usual feudal dues  not
excluding the duty of furnishing troops to his lord   4  Lastly  in
Germany  the king had found it convenient  from about the beginning of
the eleventh century  to confer upon the bishops in many cases the
authority of a count in the districts about them  In this way they might
have the right to collect tolls  coin money  and perform other important
governmental duties  103  When a prelate was inducted into office he
was invested with all these various functions at once  both spiritual
and governmental 

To forbid the king to take part in the investiture was  consequently  to
rob him not only of his feudal rights but also of his authority over
many of his government officials  since bishops  and sometimes even
abbots  were often counts in all but name  Moreover  the monarch relied
upon the clergy  both in Germany and France  to counterbalance the
influence of his lay vassals  who were always trying to exalt their
power at his expense  He therefore found it necessary to take care who
got possession of the important church offices 

 Sidenote  The marriage of the clergy threatens the wealth of the
Church  

60  Still another danger threatened the wealth and resources of the
Church  During the tenth and eleventh centuries the rule of the Church
prohibiting the clergy from marrying 104  appears to have been widely
and publicly neglected in Italy  Germany  France  and England  To the
stricter critics of the time this appeared a terrible degradation of the
clergy  who  they felt  should be unencumbered by family cares and
wholly devoted to the service of God  The question  too  had another
side  It was obvious that the property of the Church would soon be
dispersed if the clergy were allowed to marry  since they would wish to
provide for their children  Just as the feudal tenures had become
hereditary  so the church lands would become hereditary unless the
clergy were forced to remain unmarried 

 Sidenote  Buying and selling of church offices  

Besides the feudalizing of its property and the marriage of the clergy 
there was a third great and constant source of weakness and corruption
in the Church  namely  the temptation to buy and sell church offices 
Had the duties and responsibilities of the bishops  abbots  and priests
always been arduous and exacting  and their recompense barely enough to
maintain them  there would have been little tendency to bribe those who
could bestow the appointments  But the incomes of bishoprics and abbeys
were usually considerable  sometimes very great  while the duties
attached to the office of bishop or abbot  however serious in the eyes
of the right minded  might easily be neglected by the unscrupulous  The
revenue from a great landed estate  the distinction of high
ecclesiastical rank  and the governmental prerogatives that went with
the office  were enough to induce the members of the noblest families to
vie with each other in securing church positions  The king or prince who
possessed the right of investiture was sure of finding some one willing
to pay something for important benefices 

 Sidenote  Origin of the term simony  

The sin of buying or selling church offices was recognized as a most
heinous one  It was called  simony   105  a name derived from Simon the
Magician  who  according to the account in the Acts of the Apostles 
offered Peter money if he would give him the power of conferring the
Holy Spirit upon those upon whom he should lay his hands  As the apostle
denounced this first simonist  so the Church has continued ever since to
denounce those who propose to purchase its sacred powers    Thy silver
perish with thee  because thou hast thought to obtain the gift of God
with money   Acts viii  20  

 Sidenote  Simony not really the sale of church offices  

Doubtless very few bought positions in the Church with the view of
obtaining the  gift of God   that is to say  the religious office  It
was the revenue and the honor that were chiefly coveted  Moreover  when
a king or lord accepted a gift from one for whom he procured a benefice 
he did not regard himself as selling the office  he merely shared its
advantages  No transaction took place in the Middle Ages without
accompanying gifts and fees of various kinds  The church lands were well
managed and remunerative  The clergyman who was appointed to a rich
bishopric or abbey seemed to have far more revenue than he needed and so
was expected to contribute to the king s treasury  which was generally
empty 

 Sidenote  Simony corrupts the lower clergy  

The evil of simony was  therefore  explicable enough  and perhaps
ineradicable under the circumstances  It was  nevertheless  very
demoralizing  for it spread downward and infected the whole body of the
clergy  A bishop who had made a large outlay in obtaining his office
naturally expected something from the priests  whom it was his duty to
appoint  The priest in turn was tempted to reimburse himself by improper
exactions for the performance of his regular religious duties  for
baptizing and marrying his parishioners  and for burying the dead 

So it seemed  at the opening of the eleventh century  as if the Church
was to be dragged down by its property into the anarchy of feudalism
described in a preceding chapter  There were many indications that its
great officers were to become merely the vassals of kings and princes
and no longer to represent a great international institution under the
headship of the popes  The Bishop of Rome had not only ceased  in the
tenth century  to exercise any considerable influence over the churches
beyond the Alps  but was himself controlled by the restless nobles of
central Italy  He appears much less important  in the chronicles of the
time  than the Archbishop of Rheims or Mayence  There is no more
extraordinary revolution recorded in history than that which raised the
weak and demoralized papacy of the tenth century to a supreme place in
European affairs 

 Sidenote  Three rival popes  

61  One of the noble families of Rome had got the selection of the popes
into its own hands  and was using the papal authority to secure its
control over the city  In the same year  1024  in which Conrad II became
emperor  a layman was actually exalted to the headship of the Church 
and after him a mere boy of ten or twelve years  Benedict IX  who  in
addition to his youth  proved to be thoroughly evil minded  His powerful
family maintained him  however  on the papal throne for a decade  until
he proposed to marry  This so scandalized even the not over sensitive
Romans that they drove him out of the city  A rich neighboring bishop
then secured his own election  Presently a third claimant appeared in
the person of a pious and learned priest who bought out the claims of
Benedict IX for a large sum of money and assumed the title of Gregory
VI 

 Sidenote  The interference of Henry III in papal affairs and its
momentous consequences  

This state of affairs seemed to the emperor  Henry III  to call for his
interference  He accordingly went to Italy and summoned a council at
Sutri  north of Rome  in 1046  where two of the claimants were deposed 
Gregory VI  more conscientious than his rivals  not only resigned his
office but tore his pontifical robes in pieces and admitted his
monstrous crime in buying the papal dignity  though his motives had been
of the purest  The emperor then secured the election of a worthy German
bishop as pope  whose first act was to crown Henry and Agnes his
wife  106 

The appearance of Henry III in Italy at this juncture  and the
settlement of the question of the three rival popes  are among the most
important events of all mediæval history in their results  In lifting
the papacy out of the realm of petty Italian politics  Henry unwittingly
helped to raise up a rival to the imperial authority which was destined 
before the end of the next century  to overshadow it and to become
without question the greatest power in western Europe 

 Sidenote  Difficulties to be overcome in establishing the supremacy of
the popes in western Europe  

For nearly two hundred years the popes had assumed very little
responsibility for the welfare of Europe at large  It was a gigantic
task to make of the Church a great international monarchy  with its head
at the old world center  Rome  the difficulties in the way seemed 
indeed  well nigh insurmountable  The great archbishops  who were as
jealous of the power of the pope as the great vassals were of the kingly
power  must be brought into subjection  National tendencies which made
against the unity of the Church must be overcome  The control enjoyed by
kings  princes  and other feudal lords in the selection of church
officials must be done away with  Simony with its degrading influence
must be abolished  The marriage of the clergy must be checked  so that
the property of the Church should not be dissipated  The whole body of
churchmen  from the priest to the archbishop  must be redeemed from the
immorality and worldliness which degraded them in the eyes of the
people 

 Sidenote  Pope Leo IX  1049 1054  

It is true that during the remainder of his life Henry III himself
controlled the election of the popes  but he was sincerely and deeply
interested in the betterment of the Church and took care to select able
and independent German prelates to fill the papal office  Of these the
most important was Leo IX  1049 1054   He was the first to show clearly
how the pope might not only become in time the real head and monarch of
the Church but might also aspire to rule kings and emperors as well as
bishops and abbots  Leo refused to regard himself as pope simply because
the emperor had appointed him  He held that the emperor should aid and
protect  but might not create  popes  So he entered Rome as an humble
barefoot pilgrim and was duly elected by the Roman people according to
the rule of the Church 

 Sidenote  Papal legates  

Leo IX undertook to visit France and Germany and even Hungary in person 
with the purpose of calling councils to check simony and the marriage of
the clergy  But this personal oversight on the part of the popes was
not feasible in the long run  if for no other reason  because they were
generally old men who would have found traveling arduous and often
dangerous  Leo s successors relied upon legates  to whom they delegated
extensive powers and whom they dispatched to all parts of western Europe
in something the same way that Charlemagne employed his  missi   It is
supposed that Leo IX was greatly influenced in his energetic policy by a
certain sub deacon  Hildebrand by name  Hildebrand was himself destined
to become one of the greatest popes  under the title of Gregory VII  and
to play a part in the formation of the mediæval Church which justifies
us in ranking him  as a statesman  with Cæsar  Charlemagne  Richelieu 
and Bismarck 

 Sidenote  Pope Nicholas II places the election of the popes in the
hands of the cardinals  1059  

62  The first great step toward the emancipation of the Church from the
control of the laity was taken by Nicholas II  In 1059 he issued a
remarkable decree which took the election of the head of the Church once
for all out of the hands of both the emperor and the people of Rome  and
placed it definitely and forever in the hands of the  cardinals   who
represented the Roman clergy  107  Obviously the object of this decree
was to preclude all lay interference  whether of the distant emperor  of
the local nobility  or of the Roman mob  The college of cardinals still
exists and still elects the pope  108 

 Sidenote  Opposition to further reforms  

The reform party which directed the policy of the popes had  it hoped 
freed the head of the Church from the control of worldly men by putting
his election in the hands of the Roman clergy  It now proposed to
emancipate the Church as a whole from the base entanglements of earth 
first  by strictly forbidding the married clergy to perform religious
functions and by exhorting their flocks to refuse to attend their
ministrations  and secondly  by depriving the kings and feudal lords of
their influence over the choice of the bishops and abbots  since this
influence was deemed the chief cause of worldliness among the prelates 
Naturally these last measures met with far more general opposition than
the new way of electing the pope  An attempt to expel the married clergy
from Milan led to a popular revolt  in which the pope s legate actually
found his life in danger  The decrees forbidding clergymen to receive
their lands and offices from laymen received little attention from
either the clergy or the feudal lords  The magnitude of the task which
the popes had undertaken first became fully apparent when Hildebrand
himself ascended the papal throne  in 1073  as Gregory VII 




CHAPTER XIII

THE CONFLICT BETWEEN GREGORY VII AND HENRY IV


 Sidenote  The  Dictatus  of Gregory VII  

63  Among the writings of Gregory VII there is a very brief statement 
called the  Dictatus   of the powers which he believed the popes to
possess  Its chief claims are the following  The pope enjoys a unique
title  he is the only universal bishop and may depose and reinstate
other bishops or transfer them from place to place  No council of the
Church may be regarded as speaking for Christendom without his consent 
The Roman Church has never erred  nor will it err to all eternity  No
one may be considered a Catholic Christian who does not agree with the
Roman Church  No book is authoritative unless it has received the papal
sanction 

Gregory does not stop with asserting the pope s complete supremacy over
the Church  he goes still further and claims for him the right to
restrain the civil government when it seems necessary in the cause of
righteousness  He says that  the Pope is the only person whose feet are
kissed by all princes   that he may depose emperors and  absolve
subjects from allegiance to an unjust ruler   No one shall dare to
condemn one who appeals to the pope  No one may annul a decree of the
pope  though the pope may declare null and void the decrees of all other
earthly powers  and no one may pass judgment upon his acts  109 

 Sidenote  Inadequacy of civil government in the Middle Ages  

 Sidenote  The Church claims the right to interfere only when
necessary  

These are not the insolent claims of a reckless tyrant  but the
expression of a theory of government which has had advocates among some
of the most conscientious and learned men of all succeeding ages  Before
venturing to criticise Gregory s view of his position we should
recollect two important facts  In the first place  what most writers
call the  state   when dealing with the Middle Ages  was no orderly
government in our sense of the word  it was represented only by restless
feudal lords  to whom disorder was the very breath of life  When  on one
occasion  Gregory declared the civil power to be the invention of evil
men instigated by the devil  he was making a natural inference from what
he observed of the conduct of the princes of his time  In the second
place  it should be remembered that Gregory does not claim that the
Church should manage the civil government  but that the papacy  which is
answerable for the eternal welfare of every Christian  should have the
right to restrain a sinful and perverse prince and to refuse to
recognize unrighteous laws  Should all else fail  he claimed the right
to free a nation which was being led to disaster in this world and to
perdition in the next from its allegiance to a wicked monarch 

 Sidenote  Gregory VII puts his theories of the papal power into
practice  

Immediately upon his election as pope  Gregory began to put into
practice his high conception of the rôle that the spiritual head of the
world should play  He dispatched legates throughout Europe  and from
this time on these legates became a powerful instrument of government 
He warned the kings of France and England and the youthful German ruler 
Henry IV  to forsake their evil ways  to be upright and just  and obey
his admonitions  He explains  kindly but firmly  to William the
Conqueror that the papal and kingly powers are both established by God
as the greatest among the authorities of the world  just as the sun and
moon are the greatest of the heavenly bodies  110  But the papal power
is obviously superior to the kingly  for it is responsible for it  at
the Last Day Gregory must render an account of the king as one of the
flock intrusted to his care  The king of France was warned to give up
his practice of simony  lest he be excommunicated and his subjects freed
from their oath of allegiance  All these acts of Gregory appear to have
been dictated not by worldly ambition but by a fervent conviction of
their righteousness and of his duty toward all men 

 Sidenote  Death of Henry III  1056  

64  Obviously Gregory s plan of reform included all the states of
western Europe  but conditions were such that the most striking conflict
took place between him and the emperor  The trouble came about in this
way  Henry III had died in 1056  leaving only his good wife Agnes and
their little son of six years to maintain the hard fought prerogatives
of the German king in the midst of ambitious vassals such as even Otto
the Great had found it difficulty to control 

 Sidenote  Accession of Henry IV  1065  

In 1065 the fifteen year old lad was declared of age  and his lifelong
difficulties began with a great rebellion of the Saxons  They accused
the young king of having built castles in their land and of filling them
with rough soldiers who preyed upon the people  Gregory felt it his duty
to interfere  To him the Saxons appeared a people oppressed by a
heedless youth under the inspiration of evil counselors 

As one reads of Henry s difficulties and misfortunes it seems miraculous
that he was able to maintain himself as king at all  Sick at heart 
unable to trust any one  and forced to flee from his own subjects  he
writes contritely to the pope   We have sinned against heaven and before
thee and are no longer worthy to be called thy son   But when cheered
for a moment by a victory over the rebellious Saxons  he easily forgot
his promise of obedience to the pope  He continued to associate with
counselors whom the pope had excommunicated and went on filling
important bishoprics in Germany and Italy regardless of the pope s
prohibitions 

 Sidenote  New prohibition of lay investiture  

The popes who immediately preceded Gregory had more than once forbidden
the churchmen to receive investiture from laymen  Gregory reissued this
prohibition in 1075  111  just as the trouble with Henry had begun 
Investiture was  as we have seen  the legal transfer by the king  or
other lord  to a newly chosen church official  of the lands and rights
attached to the office  In forbidding lay investiture Gregory attempted
nothing less than a revolution  The bishops and abbots were often
officers of government  exercising in Germany and Italy powers similar
in all respects to those of the counts  The king not only relied upon
them for advice and assistance in carrying on his government  but they
were among his chief allies in his constant struggles with his vassals 

 Sidenote  Henry IV angered by the language of the papal legates  

Gregory dispatched three envoys to Henry  end of 1075  with a fatherly
letter 112  in which he reproached the king for his wicked conduct  But
he evidently had little expectation that mere expostulation would have
any effect upon Henry  for he gave his legates instructions to use
threats  if necessary  which were bound to produce either complete
subjection or out and out revolt  The legates were to tell the king that
his crimes were so numerous  so horrible  and so notorious  that he
merited not only excommunication but the permanent loss of all his royal
honors 

 Sidenote  Gregory VII deposed by a council of German bishops at Worms 
1076 

The violence of the legates  language not only kindled the wrath of the
king but also gained for him friends among the bishops  A council which
Henry summoned at Worms  in 1076  was attended by more than two thirds
of the German bishops  Here Gregory was declared deposed owing to the
alleged irregularity of his election and the many terrible charges of
immorality and ambition brought against him  The bishops renounced their
obedience to him and publicly declared that he had ceased to be their
pope  It appears very surprising  at first sight  that the king should
have received the prompt support of the German churchmen against the
head of the Church  But it must be remembered that the prelates owed
their offices to the king and not to the pope 

In a remarkable letter 113  to Gregory  Henry asserts that he has shown
himself long suffering and eager to guard the honor of the papacy  but
that the pope has mistaken his humility for fear   Thou hast not
hesitated   the letter concludes   to rise up against the royal power
conferred upon us by God  daring to threaten to deprive us of it  as if
we had received our kingdom from thee  As if the kingdom and the Empire
were in thine and not in God s hands     I  Henry  King by the grace of
God  together with all our bishops  say unto thee  come down  come down
from thy throne and be accursed of all generations  

 Sidenote  Henry IV deposed and excommunicated by the pope  

Gregory s reply to Henry and the German bishops who had deposed him was
speedy and decisive   Incline thine ear to us  O Peter  chief of the
Apostles  As thy representative and by thy favor has the power been
granted especially to me by God of binding and loosing in heaven and
earth  On the strength of this  for the honor and glory of thy Church 
in the name of Almighty God  Father  Son  and Holy Ghost  I withdraw 
through thy power and authority  from Henry the King  son of Henry the
Emperor  who has risen against thy Church with unheard of insolence  the
rule over the whole kingdom of the Germans and over Italy  I absolve all
Christians from the bonds of the oath which they have sworn  or may
swear  to him  and I forbid anyone to serve him as king   For his
intercourse with the excommunicated and his manifold iniquities  the
king is furthermore declared accursed and excommunicate  114 

 Sidenote  Attitude of the German princes  

For a time after the pope had deposed him everything went against Henry 
Even the churchmen now held off  Instead of resenting the pope s
interference  the discontented Saxons  and many other of Henry s
vassals  believed that there was now an excellent opportunity to get rid
of Henry and choose a more agreeable ruler  But after a long conference
the great German vassals decided to give Henry another chance  He was to
refrain from exercising the functions of government until he had made
peace with the pope  If at the end of a year he had failed to do this 
he was to be regarded as having forfeited the throne  The pope was 
moreover  invited to come to Augsburg to consult with the princes as to
whether Henry should be reinstated or another chosen in his stead  It
looked as if the pope was  in truth  to control the civil government 

 Sidenote  Henry submits to the pope at Canossa  1077  

Henry decided to anticipate the arrival of the pope  He hastened across
the Alps in midwinter and appeared as an humble suppliant before the
castle of Canossa  whither the pope had come on his way to Augsburg  For
three days the German king appeared before the closed door  barefoot and
in the coarse garments of a pilgrim and a penitent  and even then
Gregory was induced only by the expostulations of his influential
companions to admit the humiliated ruler  The spectacle of this mighty
prince of distinguished appearance  humiliated and in tears before the
nervous little man who humbly styled himself the  servant of the
servants of God   has always been regarded as most completely typifying
the power of the Church and the potency of her curses  against which
even the most exalted of the earth found no weapon of defense except
abject penitence  115 

 Sidenote  A new king chosen  

 Sidenote  Henry again excommunicated  

65  The pardon which Henry received at Canossa did not satisfy the
German princes  for their main object in demanding that he should
reconcile himself with the Church had been to cause him additional
embarrassment  They therefore proceeded to elect another ruler  and the
next three or four years was a period of bloody struggles between the
adherents of the rival kings  Gregory remained neutral until 1080  when
he again  bound with the chain of anathema  Henry   the so called king  
and all his followers  He declared him deprived of his royal power and
dignity and forbade all Christians to obey him 

 Sidenote  Henry triumphs over Gregory  

 Sidenote  Death of Gregory  

The new excommunication had precisely the opposite effect from the first
one  Henry s friends increased rather than decreased  The German clergy
were again aroused  and they again deposed  this same most brazen
Hildebrand   Henry s rival fell in battle  and Henry  accompanied by an
anti pope  betook himself to Italy with the double purpose of putting
his pope on the throne and winning the imperial crown  Gregory held out
for no less than two years  but at last Rome fell into Henry s hands and
Gregory withdrew and soon died  His last words were   I have loved
justice and hated iniquity  therefore I die an exile   and the
fair minded historical student will not question their truth  116 

 Sidenote  Henry IV s further troubles  

The death of Gregory did not put an end to Henry s difficulties  He
spent the remaining twenty years of his life in trying to maintain his
rights as king of Germany and Italy against his rebellious subjects on
both sides of the Alps  In Germany his chief enemies were the Saxons and
his discontented vassals  In Italy the pope was now actively engaged as
a temporal ruler  in building up a little state of his own  He was 
moreover  always ready to encourage the Lombard cities  which were
growing more and more powerful and less and less willing to submit to
the rule of a German  in their opposition to the emperor 

 Sidenote  Rebellion at home and in Italy  

 Sidenote  Treason of Henry s sons  

 Sidenote  Death of Henry IV  1106  

A combination of his Italian enemies called Henry again to Italy in
1090  although he was forced to leave Germany but half subdued  He was
seriously defeated by the Italians  and the Lombard cities embraced the
opportunity to form their first union against their foreign king  In
1093 Milan  Cremona  Lodi  and Piacenza joined in an offensive and
defensive alliance for their own protection  After seven years of
hopeless lingering in Italy  Henry returned sadly across the Alps 
leaving the peninsula in the hands of his enemies  But he found no peace
at home  His discontented German vassals induced his son  whom he had
had crowned as his successor  to revolt against his father  Thereupon
followed more civil war  more treason  and a miserable abdication  In
1106 death put an end to perhaps the saddest reign that history records 

 Sidenote  Henry V  1106 1125  

The achievement of the reign of Henry IV s son  Henry V  which chiefly
interests us was the adjustment of the question of investitures  Pope
Paschal II  while willing to recognize those bishops already chosen by
the king  provided they were good men  proposed that thereafter
Gregory s decrees against lay investiture should be carried out  The
clergy should no longer do homage and lay their hands  consecrated to
the service of the altar  in the blood stained hands of the nobles 
Henry V  on the other hand  declared that unless the clergy took the
oath of fealty the bishops would not be given the lands  towns  castles 
tolls  and privileges attached to the bishoprics 

 Sidenote  Settlement of the question of lay investiture in the
Concordat of Worms  1122  

After a succession of troubles a compromise was at last reached in the
Concordat of Worms  1122   which put an end to the controversy over
investitures in Germany  117  The emperor promised to permit the Church
freely to elect the bishops and abbots and renounced his old claim to
invest with the spiritual emblems of the ring and the crosier  But the
elections were to be held in the presence of the king  and he was
permitted  in a separate ceremony  to invest the new bishop or abbot
with his fiefs and secular prerogatives by a touch of the scepter  In
this way the spiritual rights of the bishops were obviously conferred by
the churchmen who elected him  and although the king might still
practically invalidate an election by refusing to invest with the
coveted temporal privileges  still the direct appointment of the bishops
and abbots was taken out of his hands  As for the emperor s control over
the papacy  too many popes  since the advent of Henry IV  had been
generally recognized as properly elected without the sanction of the
emperor  for any one to believe any longer that his sanction was
necessary 




CHAPTER XIV

THE HOHENSTAUFEN EMPERORS AND THE POPES


 Sidenote  Frederick I  Barbarossa  1152 1190  

 Sidenote  The historian  Otto of Freising  

66  Frederick I  nicknamed Barbarossa  i e    Redbeard   who became king
of Germany in 1152  118  is the most interesting of all the German
emperors  and the records we have of his reign enable us to gain a
pretty good view of Europe in the middle of the twelfth century  With
his advent  we feel that we are emerging from that long period which
used to be known as the dark ages  Most of our knowledge of European
history from the sixth to the twelfth century is derived from meager and
unreliable monkish chronicles  whose authors were often ignorant and
careless  and usually far away from the scenes of the events they
recorded  In the latter half of the twelfth century  however 
information grows much more abundant and varied  We begin to have
records of the town life and are no longer entirely dependent upon the
monks  records  The first historian with a certain philosophic grasp of
his theme was Otto of Freising  His  Life of Frederick Barbarossa  and
his history of the world form invaluable sources of knowledge of the
period we now enter 

 Sidenote  Frederick s ideal of the Empire  

Frederick s ambition was to raise the Roman Empire to its old glory and
influence  He regarded himself as the successor of the Cæsars  of
Justinian  of Charlemagne  and of Otto the Great  He believed his office
to be quite as divinely established as the papacy  In announcing his
election to the pope  he stated that the Empire had been  bestowed upon
him by God   and he did not ask for the pope s sanction  as his
predecessors had done  But in his lifelong attempt to maintain what he
assumed to be the rights of the emperor he encountered all the old
difficulties  He had to watch his rebellious vassals in Germany and meet
the opposition of a series of unflinching popes  ready to defend the
most exalted claims of the papacy  He found  moreover  in the Lombard
cities unconquerable foes  who finally brought upon him a signal defeat 

 Sidenote  The towns begin to play a part in history  

67  One of the most striking differences between the ages before
Frederick and the whole period since  lies in the development of town
life  with all that that implies  Up to this time we have heard only of
emperors  popes  bishops  and feudal lords  from now on the cities must
be reckoned with  as Frederick was to discover to his sorrow  119 

 Sidenote  The government of the Lombard cities becomes partially
democratic  

The government of the towns of Lombardy fell  after Charlemagne s time 
into the hands of their respective bishops  who exercised the
prerogatives of counts  Under the bishops the towns flourished within
their walls and also extended their control over the neighboring
districts  As industry and commerce increased  the prosperous citizens 
and the poorer classes as well  aspired to some control over the
government  Cremona very early expelled its bishop  destroyed his
castle  and refused to pay him any dues  Later Henry IV stirred up Lucca
against its bishop and promised that its liberties should never be
interfered with henceforth by bishop  duke  or count  Other towns threw
off the episcopal rule  and in practically all of them the government
came at last into the hands of municipal officials elected by those
citizens who were permitted to have a hand in the government 

 Sidenote  The turmoil in the Italian towns  their remarkable
civilization  

 Illustration  Italian Towns in the Twelfth Century 

The more humble artisans were excluded altogether from a voice in city
affairs  Their occasional revolts  as well as the feuds between the
factions of the nobles   who took up their residence in the towns
instead of remaining on their estates   produced a turmoil which we
should think intolerable in our modern peaceable cities  This was
greatly increased by bitter wars with neighboring towns  Yet  in spite
of incredible disorder within and without  the Italian towns became
centers of industry  learning  and art  unequaled in history except by
the famous cities of Greece  They were able  moreover  to maintain their
independence for several centuries  Frederick s difficulties in playing
the emperor in Italy were naturally greatly increased by the sturdy
opposition of the Lombard towns which could always count on a faithful
ally in the pope  He and they had a common interest in seeing that the
power of the king of Germany remained purely nominal on their side of
the mountains  120 

 Sidenote  Frederick s first expedition to Italy  1154  

68  Milan was the most powerful of the Lombard towns and was heartily
detested by her neighbors  over whom she was constantly endeavoring to
extend her control  Two refugees from Lodi brought word to the newly
elected emperor of Milan s tyranny  When Frederick s representatives
reached the offending city they were insulted and the imperial seal was
trampled in the dust  Like the other towns  Milan would acknowledge the
supremacy of the emperor only so long as he made it no trouble  The wish
to gain the imperial crown and to see what this bold conduct of Milan
meant  brought Frederick to Italy  in 1154  on the first of six
expeditions  which together were to occupy many years of his reign 

Frederick pitched his camp in the plain of Roncaglia and there received
representatives from the Lombard towns  who had many and grievous
complaints to make of the conduct of their neighbors  especially of the
arrogant Milan  We get a hint of the distant commerce of the maritime
cities when we read that Genoa sent gifts of ostriches  lions  and
parrots  Frederick made a momentary impression by proceeding  upon the
complaint of Pavia  to besiege and destroy the town of Tortona  As soon
as he moved on to Rome  Milan plucked up courage to punish two or three
neighbors who had too enthusiastically supported the emperor  it also
lent a hand to Tortona s hapless citizens in rebuilding their city 

 Sidenote  Frederick and Pope Hadrian  

When the pope  Hadrian IV  and the emperor first met there was some
bitter feeling because Frederick hesitated to hold the pope s stirrup 
He made no further objection  however  when he learned that it was the
custom  Hadrian was relying upon his assistance  for Rome was in the
midst of a remarkable revolution  Under the leadership of the famous
Arnold of Brescia  121  the city was attempting to reëstablish a
government similar to that of the times when the Roman senate ruled the
civilized world  It is needless to say that the attempt failed  though
Frederick gave the pope but little help against Arnold and the
rebellious Romans  After receiving his crown  the emperor hastened back
to Germany and left the disappointed Hadrian to deal with his refractory
people as best he might  This desertion and later misunderstandings
produced much ill feeling between the pope and Frederick 

 Sidenote  The assembly at Roncaglia  1158  

 Sidenote  Its decision as to the rights   regalia   of the emperor over
the Lombard towns  

In 1158 Frederick was back in Italy and held another great assembly at
Roncaglia  He summoned hither certain teachers of the Roman law from
Bologna  where the revived study of the law was actively pursued   as
well as representatives of the towns  to decide exactly what his rights
as emperor were  There was little danger but that those versed in a law
which declared that  whatsoever the prince has willed has the force of
law   should give the emperor his due  His  regalia   or governmental
prerogatives  were declared to consist in feudal suzerainty over the
various duchies and counties  and in the right to appoint magistrates 
collect tolls  impose an extraordinary war tax  coin money  and enjoy
the revenue from fisheries and from salt and silver mines  Such persons
or towns as could produce proof that any of these privileges had been
formally conceded to them might continue to enjoy them  otherwise the
emperor assumed them  As most of the towns had simply succeeded to the
rights of the bishops and had no legal proofs of any concessions from
the emperor  this decision meant the loss of their independence  The
emperor greatly increased his revenue for the moment  but these extreme
measures and the hated governors whom he appointed to represent him were
bound to produce ultimate revolt  It became a matter of life and death
to the towns to get rid of the imperial officials and taxgatherers 

 Sidenote  The destruction of Crema and Milan  

The town of Crema refused to level its walls at the command of the
emperor  It had to undergo a most terrible siege and finally succumbed 
Its citizens were allowed to depart with nothing but their lives  and
the place was given over to plunder and destruction  Then Milan drove
the emperor s deputies from the gates  A long siege brought even this
proud city to terms  and the emperor did not hesitate to order its
destruction  in spite of its commercial and political importance  1162  
It is a melancholy commentary upon the relations between the various
towns that Milan s neighbors begged to be permitted to carry out her
annihilation  Her inhabitants were allowed to settle in the neighborhood
of the spot where their prosperous city had stood  and from the rapidity
with which they were able to rebuild it later  we may conclude that the
demolition was not so thoroughgoing as some of the accounts imply 

 Sidenote  The Lombard towns secretly unite to form the Lombard League  

69  The only hope for the Lombard towns was in  union   which the
emperor had explicitly forbidden  Soon after Milan s destruction
measures were secretly taken to form the nucleus of what became later
the great Lombard League  Cremona  Brescia  Mantua  and Bergamo joined
together against the emperor  Encouraged by the pope and aided by the
League  Milan was speedily rebuilt  Frederick  who had been engaged in
conquering Rome with a view of placing an anti pope on the throne of St 
Peter  was glad  in 1167  to escape the combined dangers of Roman fever
and the wrath of the towns and get back to Germany  The League was
extended to include Verona  Piacenza  Parma  and eventually many other
towns  It was even deemed best to construct an entirely new town  with a
view of harboring forces to oppose the emperor on his return  and
Alessandria remains a lasting testimonial to the energy and coöperative
spirit of the League  The new town got its name from the League s ally 
Pope Alexander III  one of the most conspicuous among the papal
opponents of the German kings 

 Sidenote  Frederick completely defeated by the League at Legnano 
1176  

After several years spent in regulating affairs in Germany  Frederick
again appeared in Lombardy  He found the new  straw  town  as the
imperialists contemptuously called it  too strong for him  The League
got its forces together  and a great battle took place at Legnano in
1176   a really decisive conflict  which was rare enough in the Middle
Ages  Frederick had been unable to get the reënforcements he wished from
across the Alps  and  under the energetic leadership of Milan  the
League so completely and hopelessly defeated him that the question of
the mastery in Lombardy was settled for some time 

 Sidenote  Peace of Constance  1183  establishes independence of Lombard
towns  

A great congress was thereupon assembled at Venice  and here  under the
auspices of Pope Alexander III  a truce was concluded  which was made a
perpetual peace at Constance in 1183  The towns received back
practically all their regalia and  upon formally acknowledging the
emperor s overlordship  were left by him to go their own way  Frederick
was forced  moreover  humbly to recognize a pope that he had solemnly
sworn should never be obeyed by him  The pope and the towns had made
common cause and enjoyed a common victory 

 Sidenote  Origin of the power of the Guelfs  

From this time on we find the name  Guelf  assumed by the party in Italy
which was opposed to the emperors  122  This is but another form of the
name of the Welf family  who made most of the trouble for the
Hohenstaufens in Germany  A certain Welf had been made duke of Bavaria
by Henry IV  in 1070   His son added to the family estates by marrying a
rich north German heiress  His grandson  Henry the Proud  looked still
higher and became the son in law of the duke of Saxony and the heir to
his great duchy  This  added to his other vast possessions  made him the
most powerful and dangerous of the vassals of the Hohenstaufen emperors 

 Sidenote  Division of Saxony and the other great German duchies  

On returning from his disastrous campaign against the Lombard towns 
Frederick Barbarossa found himself at war with the Guelf leader  Henry
the Lion  son of Henry the Proud   who had refused to come to the
emperor s aid before the battle of Legnano  Henry was banished  and
Frederick divided up the Saxon duchy  His policy was to split up the old
duchies  for he clearly saw the danger of permitting his vassals to
control districts as large as he himself held 

 Sidenote  The Hohenstaufens extend their power into southern Italy  

70  Before his departure upon the crusading expedition during which he
lost his life  Frederick saw his son  Henry VI  crowned king of Italy 
Moreover  in order to extend the power of the Hohenstaufens over
southern Italy  he arranged a marriage between the young Henry and
Constance  the heiress to the Norman kingdom of Naples and Sicily  123 
Thus the hopeless attempt to keep both Germany and Italy under the same
head was continued  It brought about new conflicts with the popes  who
were the feudal suzerains of Naples and Sicily  and ended in the ruin of
the house of Hohenstaufen 

 Sidenote  Henry VI  1190 1197  

 Sidenote  His troubles in Italy and Germany  

Henry VI s short reign was beset with difficulties which he sturdily met
and overcame  Henry the Lion  the Guelf leader  having broken the oath
he had sworn to Frederick to keep away from Germany  returned and
organized a rebellion  So soon as this was quelled and the Guelf party
was under control for a time  Henry VI had to hasten south to rescue his
Sicilian kingdom  There a certain Norman count  Tancred  was leading a
national revolt against the German claimant  The pope  who regarded
Sicily as his fief  had freed the emperor s Norman subjects from their
oath of fidelity to him  Moreover  Richard the Lion Hearted of England
had landed on his way to the Holy Land and allied himself with Tancred 

Henry VI s expedition to Italy proved a complete disaster  His empress
was captured by Tancred s people  his army largely perished by sickness 
and Henry the Lion s son  whom he held as a hostage  escaped  To add to
his troubles  no sooner had he reached Germany once more than he was
confronted by a new and more formidable revolt  1192   Luckily for him 
Richard  stealing home through Germany from his crusade  fell into his
hands  He held the English king  as an ally of the Guelfs  until he
obtained an enormous ransom  which supplied him with the means of
fighting his enemies in both Germany and Italy  The death of Tancred
enabled him to regain his realms in southern Italy  But he endeavored in
vain to induce the German princes to recognize the permanent union of
the southern Italian kingdom with Germany  or to make the imperial crown
hereditary in his house 

 Sidenote  Pope Innocent III  

At the age of thirty two  and in the midst of plans for a world empire 
Henry succumbed to Italian fever  leaving the fate of the Hohenstaufen
family in the hands of his infant son  who was to become the famous
Frederick II  Just as Henry VI died  the greatest  perhaps  of all the
popes was about to ascend the throne of St  Peter  and for nearly a
score of years to dominate the political affairs of western Europe  For
a time the political power of the popes almost overshadows that of a
Charlemagne or a Napoleon  In a later chapter a description will be
given of the great institution over which Innocent III presided like a
monarch upon his throne  But first we must follow the history of the
struggle between the papacy and the house of Hohenstaufen during the
remarkable career of Frederick II 

 Sidenote  Philip of Hohenstaufen and Otto of Brunswick rival claimants
for the German throne  

71  No sooner was Henry VI out of the way than Germany became  in the
words of Henry s brother Philip   like a sea lashed by every wind   So
wild was the confusion  so torn and so shaken was poor Germany in all
its parts  that far sighted men doubted if they would ever see it return
to peace and order  Philip first proposed to play the rôle of regent to
his little nephew  but before long he assumed the imperial prerogatives 
after being duly elected king of the Romans  The Archbishop of Cologne 
however  summoned an assembly and brought about the election of a rival
king  Otto of Brunswick  the youthful son of Henry the Lion 

 Sidenote  Innocent III decides in favor of Otto  

So the old struggle between Guelf and Hohenstaufen was renewed  Both of
the kings bid for the support of Innocent III  who openly proclaimed
that the decision of the matter lay with him  Otto was willing to make
the most reckless concessions to him  and as the pope naturally feared a
revival of the power of the Hohenstaufen house should Philip be
recognized  he decided in favor of the Guelf claimant in 1201  The
grateful Otto wrote to him   My kingship would have dissolved in dust
and ashes had not your hand  or rather the authority of the Apostolic
Chair  weighed the scale in my favor   Innocent appears here  as upon
other occasions  as the arbiter of Europe 

In the dreary civil wars which followed in Germany  Otto gradually lost
all his friends  His rival s promising career was  however  speedily cut
short  for he was murdered by a private enemy in 1208  Thereupon the
pope threatened to excommunicate any German bishop or prince who failed
to support Otto  The following year Otto went to Rome to be crowned  but
he promptly made an enemy of the pope by playing the emperor in Italy 
he even invaded the Sicilian kingdom of the pope s ward  Frederick  the
son of Henry VI 

 Sidenote  Innocent III the arbiter of western Europe  

Innocent then repudiated Otto  in whom he claimed to have  been deceived
as God himself was once deceived in Saul   He determined that the young
Frederick should be made emperor  but he took great precautions to
prevent him from becoming a dangerous enemy of the pope  as his father
and grandfather had been  When Frederick was elected king in 1212 he
made all the promises that Innocent asked 

 Sidenote  John of England becomes a vassal of the pope  

While the pope had been guiding the affairs of the empire he had by no
means neglected to exhibit his power in other quarters  above all in
England  The monks of Canterbury had  1205  ventured to choose an
archbishop  who was at the same time their abbot  without consulting
their king  John  Their appointee hastened off to Rome to gain the
pope s confirmation  while the irritated John forced the monks to hold
another election and make his treasurer archbishop  Innocent thereupon
rejected both of those who had been elected  sent for a new deputation
of monks from Canterbury  and bade them choose Stephen Langton  a man of
great ability  John then angrily drove the monks of Canterbury out of
the kingdom  Innocent replied by placing England under the  interdict  
that is to say  he ordered the clergy to close all the churches and
suspend all public services   a very terrible thing to the people of the
time  John was excommunicated  and the pope threatened that unless the
king submitted to his wishes he would depose him and give his crown to
Philip Augustus of France  As Philip made haste to collect an army for
the conquest of England  John humbly submitted to the pope in 1213  He
went so far as to hand England over to Innocent III and receive it back
as a fief  thus becoming the vassal of the pope  He agreed also to send
a yearly tribute to Rome  124 

 Sidenote  The fourth Lateran Council  1215  

Innocent  in spite of several setbacks  now appeared to have attained
all his ambitious ends  The emperor  Frederick II  was his protégé and 
as king of Sicily  his acknowledged vassal  as was also the king of
England  He not only asserted but also maintained his right to
interfere in all the important political affairs of the various European
countries  In 1215 a stately international congress  the fourth Lateran
Council  met in his palace  It was attended by hundreds of bishops 
abbots  and representatives of kings  princes  and towns  Its decrees
were directed against the abuses in the Church and the progress of
heresy  both of which were seriously threatening the power of the
clergy  It confirmed the election of Frederick II and excommunicated
once more the now completely discredited Otto  125 

 Sidenote  Death of Innocent III  1216  

 Sidenote  Emperor Frederick II  1212 1250  

72  Innocent III died during the following year and left a heritage of
trouble to his successors in the person of the former papal ward 
Frederick II  who was little inclined to obey the pope  He had been
brought up in Sicily and was much influenced by the Arabic culture which
prevailed there  He appears to have rejected many of the received
opinions of the time  His enemies asserted that he was not even a
Christian  and that he declared that Moses  Christ  and Mohammed were
all alike impostors  He was nearsighted  bald  and wholly insignificant
in person  but he exhibited the most extraordinary energy and ability in
the organization of his kingdom of Sicily  in which he was far more
interested than in Germany  He drew up an elaborate code of laws for his
southern realms and may be said to have founded the first modern
well regulated state  in which the king was indisputably supreme 

 Sidenote  His bitter struggle with the papacy  

We cannot stop to relate the romantic and absorbing story of his long
struggle with the popes  They speedily discovered that he was bent upon
establishing a powerful state to the south of them  and upon extending
his control over the Lombard cities in such a manner that the papal
possessions would be held as in a vise  This  they felt  should never be
permitted  Almost every measure that Frederick adopted aroused their
suspicion and opposition  and they made every effort to destroy him and
his house 

 Sidenote  Frederick recognized as king of Jerusalem  

His chance of success in the conflict with the head of the Church was
gravely affected by the promise which he had made before Innocent III s
death to undertake a crusade  He was so busily engaged with his endless
enterprises that he kept deferring the expedition  in spite of the papal
admonitions  until at last the pope lost patience and excommunicated
him  While excommunicate  he at last started for the East  He met with
signal success and actually brought Jerusalem  the Holy City  once more
into Christian hands and was himself recognized as king of Jerusalem 

 Sidenote  Extinction of the Hohenstaufens  power  

Frederick s conduct continued  however  to give offense to the popes 
The emperor was denounced in solemn councils  and at last the popes
began to raise up rival kings in Germany to replace Frederick  whom they
deposed  After Frederick died  1250  his sons maintained themselves for
a few years in the Sicilian kingdom  but they finally gave way before a
French army  led by the brother of St  Louis  Charles of Anjou  upon
whom the pope bestowed the southern realms of the Hohenstaufens  126 

 Sidenote  Frederick s death marks the close of the mediæval empire  

With Frederick s death the mediæval empire may be said to have come to
an end  It is true that after a period of  fist law   as the Germans
call it  a new king  Rudolf of Hapsburg  was elected in Germany in 1273 
The German kings continued to call themselves emperors  Few of them 
however  took the trouble to go to Rome to be crowned by the pope  No
serious effort was ever made to reconquer the Italian territory for
which Otto the Great  Frederick Barbarossa  and his son and grandson had
made such serious sacrifices  Germany was hopelessly divided and its
king was no real king  He had no capital  no well organized government 

 Sidenote  Division of Germany and Italy into small independent
states  

By the middle of the thirteenth century it became apparent that neither
Germany nor Italy was to be converted into a strong single kingdom like
England and France  The map of Germany shows a confused group of
duchies  counties  archbishoprics  bishoprics  abbacies  and free towns 
each one of which asserted its practical independence of the weak king
and emperor 

In northern Italy each town  including a certain district about its
walls  had become an independent state  dealing with its neighbors as
with independent powers  The Italian towns were destined to become the
birthplace of our modern culture during the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries  Venice and Florence  in spite of their small size  came to be
reckoned among the most important states of Europe  In the central part
of the peninsula the pope maintained more or less control over his
possessions  but he often failed to subdue the towns within his realms 
To the south Naples remained for some time under the French dynasty 
which the pope had called in  but the island of Sicily drifted into
Spanish hands 




CHAPTER XV

THE CRUSADES


73  Of all the events of the Middle Ages  the most romantic and
fascinating are the Crusades  the adventurous expeditions to Syria 
undertaken by kings and doughty knights with the hope of permanently
reclaiming the Holy Land from the infidel Turks  All through the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries each generation beheld at least one great army
of crusaders gathering from all parts of the West and starting toward
the Orient  Each year witnessed the departure of small bands of pilgrims
or of solitary soldiers of the cross  For two hundred years there was a
continuous stream of Europeans of every rank and station making their
way into western Asia  If they escaped the countless hazards of the
journey  they either settled in this distant land and devoted themselves
to war or commerce  or returned home  bringing with them tales of great
cities and new peoples  of skill and luxury unknown in the West 

 Sidenote  Natural temptation to overrate the importance of the
Crusades  

Our sources of information in regard to the Crusades are so abundant and
so rich in picturesque incidents that writers have often yielded to the
temptation to give more space to these expeditions than their
consequences really justify  They were  after all  only one of the great
foreign enterprises which have been undertaken from time to time by the
European peoples  While their influence upon the West was doubtless very
important   like that of the later conquest of India by the English and
the colonization of America   the details of the campaigns in the East
scarcely belong to the history of western Europe 

 Sidenote  The Holy Land conquered first by the Arabs and then by the
Turks  

 Sidenote  Eastern emperor appeals to the pope for aid against the
infidel Turks  

Syria had been overrun by the Arabs in the seventh century  shortly
after the death of Mohammed  and the Holy City of Jerusalem had fallen
into the hands of the infidels  The Arab  however  shared the veneration
of the Christian for the places associated with the life of Christ and 
in general  permitted the Christian pilgrims who found their way thither
to worship unmolested  But with the coming of a new and ruder people 
the Seljuk Turks  in the eleventh century  the pilgrims began to bring
home news of great hardships  Moreover  the eastern emperor was defeated
by the Turks in 1071 and lost Asia Minor  The presence of the Turks in
possession of the fortress of Nicæa  just across from Constantinople 
was of course a standing menace to the Eastern Empire  When the
energetic Emperor Alexius  1081 1118  ascended the throne he endeavored
to expel the infidel  Finding himself unequal to the task  he appealed
for assistance to the head of Christendom  Urban II  The first great
impetus to the Crusades was the call issued by Urban at the celebrated
council which met in 1095 at Clermont in France 

 Sidenote  Urban II issues the call to the First Crusade at the Council
of Clermont  1095  

In an address  which produced more remarkable immediate results than any
other which history records  the pope exhorted knights and foot soldiers
of all ranks to give up their usual wicked business of destroying their
Christian brethren in private warfare and turn instead to the succor of
their fellow Christians in the East  Otherwise the insolent Turks would 
if unchecked  extend their sway still more widely over the faithful
servants of the Lord   Let the Holy Sepulcher of the Lord our Saviour 
which is possessed by unclean nations  especially urge you on  and the
holy places which they are now treating with ignominy and irreverently
polluting   Urban urged besides that France was too poor to support all
its people  while the Holy Land flowed with milk and honey   Enter upon
the road to the Holy Sepulcher  wrest the land from the wicked race and
subject it to yourselves   When the pope had finished  all who were
present exclaimed  with one accord   It is the will of God   This  the
pope declared  should be the rallying cry of the crusaders  who were to
wear a cross upon their bosoms as they went forth  and upon their backs
as they returned  as a holy sign of their sacred mission  127 

 Sidenote  The motives of the crusaders  

The Crusades are ordinarily represented as the most striking examples of
the simple faith and religious enthusiasm of the Middle Ages  They
appealed  however  to many different kinds of men  The devout  the
romantic  and the adventurous were by no means the only classes that
were attracted  Syria held out inducements to the discontented noble who
might hope to gain a principality in the East  to the merchant who was
looking for new enterprises  to the merely restless who wished to avoid
his responsibilities at home  and even to the criminal who enlisted with
a view of escaping the results of his past offenses  It is noteworthy
that Urban appeals especially to those who had been  contending against
their brethren and relatives   and urges those  who have hitherto been
robbers now to become soldiers of Christ   The conduct of many of the
crusaders indicates that the pope found a ready hearing among this
class  Yet higher motives than a love of adventure and the hope of
conquest impelled many who took their way eastward  Great numbers 
doubtless  went to Jerusalem  through devotion alone  and not for the
sake of honor or gain   with the sole object of freeing the Holy
Sepulcher from the hands of the infidel 

 Sidenote  Privileges of the crusaders  

To such as these the pope promised that the journey itself should take
the place of all penance for sin  The faithful crusader  like the
faithful Mohammedan  was assured of immediate entrance into heaven if he
died repentant in the holy cause  Later the Church exhibited its
extraordinary authority by what would seem to us an unjust interference
with business contracts  It freed those who  with a pure heart  entered
upon the journey from the payment of interest upon their debts  and
permitted them to mortgage property against the wishes of their feudal
lords  The crusaders  wives and children and property were taken under
the immediate protection of the Church  and he who troubled them
incurred excommunication  128  These various considerations help to
explain the great popularity of undertakings that  at first sight  would
seem to have promised only hardships and disappointment 

 Illustration  ROUTES OF THE CRUSADERS 

 Sidenote  Peter the Hermit and his army  

74  The Council of Clermont met in November  Before spring  1096  those
who set forth to preach the Crusade  above all the famous Peter the
Hermit  who was formerly given credit for having begun the whole
crusading movement  had collected  in France and along the Rhine  an
extraordinary army of the common folk  Peasants  artisans  vagabonds 
and even women and children  answered the summons  all fanatically
intent upon rescuing the Holy Sepulcher  two thousand miles away  They
were confident that the Lord would sustain them during the weary leagues
of the journey  and grant them a prompt victory over the infidel  The
host was got under way in several divisions under the leadership of
Peter the Hermit  129  and of Walter the Penniless and other humble
knights  Many of the crusaders were slaughtered by the Hungarians  who
rose to protect themselves from the depredations of this motley horde 
Part of them got as far as Nicæa  only to be slaughtered by the Turks 
This is but an example  on a large scale  of what was going on
continually for a century or so after this first great catastrophe 
Individual pilgrims and adventurers  and sometimes considerable bodies
of crusaders  were constantly falling a prey to every form of
disaster  starvation  slavery  disease  and death  in their endeavors to
reach the Holy Land 

 Sidenote  The First Crusade  1096  

The conspicuous figures of the long period of the Crusades are not 
however  to be found among the lowly followers of Peter the Hermit  but
are the knights  in their long coats of mail  A year after the summons
issued at Clermont great armies of fighting men had been collected in
the West under noble leaders   the pope speaks of three hundred thousand
soldiers  Of the various divisions which were to meet in Constantinople 
the following were the most important  the volunteers from Provence
under the papal legate and Count Raymond of Toulouse  inhabitants of
Germany  particularly of Lorraine  under Godfrey of Bouillon and his
brother Baldwin  both destined to be rulers of Jerusalem  and lastly  an
army of French and of the Normans of southern Italy under Bohemond and
Tancred  130 

 Illustration  Knight of the First Crusade  

The distinguished knights who have been mentioned were not actually in
command of real armies  Each crusader undertook the expedition on his
own account and was only obedient to any one s orders so long as he
pleased  The knights and men naturally grouped themselves around the
more noted leaders  but considered themselves free to change chiefs when
they pleased  The leaders themselves reserved the right to look out for
their own special interests rather than sacrifice themselves to the good
of the expedition 

 Sidenote  Hostilities between the Greeks and the crusaders  

Upon the arrival of the crusaders at Constantinople it quickly became
clear that they had little more in common with the Greeks than with the
Turks  Emperor Alexius ordered his soldiers to attack Godfrey s army 
encamped in the suburbs of his capital  because their chief at first
refused to take the oath of feudal homage to him  The emperor s
daughter  in her remarkable history of the times  gives a sad picture of
the outrageous conduct of the crusaders  They  on the other hand 
denounced the  schismatic Greeks  as traitors  cowards  and liars 

The eastern emperor had hoped to use his western allies to reconquer
Asia Minor and force back the Turks  The leading knights  on the
contrary  dreamed of carving out principalities for themselves in the
former dominions of the emperor and proposed to control them by right of
conquest  Later we find both Greeks and western Christians shamelessly
allying themselves with the Mohammedans against each other  The
relations of the eastern and western enemies of the Turks were well
illustrated when the crusaders besieged their first town  Nicæa  When it
was just ready to surrender  the Greeks arranged with the enemy to have
their troops admitted first  They then closed the gates against their
western confederates and invited them to move on 

 Sidenote  Dissension among the leaders of the crusaders  

The first real allies that the crusaders met with were the Christian
Armenians  who brought them aid after their terrible march through Asia
Minor  With their help Baldwin got possession of Edessa  of which he
made himself prince  The chiefs induced the great body of the crusaders
to postpone the march on Jerusalem  and a year was spent in taking the
rich and important city of Antioch  A bitter strife then broke out 
especially between the Norman Bohemond and the count of Toulouse  as to
who should have the conquered town  After the most unworthy conduct on
both sides  Bohemond won  and Raymond set to work to conquer a
principality for himself on the coast about Tripoli 

 Illustration  Map of the Crusaders  States in Syria 

 Sidenote  Capture of Jerusalem  



In the spring of 1099 about twenty thousand warriors finally moved upon
Jerusalem  They found the city well walled and in the midst of a
desolate region where neither food nor water  nor the materials to
construct the apparatus necessary for the capture of the town  were to
be found  The opportune arrival at Jaffa of galleys from Genoa furnished
the besiegers with supplies  and  in spite of all the difficulties  the
place was taken in a couple of months  The crusaders  with their
customary barbarity  massacred the inhabitants  Godfrey of Bouillon was
chosen ruler of Jerusalem and took the modest title of  Defender of the
Holy Sepulcher   He soon died and was succeeded by his brother Baldwin 
who left Edessa in 1100 to take up the task of extending the bounds of
the Kingdom of Jerusalem 

 Sidenote  Founding of Latin kingdoms in Syria  

It will be observed that the  Franks   as the Mohammedans called all the
western folk  had established the centers of four principalities  These
were Edessa  Antioch  the region about Tripoli conquered by Raymond  and
the Kingdom of Jerusalem  The last was speedily increased by Baldwin 
with the help of the mariners from Venice and Genoa  he succeeded in
getting possession of Acre  Sidon  and a number of coast towns 

The news of these Christian victories quickly reached the West  and in
1101 tens of thousands of new crusaders started eastward  Most of them
were lost or dispersed in passing through Asia Minor  and few reached
their destination  The original conquerors were consequently left to
hold the land against the Saracens and to organize their conquests as
best they could 

The permanent hold of the Franks upon the eastern borders of the
Mediterranean depended upon the strength of the colonies which their
various princes were able to establish  It is impossible to learn how
many pilgrims from the West made their permanent homes in the new Latin
principalities  Certainly the greater part of those who visited
Palestine returned home after fulfilling their vow to kneel at the Holy
Sepulcher  Still the princes could rely upon a certain number of
soldiers who would be willing to stay and fight the Mohammedans  The
Turks  moreover  were so busy fighting one another that they showed less
energy than might have been expected in attempting to drive the Franks
from the narrow strip of territory  some five hundred miles long and
fifty wide  which they had conquered 

 Sidenote  The Hospitalers  

75  A noteworthy outcome of the crusading movement was the foundation of
several curious orders  the Hospitalers  the Templars  and the Teutonic
Knights  which combined the dominant interests of the time  those of the
monk and the soldier  They permitted a man to be both at once  the
knight might wear a monkish cowl over his coat of mail  The Hospitalers
grew out of a monastic association that was formed before the First
Crusade for the succor of the poor and sick among the pilgrims  Later
the society admitted noble knights to its membership and became a
military order  while continuing its care for the sick  This charitable
association  like the earlier monasteries  received generous gifts of
land in western Europe and built and controlled many fortified
monasteries in the Holy Land itself  After the evacuation of Syria in
the thirteenth century  the Hospitalers moved their headquarters to the
island of Rhodes  and later to Malta  The order still exists and it is
considered a distinction to this day to have the privilege of wearing
its emblem  the cross of Malta 

 Illustration  Costume of the Hospitalers  showing the Form of the Cross
of Malta  

 Sidenote  The Templars  

Before the Hospitalers were transformed into a military order  a little
group of French knights banded together in 1119 to defend pilgrims on
their way to Jerusalem from the attacks of the infidel  They were
assigned quarters in the king s palace at Jerusalem on the site of the
former Temple of Solomon  hence the name  Templars  which they were
destined to render famous  The  poor soldiers of the Temple  were
enthusiastically approved by the Church  They wore a white cloak adorned
with a red cross  and were under a very strict monastic rule which bound
them by the vows of obedience  poverty  and celibacy  The fame of the
order spread throughout Europe  and the most exalted  even dukes and
princes  were ready to renounce the world and serve Christ under its
black and white banner  with the legend   Non nobis  Domine  

The order was aristocratic from the first  and it soon became incredibly
rich and independent  It had its collectors in all parts of Europe  who
dispatched the  alms  they received to the Grand Master at Jerusalem 
Towns  churches  and estates were given to the order  as well as vast
sums of money  The king of Aragon proposed to bestow upon it a third of
his kingdom  The pope showered privileges upon the Templars  They were
exempted from tithes and taxes  and were brought under his immediate
jurisdiction  they were released from feudal obligations  and bishops
were forbidden to excommunicate them 

 Sidenote  Abolition of the order of Templars  

No wonder they grew insolent and aroused the jealousy and hate of
princes and prelates alike  Even Innocent III violently upbraided them
for admitting to their order wicked men  who then enjoyed all the
privileges of churchmen  Early in the fourteenth century  through the
combined efforts of the pope and Philip the Fair of France  the order
was brought to a terrible end  Its members were accused of the most
abominable practices   such as heresy  the worship of idols  and the
systematic insulting of Christ and his religion  Many distinguished
Templars were burned for heresy  others perished miserably in dungeons 
The order was abolished and its property confiscated 

 Sidenote  The Teutonic Knights conquer the Prussians  

As for the third great order  that of the Teutonic Knights  their
greatest importance lies in their conquest  after the Crusades were
over  of the heathen Prussians  Through their efforts a new Christian
state was formed on the shores of the Baltic  in which the important
cities of Königsberg and Dantzig grew up 

 Sidenote  The Second Crusade  

76  Fifty years after the preaching of the First Crusade  the fall of
Edessa  1144   an important outpost of the Christians in the East  led
to a second great expedition  This was forwarded by no less a person
than St  Bernard  who went about using his unrivaled eloquence to induce
volunteers to take the cross  In a fierce hymn of battle he cried to the
Knights Templars   The Christian who slays the unbeliever in the Holy
War is sure of his reward  the more sure if he himself be slain  The
Christian glories in the death of the pagan  because Christ is
glorified   The king of France readily consented to take the cross  but
the emperor  Conrad III  appears to have yielded only after St  Bernard
had preached before him and given a vivid picture of the terrors of the
Judgment Day 

In regard to the less distinguished recruits  the historian  Otto of
Freising  tells us that so many thieves and robbers hastened to take the
cross that every one recognized in their enthusiasm the hand of God  St 
Bernard himself  the chief promoter of the expedition  gives a most
unflattering description of the  soldiers of Christ    In that countless
multitude you will find few except the utterly wicked and impious  the
sacrilegious  homicides  and perjurers  whose departure is a double
gain  Europe rejoices to lose them and Palestine to gain them  they are
useful in both ways  in their absence from here and their presence
there   It is quite unnecessary to describe the movements and fate of
the crusaders  suffice it to say that  from a military standpoint  the
so called Second Crusade was a miserable failure 

 Sidenote  The Third Crusade  

Forty years later  in 1187  Jerusalem was taken by Saladin  the most
heroic and distinguished of all the Saracen rulers  The loss of the Holy
City led to the most famous of all the military expeditions to the Holy
Land  in which Frederick Barbarossa  Richard the Lion Hearted of
England  and his political rival  Philip Augustus of France  all took
part  The accounts of the enterprise show that while the several
Christian leaders hated one another heartily enough  the Christians and
Saracens were coming to respect one another  We find examples of the
most courtly relations between the representatives of the opposing
religions  In 1192 Richard concluded a truce with Saladin  by the terms
of which the Christian pilgrims were allowed to visit the holy places
with safety and comfort  131 

 Sidenote  The Fourth and subsequent Crusades  

In the thirteenth century the crusaders began to direct their
expeditions toward Egypt as the center of the Saracen power  The first
of these was diverted in an extraordinary manner by the Venetians  who
induced the crusaders to conquer Constantinople for their benefit  The
further expeditions of Frederick II and St  Louis need not be described 
Jerusalem was irrevocably lost in 1244  and although the possibility of
recovering the city was long considered  the Crusades may be said to
have come to a close before the end of the thirteenth century 

 Illustration  Ruins of a Fortress of the Hospitalers in the Holy Land 

 Sidenote  Settlements of the Italian merchants  

77  For one class at least  the Holy Land had great and permanent
charms  namely  the Italian merchants  especially those from Genoa 
Venice  and Pisa  It was through their early interest and supplies from
their ships  that the conquest of the Holy Land had been rendered
possible  The merchants were always careful to see that they were well
paid for their services  When they aided in the successful siege of a
town they arranged that a definite quarter should be assigned to them
in the captured place  where they might have their market  docks 
church  and all that was necessary for a permanent center for their
commerce  This district belonged to the town to which the merchants
belonged  Venice even sent governors to live in the quarters assigned to
its citizens in the Kingdom of Jerusalem  Marseilles also had
independent quarters in Jerusalem  and Genoa had its share in the county
of Tripoli 

 Sidenote  Oriental luxury introduced into Europe  

This new commerce had a most important influence in bringing the West
into permanent relations with the Orient  Eastern products from India
and elsewhere  silks  spices  camphor  musk  pearls  and ivory  were
brought by the Mohammedans from the East to the commercial towns of
Palestine and Syria  then  through the Italian merchants  they found
their way into France and Germany  suggesting ideas of luxury hitherto
scarcely dreamed of by the still half barbarous Franks 

 Illustration  Tomb of a Crusader 

 Sidenote  Results of the Crusades  

Some of the results of the Crusades upon western Europe must already be
obvious  even from this very brief account  Thousands and thousands of
Frenchmen  Germans  and Englishmen had traveled to the Orient by land
and by sea  Most of them came from hamlets or castles where they could
never have learned much of the great world beyond the confines of their
native village or province  They suddenly found themselves in great
cities and in the midst of unfamiliar peoples and customs  This could
not fail to make them think and give them new ideas to carry home  The
Crusade took the place of a liberal education  The crusaders came into
contact with those who knew more than they did  above all the Arabs  and
brought back with them new notions of comfort and luxury 

Yet in attempting to estimate the debt of the West to the Crusades it
should be remembered that many of the new things may well have come from
Constantinople  or through the Saracens of Sicily and Spain  quite
independently of the armed incursions into Syria  132  Moreover  during
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries towns were rapidly growing up in
Europe  trade and manufactures were extending  and the universities were
being founded  It would be absurd to suppose that without the Crusades
this progress would not have taken place  So we may conclude that the
distant expeditions and the contact with strange and more highly
civilized peoples did no more than hasten the improvement which was
already perceptible before Urban made his ever memorable address at
Clermont  133 


     General Reading   A somewhat fuller account of the Crusades will be
     found in EMERTON   Mediæval Europe   Chapter XI  Their results are
     discussed in ADAMS   Civilization   Chapter XI  Professor Munro has
     published a number of very interesting documents in  Translations
     and Reprints   Vol  I  Nos  2  4  Letters of the Crusaders   and
     Vol  III  No  1  The Fourth Crusade   See also his  Mediæval
     History   Chapter XI  on the Crusades  ARCHER and KINGSFORD   The
     Crusades   G P  Putnam s Sons   1 50   is probably the best modern
     work in English 




CHAPTER XVI

THE MEDIÆVAL CHURCH AT ITS HEIGHT


78  In the preceding pages it has been necessary to refer constantly to
the Church and the clergy  Indeed  without them mediæval history would
become almost a blank  for the Church was incomparably the most
important institution of the time and its officers were the soul of
nearly every great enterprise  In the earlier chapters  the rise of the
Church and of its head  the pope  has been reviewed  as well as the work
of the monks as they spread over Europe  We must now consider the
mediæval Church as a completed institution at the height of its power in
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries 

 Sidenote  Ways in which the mediæval church differed from modern
churches  

We have already had abundant proofs that the mediæval Church was very
different from modern churches  whether Catholic or Protestant 

 Sidenote  Membership in the mediæval church compulsory  

1  In the first place  every one was required to belong to it  just as
we all must belong to the state to day  One was not born into the
Church  it is true  but he was ordinarily baptized into it before he had
any opinion in the matter  All western Europe formed a single religious
association  from which it was a crime to revolt  To refuse allegiance
to the Church  or to question its authority or teachings  was reputed
treason against God and was punishable with death 

 Sidenote  The wealth of the Church  

 Sidenote  The tithe  

2  The mediæval Church did not rely for its support  as churches usually
must to day  upon the voluntary contributions of its members  It
enjoyed  in addition to the revenue from its vast tracts of lands and a
great variety of fees  the income from a regular tax  the  tithe  
Those upon whom this fell were forced to pay it  just as we all must now
pay taxes imposed by the government 

 Sidenote  Resemblance of the Church to a state  

3  It is obvious  moreover  that the mediæval Church was not merely a
religious body  as churches are to day  Of course it maintained places
of worship  conducted devotional exercises  and cultivated the spiritual
life  but it did far more  It was  in a way  a state  for it had an
elaborate system of law  and its own courts  in which it tried many
cases which are now settled in our ordinary tribunals  134  It had also
its prisons  to which it might sentence offenders to lifelong detention 

 Sidenote  Unity of organization in the Church  

4  The Church not only performed the functions of a state  it had the
organization of a state  Unlike the Protestant ministers of to day  all
churchmen and religious associations of mediæval Europe were under one
supreme head  who made laws for all and controlled every church officer 
wherever he might be  whether in Italy or Germany  Spain or Ireland  The
whole Church had one official language  Latin  in which all
communications were dispatched and in which its services were everywhere
conducted 

 Sidenote  The mediæval Church a monarchy in its form of government  

79  The mediæval Church may  therefore  properly be called a monarchy in
its government  The pope was its all powerful and absolute head and
concentrated in his person its entire spiritual and disciplinary
authority  He was the supreme lawgiver  No council of the Church  no
matter how large and important  could make laws against his will  for
its decrees  to be valid  required his sanction 

 Sidenote  Dispensations  

The pope might  moreover  set aside or abrogate any law of the Church 
no matter how ancient  so long as it was not ordained by the Scriptures
or by Nature  He might  for good reasons  make exceptions to all merely
human laws  as  for instance  permit cousins to marry  or free a monk
from his vows  Such exceptions were known as  dispensations  

 Sidenote  The pope the supreme judge of Christendom  

The pope was not merely the supreme lawgiver  he was the supreme judge 
As a distinguished legal writer has said  the whole of western Europe
was subject to the jurisdiction of one tribunal of last resort  the
pope s court at Rome  Any one  whether clergyman or layman  in any part
of Europe  could appeal to him at any stage in the trial of a large
class of cases  Obviously this system had serious drawbacks  Grave
injustice might be done by carrying to Rome a case which ought to have
been settled in Edinburgh or Cologne  where the facts were best known 
The rich  moreover  always had the advantage  as they alone could afford
to bring suits before so distant a court 

 Sidenote  The control of the pope over the clergy at large  

The control of the pope over the clergy scattered throughout Christendom
was secured in several ways  A newly elected archbishop might not
venture to perform any of the duties of his office until he had taken an
oath of fidelity and obedience to the pope and received from him the
 pallium   the archbishop s badge of office  This was a narrow woolen
scarf made by the nuns of the convent of St  Agnes at Rome  Bishops and
abbots were also required to have their election duly confirmed by the
pope  He claimed  too  the right to settle the very frequent disputed
elections of church officials  He might even set aside both of the rival
candidates and fill the office himself  as did Innocent III when he
forced the monks of Canterbury  after a double election  to choose
Stephen Langton 

Since the time of Gregory VII the pope had claimed the right to depose
and transfer bishops at will  The control of Rome over all parts of the
Christian Church was further increased by the legates  These papal
emissaries were intrusted with great powers  Their haughty mien often
enough offended the prelates and rulers to whom they brought home the
authority of the pope   as  for instance  when the legate Pandulf
grandly absolved all the subjects of King John of England  before his
very face  from their oath of fealty to him 

 Sidenote  The Roman Curia  

The task assumed by the pope of governing the whole western world
naturally made it necessary to create a large body of officials at Rome
in order to transact all the multiform business and prepare and transmit
the innumerable legal documents  135  The cardinals and the pope s
officials constituted what was called the papal Curia  or court 

 Sidenote  Sources of the pope s income  

To carry on his government and meet the expenses of palace and retinue 
the pope had need of a vast income  This he secured from various
sources  Heavy fees were exacted from those who brought suits to his
court for decision  The archbishops were expected to make generous
contributions on receiving their palliums  and the bishops and abbots
upon their confirmation  In the thirteenth century the pope began to
fill many benefices throughout Europe himself  and customarily received
half the first year s revenues from those whom he appointed  For several
centuries before the Protestants finally threw off their allegiance to
the popes  there was widespread complaint on the part of both clergy and
laymen that the fees and taxes levied by the Curia were excessive 

 Illustration  Ecclesiastical Map of France in the Middle Ages 

 Sidenote  The archbishops  

80  Next in order below the head of the Church were the archbishops  An
archbishop was a bishop whose power extended beyond the boundaries of
his own diocese and who exercised a certain control over all the bishops
within his  province   136  One of the chief prerogatives of the
archbishop was the right to summon the bishops of his province to meet
in a provincial council  His court received appeals from the bishops 
courts  Except  however  for the distinction of his title and the fact
that he generally lived in an important city and often had vast
political influence  the archbishop was not very much more powerful  as
an officer of the Church  than the other bishops 

 Illustration  The Costume of a Bishop  showing Miter and Crosier  From
a manuscript of the twelfth century  

 Sidenote  The importance of the bishops  

There is perhaps no class of persons in mediæval times whose position it
is so necessary to understand as that of the bishops  They were regarded
as the successors of the apostles  whose powers were held to be divinely
transmitted to them  They represented the Church Universal in their
respective dioceses  under the supreme headship of their  elder
brother   the Bishop of Rome  the successor of the chief of the
apostles  Their insignia of office  the miter and crosier  are familiar
to every one  Each bishop had his especial church  which was called a
cathedral  and usually surpassed the other churches of the diocese in
size and beauty 

 Sidenote  Duties of a Bishop  

Only a bishop could ordain new members of the clergy or degrade the old 
He alone could consecrate churches or anoint kings  He alone could
perform the sacrament of confirmation  though as priest he might
administer any of the other sacraments  137  Aside from his purely
religious duties  he was the overseer of all the churchmen in his
diocese  including the monks  138  He held a court where a great variety
of suits were tried  If he were a conscientious prelate  he traveled
about his diocese visiting the parish churches and the monasteries to
see if the priests did their duty and the monks behaved themselves
properly 

 Sidenote  The bishop s temporal duties  

In addition to the oversight of his diocese  it was the bishop s
business to see to the lands and other possessions which belonged to the
bishopric  He had  moreover  to perform those governmental duties which
the king  especially in Germany  had thrown upon him  and he was
conspicuous among the monarch s counselors  Lastly  the bishop was
usually a feudal lord  with the obligations that that implied  He might
have vassals and subvassals  and often was himself a vassal  not only of
the king but also of some neighboring lord  As one reads through the
archives of a bishopric  it is hard to tell whether the bishop should be
called  first and foremost  a churchman or a feudal lord  In short  the
duties of the bishop were as manifold as those of the mediæval Church
itself 

 Sidenote  Election of the bishops  

The reforms of Gregory VII had resulted in placing the choice of the
bishop in the hands of the cathedral  chapter   139  that is  the body
of clergy connected with the cathedral church  But this did not prevent
the king from suggesting the candidate  since the chapter did not
venture to proceed to an election without procuring a license from the
king  Otherwise he might have refused to invest the person they chose
with the lands and political prerogatives attached to the office 

 Illustration  Canterbury Cathedral 

 Sidenote  The parish priest and his duties  

The lowest division of the Church was the parish  This had definite
limits  although the parishioners might vary in number from a few
families to a considerable village or an important district of a town 
At the head of the parish was the parish priest  who conducted services
in the parish church and absolved  baptized  married  and buried his
parishioners  The priests were supposed to be supported by the lands
belonging to the parish church and by the tithes  But both of these
sources of income were often in the hands of laymen or of a neighboring
monastery  while the priest received the merest pittance  scarcely
sufficient to keep soul and body together 

The parish church was the center of village life and the priest was the
natural guardian of the community  It was his business  for example  to
see that no undesirable persons lurked in the village   heretics 
sorcerers  or lepers  It will be observed that the priest  besides
attending to the morals of his flock  was expected to see to their
bodily welfare by preventing the presence of those afflicted with the
only infectious disease against which precautions were taken in the
Middle Ages  140 

 Sidenote  Other sources of the Church s power  

81  The unexampled authority of the mediæval Church is  however  only
partially explained by its wonderful organization  To understand the
hold which it had upon mankind  we must consider the exalted position of
the clergy and the teachings of the Church in regard to salvation  of
which it claimed to be the exclusive agent 

 Sidenote  The exalted position of the clergy  

The clergy were set apart from the laity in several ways  The higher
orders  bishop  priest  deacon  and sub deacon  were required to remain
unmarried  and in this way were freed from the cares and interests of
family life  The Church held  moreover  that the higher clergy  when
they had been properly ordained  received through their ordination a
mysterious imprint  the  indelible character   so that they could never
become simple laymen again  even if they ceased to perform their duties
altogether or were cast out of the Church for crime  Above all  the
clergy alone could administer the  sacraments  upon which the salvation
of every individual soul depended 

 Sidenote  Peter Lombard s  Sentences   

Although the Church believed that all the sacraments were established by
Christ  it was not until the middle of the twelfth century that they
were clearly described  Peter Lombard  d  1164   a teacher of theology
at Paris  prepared a manual of the doctrines of the Church as he found
them in the Scriptures and in the writings of the church fathers 
especially Augustine  These  Sentences   Latin   sententiæ   opinions 
of Peter Lombard were very influential  for they appeared at a time when
there was a new interest in theology  particularly at Paris  where a
great university was growing up  141 

 Sidenote  The seven sacraments  

It was Peter Lombard who first distinctly formulated the doctrine of the
seven sacraments  His teachings did not claim  of course  to be more
than an orderly statement and reconciliation of the various opinions
which he found in the Scriptures and the church fathers  but his
interpretations and definitions constituted a new basis for mediæval
theology  Before his time the word  sacramentum   that is  something
sacred  a mystery  was applied to a variety of sacred things  for
example  baptism  the cross  Lent  holy water  etc  But Peter Lombard
states that there are seven sacraments  to wit  baptism  confirmation 
extreme unction  marriage  penance  ordination  and the Lord s Supper 
Through these sacraments all righteousness either has its beginning  or
when begun is increased  or if lost is regained  They are essential to
salvation  and no one can be saved except through them  142 

 Sidenote  Baptism  

 Sidenote  Confirmation  

 Sidenote  Extreme unction  

 Sidenote  Marriage  

 Sidenote  Penance  

 Sidenote  Ordination  

 Sidenote  The Lord s Supper  or Holy Eucharist  

By means of the sacraments the Church accompanied the faithful through
life  By baptism all the sin due to Adam s fall was washed away  through
that door alone could a soul enter the spiritual life  With the holy oil
and the balsam  typifying the fragrance of righteousness  which were
rubbed upon the forehead of the boy or girl at confirmation by the
bishop  the young were strengthened so that they might boldly confess
the name of the Lord  If the believer fell perilously ill  the priest
anointed him with oil in the name of the Lord and by this sacrament of
extreme unction expelled all vestiges of former sin and refreshed the
spirit of the dying  Through the priest alone might marriage be
sanctified  and when the bonds were once legally contracted they might
never be sundered  If evil desire  which baptism lessened but did not
remove  led the Christian into deadly sin  as it constantly did  the
Church  through the sacrament of penance  reconciled him once more with
God and saved him from the jaws of hell  For the priest  through the
sacrament of ordination  received the most exalted prerogative of
forgiving sins  He enjoyed  too  the awful power and privilege of
performing the miracle of the Mass   of offering up Christ anew for the
remission of the sinner s guilt 

 Sidenote  The sacrament of penance  

82  The sacrament of penance is  with the Mass  of especial historical
importance  When a bishop ordained a priest  he said to him   Receive ye
the Holy Ghost  whose soever sins ye forgive  they are forgiven them 
whose soever sins ye retain  they are retained   In this way the priest
was intrusted with the keys of the kingdom of heaven  There was no hope
of salvation for one who had fallen into mortal sin unless he
received  or at least desired and sought  the absolution of the priest 
To one who scorned the priest s ministrations the most sincere and
prayerful repentance could not by itself bring forgiveness in the eyes
of the Church  Before the priest could utter the solemn  I absolve thee
from thy sins   the sinner must have duly confessed his sins and have
expressed his vehement detestation of them and his firm resolve never
more to offend  It is clear that the priest could not pronounce judgment
unless he had been told the nature of the case  Nor would he be
justified in absolving an offender who was not truly sorry for what he
had done  Confession and penitence were  therefore  necessary
preliminaries to absolution  143 

 Sidenote  Penance and purgatory  

Absolution did not free the contrite sinner from all the results of his
sin  It cleared the soul of the deadly guilt which would otherwise have
been punished by everlasting suffering  but did not exempt the penitent
from temporal penalties  These might be imposed by the priest in this
world or suffered after death in the fires of purgatory  which cleansed
the soul and prepared it for heaven 

 Sidenote  Nature of penance  

The punishment prescribed by the priest was called  penance   This took
a great variety of forms  It might consist in fasting  repeating
prayers  visiting holy places  or abstaining from one s ordinary
amusements  A journey to the Holy Land was regarded as taking the place
of all penance  Instead  however  of requiring the penitent actually to
perform the fasts  pilgrimages  or other sacrifices imposed as penance
by the priest  the Church early permitted him to change his penance into
a contribution  to be applied to some pious enterprise  like building a
church or bridge  or caring for the poor and sick 

 Sidenote  The Mass  

 Sidenote  Transubstantiation  

The priest not only forgave sin  he was also empowered to perform the
stupendous miracle of the Mass  The early Christians had celebrated the
Lord s Supper or Holy Eucharist in various ways and entertained various
conceptions of its nature and significance  Gradually the idea came to
be universally accepted that by the consecration of the bread and the
wine the whole substance of the bread was converted into the substance
of the body of Christ  and the whole substance of the wine into his
blood  This change was termed  transubstantiation   The Church believed 
further  that in this sacrament Christ was offered up anew  as he had
been on the cross  as a sacrifice to God  This sacrifice might be
performed for the sins of the absent as well as of the present  and for
the dead as well as for the living  Moreover  Christ was to be worshiped
under the form of the bread  or  host   Latin   hostia   sacrifice  
with the highest form of adoration  The host was to be borne about in
solemn procession when God was to be especially propitiated  as in the
case of a famine or plague 

 Sidenote  Consequences of conceiving the Mass as a sacrifice  

This conception of the Mass as a sacrifice had some important practical
consequences  It became the most exalted of the functions of the priest
and the very center of the Church s services  Besides the public masses
for the people  private ones were constantly celebrated for the benefit
of individuals  especially of the dead  Foundations were created  the
income of which went to support priests for the single purpose of saying
daily masses for the repose of the soul of the donor or those of the
members of his family  It was also a common practice to bestow gifts
upon churches and monasteries on condition that annual or more frequent
masses should be said for the giver 

 Sidenote  The dominant position of the clergy and the sources of their
power  

 Sidenote  Excommunication and interdict  

83  The sublime prerogatives of the Church  together with its unrivaled
organization and vast wealth  combined to make its officers  the clergy 
the most powerful social class of the Middle Ages  They held the keys of
heaven and without their aid no one could hope to enter in  By
excommunication they could not only cast an offender out of the Church 
but also forbid his fellow men to associate with him  since he was
accursed and consigned to Satan  By means of the  interdict  they could
suspend the consolations of religion in a whole city or country by
closing the church doors and prohibiting all public services  144 

 Sidenote  Their monopoly of the advantages of education  

The influence of the clergy was greatly enhanced by the fact that they
alone were educated  For six or seven centuries after the overthrow of
the Roman government in the West  very few outside of the clergy ever
dreamed of studying or even of learning to read and write  Even in the
thirteenth century an offender who wished to prove that he belonged to
the clergy  in order that he might be tried by a church court  had only
to show that he could read a single line  for it was assumed by the
judges that no one unconnected with the Church could read at all  145 

It was therefore inevitable that almost all the books should be written
by priests and monks and that the clergy should become the ruling power
in all intellectual  artistic  and literary matters   the chief
guardians and promoters of civilization  Moreover  the civil government
was forced to rely upon churchmen to write out the public documents and
proclamations  The priests and monks held the pen for the king 
Representatives of the clergy sat in the king s councils and acted as
his ministers  in fact  the conduct of the government largely devolved
upon them  146 

 Sidenote  Offices in the Church open to all classes  

The offices in the Church were open to all ranks of men  and many of the
popes themselves sprang from the humblest classes  The Church thus
constantly recruited its ranks with fresh blood  No one held an office
simply because his father had held it before him  as was the case in the
civil government 

 Sidenote  Lea s description of the mediæval Church  

The man who entered the service of the Church  was released from the
distraction of family cares and the seduction of family ties  The Church
was his country and his home and its interests were his own  The moral 
intellectual  and physical forces  which throughout the laity were
divided between the claims of patriotism  the selfish struggle for
advancement  the provision for wife and children  were in the Church
consecrated to a common end  in the success of which all might hope to
share  while all were assured of the necessities of existence  and were
relieved of anxiety as to the future   The Church was thus  an army
encamped on the soil of Christendom  with its outposts everywhere 
subject to the most efficient discipline  animated with a common
purpose  every soldier panoplied with inviolability and armed with the
tremendous weapons which slew the soul   Lea  


     General Reading   CUTTS   Parish Priests and their People   E   
     J B  Young   3 00   PRÉVOST   L Église et les Campagnes au Moyen
     Âge   Paris   1 50  




CHAPTER XVII

HERESY AND THE FRIARS


 Sidenote  The question of the character of the mediæval clergy  

84  It is natural to ask whether the commanders of the great army which
made up the Church proved valiant leaders in the eternal warfare against
evil  Did they  on the whole  resist the temptations which their almost
limitless power and wealth constantly placed in their way  Did they use
their vast resources to advance the cause of the Great Leader whose
humble followers and servants they claimed to be  Or were they  on the
contrary  selfish and corrupt  turning the teachings of the Church to
their own advantage  and discrediting its doctrines in the eyes of the
people by flagrant maladministration and personal wickedness 

 Sidenote  The debt of western Europe to the church  

No simple answer to this question is possible  One who realizes how
completely the Church dominated every human interest and influenced
every department of life in the Middle Ages must hesitate to attempt to
balance the good and evil to be placed to its account  That the Church
conferred incalculable benefits upon western Europe  few will question 
To say nothing of its chief mission   the moral uplifting of mankind
through the Christian religion   we have seen how  under its auspices 
the barbarians were civilized and brought into the family of nations 
how violence was checked by the  Truce of God   and how an educated
class was maintained during the centuries when few laymen could either
read or write  These are only the more obvious of its achievements  the
solace and protection which it afforded to the weak  the wretched  and
the heart sore  no one can assume to estimate 

 Sidenote  The corruption of the clergy  

On the other hand  no one can read the sources of our knowledge of the
history of the Church without perceiving that there were always bad
clergymen who abused their high prerogatives  Many bishops and priests
were no more worthy to be intrusted with their extensive powers than the
unscrupulous office seekers to whom high stations in our modern
governments sometimes fall 

 Sidenote  Tendency to exaggerate the evil in the Church  

Yet as we read the fiery denunciations of the clergy s evil practices 
which may be found in the records of nearly every age  we must not
forget that the critic is always prone to take the good for granted and
to dwell upon the evil  This is particularly true in dealing with a
great religious institution  where corruption is especially shocking 
One wicked bishop  or one form of oppression or immorality among the
clergy  made a far deeper impression than the humble virtues of a
hundred dutiful and God fearing priests  If  however  we make all due
allowance for the good which escaped the writers of the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries  it must be admitted by all who read their
testimony that they give us a gloomy picture of the life of many
prelates  priests  and monks  and of the startling variety of abuses
which developed in the Church 

 Sidenote  Temptations to corruption among the clergy  

Gregory VII imagined that the reason for the existence of bad clergymen
was that the kings and feudal lords forced their favorites into the
offices of the Church  The root of the difficulty lay  however  in the
wealth and power of the Church itself  It would have needed saints
always to exercise righteously the tremendous powers which the clergy
had acquired  and to resist the temptations to which they were
subjected  When we consider the position of a rich prelate  it is not
surprising that corruption abounded  The offices of the Church offered
the same possibilities of money making that civil offices  especially
those in the great American cities  offer to the mere schemer to day 
The descriptions of some of the churchmen of the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries remind us far more of the professional politician than of a
modern clergyman  whether Catholic or Protestant 

 Sidenote  The chief forms of corruption in the Church  

85  At least a brief description of the more notorious forms of
corruption among the clergy will be necessary to an understanding of the
various heresies or revolts against the Church  These began seriously to
threaten its power in the twelfth century and culminated in the
successful Protestant revolt of the sixteenth  The vices of the clergy
serve to account also for the appearance of the begging monks  the
Franciscans and Dominicans  and to explain the need of the great reform
which they undertook in the thirteenth century 

 Sidenote  Simony  

 Sidenote  The worldly and immoral lives of many bishops and abbots  

In the first place  there was simony  a disease so deep seated and
persistent that Innocent III declared it incurable  This has already
been described in an earlier chapter  Even boys were made bishops and
abbots through the influence of their friends and relatives  Wealthy
bishoprics and monasteries were considered by feudal lords an admirable
means of support for their younger sons  since the eldest born usually
inherited the fief  The life led by bishops and abbots was often merely
that of a feudal prince  If a prelate had a taste for fighting  he
organized military expeditions for conquest or to satisfy a grudge
against a neighbor  exactly as if he belonged to the bellicose laity of
the period 

 Sidenote  Corruption in the ecclesiastical courts  

Besides simony and the scandalous lives of many of the clergy  there
were other evils which brought the Church into disrepute  While the
popes themselves  in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries  were usually
excellent men and sometimes distinguished statesmen  who honestly
endeavored to exalt the vast institution over which they presided  their
officials  who tried the innumerable cases which were brought to the
papal court  had a reputation for grave corruption  147  It was
generally believed that the decision was always in favor of him who
could pay most and that the poor received scant attention  The bishops 
courts were notorious for their oppression  since a considerable portion
of the bishop s income  like that of the feudal lord  came from the
fines imposed upon those condemned by his officials  The same person was
sometimes summoned to different courts at the same time and then fined
for neglecting to appear at one or the other 

 Sidenote  The parish priests often no better than their superiors  

As for the parish priests  they appear often to have followed the
demoralizing example set by their superiors  The acts of church councils
indicate that the priest sometimes turned his parsonage into a shop and
sold wine or other commodities  He further increased his income  as we
have seen  by demanding fees for merely doing his duty in baptizing 
confessing  absolving  marrying  and burying his parishioners 

The monks of the twelfth century  with some remarkable exceptions  did
little to supply the deficiencies of the secular clergy  148  Instead of
instructing the people and setting before them an example of a pure and
holy life  they enjoyed no better reputation than the bishops and
priests  Efforts were made  however  by newly founded orders in the
eleventh and twelfth centuries  like that of the Cistercians to which
St  Bernard belonged  to reform the monks 

 Sidenote  Corruption and abuses recognized and condemned by the better
element in the clergy itself  

The universal impression of selfishness and depravity which the corrupt
churchmen made upon all observers is reflected in innumerable writings
of the time   in the letters of the popes  in the exhortations of holy
men like St  Bernard  in the acts of the councils  in the satirical
poems of the popular troubadours and the sprightly versifiers of the
courts  149  All agree in denouncing the iniquity of the clergy  their
greed  and their reckless disregard of their sacred duties  St  Bernard
sadly asks   Whom can you show me among the prelates who does not seek
rather to empty the pockets of his flock than to subdue their vices  

 Sidenote  The lay critics of the Church  

86  The evils which the churchmen themselves so frankly admitted could
not escape the notice and comment of laymen  But while the better
element among the clergy vigorously urged a reform of the existing
abuses  no churchman dreamed of denying the truth of the Church s
doctrines or the efficacy of its ceremonies  Among the laity  however 
certain popular leaders arose who declared that the Church was the
synagogue of Satan  that no one ought any longer to rely upon it for his
salvation  that all its elaborate ceremonies were worse than useless 
that its masses  holy water  and relics were mere money getting devices
of a depraved priesthood and helped no one to heaven  These bold rebels
against the Church naturally found a hearing among those who felt that
the ministrations of a wicked priest could not possibly help a sinner 
as well as among those who were exasperated by the tithes and other
ecclesiastical dues 

 Sidenote  Heresy  

Those who questioned the teachings of the Church and proposed to cast
off its authority were  according to the accepted view of the time 
guilty of the supreme crime of heresy  To the orthodox believer nothing
could exceed the guilt of one who committed treason against God by
rejecting the religion which had been handed down in the Roman Church
from the immediate followers of his Son  Moreover  doubt and unbelief
were not merely sin  they were revolt against the most powerful social
institution of the time  which  in spite of the depravity of some of its
officials  continued to be venerated by people at large throughout
western Europe  The extent and character of the heresies of the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries and the efforts of the Church to suppress them
by persuasion  by fire and sword  and by the stern court of the
Inquisition  form a strange and terrible chapter in mediæval history 

 Sidenote  Two classes of heretics  

The heretics were of two sorts  One class merely abjured the practices
and some of the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church while they
remained Christians and endeavored to imitate as nearly as possible the
simple life of Christ and the apostles  On the other hand  there were
popular leaders who taught that the Christian religion was false  They
held that there were two principles in the universe  the good and the
evil  which were forever fighting for the victory  They asserted that
the Jehovah of the Old Testament was really the evil power  and that it
was  therefore  the evil power whom the Catholic Church worshiped 

 Sidenote  The Albigenses  

This latter heresy was a very old one  by which even St  Augustine had
been fascinated in his early years  It was revived in Italy in the
eleventh century and became very popular  especially in southern France 
in the twelfth  Its adherents called themselves  Cathari   the pure  
but we shall call them  Albigenses   a name derived from the town of
Albi in southern France  where they were very numerous  150 

 Sidenote  The Waldensians  

Among those who continued to accept the Christian faith but refused to
obey the clergy on account of their wickedness  the most important sect
was that of the Waldensians  These were followers of Peter Waldo of
Lyons  who gave up all their property and lived a life of apostolic
poverty  They went about preaching the Gospel and expounding the
Scriptures  which they translated into the language of the people  They
made many converts  and before the end of the twelfth century there were
great numbers of them scattered throughout western Europe 

The Church did not wish to condemn the efforts of good and simple men to
imitate as exactly as possible the life of Christ and the apostles 
Nevertheless these laymen  who claimed the right to preach and hear
confession  and who asserted that prayer was quite as efficacious when
uttered in bed or in a stable as in a church  seemed clearly to call in
question the general belief in the Church as the exclusive agent of
salvation  and seriously to threaten its influence among the people 

 Sidenote  Beginning of the fight against heresy  

Before the end of the twelfth century the secular rulers began to take
notice of heresy  Henry II of England  in 1166  ordered that no one
should harbor heretics in England  and that any house in which they were
received should be burned  The king of Aragon decreed  1194  that any
one who listened to the preaching of the Waldensians  or even gave them
food  should suffer the penalties for treason and should have his
property confiscated by the state  These are the beginnings of a series
of pitiless decrees which even the most enlightened kings of the
thirteenth century issued against all who should be convicted of
belonging either to the Albigenses or the Waldensians  The Church and
the civil government agreed that heretics were dangerous to the welfare
of both  and that they were criminals deserving the terrible death of
burning alive  151 

 Sidenote  Heresy regarded as treason  

It is very difficult for us who live in a tolerant age to understand the
universal and deep rooted horror of heresy which prevailed not only in
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries  but also down at least to the
eighteenth  Too much stress cannot be laid upon the fact that heresy was
considered treason against an institution which practically all  both
the learned and the unlearned  agreed was not only essential to
salvation but was necessary also to order and civilization  Frank
criticism of the evil lives of the clergy  not excluding the pope
himself  was common enough  But this did not constitute heresy  One
might believe that the pope and half the bishops were bad men  and yet
in no way question the necessity for the Church s existence or the truth
of every one of its dogmas  just as nowadays we might call particular
rulers and government officials fools or knaves  without being
suspected of repudiating government altogether  The heretic was the
anarchist of the Middle Ages  He did not simply denounce the immorality
of the officers of the Church  he claimed that the Church was worse than
useless  He sought to lead people to throw off their allegiance to it
and to disregard its laws and commands  The Church and the civil
government consequently proceeded against him as against an enemy of
society and order  Heresy was  moreover  a contagious disease  and
spread rapidly and unobserved  so that to the rulers of the times even
the harshest measures appeared justifiable in order to prevent its
dissemination 

 Sidenote  Different methods of opposing heresy  

 Sidenote  Internal reform  

87  There were several ways of opposing heresy  First  a reform of the
character of the clergy and a suppression of the abuses in the Church
would have removed a great cause of that discontent to which the writers
of the time attributed the rapid growth of heresy  The attempt of
Innocent III to improve the conditions in the Church by summoning a
great council at Rome in 1215 failed  however  and  according to his
successor  matters grew worse rather than better 

 Sidenote  Extermination by the sword  

A second plan was to organize an expedition against the rebels and
annihilate them by the sword  This policy was only possible if a large
number of heretics could be found in a single district  In southern
France there were many adherents of both the Albigenses and the
Waldensians  especially in the county of Toulouse  At the beginning of
the thirteenth century there was in this region an open contempt for the
Church and a bold defense of heretical teachings even among the higher
classes 

 Sidenote  Albigensian crusade  

Against the people of this flourishing land Innocent III preached a
crusade in 1208  An army under Simon de Montfort 152  marched from
northern France into the doomed region and  after one of the most
atrocious and bloody wars upon record  suppressed the heresy by
wholesale slaughter  At the same time the war checked the civilization
and destroyed the prosperity of the most enlightened portion of France 

 Sidenote  The Inquisition  

The third and most permanent defense against heresy was the
establishment  under the headship of the pope  of a system of tribunals
designed to ferret out secret cases of unbelief and bring the offenders
to punishment  These courts of experts  who devoted their whole
attention to the discovery and conviction of heresy  constituted the
Holy Inquisition  which gradually took form after the Albigensian
crusade  We cannot stop to describe these courts  which became
especially notorious in Spain some two centuries after their
establishment  The unfairness of the trials and the cruel treatment to
which those suspected of heresy were subjected  through long
imprisonment or torture  inflicted with the hope of forcing them to
confess their crime or implicate others  have rendered the name of the
Inquisition infamous 

Without by any means attempting to defend the methods employed  it may
be remarked that the inquisitors were often earnest and upright men
whose feelings were not unlike those of a New England judge presiding at
a witch trial in the seventeenth century  The methods of procedure of
the Inquisition were not more cruel than those used in the secular
courts of the period 

The assertion of the suspected person that he was not a heretic did not
receive any attention  for it was assumed that he would naturally deny
his guilt  as would any other criminal  A person s belief had 
therefore  to be judged by outward acts  Consequently one might fall
into the hands of the Inquisition by mere inadvertent conversation with
a heretic  by some unintentional neglect to show due respect toward the
Church rites  or by the malicious testimony of one s neighbors  This is
really the most dreadful aspect of the Inquisition and its procedure 
It put a premium on talebearing and resorted to most cruel means to
convict those who earnestly denied that their beliefs were different
from those of the Church 

 Sidenote  Fate of the convicted heretic  

If the suspected person confessed his guilt and abjured his heresy  he
was forgiven and received back into the Church  but a penance of life
imprisonment was imposed upon him as a fitting means of wiping away the
unspeakable sin of which he had been guilty  If he remained impenitent 
he was  relaxed to the secular arm  153   that is to say  the Church 
whose law forbade it to shed blood  handed over the convicted person to
the civil power  which burned him alive without further trial 

 Sidenote  Founding of the mendicant orders  

88  We may now turn to that far more cheerful and effective method of
meeting the opponents of the Church  which may be said to have been
discovered by St  Francis of Assisi  His teachings and the example of
his beautiful life probably did far more to secure continued allegiance
to the Church than all the hideous devices of the Inquisition 

We have seen how the Waldensians tried to better the world by living
simple lives and preaching the Gospel  Owing to the disfavor of the
church authorities  who declared their teachings erroneous and
dangerous  they were prevented from publicly carrying on their
missionary work  Yet all conscientious men agreed with the Waldensians
that the world was in a sad plight owing to the negligence and the
misdeeds of the clergy  St  Francis and St  Dominic strove to meet the
needs of their time by inventing a new kind of clergyman  the begging
brother  or mendicant friar  Latin   frater   brother   He was to do
just what the bishops and parish priests ordinarily failed to
do   namely  lead a holy life of self sacrifice  defend the orthodox
beliefs against the reproaches and attacks of the heretics  and awaken
the people at large to a new spiritual life  The founding of the
mendicant orders is one of the most important and interesting events of
the Middle Ages 

 Sidenote  St  Francis of Assisi  1182 1226  

There is no more lovely and fascinating figure in all history than St 
Francis  He was born  probably in 1182  at Assisi  a little town in
central Italy  He was the son of a well to do merchant  and during his
early youth he lived a very gay life  spending his father s money
freely  He read the French romances of the time and dreamed of imitating
the brave knights whose adventures they described  Although his
companions were wild and reckless  there was a delicacy and chivalry in
Francis  own make up which made him hate all things coarse and
heartless  When later he voluntarily became a beggar  his ragged coat
still covered a true poet and knight 

 Sidenote  Francis forsakes his life of luxury and his inheritance and
becomes a hermit  

The contrast between his own life of luxury and the sad state of the
poor early afflicted him  When he was about twenty  after a long and
serious illness which made a break in his gay life and gave him time to
think  he suddenly lost his love for the old pleasures and began to
consort with the destitute  above all with the lepers  Now Francis 
being delicately organized and nurtured  especially loathed these
miserable creatures  but he forced himself to kiss their hands  as if
they were his friends  and to wash their sores  So he gained a great
victory over himself  and that which seemed bitter to him became  as he
says   sweet and easy  

His father does not appear to have had any fondness whatever for
beggars  and the relations between him and his son grew more and more
strained  When finally he threatened to disinherit the young man 
Francis cheerfully agreed to surrender all right to his inheritance 
Stripping off his clothes and giving them back to his father  he
accepted the worn out garment of a gardener and became a homeless
hermit  busying himself in repairing the dilapidated chapels near
Assisi 

 Sidenote  He believes he receives a direct message from Heaven  

One day in February  1209  as he was listening to Mass  the priest 
turning toward him by chance  read   And as ye go  preach  saying  The
kingdom of heaven is at hand     Get you no gold  nor silver  nor brass
in your purses  no wallet for your journey  neither two coats  nor
shoes  nor staff  for the laborer is worthy of his food   Matt  x 
7 10   This seemed to the expectant Francis the answer of Christ himself
to his longings for guidance  Here was a complete programme laid out for
him  He threw aside his stick  wallet  and shoes and resolved thereafter
to lead  literally and absolutely  the life the apostles had led 

 Sidenote  Francis begins to preach and to attract followers  

He began to preach in a simple way  and before long a rich
fellow townsman resolved to sell all and give to the poor  and follow
Francis  example  Others soon joined them  and these joyous penitents 
free of worldly burdens  calling themselves  God s troubadours   went
barefoot and moneyless about central Italy preaching the Gospel  Some of
those they met  listened willingly  others scoffed  the greater number
overwhelmed them with questions   Whence come you  Of what order are
you   and they  though sometimes it was wearisome to answer  said
simply   We are penitents  natives of the city of Assisi   

 Sidenote  Seeks and obtains the approval of the pope  

When  with a dozen followers  Francis appealed to the pope in 1210 to
approve his plan  Innocent III hesitated  He did not believe that any
one could lead a life of absolute poverty  Then might not these ragged 
ill kempt vagabonds appear to condemn the Church by adopting a life so
different from that of the rich and comfortable clergy  Yet if he
disapproved the friars  he would seem to disapprove at the same time
Christ s directions to his apostles  He finally decided to give his oral
sanction and to authorize the brethren to continue their missions  They
were to receive the tonsure  and to come under the spiritual authority
of the Roman Church 

 Sidenote  Missionary work undertaken  

89  Seven years later  when Francis  followers had greatly increased 
missionary work was begun on a large scale  and brethren were dispatched
to Germany  Hungary  France  Spain  and even to Syria  It was not long
before an English chronicler was telling with wonder of the arrival in
his country of these barefoot men  in their patched gowns and with ropes
about their waists  who  with Christian faith  took no thought for the
morrow  believing that their Heavenly Father knew what things they had
need of 

 Sidenote  Francis did not desire to found a powerful order  

The ill treatment which the friars received in their distant journeys
led them to appeal to the pope for a letter which should request the
faithful everywhere to treat them kindly  since they were good
Catholics  This was the beginning of numberless privileges from the
pope  It grieved Francis  however  to see his little band of companions
converted into a great and powerful order  He foresaw that they would
soon cease to lead their simple  holy life  and would become ambitious
and perhaps rich   I  little Brother Francis   he writes   desire to
follow the life and the poverty of Jesus Christ  persevering therein
until the end  and I beg you all and exhort you to persevere always in
this most holy life of poverty  and take good care never to depart from
it upon the advice and teachings of anyone whomsoever  

 Sidenote  Francis reluctantly draws up a new rule for the guidance of
the friars  

Francis sorrowfully undertook to draw up a new and more elaborate
constitution to take the place of the few Gospel passages which he had
originally brought together as a guide  After many modifications  to
suit the ideas of the pope and the cardinals  the Franciscan Rule was
solemnly ratified  1228  by Honorius III  It provides that  The brothers
shall appropriate nothing to themselves  neither a house  nor a place 
nor anything  but as pilgrims and strangers in this world  in poverty
and humility serving God  they shall confidently seek alms  Nor need
they be ashamed  for the Lord made Himself poor for us in this world  
Yet the friars are to work if they are able and if their charitable and
religious duties leave them time to do so  They may be paid for this
labor in necessities for themselves or their brethren  but never may
they receive coin or money  Those may wear shoes who cannot get along
without them  They may repair their garments with sackcloth and other
remnants  They must live in absolute obedience to their superior and may
not  of course  marry nor may they leave the order  154 

After the death of St  Francis  1226   many of the order  which now
numbered several thousand members  wished to maintain the simple rule of
absolute poverty  Others  including the new head of the order  believed
that much good might be done with the wealth which people were anxious
to give them  They argued that the individual friars might still remain
absolutely possessionless  even if the order had beautiful churches and
comfortable monasteries  A stately church was immediately constructed at
Assisi to receive the remains of their humble founder  who in his
lifetime had chosen a deserted hovel for his home  and a great chest was
set up in the church to receive offerings 

 Sidenote  St  Dominic  

90  St  Dominic  b  1170   the founder of the other great mendicant
order  was not a simple layman like Francis  He was a churchman and took
a regular course of instruction in theology for ten years in a Spanish
university  He then  1208  accompanied his bishop to southern France on
the eve of the Albigensian crusade and was deeply shocked to see the
prevalence of heresy  His host at Toulouse happened to be an
Albigensian  and Dominic spent the night in converting him  He then and
there determined to devote his life to the extirpation of heresy  The
little we know of him indicates that he was a man of resolute purpose
and deep convictions  full of burning zeal for the Christian faith  yet
kindly and cheerful  and winning in manner 

 Sidenote  Founding of the Dominican order  

By 1214 a few sympathetic spirits from various parts of Europe had
joined Dominic  and they asked Innocent III to sanction their new order 
The pope again hesitated  but is said to have dreamed a dream in which
he saw the great Roman Church of the Lateran tottering and ready to fall
had not Dominic supported it on his shoulders  So he inferred that the
new organization might sometime become a great aid to the papacy and
gave it his approval  As soon as possible Dominic sent forth his
followers  of whom there were but sixteen  to evangelize the world  just
as the Franciscans were undertaking their first missionary journeys  By
1221 the Dominican order was thoroughly organized and had sixty
monasteries scattered over western Europe   Wandering on foot over the
face of Europe  under burning suns or chilling blasts  rejecting alms in
money but receiving thankfully whatever coarse food might be set before
the wayfarer  enduring hunger in silent resignation  taking no thought
for the morrow  but busied eternally in the work of snatching souls from
Satan and lifting men up from the sordid cares of daily life  of
ministering to their infirmities and of bringing to their darkened souls
a glimpse of heavenly light   Lea    in this way did the early
Franciscans and Dominicans win the love and veneration of the people 

 Sidenote  Contrast between the mendicants and the older orders  

91  Unlike the Benedictine monks  each of the friars was under the
command not only of the head of his particular monastery  but also of
the  general  of the whole order  Like a soldier  he was liable to be
sent by his commander upon any mission that the work of the order
demanded  The friars indeed regarded themselves as soldiers of Christ 
Instead of devoting themselves to a life of contemplation apart from the
world  like the earlier monks  they were accustomed and required to mix
with all classes of men  They must be ready to dare and suffer all in
the interest of their work of saving not only themselves but their
fellow men 

 Sidenote  Contrast between the Dominicans and the Franciscans  

The Dominicans were called the  Preaching Friars  and were carefully
trained in theology in order the better to refute the arguments of the
heretics  The pope delegated to them especially the task of conducting
the Inquisition  They early began to extend their influence over the
universities  and the two most distinguished theologians and teachers of
the thirteenth century  Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas  were
Dominicans  Among the Franciscans  on the other hand  there was always a
considerable party who were suspicious of learning and who showed far
more anxiety to remain absolutely poor than did the Dominicans  Yet as a
whole the Franciscans  like the Dominicans  accepted the wealth that
came to them  and they  too  contributed distinguished scholars to the
universities 

 Sidenote  Importance and influence of the new orders  

The pope quickly recognized the importance of these new orders  He
granted them successive privileges which freed them from all control of
the bishops  and finally declared that they were to be bound only by
their own rules  What was still more important  he gave them the right 
if they were priests  to celebrate Mass everywhere  to preach and to
perform the ordinary functions of the parish priests  such as hearing
confession  granting absolution  and conducting burials  The friars
invaded every parish  and appear to have largely replaced the parish
priests  The laity believed them to be holier than the secular clergy
and therefore regarded their prayers and ministrations as more
efficient  Few towns were without a gray friars   Franciscan  or a black
friars   Dominican  cloister  few princes but had a Dominican or a
Franciscan confessor 

 Sidenote  Opposition of the secular clergy  

It is hardly necessary to say that the secular clergy took these
encroachments very ill  They repeatedly appealed to the pope to abolish
the orders  or at least to prevent them from enriching themselves at the
expense of the parish priests  But they got little satisfaction  Once
the pope quite frankly told a great deputation of cardinals  bishops 
and minor clergy that it was their own vain and worldly lives which
made them hate the mendicant brothers  who spent the bequests they
received from the dying for the honor of God  instead of wasting it in
pleasure 

The mendicant orders have counted among their numbers men of the
greatest ability and distinction   scholars like Thomas Aquinas 
reformers like Savonarola  artists like Fra Angelico and Fra
Bartolommeo  and scientists like Roger Bacon  In the busy world of the
thirteenth century there was no agency more active for good than the
friars  Yet their vagrant lives  free from the ordinary control of the
Church  and the great wealth which was showered upon them  afforded many
obvious temptations which they did not long withstand  Bonaventura  who
was made head of the Franciscan order in 1257  admits the general
dislike aroused by the greed  idleness  and vice of its degenerate
members  as well as by their importunate begging  which rendered the
friar more troublesome to the wayfarer than the robber  Nevertheless the
friars were preferred to the ordinary priests by high and low alike  it
was they  rather than the secular clergy  who maintained and cultivated
the religious life in both city and country 


     General Reading   The opening chapter of Lea s monumental work   A
     History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages   Harper Bros    Co  
     3 vols    10 00   gives a remarkable account of the mediæval Church
     and the abuses which prevailed  The first volume also contains
     unexcelled chapters upon the origin of both the Franciscan and
     Dominican orders  For St  Francis  by far the best work is
     Sabatier s beautiful biography   St  Francis of Assisi   Charles
     Scribner s Sons   2 50   The earliest and best source for Francis
     is  The Mirror of Perfection   Page  Boston  75 cents   by Brother
     Leo  which shows the love and admiration in which  Little Brother
     Francis  was held by one of his companions  See also JESSOPP   The
     Coming of the Friars  and Other Historic Essays   G P  Putnam s
     Sons   1 25   Chapter I 




CHAPTER XVIII

THE PEOPLE IN COUNTRY AND TOWN


 Sidenote  Little known of the life of the people in the Middle Ages  

92  Since the development of the rather new science of political
economy  historical writers have become much interested in the condition
and habits of the farmer  tradesman  and artisan in the Middle Ages 
Unfortunately no amount of research is likely to make our knowledge very
clear or certain regarding the condition of the people at large during
the five or six centuries following the barbarian invasions  It rarely
occurred to a mediæval chronicler to describe the familiar things about
him  such as the way in which the peasant lived and tilled his land 
Only the conspicuous personages and the startling events caught his
attention  Nevertheless enough is known of the mediæval manor and town
to make them very important subjects for the student of general history 

 Sidenote  Unimportance of town life in the early Middle Ages  

There was little town life in western Europe before the twelfth century 
The Roman towns were decreasing in population before the German inroads 
The confusion which followed the invasions hastened their decline  and a
great number of them disappeared altogether  Those which survived and
such new towns as sprang up were  to judge from the chronicles  of very
little importance during the early Middle Ages  We may assume 
therefore  that during the long period from Theodoric to Frederick
Barbarossa by far the greater part of the population of England 
Germany  and northern and central France were living in the country  on
the great estates belonging to the feudal lords  abbots  and
bishops  155 

 Sidenote  The manor  or vill  

These mediæval estates were called  vills   or  manors   and closely
resembled the Roman villas described in an earlier chapter  A portion of
the estate was reserved by the lord for his own use  the rest of it was
divided up among the peasants  156  usually in long strips  of which
each peasant had several scattered about the manor  The peasants were
generally serfs who did not own their fields  but could not  on the
other hand  be deprived of them so long as they worked for the lord and
paid him certain dues  They were attached to the land and went with it
when it changed hands  The serfs were required to till those fields
which the lord reserved for himself and to gather in his crops  They
might not marry without their lord s permission  Their wives and
children rendered such assistance as was necessary in the manor house 
In the women s buildings the daughters of the serfs engaged in spinning 
weaving  sewing  baking  and brewing  thus producing clothes  food  and
drink to be used by the whole community 

 Illustration  An English Manor House  Thirteenth Century 

 Sidenote  The obligations of the serfs  

We get our clearest ideas of the position of the serfs from the ancient
descriptions of manors  which give an exact account of what each member
of a particular community owed to the lord  For example  we find that
the abbot of Peterborough held a manor upon which Hugh Miller and
seventeen other serfs  mentioned by name  were required to work for him
three days in each week during the whole year  except one week at
Christmas  one at Easter  and one at Whitsuntide  Each serf was to give
the lord abbot one bushel of wheat and eighteen sheaves of oats  three
hens and one cock yearly  and five eggs at Easter  If he sold his horse
for more than ten shillings  he was to give the said abbot four pence 
Five other serfs  mentioned by name  held but half as much land as Hugh
and his companions  by paying and doing in all things half as much
service 

There were sometimes a few people on the manor who did not belong to the
great body of cultivators  The limits of the manor and those of the
parish often coincided  in that case there would be a priest who had
some scattered acres and whose standing was naturally somewhat superior
to that of the people about him  Then the miller  who ground the flour
and paid a substantial rent to the lord  was generally somewhat better
off than his neighbors  and the same may be said of the blacksmith 

 Sidenote  The manor independent of the outside world  

One of the most remarkable characteristics of the manor was its
independence of the rest of the world  It produced nearly everything
that its members needed and might almost have continued to exist
indefinitely without communication with those who lived beyond its
bounds  Little or no money was necessary  for the peasants paid what was
due to the lord in the form of labor and farm products  They also
rendered the needful help to one another and found little occasion for
buying and selling 

 Sidenote  The monotony and misery of the peasants  lives  

There was almost no opportunity to better one s condition  and life  in
the greater part of the hamlets  must have gone on for generation after
generation in a weary routine  The life was not merely monotonous  it
was miserable  The food was coarse and there was little variety  as the
peasants did not even take pains to raise fresh vegetables  The houses
usually had but one room  This was ill lighted by a single little window
and had no chimney 

 Sidenote  The manor court  

Yet the very dependence upon one another can hardly have failed to
produce a certain spirit of brotherhood and mutual assistance in the
community  It was not only separated from the outside world  but its
members were brought together constantly by their intermingled fields 
their attendance at one church  and their responsibility to one
proprietor  The men were all expected to be present at the  court  which
was held in each manor  where the business of the manor was transacted
under the supervision of a representative of the lord  Here  for
instance  disputes were settled  fines imposed for the violation of the
customs of the manor  and redistributions of the strips of land took
place 

 Sidenote  The serf an inferior farmer who could only exist when there
was plenty of land  

The serf was ordinarily a bad farmer and workman  He cultivated the soil
in a very crude manner  and his crops were accordingly scanty and
inferior  Obviously serfdom could exist only as long as land was
plentiful  But in the twelfth and thirteenth century western Europe
appears to have been gaining steadily in population  Serfdom would 
therefore  naturally tend to disappear when the population so increased
that the carelessly cultivated fields no longer supplied the food
necessary for the growing numbers 

 Sidenote  Barter replaced by money transactions  

The increased use of money in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries 
which came with the awakening trade and industry  also tended to break
up the manor  The old habit of bartering one thing for another without
the intervention of money began to disappear  As time went on  neither
the lord nor the serf was satisfied with the ancient primitive
arrangements  which had answered well enough in the time of Charlemagne 
The serfs  on the one hand  began to obtain money by the sale of their
products in the markets of neighboring towns  They soon found it more
profitable to pay the lord a certain sum instead of working for him  for
they could then turn their whole attention to their own farms  The
proprietors  on the other hand  found it to their advantage to accept
money in place of the services of their tenants  With this money the
landlord could hire laborers to cultivate his fields and could buy the
luxuries which were brought to his notice as commerce increased  So it
came about that the lords gradually renounced their control over the
peasants  and the serf was no longer easily distinguishable from the
freeman who paid a regular rent for his land  157  A serf might also
gain his liberty by fleeing to a town  If he remained undiscovered  or
was unclaimed by his lord  for a year and a day  he became a freeman 

 Sidenote  Disappearance of serfdom  

The slow extinction of serfdom in western Europe appears to have begun
as early as the twelfth century  A very general emancipation had taken
place in France by the end of the thirteenth century  and in England
somewhat later   though there were still some serfs in France when the
revolution came in 1789  Germany was far more backward in this respect 
We find the peasants revolting against their hard lot in Luther s time 
and it was not until the beginning of the nineteenth century that the
serfs were freed in Prussia 

 Sidenote  Importance of town life  

93  It is hardly necessary to point out that the gradual reappearance of
town life in western Europe is of the greatest interest to the student
of history  The cities had been the centers of Greek and Roman
civilization  and in our own time they dominate the life  culture  and
business enterprise of the world  Were they to disappear  our whole
life  even in the country  would necessarily undergo a profound change
and tend to become primitive again like that of the age of Charlemagne 

 Sidenote  Origin of the mediæval towns  

 Sidenote  Compactness of a mediæval town  

A great part of the mediæval towns  of which we begin to have some
scanty records about the year 1000  appear to have originated on the
manors of feudal lords or about a monastery or castle  The French name
for town   ville   is derived from vill  the name of the manor  The need
of protection was probably the usual reason for establishing a town with
a wall about it  so that the neighboring country people might find
safety in it when attacked  The way in which a mediæval town was built
seems to justify this conclusion  It was generally crowded and compact
compared with its more luxurious Roman predecessors  Aside from the
market place there were few or no open spaces  There were no
amphitheaters or public baths as in the Roman cities  The streets were
often mere alleys over which the jutting stories of the high houses
almost met  The high  thick wall that surrounded it prevented its
extending easily and rapidly as our cities do nowadays 

 Sidenote  Townsmen originally serfs  

All towns outside of Italy were evidently small in the eleventh and
twelfth centuries  and  like the manors on which they had grown up  they
had little commerce as yet with the outside world  They produced almost
all that their inhabitants needed except the farm products which came
from the neighboring country  There was likely to be little expansion so
long as the town remained under the absolute control of the lord or
monastery upon whose land it was situated  The townspeople were scarcely
more than serfs  in spite of the fact that they lived within a wall and
engaged in industry instead of farming  They had to pay irritating dues
to their lord  just as if they had still formed a farming community  The
emancipation of the townsmen from their lords and the establishment of a
suitable form of government for their town were necessary preliminaries
to the free development of town life 

 Sidenote  Increase of trade promotes the growth of the towns  

With the increase of trade came the longing for this freedom  For when
new and attractive commodities began to be brought from the East and the
South  the people of the towns were encouraged to produce goods with the
idea of exchanging them at some neighboring fair for the products of
distant lands  But no sooner did the townsmen begin to engage in
manufacturing and to enter into relations with the outside world  than
they became conscious that they were greatly hampered by their
half servile condition and were subject to exactions and restrictions
which would render progress impossible  Consequently during the twelfth
century there were many insurrections of the towns against their lords
and a general demand that the lords should grant the townsmen  charters 
in which the rights of both parties should be definitely stated 

 Illustration  A Castle on the Rhine with a Village below it 

 Sidenote  The communes  

In France the citizens organized themselves into what were called
 communes   or unions for the purpose of gaining their independence 
This word  commune  appeared a new and detestable one to the lords  for 
to their minds  it was merely another name for a company of serfs
leagued against their masters  The nobles sometimes put down the
insurrections of their townsmen with great cruelty  On the other hand 
the lords often realized that they would increase the prosperity of
their towns by granting them freedom from arbitrary taxation and the
right to govern themselves  In England the towns gained their privileges
more gradually by purchasing them from the lords 

 Sidenote  Town charters  

The town charters were written contracts between the lord and the
commune or the guild of merchants of a town  The charter served at once
as the certificate of birth of the town and as its constitution  It
contained a promise on the part of the lord or king to recognize the
existence of the guild of merchants  It limited the rights of the lord
in calling the townsmen before his court and fining them  and enumerated
the taxes which he might exact from the townspeople  The old dues and
services were either abolished or changed into money payments 

King Henry II of England promised the inhabitants of Wallingford that
 wheresoever they shall go on their journeys as merchants through my
whole land of England and Normandy  Aquitaine and Anjou   by water and
by strand  by wood and by land   they shall be free from toll and
passage fees and from all customs and exactions  nor are they to be
troubled in this respect by anyone under penalty of ten pounds   In the
case of the town of Southampton he concedes  that my men of Hampton
shall have and hold their guild and all their liberties and customs  by
land and by sea  in as good  peaceable  just  free  quiet  and honorable
a manner as they had the same most freely and quietly in the time of
King Henry  my grandfather  and let no one upon this do them any injury
or insult  

 Sidenote  Customs revealed in the charters  

The customs of the times  as revealed in the charters  seem to us very
primitive  We find in the charter of the French town of St  Omer  in
1168  provisions like the following  He who shall commit a murder in the
town shall not find an asylum anywhere within the walls  If he shall
seek to escape punishment by flight  his buildings shall be torn down
and his goods confiscated  nor may he come back into the town unless he
be first reconciled with the relations of his victim and pay ten pounds 
of which a half shall go to the lord s representatives and the other
half to the commune  to be spent on its fortifications  He who strikes
another one in the town shall pay one hundred sous  he who pulls out the
hair of another shall pay forty sous  etc 

 Illustration  A Mediæval Town  Siegen 

Many of the towns had  as a visible sign of their freedom  a belfry  a
high building with a watchtower  where a guard was kept day and night in
order that the bell might be rung in case of approaching danger  It
contained an assembly hall  where the commune held its meetings  and a
prison  In the fourteenth century the wonderful townhalls began to be
erected  which  with the exception of the cathedrals and other churches 
are usually the most remarkable buildings which the traveler sees to day
in the old commercial cities of Europe 

 Sidenote  Craft guilds  

The tradesmen in the mediæval towns were at once artisans and merchants 
they not only made  but offered for sale  the articles which they
produced in their shops  In addition to the original guild of merchants
which helped the towns to gain and preserve their privileges  many new
corporations of tradesmen grew up  the so called  craft guilds   The
oldest statutes of a guild in Paris are those of the candle makers 
which go back to 1061  The number of trades differed greatly in
different towns  but the guilds all had the same object   to prevent
every one from practicing a trade who had not been duly admitted to the
corporation 

 Illustation  LINES OF TRADE AND MEDIÆVAL TOWNS 

 Sidenote  The guild system  

A young man had to spend several years in learning his trade  He lived
in the house of a master workman  but received no remuneration  He then
became a  journeyman  and could earn wages  although he could still work
only for master workmen and not directly for the public  A simple trade
might be learned in three years  but to become a goldsmith one must be
an apprentice for ten years  The number of apprentices that a master
workman might employ was strictly limited  in order that the journeymen
might not become too numerous  The way in which each trade was to be
practiced was carefully regulated  as well as the time that should be
spent in work each day  The system of guilds discouraged enterprise but
maintained a uniform efficiency everywhere  Had it not been for these
unions  the defenseless  isolated workmen  serfs as they had formerly
been  would have found it impossible to secure freedom and municipal
independence from the feudal lords who had formerly been their masters 

 Sidenote  Practical disappearance of commerce in the early Middle
Ages  

94  The chief reason for the growth of the towns and their increasing
prosperity was a great development of trade throughout western Europe 
Commerce had pretty much disappeared with the decline of the Roman roads
and the general disorganization produced by the barbarian invasions 
There was no one in the Middle Ages to mend the ancient Roman roads  The
great network of highways from Persia to Britain fell apart when
independent nobles or poor local communities took the place of a world
empire  All trade languished  for there was little demand for those
articles of luxury which the Roman communities in the North had been
accustomed to obtain from the South  There was little money and scarcely
any notion of luxury  for the nobility lived a simple life in their
dreary and rudely furnished castles 

 Sidenote  Italian cities trade with the Orient  

In Italy  however  trade does not seem to have altogether ceased 
Venice  Genoa  Amalfi  and other towns appear to have developed a
considerable Mediterranean commerce even before the Crusades  Their
merchants  as we have seen  supplied the destitute crusaders with the
material necessary for the conquest of Jerusalem  The passion for
pilgrimages offered inducements to the Italian merchants for expeditions
to the Orient  whither they transported the pilgrims and returned with
the products of the East  The Italian cities established trading
stations in the East and carried on a direct traffic with the caravans
which brought to the shores of the Mediterranean the products of Arabia 
Persia  India  and the Spice Islands  The southern French towns and
Barcelona entered also into commercial relations with the Mohammedans in
northern Africa 

 Illustration  Street in Frankfort on the Main 

 Sidenote  Commerce stimulates industry  

This progress in the South could not but stir the lethargy of the rest
of Europe  The new commerce encouraged a revolution in industry  So long
as the manor system prevailed and each man was occupied in producing
only what he and the other members of his group needed  there was
nothing to send abroad and nothing to exchange for luxuries  But when
merchants began to come with tempting articles  the members of a
community were encouraged to produce a surplus of goods above what they
themselves needed  and to sell or exchange this surplus for commodities
coming from a distance  Merchants and artisans gradually directed their
energies toward the production of what others wished as well as what was
needed by the little group to which they belonged 

 Sidenote  The luxuries of the East introduced into Europe  

The romances of the twelfth century indicate that the West was
astonished and delighted by the luxuries of the East   the rich fabrics 
Oriental carpets  precious stones  perfumes  drugs  like camphor and
laudanum   silks and porcelains from China  spices from India  and
cotton from Egypt  Venice introduced the silk industry from the East and
the manufacture of those glass articles which the traveler may still buy
in the Venetian shops  The West learned how to make silk and velvet as
well as light and gauzy cotton and linen fabrics  The eastern dyes were
introduced  and Paris was soon imitating the tapestries of the Saracens 
In exchange for those luxuries which they were unable to produce  the
Flemish towns sent their woolen cloths to the East  and Italy its wines 
But there was apparently always a considerable cash balance to be paid
to the Oriental merchants  since the West could not produce enough to
pay by exchange for all that it demanded from the Orient 

 Sidenote  Some of the important commercial centers  

The northern merchants dealt mainly with Venice and brought their wares
across the Brenner Pass and down the Rhine  or sent them by sea to be
exchanged in Flanders  By the thirteenth century important centers of
trade had come into being  some of which are still among the great
commercial towns of the world  Hamburg  Lübeck  and Bremen carried on
active trade with the countries on the Baltic and with England  Augsburg
and Nuremberg  in the south of Germany  became important on account of
their situation on the line of trade between Italy and the North 
Bruges and Ghent sent their manufactures everywhere  English commerce
was relatively unimportant as yet compared with that of the great ports
of the Mediterranean 

 Sidenote  Restrictions on trade  

 Sidenote  Idea of a  just  price  

95  A word must be said of the numerous and almost incredible obstacles
in the way of commerce in the Middle Ages  There was very little of that
freedom which we now regard as essential to successful business  Our
wholesale dealers would have been considered an abomination in the
Middle Ages  Those who bought up a quantity of a commodity in order to
sell it at a high rate were called by the ugly name of  forestallers  
It was universally believed that everything had a  just  price  which
was merely enough to cover the cost of the materials used in its
manufacture and remunerate the maker for the work he had put upon it  It
was considered outrageous to sell a thing for more than the just price 
no matter how anxious the purchaser might be to obtain it  Every
manufacturer was required to keep a shop in which he offered at retail
all that he made  Those who lived near a town were permitted to sell
their products in the market place within the walls on condition that
they sold directly to the consumers  They might not dispose of their
whole stock to one dealer  for fear that if he had all there was of a
commodity he might raise the price above a just one 

 Sidenote  Payment of interest on money forbidden  

Akin to these prejudices against wholesale trade was that against
interest  Money was believed to be a dead and sterile thing  and no one
had a right to demand any return for lending it  Interest was wicked 
since it was exacted by those who took advantage of the embarrassments
of others  Usury  as the taking of even the most moderate and reasonable
rate of interest was then called  was strenuously forbidden by the laws
of the Church  We find church councils ordering that impenitent usurers
should be refused Christian burial and have their wills annulled  So
money lending  necessary to all great commercial and industrial
undertakings  was left to the Jews  from whom Christian conduct was not
expected 

 Sidenote  The Jews as money lenders  

This ill starred people played a most important part in the economic
development of Europe  but they were terribly maltreated by the
Christians  who held them guilty of the supreme crime of putting Christ
to death  The active persecution of the Jews did not  however  become
common before the thirteenth century  when they first began to be
required to wear a peculiar cap  or badge  which made them easily
recognized and exposed them to constant insult  Later they were
sometimes shut up in a particular quarter of the city  called the Jewry 
Since they were excluded from the guilds  they not unnaturally turned to
the business of money lending  which no Christian might practice 
Undoubtedly their occupation had much to do in causing their
unpopularity  The kings permitted them to make loans  often at a most
exorbitant rate  Philip Augustus allowed them to exact forty six per
cent  but reserved the right to extort their gains from them when the
royal treasury was empty  In England the usual rate was a penny a pound
for each week 

 Sidenote  The  Lombards  as bankers  

In the thirteenth century the Italians   Lombards   began to go into a
sort of banking business and greatly extended the employment of bills of
exchange  They lent for nothing  but exacted damages for all delay in
repayment  This appeared reasonable and right even to those who
condemned ordinary interest  Capitalists  moreover  could contribute
money towards an enterprise and share the profits as long as no interest
was exacted  In these and other ways the obstacles offered by the
prejudice against interest were much reduced  and large commercial
companies came into existence  especially in Italy 

 Sidenote  Tolls  duties  and other annoyances to which merchants were
subjected on land  

96  Another serious disadvantage which the mediæval merchant had to face
was the payment of an infinite number of tolls and duties which were
exacted by the lords through whose domains his way passed  Not only were
duties exacted on the highways  bridges  and at the fords  but those
barons who were so fortunate as to have castles on a navigable river
blocked the stream in such a way that the merchant could not bring his
vessel through without a payment for the privilege  The charges were
usually small  but the way in which they were exacted and the repeated
delays must have been a serious source of irritation and loss to the
merchants  For example  a certain monastery lying between Paris and the
sea required that those hastening to town with fresh fish should stop
and let the monks pick out what they thought worth three pence  with
little regard to the condition in which they left the goods  When a boat
laden with wine passed up the Seine to Paris  the agent of the lord of
Poissy could have three casks broached  and  after trying them all  he
could take a measure from the one he liked best  At the markets all
sorts of dues had to be paid  such  for example  as payments for using
the lord s scales or his measuring rod  Besides this  the great variety
of coinage which existed in feudal Europe caused infinite perplexity and
delay 

 Sidenote  Dangers by sea  

 Sidenote  Pirates  

 Sidenote  Strand laws  

Commerce by sea had its own particular trials  by no means confined to
the hazards of wind and wave  rock and shoal  Pirates were numerous in
the North Sea  They were often organized and sometimes led by men of
high rank  who appear to have regarded the business as no disgrace  Then
there were the so called  strand laws   according to which a ship with
its cargo became the property of the owner of the coast upon which it
might be wrecked or driven ashore  Lighthouses and beacons were few and
the coasts dangerous  Moreover  natural dangers were increased by false
signals which wreckers used to lure ships to shore in order to plunder
them 

 Sidenote  The Hanseatic League  

With a view to mitigating these manifold perils  the towns early began
to form unions for mutual defense  The most famous of these was that of
the German cities  called the  Hanseatic League   Lübeck was always the
leader  but among the seventy towns which at one time and another were
included in the confederation  we find Cologne  Brunswick  Dantzig  and
other centers of great importance  The union purchased and controlled
settlements in London   the so called  Steelyard  near London
Bridge   at Wisby  Bergen  and the far off Novgorod in Russia  They
managed to monopolize nearly the whole trade on the Baltic and North
Sea  either through treaties or the influence that they were able to
bring to bear 

The League made war on the pirates and did much to reduce the dangers of
traffic  Instead of dispatching separate and defenseless merchantmen 
their ships sailed out in fleets under the protection of a man of war 
On one occasion the League undertook a successful war against the king
of Denmark  who had interfered with their interests  At another time it
declared war on England and brought her to terms  For two hundred years
before the discovery of America  the League played a great part in the
commercial affairs of western Europe  but it had begun to decline even
before the discovery of new routes to the East and West Indies
revolutionized trade 

 Sidenote  Trade regulated by the towns  thirteenth to fifteenth
century   not by nations or individuals  

It should be observed that  during the thirteenth  fourteenth  and
fifteenth centuries  trade was not carried on between nations  but by
the various towns  like Venice  Lübeck  Ghent  Bruges  Cologne  A
merchant did not act or trade as an independent individual but as a
member of a particular merchant guild  and he enjoyed the protection of
his town and of the treaties it arranged  If a merchant from a certain
town failed to pay a debt  a fellow townsman might be seized where the
debt was due  At the period of which we have been speaking  an
inhabitant of London was considered a foreigner or an alien in Bristol 
just as was the merchant from Cologne or Antwerp  Only gradually did the
towns merge into the nations to which their people belonged  158 

 Sidenote  The burghers  or commons  become an influential class  

The increasing wealth of the merchants could not fail to raise them to a
position of importance in society which they had not hitherto enjoyed 
Their prosperity enabled them to vie with the clergy in education and
with the nobility in the luxury of their dwellings and surroundings 
They began to give some attention to reading  and as early as the
fourteenth century many of the books appear to have been written with a
view of meeting their tastes and needs  Representatives of the towns
were called into the councils of the king  who was obliged to take their
advice along with their contributions to the support of the government 
The rise of the burgher class alongside the older orders of the clergy
and nobility  which had so long dominated the life of western Europe  is
one of the most momentous changes of the thirteenth century 


     General Reading   GIBBINS   History of Commerce in Europe   The
     Macmillan Company  90 cents   the best short account of the
     subject  with good maps of trade routes  INGRAM   History of
     Slavery and Serfdom   Black  London   2 00   especially Chapters IV
     and V  CUNNINGHAM   Western Civilization in its Economic Aspects  
     Vol  II  Mediæval and Modern Times  The Macmillan Company   1 25  
     is very suggestive  There are several excellent accounts of the
     economic situation in England in the Middle Ages  which  in many
     respects  was similar to the conditions on the continent  CHEYNEY 
      Industrial and Social History of England   The Macmillan Company 
      1 40   GIBBINS   The Industrial History of England   Methuen 
      1 00   and a more elaborate treatise by the same writer   Industry
     in England   Methuen   3 00   CUNNINGHAM   Outlines of English
     Industrial History   The Macmillan Company   1 50   and much fuller
     by the same writer   Growth of English Industry and Commerce during
     the Middle Ages   The Macmillan Company   4 00   All these give
     excellent accounts of the manor  the guilds  the fairs  etc  See
     also JESSOPP   Coming of the Friars   second essay   Village Life
     Six Hundred Years Ago  




CHAPTER XIX

THE CULTURE OF THE MIDDLE AGES


97  The interest of the Middle Ages lies by no means exclusively in the
statesmanship of kings and emperors  their victories and defeats  in the
policy of popes and bishops  or even in feudalism and Europe s escape
from it  Important as all these are  we should have but a very imperfect
idea of the period which we have been studying if we left it without
considering the intellectual life and the art of the time  the books
that were written  the universities that were founded  and the
cathedrals that were built 

 Sidenote  General use of Latin in the Middle Ages  

To begin with  the Middle Ages differed from our own time in the very
general use then made of Latin  both in writing and speaking  In the
thirteenth century  and long after  all books that made any claim to
learning were written in Latin  159  the professors in the universities
lectured in Latin  friends wrote to one another in Latin  and state
papers  treaties  and legal documents were drawn up in the same
language  The ability of every educated person to make use of Latin  as
well as of his native tongue  was a great advantage at a time when there
were many obstacles to intercourse among the various nations  It helps
to explain  for example  the remarkable way in which the pope kept in
touch with all the clergymen of western Christendom  and the ease with
which students  friars  and merchants could wander from one country to
another  There is no more interesting or important revolution than that
by which the language of the people in the various European countries
gradually pushed aside the ancient tongue and took its place  so that
even scholars scarcely ever think now of writing books in Latin 

In order to understand how it came about that two languages  the Latin
and the native speech  were both commonly used in all the countries of
western Europe all through the Middle Ages  we must glance at the origin
of the modern languages  These all fall into two quite distinct groups 
the Germanic and the Romance 

 Sidenote  The Germanic languages derived from the dialects of the
German barbarians  

Those German peoples who had continued to live outside of the Roman
Empire  or who  during the invasions  had not settled far enough within
its bounds to be led  like the Franks in Gaul  to adopt the tongue of
those they had conquered  naturally adhered to the language they had
always used  namely  the particular Germanic dialect which their
forefathers had spoken for untold generations  From the various
languages spoken by the German barbarians  modern German  English 
Dutch  Swedish  Norwegian  Danish  and Icelandic are derived 

 Sidenote  The Romance languages derived from the spoken Latin  

The second group of languages developed within the territory which had
formed a part of the Roman Empire  and includes modern French  Italian 
Spanish  and Portuguese  It has now been clearly proved  by a very
minute study of the old forms of words  that these Romance languages
were one and all derived from the  spoken  Latin  employed by the
soldiers  merchants  and people at large  This differed considerably
from the elaborate and elegant written Latin which was used  for
example  by Cicero and Cæsar  It was undoubtedly much simpler in its
grammar and doubtless varied a good deal in different regions   a Gaul 
for instance  could not pronounce the words like an Italian  Moreover 
in conversation people did not always use the same words as those in the
books  For example  a horse was commonly spoken of as  caballus  
whereas a writer would use the word  equus   it is from  caballus  that
the word for horse is derived in Spanish  Italian  and French
  caballo    cavallo    cheval   

As time went on the spoken language diverged farther and farther from
the written  Latin is a troublesome speech on account of its complicated
inflections and grammatical rules  which can be mastered only after a
great deal of study  The people of the Roman provinces and the incoming
barbarians naturally paid very little attention to the niceties of
syntax and found easy ways of saying what they wished  160  Yet several
centuries elapsed after the German invasions before there was anything
written in the language of conversation  So long as the uneducated could
understand the correct Latin of the books when they heard it read or
spoken  there was no necessity of writing anything in their familiar
daily speech  But the gulf between the spoken and the written language
had become so great by the time Charlemagne came to the throne  that he
advised that sermons should be given thereafter in the language of the
people  who  apparently  could no longer follow the Latin  The Strasburg
oaths 161  are  however  about the first example which has come down to
us of the speech which was growing into French 

 Sidenote  Earliest examples of the Germanic languages  

 Sidenote  Gothic  

98  As for the Germanic languages  one at least was reduced to writing
even before the break up of the Empire  An eastern bishop  Ulfilas  d 
381   had undertaken to convert the Goths while they were still living
north of the Danube before the battle of Adrianople  In order to carry
on his work  Ulfilas translated a great part of the Bible into Gothic 
using the Greek letters to represent the sounds  With the single
exception of the Gothic  there is no example of writing in any German
language before Charlemagne s time  There is no doubt  however  that the
Germans possessed an unwritten literature  which was passed down by word
of mouth for several centuries before any of it was written out 
Charlemagne caused certain ancient poems to be collected  which
presumably celebrated the great deeds of the German heroes during the
invasions  These invaluable specimens of ancient German are said to have
been destroyed by the order of Louis the Pious  who was shocked by their
paganism  The great German epic  the  Song of the Niebelungs   was not
reduced to writing until the end of the twelfth century  after it had
been transmitted orally for many generations 

 Sidenote  Ancient English  or Anglo Saxon  

The oldest form of English is commonly called Anglo Saxon and is so
different from the language that we use that  in order to read it  it
must be learned like a foreign language  We hear of an English poet 
Cædmon  as early as Bede s time  a century before Charlemagne  A
manuscript of an Anglo Saxon epic  called  Beowulf   has been preserved
which belongs perhaps to the close of the eighth century  The interest
which King Alfred displayed in the mother tongue has already been
mentioned  This old form of our language prevailed until after the
Norman Conquest  the  Anglo Saxon Chronicle   which does not close until
1154  is written in pure Anglo Saxon  Then changes may be noticed in the
language as it appears in the books of the time  and decade by decade it
approaches more nearly to that which we speak  Although the first public
document in English  1256   which belongs to the reign of Henry III  is
scarcely to be understood without study  a poem written in his son s
time is tolerably intelligible  162 

English literature was destined one day to arouse the admiration of the
peoples across the Channel and exercise an important influence upon
other literatures  In the Middle Ages  however  French  not English  was
the most important of the vernacular languages of western Europe  In
France a vast literature was produced in the language of the people
during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries which profoundly affected
the books written in Italy  Spain  Germany  and England 

 Sidenote  French and Provençal  

99  Two quite different languages had gradually developed in France from
the spoken Latin of the Roman Empire  If a line were drawn on the map
from La Rochelle  on the Atlantic  eastward to the Alps  crossing the
Rhone a little below Lyons  it would give a general idea of the limits
of the two tongues  To the north  French was spoken  to the south  in a
region bounded by the Pyrenees and the Alps  Provençal  163 

 Sidenote  Mediæval French romances  

Very little in the ancient French language written before the year 1100
has been preserved  The West Franks undoubtedly began much earlier to
sing of their heroes  of the great deeds of Clovis  Dagobert  and
Charles Martel  These famous rulers were  however  completely
overshadowed later by Charlemagne  who became the unrivaled hero of
mediæval poetry and romance  It was believed that he had reigned for a
hundred and twenty five years  and the most marvelous exploits were
attributed to him and his knights  He was supposed  for instance  to
have led a crusade to Jerusalem  Such themes as these  more legend than
history  were woven into long epics  which were the first written
literature of the Frankish people  These poems  combined with the
stories of adventure  developed a spirit of patriotic enthusiasm among
the French which made them regard  fair France  as the especial care of
Providence 

 Sidenote  The  Song of Roland   

It is little wonder that the best of these long poems came to be looked
upon as the national epic of the French  This is the  Song of Roland  
probably written just before the First Crusade  It tells the story of
Charlemagne s retreat from Spain  during which Roland  one of his
commanders  lost his life in a romantic encounter in the defiles of the
Pyrenees 

  That death was on him he knew full well 
  Down from his head to his heart it fell 
  On the grass beneath a pine tree s shade 
  With face to earth  his form he laid 
  Beneath him placed he his horn and sword 
  And turned his face to the heathen horde 
  Thus hath he done the sooth to show 
  That Karl and his warriors all may know 
  That the gentle count a conqueror died  164 

 Sidenote  Romances of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table  

In the latter part of the twelfth century the romances of King Arthur
and his Knights of the Round Table begin to appear  These enjoyed great
popularity in all western Europe for centuries  and they are by no means
forgotten yet  Arthur  of whose historical existence no one can be quite
sure  was supposed to have been king of Britain shortly after the Saxons
gained a foothold in the island  In other long poems of the time 
Alexander the Great  Cæsar  and other ancient worthies appear as heroes 
The absolute disregard of historical facts and the tendency to represent
the warriors of Troy and Rome as mediæval knights  show the inability of
the mediæval mind to understand that the past could have been different
from the present  All these romances are full of picturesque adventures
and present a vivid picture of the valor and loyalty of the true knight 
as well as of his ruthlessness and contempt for human life  165 

 Sidenote  The  fabliaux  and the fables  

Besides the long and elaborate epics  like  Roland   and the romances in
verse and prose  there were numberless short stories in verse  the
 fabliaux    which usually dealt with the incidents of everyday life 
especially with the comical ones  Then there were the fables  the most
famous of which are the stories of Reynard the Fox  which were satires
upon the customs of the time  particularly the weaknesses of the priests
and monks 

 Sidenote  The troubadours  

100  Turning now to southern France  the beautiful songs of the
troubadours  which were the glory of the Provençal tongue  reveal a gay
and polished society at the courts of the numerous feudal princes  The
rulers not merely protected and encouraged the poets  they aspired to be
poets themselves and to enter the ranks of the troubadours  as the
composers of these elegant verses were called  These songs were always
sung to an accompaniment on some instrument  usually the lute  Those who
merely sang them  without being themselves poets  were called
 jongleurs   The troubadours and jongleurs traveled from court to court 
not only in France  but north into Germany and south into Italy 
carrying with them the southern French poetry and customs  We have few
examples of Provençal before the year 1100  but from that time on  for
two centuries  countless songs were written  and many of the troubadours
enjoyed an international reputation  The terrible Albigensian crusade
brought misery and death into the sprightly circles which had gathered
about the count of Toulouse and others who had treated the heretics too
leniently  But the literary critic traces signs of decline in the
Provençal verse even before this disaster  166 

 Sidenote  Chivalry  

For the student of history  the chief interest of the epics of northern
France and the songs of the South lies in the insight that they give
into the life and aspirations of this feudal period  These are usually
summed up in the term  chivalry   or  knighthood   of which a word may
properly be said here  since we should know little of it were it not for
the literature of which we have been speaking  The knights play the
chief rôle in all the mediæval romances  and  as many of the troubadours
belonged to the knightly class  they naturally have much to say of it in
their songs 

Chivalry was not a formal institution established at any particular
moment  Like feudalism  with which it was closely connected  it had no
founder  but appeared spontaneously throughout western Europe to meet
the needs and desires of the period  We learn from Tacitus that even in
his time the Germans considered the moment a solemn one when the young
warrior was first invested with the arms of a soldier   This was the
sign that the youth had reached manhood  this was his first honor   It
is probably a survival of this feeling which we find in the idea of
knighthood  When the youth of good family had been carefully trained to
ride his horse  use his sword  and manage his hawk in the hunt  he was
made a  knight  by a ceremony in which the Church took part  although
the knighthood was actually conferred by an older knight 

 Sidenote  Nature of the knightly order  

The knight was a Christian soldier  and he and his fellows were supposed
to form  in a way  a separate order with high ideals of the conduct
befitting their class  Knighthood was not  however  membership in an
association with officers and a written constitution  It was an ideal 
half imaginary society   a society to which even those who enjoyed the
title of king or duke were proud to belong  One was not born a knight as
he might be born a duke or count  and could become one only through the
ceremony mentioned above  One might be a noble and still not belong to
the knightly order  and  on the other hand  one baseborn might be raised
to knighthood on account of some valorous deed 

 Sidenote  The ideals of the knight  

The knight must  in the first place  be a Christian and must obey and
defend the Church on all occasions  He must respect all forms of
weakness and defend the helpless wherever he might find them  He must
fight the infidel ceaselessly  pitilessly  and never give way before the
enemy  He must perform all his feudal duties  be faithful in all things
to his lord  never lie or violate his plighted word  He must be generous
and give freely and ungrudgingly to the needy  He must be faithful to
his lady and be ready to defend her person and her honor at all costs 
Everywhere he must be the champion of the right against injustice and
oppression  In short  chivalry was the Christianized profession of arms 

In the stories of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table there
is a beautiful picture of the ideal knight  The dead Lancelot is
addressed by one of his sorrowing companions as follows   Thou wert the
courtliest knight that ever bare shield  and thou wert the truest friend
to thy lover that ever bestrode horse  and thou wert the truest lover of
a sinful man  i e   among sinful men  that ever loved woman  and thou
wert the kindest man that ever struck with sword  and thou wert the
goodliest person that ever came among the press of knights  and thou
wert the meekest man and the gentlest that ever ate in hall among
ladies  and thou wert the sternest knight to thy mortal foe that ever
put spear in breast  

 Sidenote  The German minnesingers  

 Sidenote  Walther von der Vogelweide  

 Sidenote   Parsifal   

The Germans also made their contribution to the literature of chivalry 
The German poets of the thirteenth century are called  minnesingers  
Like the troubadours  whom they greatly admired  they usually sang of
love  German   Minne    The most famous of the minnesingers was Walther
von der Vogelweide  d  about 1228   whose songs are full of charm and of
enthusiasm for his German fatherland  Wolfram von Eschenbach  d  about
1225  in his story of  Parsifal  gives the long and sad adventures of a
knight in search of the Holy Grail   the sacred vessel which had held
the blood of Christ  Only those perfectly pure in thought  word  and
deed could hope to behold it  Parsifal failed to speak a word of
sympathy to a suffering man and was forced to undergo a long atonement 
At last he learned that only through pity and humility and faith in God
could he hope to find the Grail 

 Sidenote  Difference between the earlier and later ideals of chivalry  

The chivalry depicted in the  Song of Roland  and the more serious poems
of northern France is of a severe type  in which the service of the
Church  especially against the infidel  and the obligations to the
feudal suzerain have the predominant place  On the other hand  in the
Arthurian legends  and  above all  in the songs of the troubadours  the
ideal conduct of a polished and valorous gentleman  especially toward
the lady of his choice  finds expression  The later romances of chivalry
 in the thirteenth and following centuries  deal very largely with
knighthood in the latter sense of the word  No one  indeed  any longer
thought of fighting the infidel  for the Crusades were over and the
knight was forced to seek adventures nearer home  167 

 Sidenote  General ignorance of the past  

101  So long as all books had to be copied by hand  there were  of
course  but few of them compared with modern times  The literature of
which we have been speaking was not in general read  but was listened
to  as it was sung or recited by those who made it their profession 
Wherever the wandering jongleur appeared he was sure of a delighted
audience for his songs and stories  both serious and light  Those
unfamiliar with Latin could  however  learn little of the past  there
were no translations of the great classics of Greece and Rome  of Homer 
Plato  Cicero  or Livy  All that they could know of ancient history was
derived from the fantastic romances referred to above  which had for
their theme the quite preposterous deeds ascribed to Alexander the
Great  Æneas  and Cæsar  As for their own history  the epics relating to
the earlier course of events in France and the rest of Europe were
hopelessly confused  The writers attributed a great part of the acts of
the Frankish kings  from Clovis to Pippin  to Charlemagne  The first
real history written in French is Villehardouin s account of the capture
of Constantinople by the crusaders  in 1204   which he witnessed 

 Sidenote  Mediæval popular science  

What we should call scientific literature was practically wanting  It is
true that there was a kind of encyclopedia in verse which gave a great
deal of misinformation about things in general  Every one believed in
strange animals like the unicorn  the dragon  and the phoenix  and in
still stranger habits of real animals  A single example will suffice to
show what passed for zoölogy in the thirteenth century 

 There is a little beast made like a lizard and such is its nature that
it will extinguish fire should it fall into it  The beast is so cold and
of such a quality that fire is not able to burn it  nor will trouble
happen in the place where it shall be   This beast signifies the holy
man who lives by faith  who  will never have hurt from fire nor will
hell burn him     This beast we name also by another name   it is called
salamander  as you find written   it is accustomed to mount into
apple trees  poisons the apples  and in a well where it shall fall it
will poison the water  

It will be noticed that the habits of the animals were supposed to have
some spiritual meaning and carry with them a lesson for mankind  It may
be added that this and similar stories were centuries old  The most
improbable things were repeated from generation to generation without
its occurring to any one to inquire if there was any truth in them  Even
the most learned men of the time believed in astrology and in the
miraculous virtues of herbs and gems  For instance  Albertus Magnus  one
of the most distinguished scientists of the thirteenth century  agrees
that a sapphire will drive away boils and that the diamond can be
softened in the blood of a stag  which will work best if the stag has
been fed on wine and parsley  168 

102  It is not only in the literature of the Middle Ages that we find
the thought and life of the people reflected  but in the art as well 
for painters  sculptors  and builders were at work in every country of
western Europe 

 Sidenote  Illuminations done by the monks  

 Sidenote  In religious works  

The paintings were altogether different from those of to day  and
consisted chiefly of illustrations in the books  called  illuminations  
Just as the books had all to be laboriously written out by hand  so each
picture was painted on the parchment page with tiny brushes and usually
in brilliant colors with a generous use of gold  And as the monks wrote
out the books  so it was  in general  the monks who painted the
pictures  The books that they adorned were chiefly those used in the
church services  especially the breviary  the psalter  and the book of
hours  Naturally these pictures usually dealt with religious subjects
and illustrated the lives of the saints or the events of biblical
history  Virtue was encouraged by representations of the joys of heaven
and also stimulated by spirited portrayals of the devil and his fiends 
and of the sufferings of the lost 

 Sidenote  In secular books  

Secular works  too  were sometimes provided with pictures drawn from a
wide variety of subjects  We find in their pages such homely and
familiar figures as the farmer with his plow  the butcher at his block 
the glass blower at his furnace  then  again  we are transported to an
imaginary world  peopled with strange and uncouth beasts and adorned
with fantastic architecture 

 Sidenote  The artist governed by fixed rules  

The mediæval love of symbols and of fixed rules for doing things is
strikingly illustrated in these illuminations  Each color had its
especial significance  There were certain established attitudes and ways
of depicting various characters and emotions which were adhered to by
generation after generation of artists and left comparatively little
opportunity for individual talent or lifelike presentation  On the other
hand  these little pictures  for of course they were always
small 169   were often executed with exquisite care and skill and
sometimes in the smaller details with great truth to nature 

Beside the pictures of which we have been speaking  it was a common
practice to adorn the books with gay illuminated initials or page
borders  which were sometimes very beautiful in both design and color 
In these rather more freedom was allowed to the caprice of the
individual artist  and they were frequently enlivened with very charming
and lifelike flowers  birds  squirrels  and other small animals 

 Illustration  A Romanesque Church 

 Sidenote  Sculpture subservient to architecture  

The art of sculpture was more widely and successfully cultivated during
the Middle Ages than painting  Mediæval sculpture did not  however 
concern itself chiefly with the representation of the human figure  but
with what we may call  decorative carving   it was almost wholly
subservient to the dominant art of the Middle Ages  namely 
architecture 

 Sidenote  Architecture the dominant art of the Middle Ages  

It is in the great cathedrals and other churches scattered throughout
England  France  Spain  Holland  Belgium  and Germany  that we find the
noblest and most lasting achievements of mediæval art  which all the
resources of modern skill have been unable to equal  Everybody belonged
to the Church  but the Church  too  belonged to each individual  The
building and beautifying of a new church was a matter of interest to the
whole community   to men of every rank  It gratified at once their
religious sentiments  their local pride  and their artistic cravings 
All the arts and crafts ministered to the construction and adornment of
the new edifice  and  in addition to its religious significance  it took
the place of our modern art museum 

 Illustration  Durham Cathedral  Romanesque  

 Sidenote  The Romanesque style  

Up to the beginning of the thirteenth century the churches were built in
the Romanesque style  170  They were  generally speaking  in the form of
a cross  with a main aisle  and two side aisles which were both narrower
and lower than the main aisle  The aisles were divided from each other
by massive round pillars which supported the round vaulting of the roof
and were connected by round arches  The round arched windows were
usually small for the size of the building  so that the interior was not
very light  The whole effect was one of massive simplicity  There was 
however  especially in the later churches of this style  a profusion of
carved ornament  usually in geometric designs 

 Sidenote  Introduction of the Gothic style  

 Sidenote  The pointed arch  

 Sidenote  Flying buttresses  

The  pointed  form of arch was used occasionally in windows during the
eleventh and twelfth centuries  But about the beginning of the
thirteenth century 171  it began to be employed much more extensively 
and in an incredibly short time practically superseded the round arch
and became the characteristic feature of a new style  called  Gothic  
The adoption of the pointed arch had very important results  It enabled
the builder to make arches of the same height but various widths  and of
varying height and the same width  A round arch of a given span can be
only half as high as it is wide  but the pointed arch may have a great
diversity of proportions  The development of the Gothic style was
greatly forwarded by the invention of the  flying buttress   By means of
this graceful outside prop it became possible to lighten the masonry of
the hitherto massive walls and pierce them with great windows which let
a flood of light into the hitherto dark churches  172 

 Illustration  Round and Pointed Arches 

 Illustration  FAÇADE OF RHEIMS CATHEDRAL 

 Sidenote  Stained glass  

The light from all these great windows might even have been too glaring
had it not been for the wonderful stained glass set in exquisite stone
tracery with which they were filled  The stained glass of the mediæval
cathedral  especially in France  where the glass workers brought their
art to the greatest perfection  was one of its chief glories  By far the
greater part of this old glass has of course been destroyed  but it is
still so highly prized that every bit of it is now carefully preserved 
for it has never since been equaled  A window set with odd bits of it
pieced together like crazy patch work is more beautiful  in its rich and
jewel like coloring  than the finest modern work 

 Illustration  Flying Buttresses of Notre Dame  Paris 

 Sidenote  Sculptured ornament  

As the Gothic style developed and the builders grew all the time more
skillful and daring  the churches became marvels of lightness and
delicacy of detail and finish  while still retaining their dignity and
beauty of proportion  Sculptors enriched them with the most beautiful
creations of their art  Moldings and capitals  pulpits  altars  and
choir screens  the wooden seats for the clergy and choristers  are
sometimes literally covered with carving representing graceful leaf and
flower forms  familiar animals or grotesque monsters  biblical incidents
or homely scenes from everyday life  In the cathedral of Wells  in
England  one capital shows us among its vines and leaves a boy whose
face is screwed up with pain from the thorn he is extracting from his
foot  another depicts a whole story of sin found out  thieves stealing
grapes pursued by an angry farmer with a pitchfork  One characteristic
of the mediæval imagination is its fondness for the grotesque  It loved
queer beasts  half eagle  half lion  hideous batlike creatures  monsters
like nothing on land or sea  They lurk among the foliage on choir
screens  leer at you from wall or column  or squat upon the gutters high
on roof and steeple 

 Illustration  Window in the Cathedral of Sens  France 

 Sidenote  Gothic sculpture  

A striking peculiarity of the Gothic structure is the great number of
statues of apostles  saints  and rulers which adorn the façades and
especially the main portal of the churches  These figures are cut from
the same kind of stone of which the building is made and appear to be
almost a part of it  While  compared with later sculpture  they seem
somewhat stiff and unlifelike  they harmonize wonderfully with the whole
building  and the best of them are full of charm and dignity 

 Illustration  INTERIOR OF EXETER CATHEDRAL 

 Sidenote  Secular buildings  

So far we have spoken only of the church architecture  and that was by
far the most important during the period with which we have been
dealing  Later  in the fourteenth century  many beautiful secular
buildings were constructed in the Gothic style  The most striking and
important of these were the guildhalls built by the rich merchant
guilds  and the townhalls of some of the important cities  But the
Gothic style has always been especially dedicated to  and seems
peculiarly fitted for  ecclesiastical architecture  Its lofty aisles and
open floor spaces  its soaring arches leading the eye toward heaven  and
its glowing windows suggesting the glories of paradise  may well have
fostered the ardent faith of the mediæval Christian 

 Illustration  Figures  gargoyles  on Notre Dame  Paris 

 Sidenote  The mediæval castle  

We have already touched upon some of the characteristics of domestic
architecture in referring to the mediæval castle  This was rather a
stronghold than a home   strength and inaccessibility were its main
requirements  The walls were many feet thick and the tiny windows  often
hardly more than slits in the massive walls  the stone floors  the great
bare halls warmed only by large fireplaces  suggest nothing of the
comfort of a modern household  At the same time they imply a simplicity
of taste and manners and a hardihood of body which we may well envy 

 Sidenote  The schools before the eleventh century  

103  On turning from the language and books of the people and the art of
the period to the occupations of the learned class  who carried on their
studies and discussions in Latin  we naturally inquire where such
persons obtained their education  During the long centuries which
elapsed between the time when Justinian closed the government schools
and the advent of Frederick Barbarossa  there appears to have been
nothing in western Europe  outside of Italy and Spain  corresponding to
our universities and colleges  Some of the schools which the bishops and
abbots had established in accordance with Charlemagne s commands were 
it is true  maintained all through the dark and disorderly times which
followed his death  But the little that we know of the instruction
offered in them would indicate that it was very elementary  although
there were sometimes noted men at their head 

 Sidenote  Abelard  d  1142  

About the year 1100 an ardent young man named Abelard started out from
his home in Brittany to visit all the places where he might hope to
receive instruction in logic and philosophy  in which  like all his
learned contemporaries  he was especially interested  He reports that he
found teachers in several of the French towns  particularly in Paris 
who were attracting large numbers of students to listen to their
lectures upon logic  rhetoric  and theology  Abelard soon showed his
superiority to his teachers by defeating them several times in debate 
Before long he began lecturing on his own account  and such was his
success that thousands of students flocked to hear him 

 Sidenote  Abelard s  Yea and Nay   

He prepared a remarkable little text book  called  Yea and Nay  
containing seemingly contradictory opinions of the church fathers upon
particular questions  The student was left to reconcile the
contradictions  if he could  by careful reasoning  for Abelard held that
a constant questioning was the only path to real knowledge  His free way
of dealing with the authorities upon which men based their religious
beliefs seemed wicked to many of his contemporaries  especially to St 
Bernard  who made him a great deal of trouble  Nevertheless it soon
became the fashion to discuss the various doctrines of Christianity with
great freedom and to try to make a well reasoned system of theology by
following the rules of Aristotle s logic  It was just after Abelard s
death  1142  that Peter Lombard published his  Sentences   already
described 

Abelard did not found the University of Paris  as has sometimes been
supposed  but he did a great deal to make the discussions of theological
problems popular  and by his attractive method of teaching he greatly
increased the number of those who wished to learn  The sad story of his
life  which he wrote when he was worn out with the calamities that had
overtaken him  is the best and almost the only account which exists of
the remarkable interest in learning which explains the origin of the
University of Paris  173 

 Sidenote  Origin of the University of Paris  

Before the end of the twelfth century the teachers had become so
numerous in Paris that they formed a union  or guild  for the
advancement of their interests  This union of professors was called by
the usual name for corporations in the Middle Ages   universitas   hence
our word  university   The king and pope both favored the university and
granted the teachers and students many of the privileges of the clergy 
a class to which they were regarded as belonging  because learning had
for so many centuries been confined to the clergy 

 Sidenote  Study of the Roman and canon law in Bologna  

 Sidenote  The  Decretum  of Gratian  

About the time that we find the beginnings of a university or guild of
professors at Paris  a great institution of learning was growing up at
Bologna  Here the chief attention was given  not to theology  as at
Paris  but to the study of the law  both Roman and canon  Very early in
the twelfth century a new interest in the Roman law became apparent in
Italy  where the old jurisprudence of Rome had never been completely
forgotten  Then  in 1142 or thereabouts  a monk  Gratian  published a
great work in which he aimed to reconcile all the conflicting
legislation of the councils and popes and to provide a convenient
text book for the study of the church or canon law  Students then began
to stream to Bologna in greater numbers than ever before  In order to
protect themselves in a town where they were regarded as strangers  they
organized themselves into associations  which became so powerful that
they were able to force the professors to obey the rules which they laid
down 

 Sidenote  Other universities founded  

The University of Oxford was founded in the time of Henry II  probably
by English students and masters who had become discontented at Paris for
some reason  The University of Cambridge  as well as numerous
universities in France  Italy  and Spain  appeared in the thirteenth
century  The German universities  which are still so famous  were
established somewhat later  most of them in the latter half of the
fourteenth and in the fifteenth centuries  The northern institutions
generally took the great mother university on the Seine as their model 
while those in southern Europe usually adopted the habits of Bologna 

 Sidenote  The academic degree  

When  after some years of study  a student was examined by the
professors  he was  if successful  admitted to the corporation of
teachers and became a master himself  What we call a degree to day was
originally  in the mediæval universities  nothing more than the
qualification to teach  But in the thirteenth century many began to
desire the honorable title of master or doctor  which is only the Latin
word for  teacher   who did not care to become professors in our sense
of the word  174 

 Sidenote  Simple methods of instruction  

The students in the mediæval universities were of all ages  from
thirteen to forty  and even older  There were no university buildings 
and in Paris the lectures were given in the Latin quarter  in Straw
Street  so called from the straw strewn on the floors of the hired rooms
where the lecturer explained the text book  with the students squatting
on the floor before him  There were no laboratories  for there was no
experimentation  All that was required was a copy of the
text book   Gratian s  Decretum   the  Sentences   a treatise of
Aristotle  or a medical book  This the lecturer explained sentence by
sentence  and the students listened and sometimes took notes 

 Sidenote  The universities could move freely from one town to another  

The fact that the masters and students were not bound to any particular
spot by buildings and apparatus left them free to wander about  If they
believed themselves ill treated in one town they moved to another 
greatly to the disgust of the tradespeople of the place which they
deserted  who of course profited by the presence of the university  The
universities of Oxford and of Leipsic  among others  were founded by
professors and students who had deserted their former home 

 Sidenote  Course of study  

The course in arts  which corresponded to our college course and led to
the degree of Master of Arts  occupied six years at Paris  The studies
were logic  various sciences   physics  astronomy  etc    studied in
Aristotle s treatises  and some philosophy and ethics  There was no
history  no Greek  Latin had to be learned in order to carry on the work
at all  but little attention was given to the Roman classics  The new
modern languages were considered entirely unworthy of the learned  It
must of course be remembered that none of the books which we consider
the great classics in English  French  Italian  or Spanish had as yet
been written 

 Sidenote  Aristotle s works become known in the West  

104  The most striking peculiarity of the instruction in the mediæval
university was the supreme deference paid to Aristotle  Most of the
courses of lectures were devoted to the explanation of some one of his
numerous treatises   his  Physics   his  Metaphysics   his various
treatises on logic  his  Ethics   his minor works upon the soul  heaven
and earth  etc  Only his  Logic  had been known to Abelard  as all his
other works had been forgotten  But early in the thirteenth century all
his comprehensive contributions to science reached the West  either from
Constantinople or through the Arabs who had brought them to Spain  The
Latin translations were bad and obscure  and the lecturer had enough to
do to give some meaning to them  to explain what the Arab philosophers
had said of them  and  finally  to reconcile them to the teachings of
Christianity 

 Sidenote  Veneration for Aristotle  

Aristotle was  of course  a pagan  He was uncertain whether the soul
continued to exist after death  he had never heard of the Bible and knew
nothing of the salvation of man through Christ  One would have supposed
that he would have been promptly rejected with horror by those who never
questioned the doctrines of Christianity  But the teachers of the
thirteenth century were fascinated by his logic and astonished at his
learning  The great theologians of the time  Albertus Magnus  d  1280 
and Thomas Aquinas  d  1274   did not hesitate to prepare elaborate
commentaries upon all his works  He was called  The Philosopher   and so
fully were scholars convinced that it had pleased God to permit
Aristotle to say the last word upon each and every branch of knowledge
that they humbly accepted him  along with the Bible  the church fathers 
and the canon and Roman law  as one of the unquestioned authorities
which together formed a complete guide for humanity in conduct and in
every branch of science 

 Sidenote  Scholasticism  

The term  scholasticism  is commonly given to the philosophy  theology 
and method of discussion of the mediæval professors  To those who later
outgrew the fondness for logic and the supreme respect for Aristotle 
scholasticism  with its neglect of Greek and Roman literature  came to
seem an arid and profitless plan of education  Yet if we turn over the
pages of the wonderful works of Thomas Aquinas  we see that the
scholastic philosopher might be a person of extraordinary insight and
erudition  ready to recognize all the objections to his position  and
able to express himself with great clearness and cogency  175  The
training in logic  if it did not increase the sum of human knowledge 
accustomed the student to make careful distinctions and present his
material in an orderly way 

 Sidenote  Roger Bacon s attack on scholasticism  

Even in the thirteenth century there were a few scholars who criticised
the habit of relying upon Aristotle for all knowledge  The most
distinguished fault finder was Roger Bacon  an English Franciscan monk
 d  about 1290   who declared that even if Aristotle were very wise he
had only planted the tree of knowledge and that this had  not as yet put
forth all its branches nor produced all its fruits    If we could
continue to live for endless centuries we mortals could never hope to
reach full and complete knowledge of all the things which are to be
known  No one knows enough of nature completely to describe the
peculiarities of a single fly and give the reason for its color and why
it has just so many feet  no more and no less   Bacon held that truth
could be reached a hundred thousand times better by experiments with
real things than by poring over the bad Latin translations of Aristotle 
 If I had my way   he declared   I should burn all the books of
Aristotle  for the study of them can only lead to a loss of time 
produce error and increase ignorance  

So we find that even when scholasticism was most popular in the
universities  there were keen sighted scientists who recommended the
modern scientific method of discovering truth  This does not consist in
discussing  according to the rules of logic  what a Greek philosopher
said hundreds of years ago  but in the patient observation of things
about us 

                                        

 Sidenote  Review of the great changes between the break up of the Roman
Empire in the west and the end of the thirteenth century  

We have now traversed somewhat over one half of the long period of
fifteen hundred years which separates Europe of to day from the
disintegrating Roman Empire of the fifth century  The eight hundred
years which lie between the century of Alaric  Attila  Leo the Great 
and Clovis  and that of Innocent III  St  Louis  and Edward I  witnessed
momentous changes  quite as important as any that have occurred since 

 Sidenote  The  dark ages   

It is true that it seemed at first as if the barbarous Goths  Franks 
Vandals  and Burgundians were bringing nothing but turmoil and
distraction  Even the strong hand of Charlemagne curbed the unruly
elements for only a moment  then the discord of his grandsons and the
incursions of Northmen  Hungarians  Slavs  and Saracens plunged western
Europe once more into the same anarchy and ignorance through which it
had passed in the seventh and eighth centuries 

Two hundred years and more elapsed after Charlemagne s death before we
can begin once more to note signs of progress  While we know little of
the eleventh century  and while even its most distinguished writers are
forgotten by all save the student of the period  it was undoubtedly a
time of preparation for the brilliant twelfth century  for Abelard and
St  Bernard  for the lawyers  poets  architects  and philosophers who
seem to come suddenly upon the scene 

 Sidenote  The twelfth and thirteenth centuries a period of rapid
advance  

The Middle Ages may therefore be divided into two fairly distinct and
quite different periods  The centuries prior to the age of Gregory VII
and of William the Conqueror may  on account of their disorder and
ignorance  be properly called the  dark ages   although they beheld some
important stages in the transformation of Europe  The later Middle Ages 
on the contrary  were a time of rapid and unmistakable progress in
almost every line of human endeavor  Indeed by the end of the thirteenth
century a great part of those changes were well under way which serve to
make modern Europe so different from the condition of western Europe
under the Roman Empire  The most striking of these are the following 

 Sidenote  Appearance of national states  

 1  A group of national states in which a distinct feeling of
nationality was developing had taken the place of the Roman Empire 
which made no allowance in its government for the differences between
Italians  Gauls  Germans  and Britons  The makeshift feudal government
which had grown up during the dark ages was yielding to the kingly
power  except in Germany and Italy  and there was no hope of ever
reuniting western Europe into a single empire 

 Sidenote  The national states begin to deprive the Church of its
governmental powers  

 2  The Church had  in a way  taken the place of the Roman Empire by
holding the various peoples of western Europe together under the
headship of the pope and by assuming the powers of government during the
period when the feudal lords were too weak to secure order and justice 
Organized like an absolute monarchy  the Church was in a certain sense
far the most powerful state of the Middle Ages  But it attained the
zenith of its political influence under Innocent III  at the opening of
the thirteenth century  before its close the national states had so
grown in strength that it was clear that they would gradually reassume
the powers of government temporarily exercised by the Church and confine
the pope and clergy more and more to their strictly religious functions 

 Sidenote  Appearance of the commons or third estate  

 3  A new social class had come into prominence alongside the clergy and
the knightly aristocracy  The emancipation of the serfs  the founding of
towns  and the growth of commerce made it possible for merchants and
successful artisans to rise to importance and become influential through
their wealth  From these beginnings the great intelligent and educated
public of modern times has sprung 

 Sidenote  Books begin to be written in the language of the people  

 4  The various modern languages began to be used in writing books  For
five or six hundred years after the invasions of the Germans  Latin was
used by all writers  but in the eleventh and following centuries the
language of the people began to replace the ancient tongue  This enabled
the laymen who had not mastered the intricacies of the old Roman speech
to enjoy the stories and poems which were being composed in French 
Provençal  German  English  and Spanish  and  somewhat later  in
Italian 

 Sidenote  The clergy lose the monopoly of learning  

Although the clergy still directed education  laymen were beginning to
write books as well as to read them  and gradually the churchmen ceased
to enjoy the monopoly of learning which they had possessed during the
early Middle Ages 

 Sidenote  Study of law  theology  and philosophy  

 Sidenote  The universities  

 5  Scholars began as early as the year 1100 to gather eagerly about
masters who lectured upon the Roman and canon law or upon logic 
philosophy  or theology  The works of Aristotle  the most learned of the
ancients  were sought out  and students followed him enthusiastically
into all fields of knowledge  The universities grew up which are now so
conspicuous a feature of our modern civilization 

 Sidenote  Beginnings of experimental science  

 6  Scholars could not satisfy themselves permanently with the works of
Aristotle but began themselves to add to the fund of human knowledge  In
Roger Bacon and his sympathizers we find a group of scientific
investigators who were preparing the way for the unprecedented
achievements in natural science which are the glory of recent times 

 Sidenote  Artistic progress  

 7  The developing appreciation of the beautiful is attested by the
skill and taste expressed in the magnificent churches of the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries  which were not a revival of any ancient style but
the original production of the architects and sculptors of the period 


     General Reading   The most convenient and readable account of
     mediæval literature is perhaps that of SAINTSBURY   The Flourishing
     of Romance   Charles Scribner s Sons   1 50   For chivalry  see
     CORNISH   Chivalry   The Macmillan Company   1 75   For Gothic
     architecture  see C H  MOORE   Development and Character of Gothic
     Architecture   The Macmillan Company   4 50   For the art in
     general  LÜBKE   Outlines of the History of Art   Dodd  Mead   Co  
     2 vols    7 50   For the universities  RASHDALL   History of the
     Universities of the Middle Ages   Clarendon Press  3 vols  
      14 00  




CHAPTER XX

THE HUNDRED YEARS  WAR


 Sidenote  Plan of the following four chapters  

105  In dealing with the history of Europe during the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries the following order has been adopted   1  England
and France are treated together  since the claims of the English kings
to the French crown  and the long Hundred Years  War between the two
countries  bring them into the same tale of disorder and final
reorganization   2  Next the history of the papal power and the
remarkable efforts to better the Church at the great Council of
Constance  1414  are considered   3  Then the progress of enlightenment
is taken up  particularly in the Italian towns  which were the leaders
in culture during this period  This leads to an account of the invention
of printing and the extraordinary geographical discoveries of the latter
part of the fifteenth century   4  In a fourth chapter the situation of
western Europe at the opening of the sixteenth century is described  in
order that the reader may be prepared to understand the great revolt
against the Church under the leadership of Martin Luther 

 Sidenote  Extent of the king of England s realms before Edward I
 1272 1307   

We turn first to England  The English kings who preceded Edward I had
ruled over only a portion of the island of Great Britain  To the west of
their kingdom lay the mountainous district of Wales  inhabited by that
remnant of the original Britons which the German invaders had been
unable to conquer  To the north of England was the kingdom of Scotland 
which was quite independent except for an occasional vague recognition
on the part of its rulers of the English kings as their feudal
superiors  Edward I  however  succeeded in conquering Wales permanently
and Scotland temporarily 

 Illustration  THE BRITISH ISLES 

 Sidenote  The Welsh and their bards  

For centuries a border warfare had been carried on between the English
and the Welsh  William the Conqueror had found it necessary to establish
a chain of earldoms on the Welsh frontier  and Chester  Shrewsbury  and
Monmouth became the outposts of the Normans  While the raids of the
Welsh constantly provoked the English kings to invade Wales  no
permanent conquest was possible  for the enemy retreated into the
mountains about Snowdon and the English soldiers were left to starve in
the wild regions into which they had ventured  The long and successful
resistance which the Welsh made against the English must be attributed
not only to their inaccessible retreats but also to the patriotic
inspiration of their bards  These fondly believed that their people
would sometime reconquer the whole of England  which they had possessed
before the coming of the Angles and Saxons  176 

 Sidenote  Edward I conquers Wales  

 Sidenote  The title of  Prince of Wales   

When Edward I came to the throne he demanded that Llewelyn  Prince of
Wales  as the head of the Welsh clans was called  should do him homage 
Llewelyn  who was a man of ability and energy  refused the king s
summons  and Edward marched into Wales  Two campaigns were necessary
before the Welsh finally succumbed  Llewelyn was killed  1282   and with
him expired the independence of the Welsh people  Edward divided the
country into shires and introduced English laws and customs  and his
policy of conciliation was so successful that there was but a single
rising in the country for a whole century  He later presented his son to
the Welsh as their prince  and from that time down to the present the
title of  Prince of Wales  has usually been conferred upon the heir to
the English throne 

 Sidenote  Scotland before Edward I  

 Sidenote  The Highlands and Lowlands  

The conquest of Scotland proved a far more difficult matter than that of
Wales  The early history of the kingdom of Scotland is a complicated
one  When the Angles and Saxons landed in Britain  a great part of the
mountainous region north of the Firth of Forth was inhabited by a Celtic
tribe  the Picts  There was  however  on the west coast a little kingdom
of the Irish Celts  who were then called Scots  By the opening of the
tenth century the Picts had accepted the king of the Scots as their
ruler  and the annalists begin to refer to the highland region as the
land of the Scots  As time went on the English kings found it to their
advantage to grant to the Scottish rulers certain border districts 
including the Lowlands  between the river Tweed and the Firth of Forth 
This region was English in race and speech  while the Celts in the
Highlands spoke  and still speak  Gaelic 

 Sidenote  Character of the inhabitants of the Lowlands  

It was very important in the history of Scotland that its kings chose to
dwell in the Lowlands rather than in the Highlands  and made Edinburgh 
with its fortress  their chief town  With the coming of William the
Conqueror many Englishmen  and also a number of discontented Norman
nobles  fled across the border to the Lowlands of Scotland  and founded
some of the great families  like those of Balliol and Bruce  who later
fought for Scottish liberty  During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries
the country  especially in the south  developed rapidly under the
influence of the neighboring Anglo Norman civilization  and the towns
increased in size and importance 

 Sidenote  Edward intervenes in Scotch affairs  

 Sidenote  Alliance between Scotland and France  

It was not until the time of Edward I that the long series of troubles
between England and Scotland began  The death of the last representative
of the old line of Scotch kings in 1290 was followed by the appearance
of a number of claimants to the crown  In order to avoid civil war 
Edward was asked to decide who should be king  He agreed to make the
decision on condition that the one whom he selected should hold Scotland
as a fief from the English king  This arrangement was adopted  and the
crown was given to Robert Balliol  But Edward unwisely made demands upon
the Scots which aroused their anger  and their king renounced his
homage to the king of England  The Scotch  moreover  formed an alliance
with Edward s enemy  Philip the Fair of France  thenceforth  in all the
difficulties between England and France  the English kings had always to
reckon with the disaffected Scotch  who were glad to aid England s
enemies 

 Sidenote  Edward attempts to incorporate Scotland with England  

Edward marched in person against the Scotch  1296  and speedily put down
what he regarded as a rebellion  He declared that Balliol had forfeited
his fief through treason  and that consequently the English king had
become the immediate lord of the Scotch nobles  whom he forced to do him
homage  He emphasized his claim by carrying off the famous Stone of
Scone  upon which the kings of Scotland had been crowned for ages 
Continued resistance led Edward to attempt to incorporate Scotland with
England in the same way that he had treated Wales  This was the
beginning of three hundred years of intermittent war between England and
Scotland  which ended only when a Scotch king  James VI  succeeded to
the English throne in 1603 as James I 

 Sidenote  Scotland gains its independence under Robert Bruce  

 Sidenote  Battle of Bannockburn  1314  

That Scotland was able to maintain her independence was mainly due to
Robert Bruce  a national hero who succeeded in bringing both the
nobility and the people under his leadership  Edward I died  old and
worn out  in 1307  when on his way north to put down a rising under
Bruce  and left the task of dealing with the Scotch to his incompetent
son  Edward II  The Scotch acknowledged Bruce as their king and
decisively defeated Edward II in the great battle of Bannockburn  the
most famous conflict in Scottish history  Nevertheless  the English
refused to acknowledge the independence of Scotland until forced to do
so in 1328 

 Sidenote  The Scottish nation differs from the English  

In the course of their struggles with England the Scotch people of the
Lowlands had become more closely welded together  and the independence
of Scotland  although it caused much bloodshed  first and last  served
to develop certain permanent differences between the little Scotch
nation and the rest of the English race  The peculiarities of the people
north of the Tweed have been made familiar by the writings of gifted
Scotchmen like Burns  Scott  and Stevenson 

 Sidenote  Growth of the power of Parliament  

Edward II s numerous enemies took advantage of his weakness to bring
about his downfall  but it is noteworthy that they worked through
Parliament and in that way strengthened that fundamental national
institution  We have seen how Edward I called representatives of the
townspeople  as well as the nobles and prelates  to the Model Parliament
of 1295  177  This important innovation was formally ratified by his
son  who solemnly promised that all questions relating to his realm and
its people should be settled in parliaments in which the commons should
be included  Thereafter no statute could be legally passed without their
consent  In 1327 Parliament showed its power by forcing Edward II to
abdicate in favor of his son  and thereby established the principle that
the representatives of the nation might even go so far as to depose
their ruler  should he show himself clearly unfit for his high duties 
About this time Parliament began to meet in two distinct divisions 
which later became the House of Lords and the House of Commons  In
modern times this form of legislative assembly has been imitated by most
of the countries of Europe 

 Sidenote  Cause of the Hundred Years  War  

106  The so called Hundred Years  War  which we must now review  was a
long but frequently interrupted series of conflicts between the English
and the French kings  It began in the following manner  The king of
England  through John s misconduct  had lost Normandy and other portions
of the great Plantagenet realm on the continent  178  He still retained 
however  the extensive duchy of Guienne  for which he did homage to the
king of France  whose most powerful vassal he was  This arrangement was
bound to produce constant difficulty  especially as the French kings
were  as we have discovered  bent upon destroying as fast as possible
the influence of their vassals  so that the royal power should
everywhere take the place of that of the feudal lords  It was obviously
out of the question for the king of England meekly to permit the French
monarch to extend his control directly over the people of Guienne  and
yet this was the constant aim of Philip the Fair 179  and his
successors 


THE FRENCH KINGS DURING THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES


       Louis IX  Saint Louis   1226 1270 
                       
           Philip III  1270 1285 
                       
                                                        
                                                        
                                                        
Philip IV  the Fair                           Charles of Valois 
 1285 1314                            ancestor of the house of Valois
                                                        
                                                        
                                                        
Louis X       Isabella  m  Philip V    Charles IV       
 1314 1316    Edward II    1316 1322    1322 1328       
                                                        
                                                        
               Edward      daughters    daughter        
daughter       III of                               Philip VI
               England                              1328 1350 
       John                                             
        1316                                            
       an                                               
       infant                                      John II
       who died                                    1350 1364 
       when but                                         
       a few                                            
       days old                                         
                                                        
                                       Charles V     Philip 
                                        1364 1380   founder of
                                                    the powerful
                                       Charles VI     house
                                        1380 1422   of Burgundy
                                           
                                  Charles VII  1422 1461 
                                           
                                   Louis XI  1461 1483 
                                           
                                 Charles VIII  1483 1498 

 Sidenote  The French succession in 1328  

The inevitable struggle between England and France was rendered the more
serious by the claim made by Edward III that he was himself the rightful
king of France  He based his pretensions upon the fact that his mother
Isabella was the daughter of Philip the Fair  Philip  who died in 1314 
had been followed by his three sons in succession  none of whom had left
a male heir  so that the direct male line of the Capetians was
extinguished in 1328  The lawyers thereupon declared that it was a
venerable law in France that no woman should succeed to the throne  The
principle was also asserted that a woman could not even transmit the
crown to her son  Consequently Edward III appeared to be definitely
excluded  and Philip VI of Valois  a nephew of Philip the Fair  became
king 

 Sidenote  Edward III claims the French crown  

At first Edward III  who was a mere boy in 1328  appeared to recognize
the propriety of this settlement and did qualified homage to Philip VI
for Guienne  But when it became apparent later that Philip was not only
encroaching upon Edward s prerogatives in Guienne but had sent French
troops to aid the Scotch  the English king bethought him of his
neglected claim to the French crown 

 Sidenote  The Flemish towns  

The advantage of publicly declaring himself the rightful king of France
was increased by the attitude of the flourishing towns of Flanders 
Philip VI had assisted the count of Flanders in a bitter struggle to
prevent the towns from establishing their independence  Consequently the
Flemish burghers now announced their willingness to desert Philip and
acknowledge and aid Edward as their king 

 Sidenote  Commercial relations between the Flemish towns and England  

 Sidenote  English wool  

Flanders at this period was the most important trading and manufacturing
country in western Europe  Ghent was a great manufacturing town  like
Manchester to day  and Bruges a busy port  like modern Antwerp or
Liverpool  All this prosperity was largely dependent upon England  for
it was from there that the Flemish manufacturers procured the fine  long
wool which they wove on their looms into cloth and spun into yarn  In
1336 the count of Flanders  perhaps at Philip s suggestion  ordered the
imprisonment of all the Englishmen in Flanders  Edward promptly
retaliated by prohibiting the export of wool from England and the
importation of cloth  At the same time he protected and encouraged the
Flemish artisans who had emigrated across the Channel and were carrying
on their industry in the county of Norfolk 

 Illustration  Royal Arms of Edward III 

It is clear  then  that the Flemish burghers had good reason for wishing
Edward to become their king  so that their relations with England might
not be broken off  They did their part in inducing him to undertake the
conquest of France  and  in 1340  we find him adding the  fleur de lis 
of France to the lions of the English royal arms 

 Sidenote  Edward III invades France  1346  

 Sidenote  The English victory at the battle of Crécy  1346  

Edward did not invade France for some years  but his sailors destroyed
the French fleet and began to show themselves able to maintain their
king s claim to be lord of the English seas upon every side  In 1346
Edward himself landed in Normandy  devastated the country  and marched
up the Seine almost to Paris  but was then obliged to retreat northward
before a large army which Philip had collected  Edward made a halt at
Crécy  and here one of the most celebrated battles of history took
place  It taught the world a great lesson in warfare by proving once
more  as the battle of Bannockburn had already done  that foot soldiers 
properly armed and trained to act in concert  could defeat the feudal
cavaliers in spite of their lances and heavy armor  The proud mounted
knights of France performed prodigies of valor  each for himself  but
they did not act together and could not hold their ground against the
deadly shower of arrows poured into their midst from the long bows of
the English archers  The flower of French chivalry was routed with
terrible slaughter by the serried ranks of the humble English foot
soldiers  180  It was at Crécy that Edward s son  the Black Prince   so
named from his black armor   won his spurs  181 

 Sidenote  The English take Calais  

 Sidenote  The Black Prince wins a second great victory at Poitiers 
1356  

After this great victory the English king proceeded to lay siege to
Calais  the French coast town nearest England  This he took  drove out a
great part of the inhabitants  and substituted Englishmen for them  The
town remained subject to England for two centuries  When the war was
renewed the Black Prince  now at the height of his fame  was able to
deal the enemy a still more crushing blow than at Crécy  He again put
the French knights to flight in the battle of Poitiers  he even captured
the French king  John  and carried him off to London 

 Sidenote  The Estates General attempt to control the king and reform
the government  

107  The French quite properly attributed the signal disasters of Crécy
and Poitiers to the inefficiency of their king and his advisers 
Accordingly  after the second defeat  the Estates General  which had
been summoned to approve the raising of more money  attempted to take
matters into their own hands  The representatives of the towns  whom
Philip the Fair had first called in  182  were on this occasion more
numerous than the members of the clergy and nobility  A great list of
reforms was drawn up  which provided  among other things  that the
Estates should meet regularly whether summoned by the king or not  and
that the collection and expenditure of the public revenue should be no
longer entirely under the control of the king but should be supervised
by the representatives of the people  The city of Paris rose in support
of the revolutionary Estates  but the violence of its allies discredited
rather than helped the movement  and France was soon glad to accept the
unrestricted rule of its king once more  183 

 Sidenote  Contrast between the position of the Estates General and the
English Parliament  

This unsuccessful attempt to reform the French government is interesting
in two ways  In the first place  there was much in the aims of the
reformers and in the conduct of the Paris mob that suggests the great
successful French revolution of 1789  which at last fundamentally
modified the organization of the state  In the second place  the history
of the Estates forms a curious contrast to that of the English
Parliament  which was laying the foundation of its later power during
this very period  While the French king occasionally summoned the
Estates when he needed money  he did so only in order that their
approbation of new taxes might make it easier to collect them  He never
admitted that he had not the right to levy taxes if he wished without
consulting his subjects  In England  on the other hand  the kings ever
since the time of Edward I had repeatedly agreed that no new taxes
should be imposed without the consent of Parliament  Edward II had gone
farther and accepted the representatives of the people as his advisers
in all important matters touching the welfare of the realm  While the
French Estates gradually sank into insignificance  the English
Parliament soon learned to grant no money until the king had redressed
the grievances which it pointed out  and thus it insured its influence
over the king s policy 

 Sidenote  Treaty of Bretigny  1360  

Edward III found it impossible to conquer France in spite of the
victories of the Black Prince and the capture of John  He was glad in
1360 to sign the treaty of Bretigny  in which he not only renounced his
pretensions to the French crown but agreed to say no more of the old
claims of his family to Normandy and the Plantagenet provinces north of
the Loire  In return for these concessions he received  in full
sovereignty and without any feudal obligations to the king of France 
Poitou  Guienne  Gascony  and the town of Calais  amounting to about one
third of the territory of France 

 Illustration  French Territory ceded to England by the Treaty of
Bretigny  1360 

 Sidenote  England loses most of its French territory before the death
of Edward III  1377  

The promising peace of Bretigny was however soon broken  The Black
Prince  to whom the government of Guienne was delegated by his father 
levied such heavy taxes that he quickly alienated the hearts of a people
naturally drawn to France rather than to England  When the sagacious
Charles V of France  1364 1380  undertook to reconquer the territory
which his father had ceded to England  he met with no determined
opposition  Edward III was getting old and his warlike son  the Black
Prince  had fallen mortally ill  So when Edward died in 1377 nothing
remained to the English king except Calais and a strip of land from
Bordeaux southward 

 Sidenote  Miserable condition of France  

For a generation after the death of Edward III the war with France was
almost discontinued  France had suffered a great deal more than England 
In the first place  all the fighting had been done on her side of the
Channel  and in the second place  the soldiers who found themselves
without occupation after the treaty of Bretigny had wandered about in
bands maltreating and plundering the people  Petrarch  who visited
France at this period  tells us that he could not believe that this was
the same kingdom which he had once seen so rich and flourishing 
 Nothing presented itself to my eyes but fearful solitude and extreme
poverty  uncultivated land and houses in ruins  Even about Paris there
were everywhere signs of fire and destruction  The streets were
deserted  the roads overgrown with weeds  

 Sidenote  The bubonic plague of 1348 1349  commonly called the  black
death   

The horrors of war had been increased by the deadly bubonic plague which
appeared in Europe early in 1348  In April it had reached Florence  by
August it was devastating France and Germany  it then spread over
England from the southwest northward  attacking every part of the
country during the year 1349  This disease  like other terrible
epidemics  such as smallpox and cholera  came from Asia  Those who were
stricken with it usually died in two or three days  It is impossible to
tell what proportion of the population perished  Reports of the time say
that in one part of France but one tenth of the people survived  in
another but one sixteenth  and that for a long time five hundred bodies
were carried from the great hospital of Paris every day  A careful
estimate shows that in England toward one half of the population died 
At the Abbey of Newenham only the abbot and two monks were left alive
out of twenty six  There were constant complaints that certain lands
were no longer of any value to their lords because the tenants were all
dead 

 Sidenote  Conditions of English labor  

108  In England the growing discontent among the agricultural classes
may be ascribed partly to the results of the great pestilence and partly
to the new taxes which were levied in order to prolong the disastrous
war with France  Up to this time the majority of those who cultivated
the land belonged to some particular manor  paid stated dues to their
lord  and performed definite services for him  Hitherto there had been
relatively few farm hands who might be hired and who sought employment
anywhere that they could get it  The black death  by greatly decreasing
the number of laborers  raised wages and served to increase the
importance of the unattached laborer  Consequently he not only demanded
higher wages than ever before  but readily deserted one employer when
another offered him more money 

 Sidenote  The Statutes of Laborers issued in 1351 and following years  

This appeared very shocking to those who were accustomed to the
traditional rates of payment  and the government undertook to keep down
wages by prohibiting laborers from asking more than had been customary
during the years that preceded the pestilence  Every laborer  when
offered work at the established wages  was ordered to accept it on pain
of imprisonment  The first  Statute of Laborers  184  was issued in
1351  but apparently it was not obeyed and similar laws were enacted
from time to time for a century  Nevertheless complaints continued that
serfs and laborers persisted in demanding  outrageous and excessive
hire   This seems to indicate that the efforts of Parliament to
interfere with the law of supply and demand were unsuccessful 

 Sidenote  Breaking up of the mediæval manors in England  

The old manor system was breaking up  Many of the laboring class in the
country no longer held land as serfs but moved from place to place and
made a living by working for wages  The  villain   as the serf was
called in England  began to regard the dues which he had been accustomed
to pay to his lord as unjust  A petition to Parliament in 1377 asserts
that the villains are refusing to pay their customary services to their
lords or to acknowledge the obligations which they owe as serfs 

 Sidenote  Causes of discontent among the English peasants  

 Sidenote   The Vision of Piers Ploughman   

The discontent was becoming general  We see it reflected in a remarkable
poem of the time   The Vision of Piers Ploughman   in which the
unfortunate position of the peasant is vividly portrayed  185  This is
only the most notable example of a great number of pamphlets  some in
prose and some in bad verse  which were calculated to make the people
more discontented than ever  The efforts to enforce the provisions of
the Statutes of Laborers had undoubtedly produced much friction between
the landlords and their employees  A new form of taxation also caused
much irritation  A general poll tax  which was to be paid by every one
above sixteen years of age  was established in 1379 and another one in
the following year to meet the expenses of the hopeless French war which
was now being conducted by incapable and highly unpopular ministers 

 Sidenote  The peasant revolt of 1381  

In 1381 rioting began among the peasants in Kent and Essex  and several
bodies of the insurgents determined to march upon London  As they passed
along the road their ranks were swelled by discontented villagers and by
many of the poorer workingmen from the towns  Soon the revolt spread all
through southern and eastern England  The peasants burned some of the
houses of the gentry and of the rich ecclesiastics  and took particular
pains to see that the lists for the collection of the hated poll tax
were destroyed  as well as the registers kept by the various lords
enumerating the obligations of their serfs  The gates of London were
opened to the insurgents by sympathizers within the walls  and several
of the king s officers were seized and put to death  Some of the simple
people imagined that they might induce the boy king  Richard II  to
become their leader  He had no idea of aiding them  he went out 
however  to meet them and induced them to disperse by promising that he
would abolish serfdom 

 Sidenote  Final disappearance of serfdom in England  

Although the king did not keep his promise  serfdom decayed rapidly  It
became more and more common for the serf to pay his dues to the lord in
money instead of working for him  and in this way he lost one of the
chief characteristics of a serf  The landlord then either hired men to
cultivate the fields which he reserved for his own use 186  or rented
the land to tenants  These tenants were not in a position to force their
fellow tenants on the manor to pay the full dues which had formerly been
exacted by the lord  Sixty or seventy years after the Peasants  War the
English rural population had in one way or another become free men  and
serfs had practically disappeared 

 Sidenote  Deposition of Richard II and accession of Henry IV of
Lancaster  1399 1413  

 Sidenote  Henry V claims the French crown  1414  

109  The war with France had  as we have seen  almost ceased for a
generation after the death of Edward III  The young son of the Black
Prince  Richard II  who succeeded his grandfather on the throne  was
controlled by the great noblemen whose rivalries fill much space in the
annals of England  He was finally forced to abdicate in 1399  Henry IV 
of the powerful house of Lancaster  187  was recognized as king in spite
of the fact that he had less claim than another descendant of Edward
III  who was  however  a mere boy  Henry IV s uncertain title may have
made him less enterprising than Edward III  at any rate  it was left for
his son  Henry V  1413 1422   to continue the French war  The conditions
in France were such as to encourage the new claim which Henry V made to
the French crown in 1414 

 Sidenote  Civil war in France between the houses of Burgundy and
Orleans  

The able French king  Charles V  who had delivered his country for a
time from the English invaders  188  had been followed in 1380 by
Charles VI  who soon lost his mind  The right to govern France
consequently became a matter of dispute among the insane king s uncles
and other relations  The country was divided between two great factions 
one of which was headed by the powerful duke of Burgundy  who was
building up a new state between France and Germany  and the other by the
duke of Orleans  In 1407 the duke of Orleans was brutally murdered by
order of the duke of Burgundy   a by no means uncommon way at that time
of disposing of one s enemies in both France and England  This led to a
prolonged civil war between the two parties  and saved England from an
attack which the duke of Orleans had been planning 

 Sidenote  Position of Henry V  

 Sidenote  Agincourt  1415  

Henry V had no real basis for his claim to the French crown  Edward III
had gone to war because France was encroaching upon Guienne and aiding
Scotland  and because he was encouraged by the Flemish towns  Henry V 
on the other hand  was merely anxious to make himself and his house
popular by deeds of valor  Nevertheless his very first victory  the
battle of Agincourt  was as brilliant as that of Crécy or Poitiers  Once
more the English bowmen slaughtered great numbers of French knights  The
English then proceeded to conquer Normandy and march upon Paris 

 Sidenote  Treaty of Troyes  1420  

Burgundians and Orleanists were upon the point of forgetting their
animosities in their common fear of the English  when the duke of
Burgundy  as he was kneeling to kiss the hand of his future sovereign 
the Dauphin  189  was treacherously attacked and killed by a band of his
enemies  His son  the new duke of Burgundy  Philip the Good  immediately
joined the English against the Dauphin  whom he believed to be
responsible for his father s murder  Henry then forced the French to
sign the treaty of Troyes  1420   which provided that he was to become
king of France upon the death of the mad Charles VI 

 Sidenote  Henry VI recognized as king in northern France  

Both Henry V and Charles VI died two years later  Henry V s son  Henry
VI  was but nine months old  nevertheless according to the terms of the
treaty of Troyes he succeeded to the throne in France as well as in
England  The child was recognized only in a portion of northern France 
Through the ability of his uncle  the duke of Bedford  his interests
were defended with such good effect that the English succeeded in a few
years in conquering all of France north of the Loire  although the south
continued to be held by Charles VII  the son of Charles VI 

 Sidenote  Joan of Arc  

Charles VII had not yet been crowned and so was still called the Dauphin
even by his supporters  Weak and indolent  he did nothing to stem the
tide of English victories or restore the courage and arouse the
patriotism of his distressed subjects  This great task was reserved for
a young peasant girl from a remote village on the eastern border of
France  To her family and her companions Joan of Arc seemed only  a good
girl  simple and pleasant in her ways   but she brooded much over the
disasters that had overtaken her country  and a  great pity on the fair
realm of France  filled her heart  She saw visions and heard voices that
bade her go forth to the help of the king and lead him to Rheims to be
crowned 

 Sidenote  Relief of Orleans by Joan  1429  

It was with the greatest difficulty that she got anybody to believe in
her mission or to help her to get an audience with the Dauphin  But her
own firm faith in her divine guidance triumphed over all doubts and
obstacles  She was at last accepted as a God sent champion and placed at
the head of some troops despatched to the relief of Orleans  This city 
which was the key to southern France  had been besieged by the English
for some months and was on the point of surrender  Joan  who rode on
horseback at the head of her troops  clothed in armor like a man  had
now become the idol of the soldiers and of the people  Under the
guidance and inspiration of her indomitable courage  sound sense  and
burning enthusiasm  Orleans was relieved and the English completely
routed  The Maid of Orleans  as she was henceforth called  was now free
to conduct the Dauphin to Rheims  where he was crowned in the cathedral
 July 17  1429  

 Illustration  Possessions of the English King in France upon the
Accession of Henry VI  1424 

 Sidenote  Execution of Joan  1431  

The Maid now felt that her mission was accomplished and begged
permission to return to her home and her brothers and sisters  To this
the king would not consent  and she continued to fight his battles with
undiminished loyalty  But the other leaders were jealous of her  and
even her friends  the soldiers  were sensitive to the taunt of being led
by a woman  During the defense of Compiègne in May  1430  she was
allowed to fall into the hands of the duke of Burgundy  who sold her to
the English  They were not satisfied with simply holding as prisoner
that strange maiden who had so discomfited them  they wished to
discredit everything that she had done  and so declared  and undoubtedly
believed  that she was a witch who had been helped by the Evil One  She
was tried by a court of ecclesiastics  found guilty of heresy  and
burned at Rouen in 1431  Her bravery and noble constancy affected even
her executioners  and an English soldier who had come to triumph over
her death was heard to exclaim   We are lost  we have burned a saint  
The English cause in France was indeed lost  for her spirit and example
had given new courage and vigor to the French armies  190 

 Sidenote  England loses her French possessions  

 Sidenote  End of the Hundred Years  War  1453  

The English Parliament became more and more reluctant to grant funds
when there were no more victories gained  Bedford  through whose ability
the English cause had hitherto been maintained  died in 1435  and Philip
the Good  Duke of Burgundy  renounced his alliance with the English and
joined Charles VII  Owing to his acquisition of the Netherlands  the
possessions of Philip were now so great that he might well be regarded
as a European potentate whose alliance with France rendered further
efforts on England s part hopeless  From this time on the English lost
ground steadily  They were expelled from Normandy in 1450  Three years
later  the last vestige of their long domination in southern France
passed into the hands of the French king  The Hundred Years  War was
over  and although England still retained Calais  the great question
whether she should extend her sway upon the continent was finally
settled 

 Sidenote  The Wars of the Roses between the houses of Lancaster and
York  1455 1485  

110  The close of the Hundred Years  War was followed in England by the
Wars of the Roses  between the rival houses which were struggling for
the crown  The badge of the house of Lancaster  to which Henry VI
belonged  was a red rose  and that of the duke of York  who proposed to
push him off his throne  was a white one  Each party was supported by a
group of the wealthy and powerful nobles whose rivalries  conspiracies 
treasons  murders  and executions fill the annals of England during the
period which we have been discussing  Vast estates had come into the
hands of the higher nobility by inheritance  and marriages with wealthy
heiresses  Many of the dukes and earls were related to the royal family
and consequently were inevitably drawn into the dynastic struggles 

 Sidenote  Retainers  

The nobles no longer owed their power to vassals who were bound to
follow them to war  Like the king  they relied upon hired soldiers  It
was easy to find plenty of restless fellows who were willing to become
the retainers of a nobleman if he would agree to clothe them with his
livery and keep open house  where they might eat and drink their fill 
Their master was to help them when they got into trouble  and they on
their part were expected to intimidate  misuse  and even murder at need
those who opposed the interests of their chief  When the French war was
over  the unruly elements of society poured back across the Channel and 
as retainers of the rival lords  became the terror of the country  They
bullied judges and juries  and helped the nobles to control the
selection of those who were sent to Parliament 

 Sidenote  Edward IV secures the crown  

It is needless to speak of the several battles and the many skirmishes
of the miserable Wars of the Roses  These lasted from 1455  when the
duke of York set seriously to work to displace the weak minded
Lancastrian king  Henry VI  until the accession of Henry VII  of the
house of Tudor  thirty years later  After several battles the Yorkist
leader  Edward IV  assumed the crown in 1461 and was recognized by
Parliament  which declared Henry VI and the two preceding Lancastrian
kings usurpers  191  Edward was a vigorous monarch and maintained his
own until his death in 1483 

 Sidenote  Edward V  1483  Richard III  1483 1485  

 Sidenote  Death of Richard in the battle of Bosworth Field  

 Sidenote  Accession of Henry VII of the house of Tudor  1485  

 Sidenote  End of the Wars of the Roses  

Edward s son  Edward V  was only a little boy  so that the government
fell into the hands of the young king s uncle  Richard  Duke of
Gloucester  The temptation to make himself king was too great to be
resisted  and Richard soon seized the crown  Both the sons of Edward IV
were killed in the Tower of London  and with the knowledge of their
uncle  as it was commonly believed  This murder made Richard unpopular
even at a time when one could kill one s political rivals without
incurring general opprobrium  A new aspirant to the throne organized a
conspiracy  Richard III was defeated and slain in the battle of Bosworth
Field in 1485  and the crown which had fallen from his head was placed
upon that of the first Tudor king  Henry VII  The latter had no
particular right to it  although he was descended from Edward III
through his mother  He hastened to procure the recognition of
Parliament  and married Edward IV s daughter  thus blending the red and
white roses in the Tudor badge  192 

 Illustration  FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XI 

 Sidenote  The despotism of the Tudors  

The Wars of the Roses had important results  Nearly all the powerful
families of England had been drawn into the fierce struggles  and a
great part of the nobility  whom the kings had formerly feared  had
perished on the battlefield or lost their heads in the ruthless
executions carried out by each party after it gained a victory  This
left the king far more powerful than ever before  He could now dominate
Parliament  if he could not dispense with it  For a century and more the
Tudor kings enjoyed almost despotic power  England ceased for a time to
enjoy the free government for which the foundations had been laid under
the Edwards and the Lancastrian kings  whose embarrassments at home and
abroad had made them constantly dependent upon the aid of the
nation  193 

 Sidenote  France establishes a standing army  1439  

111  In France the closing years of the Hundred Years  War had witnessed
a great increase of the king s power through the establishment of a
well organized standing army  The feudal army had long since
disappeared  Even before the opening of the war the nobles had begun to
be paid for their military services and no longer furnished troops as a
condition of holding fiefs  But the companies of soldiers  although
nominally under the command of royal officers  were often really
independent of the king  They found their pay very uncertain  and
plundered their countrymen as well as the enemy  As the war drew to a
close  the lawless troopers became a terrible scourge to the country and
were known as  flayers   on account of the horrible way in which they
tortured the peasants in the hope of extracting money from them  In 1439
the Estates General approved a plan devised by the king  for putting an
end to this evil  Thereafter no one was to raise a company without the
permission of the king  who was to name the captains and fix the number
of the soldiers and the character of their arms  194 

 Sidenote  The permanent tax fatal to the powers of the Estates
General  

The Estates agreed that the king should use a certain tax  called the
 taille   to support the troops necessary for the protection of the
frontier  This was a fatal concession  for the king now had an army and
the right to collect what he chose to consider a permanent tax  the
amount of which he later greatly increased  he was not dependent  as was
the English king  upon the grants made for brief periods by the
representatives of the nation 

 Sidenote  The new feudalism  

Before the king of France could hope to establish a compact 
well organized state it was necessary for him to reduce the power of his
vassals  some of whom were almost his equals in strength  The older
feudal dynasties  as we have seen  had many of them succumbed to the
attacks and the diplomacy of the kings of the thirteenth century 
especially of St  Louis  But he and his successors had raised up fresh
rivals by granting whole provinces  called  appanages   195  to their
younger sons  In this way new and powerful lines of feudal nobles were
established  such  for example  as the houses of Orleans  Anjou 
Bourbon  and  above all  of Burgundy  The accompanying map shows the
region immediately subject to the king  the royal domain  at the time of
the expulsion of the English  It clearly indicates what still remained
to be done in order to free France from feudalism and make it a great
nation  The process of reducing the prerogatives of the nobles had been
begun  They had been forbidden to coin money  to maintain armies  and to
tax their subjects  and the powers of the king s judges had been
extended over all the realm  But the task of consolidating France was
reserved for the son of Charles VII  the shrewd and treacherous Louis XI
 1461 1483  

 Sidenote  Extent of the Burgundian possessions in the fifteenth
century  

By far the most dangerous of Louis  vassals were Philip the Good  Duke
of Burgundy  1419 1467   and his impetuous son  Charles the Bold
 1467 1477   Just a century before Louis XI came to the throne  the old
line of Burgundian dukes had died out  and in 1363 the same King John
whom the English captured and carried off to England  presented Burgundy
to his younger son Philip  196  By fortunate marriages and lucky
windfalls the dukes of Burgundy had added a number of important fiefs to
their original possessions  and Philip the Good ruled over
Franche Comté  Luxembourg  Flanders  Artois  Brabant  and other
provinces and towns which lie in what is now Holland and Belgium 

 Illustration  Louis XI 

 Sidenote  Ambition of Charles the Bold  1467 1477  

Charles the Bold busied himself for some years before his father s death
in forming alliances with the other powerful French vassals and
conspiring against Louis  Upon becoming duke himself he set his heart
upon two things  He resolved  first  to conquer Lorraine  which divided
his territories into two parts and made it difficult to pass from
Franche Comté to Luxembourg  In the second place  he proposed to have
himself crowned king of the territories which his forefathers had
accumulated and in this way establish a strong new state between France
and Germany 

 Sidenote  Charles defeated by the Swiss at Granson and Murten  1476  

Naturally neither the king of France nor the emperor sympathized with
Charles  ambitions  Louis taxed his exceptional ingenuity in frustrating
his aspiring vassal  and the emperor refused to crown Charles as king
when he appeared at Trier eager for the ceremony  The most humiliating 
however  of the defeats which Charles encountered came from an
unexpected quarter  He attempted to chastise his neighbors the Swiss for
siding with his enemies and was soundly beaten by that brave people in
two memorable battles 

 Illustration  BRONZE STATUES OF PHILIP THE GOOD AND CHARLES THE BOLD
AT INNSBRUCK 

 Sidenote  Death of Charles  1477  

 Sidenote  Marriage of Mary of Burgundy to Maximilian of Austria  

The next year Charles fell ingloriously in an attempt to take the town
of Nancy  His lands went to his daughter Mary  who was immediately
married to the emperor s son  Maximilian  much to the disgust of Louis 
who had already seized the duchy of Burgundy and hoped to gain still
more  The great importance of this marriage  which resulted in bringing
the Netherlands into the hands of Austria  will be seen when we come to
consider Charles V  the grandson of Mary and Maximilian  and his vast
empire  197 

 Sidenote  Work of Louis XI  

Louis XI did far more for the French monarchy than check his chief
vassal and reclaim a part of the Burgundian territory  He had himself
made heir to a number of provinces in central and southern
France   Anjou  Maine  Provence  etc    which by the death of their
possessors came under the king s immediate control  1481   He humiliated
in various ways the vassals who in his early days had combined with
Charles the Bold against him  The duke of Alençon he imprisoned  the
rebellious duke of Nemours he caused to be executed in the most cruel
manner  Louis  political aims were worthy  but his means were generally
despicable  It sometimes seemed as if he gloried in being the most
rascally among rascals  the most treacherous among the traitors whom he
so artfully circumvented in the interests of the French monarchy  198 

 Sidenote  England and France establish strong national governments  

Both England and France emerged from the troubles and desolations of the
Hundred Years  War stronger than ever before  In both countries the
kings had overcome the menace of feudalism by destroying the power of
the great families  The royal government was becoming constantly more
powerful  Commerce and industry increased the national wealth and
supplied the monarchs with the revenue necessary to maintain government
officials and a sufficient armed force to execute the laws and keep
order throughout their realms  They were no longer forced to rely upon
the uncertain pledges of their vassals  In short  the French and the
English were both becoming nations  each with a strong national feeling
and a king whom every one  both high and low  recognized and obeyed as
the head of the government 

 Sidenote  Influence of the development of modern states upon the
position of the mediæval Church  

It is obvious that the strengthening of the royal power could hardly
fail to alter the position of the mediæval Church  This was  as we have
seen  not simply a religious institution but a sort of international
state which performed a number of important governmental duties  We
must  therefore  now turn back and review the history of the Church from
the time of Edward I and Philip the Fair to the opening of the sixteenth
century 


     General Reading   For the political history of this period  LODGE 
      Close of the Middle Ages   The Macmillan Company   1 75   is the
     best work  although rather dry and cumbered with names which might
     have been omitted  For the general history of France  see in
     addition to ADAMS   Growth of the French Nation   The Macmillan
     Company   1 25   DURUY   A History of France   T Y  Crowell 
      2 00   The economic history of England is to be found in the works
     mentioned at the end of Chapter XVIII  The following collections of
     documents furnish illustrative material in abundance  LEE 
      Source book of English History   Holt   2 00   COLBY   Selections
     from the Sources of English History    Longmans  Green   Co  
      1 50   ADAMS   STEPHENS   Select Documents of English
     Constitutional History   The Macmillan Company   2 25   KENDALL 
      Source Book of English History   The Macmillan Company  80 cents  




CHAPTER XXI

THE POPES AND THE COUNCILS


 Sidenote  The problem of the relation of church and state  

112  The influence which the Church and its head exercised over the
civil government in the Middle Ages was due largely to the absence of
strong  efficient rulers who could count upon the support of a large
body of prosperous and loyal subjects  So long as the feudal anarchy
continued  the Church endeavored to supply the deficiencies of the
restless and ignorant princes by striving to maintain order  administer
justice  protect the weak  and encourage learning  So soon  however  as
the modern state began to develop  difficulties arose  The clergy
naturally clung to the powers and privileges which they had long
enjoyed  and which they believed to be rightly theirs  On the other
hand  the state  so soon as it felt itself able to manage its own
affairs  protect its subjects  and provide for their worldly interests 
was less and less inclined to tolerate the interference of the clergy
and their head  the pope  Educated laymen were becoming more and more
common  and the king was no longer obliged to rely upon the assistance
of the clergy in conducting his government  It was natural that he
should look with disfavor upon their privileges  which put them upon a
different footing from the great mass of his subjects  and upon their
wealth  which he would deem excessive and dangerous to his power  This
situation raised the fundamental problem of the proper relation of
church and state  upon which Europe has been working ever since the
fourteenth century and has not completely solved yet 

 Sidenote  Edward I and Philip the Fair attempt to tax the clergy  

The difficulty which the Church experienced in maintaining its power
against the kings is excellently shown by the famous struggle between
Philip the Fair  the grandson of St  Louis  and Boniface VIII  an old
man of boundless ambition and inexhaustible energy who came to the papal
throne in 1294  The first serious trouble arose over the habit into
which the kings of England and France had fallen  of taxing the property
of the churchmen like that of other subjects  It was natural after a
monarch had squeezed all that he could out of the Jews and the towns 
and had exacted every possible feudal due  that he should turn to the
rich estates of the clergy  in spite of their claim that their property
was dedicated to God and owed the king nothing  The extensive
enterprises of Edward I led him in 1296 to demand one fifth of the
personal property of the clergy  Philip the Fair exacted one hundredth
and then one fiftieth of the possessions of clergy and laity alike 

 Sidenote  The bull  Clericis laicos  of Boniface VIII  1296  

Against this impartial system Boniface protested in the famous bull
 Clericis laicos   1296   He claimed that the laity had always been
exceedingly hostile to the clergy  and that the rulers were now
exhibiting this hostility by imposing heavy burdens upon the Church 
forgetting that they had no control over the clergy and their
possessions  The pope  therefore  forbade all churchmen  including the
monks  to pay  without his consent  to a king or ruler any part of the
Church s revenue or possessions upon any pretext whatsoever  He likewise
forbade the kings and princes under pain of excommunication to presume
to exact any such payments 

 Sidenote  Boniface concedes a limited right to tax churchmen  

It happened that just as the pope was prohibiting the clergy from
contributing to the taxes  Philip the Fair had forbidden the exportation
of all gold and silver from the country  In that way he cut off an
important source of the pope s revenue  for the church of France could
obviously no longer send anything to Rome  The pope was forced to give
up his extreme claims  He explained the following year that he had not
meant to interfere with the payment on the clergy s part of customary
feudal dues nor with their loans of money to the king  199 

 Sidenote  The jubilee of 1300  

In spite of this setback  the pope never seemed more completely the
recognized head of the western world than during the first great
jubilee  in the year 1300  when Boniface called together all Christendom
to celebrate the opening of the new century by a great religious
festival at Rome  It is reported that two millions of people  coming
from all parts of Europe  visited the churches of Rome  and that in
spite of widening the streets many were crushed in the crowd  So great
was the influx of money into the papal treasury that two assistants were
kept busy with rakes collecting the offerings which were deposited at
the tomb of St  Peter 

Boniface was  however  very soon to realize that even if Christendom
regarded Rome as its religious center  the nations would not accept him
as their political head  When he dispatched an obnoxious prelate to
Philip the Fair  ordering him to free the count of Flanders whom he was
holding prisoner  the king declared the harsh language of the papal
envoy to be high treason and sent one of his lawyers to the pope to
demand that the messenger be degraded and punished 

 Sidenote  The Estates General of 1302  

Philip was surrounded by a body of lawyers  and it would seem that they 
rather than the king  were the real rulers of France  They had  through
their study of Roman law  learned to admire the absolute power exercised
by the Roman emperor  To them the civil government was supreme  and they
urged the king to punish what they regarded as the insolent conduct of
the pope  Before taking any action against the head of the Church 
Philip called together the representatives of his people  including not
only the clergy and the nobility but the people of the towns as well 
The Estates General  after hearing a statement of the case from one of
Philip s lawyers  agreed to support their monarch 

 Sidenote  Nogaret insults Boniface VIII  

 Sidenote  Death of Boniface  1303  

Nogaret  one of the chief legal advisers of the king  undertook to face
the pope  He collected a little troop of soldiers in Italy and marched
against Boniface  who was sojourning at Anagni  where his predecessors
had excommunicated two emperors  Frederick Barbarossa and Frederick II 
As Boniface  in his turn  was preparing solemnly to proclaim the king of
France an outcast from the Church  Nogaret penetrated into the papal
palace with his soldiers and heaped insults upon the helpless but
defiant old man  The townspeople forced Nogaret to leave the next day 
but Boniface s spirit was broken and he soon died at Rome 

 Sidenote  Clement V  1305 1314  and his subservience to Philip the
Fair  

 Sidenote  The popes take up their residence at Avignon  

King Philip now proposed to have no more trouble with popes  He arranged
in 1305 to have the Archbishop of Bordeaux chosen head of the Church 
with the understanding that he should transfer the papacy to France  The
new pope accordingly summoned the cardinals to meet him at Lyons  where
he was crowned under the title of Clement V  He remained in France
during his whole pontificate  moving from one rich abbey to another  At
Philip s command he reluctantly undertook a sort of trial of the
deceased Boniface VIII  who was accused by the king s lawyers of all
sorts of abominable crimes  A great part of Boniface s decrees were
revoked  and those who had attacked him were exculpated  Then  to please
the king  Clement brought the Templars to trial  the order was abolished
and its possessions in France  for which the king had longed  were
confiscated  Obviously it proved very advantageous to the king to have a
pope within his realm  Clement V died in 1314  His successors took up
their residence in the town of Avignon  just outside the French frontier
of those days  There they built a sumptuous palace in which successive
popes lived in great splendor for sixty years 

 Sidenote  The Babylonian Captivity of the Church  

113  The prolonged exile of the popes from Rome  lasting from 1305 to
1377  is commonly called the Babylonian Captivity 200  of the Church  on
account of the woes attributed to it  The popes of this period were for
the most part good and earnest men  but they were all Frenchmen  and the
proximity of their court to France led to the natural suspicion that
they were controlled by the French kings  This  together with their
luxurious court  brought them into discredit with the other
nations  201 

 Sidenote  The papal taxation  

At Avignon the popes were naturally deprived of some of the revenue
which they had enjoyed from their Italian possessions when they lived at
Rome  This deficiency had to be made up by increased taxation 
especially as the expenses of the splendid papal court were very heavy 
The papacy was  consequently  rendered still more unpopular by the
methods employed to raise money  particularly by the granting of
benefices throughout Europe to the pope s courtiers  by the heavy
contributions which were demanded for dispensations  for the
confirmation of bishops  and for granting the pallium to archbishops  as
well as the high fees for the trial of law suits 

 Sidenote  Pope s control of church benefices  

Many of the church offices  such as those of the bishops and abbots 
insured a more than ample revenue to their holders  It was natural 
therefore  that the pope  in his endeavor to increase his income  should
have tried to bring as many of these appointments as he could into his
own hands  He did this by reserving to himself the filling of certain
benefices so soon as they should become vacant  He then chose some one
to whom he wished to do a favor and promised him the benefice upon the
death of the one then holding it  Men appointed in this way were called
 provisors  and were extremely unpopular  They were very often
foreigners  and it was suspected that they had obtained these positions
from the pope simply for the sake of the revenue  and had no intention
whatever of performing the duties connected with them 

 Sidenote  Statute of provisors  1352  

The papal exactions met with the greatest opposition in England because
the popes were thought to favor France  with which country the English
were at war  A law was passed by Parliament in 1352 ordering that all
who procured appointments from the pope should be outlawed  that any one
might injure such offenders at will  and that the injured should have no
redress  since they were enemies of the king and his realm  202  This
and similar laws failed  however  to prevent the pope from filling
English benefices to the advantage of himself and his courtiers  The
English king was unable to keep the money of his realm from flowing to
Avignon on one pretext or another  It was declared by the Good
Parliament  held in 1376  that the taxes levied by the pope in England
were five times those raised by the king 

 Sidenote  John Wycliffe  

The most famous and conspicuous critic of the pope and of the policy of
the Roman Church at this time was John Wycliffe  a teacher at Oxford  He
was born about 1320  but we know little of him before 1366  when Urban V
demanded that England should pay the tribute promised by King John when
he became the pope s vassal  203  Parliament declared that John had no
right to bind the people without their consent  and Wycliffe began his
career of opposition to the papacy by trying to prove that John s
compact was void  About ten years later we find the pope issuing bulls
against the teachings of Wycliffe  who had begun to assert that the
state might appropriate the property of the Church if it was misused 
and that the pope had no authority except as he acted according to the
Gospels  Soon Wycliffe went further and boldly attacked the papacy
itself  as well as indulgences  pilgrimages  and the worship of the
saints  finally he even denied the truth of the doctrine of
transubstantiation 

 Sidenote  Wycliffe s  simple priests   

He did not  however  confine his work to a denunciation of what he
considered wrong in the teaching and conduct of the churchmen  He
established an order of  simple priests  who were to go about doing good
and reprove by their example the worldly habits of the general run of
priests and monks 

 Sidenote  Wycliffe the father of English prose  

Wycliffe s anxiety to reach the people and foster a higher spiritual
life among them led him to have the Bible translated into English  He
also prepared a great number of sermons and tracts in English  He is the
father of English prose  and it has been well said that  the exquisite
pathos  the keen  delicate irony  and the manly passion of his short 
nervous sentences  fairly overmaster the weakness of the unformed
language and give us English which cannot be read without a feeling of
its beauty to this hour  

 Sidenote  Influence of Wycliffe s teaching  

Wycliffe and his  simple priests  were charged with fomenting the
discontent and disorder which culminated in the Peasants  War  Whether
this charge was true or not  it caused many of his more aristocratic
followers to fall away from him  But in spite of this and the
denunciations of the Church  Wycliffe was not seriously interfered with
and died peaceably in 1384  While his followers appear to have yielded
pretty readily to the persecution which soon overtook them  his
doctrines were spread abroad in Bohemia by another ardent reformer  John
Huss  who was destined to give the Church a great deal of trouble 
Wycliffe is remarkable as being the first distinguished scholar and
reformer to repudiate the headship of the pope and those practices of
the Church of Rome which a hundred and fifty years after his death were
attacked by Luther in his successful revolt against the mediæval
Church  204 

 Sidenote  The papal court moves back to Rome  1377  

114  In 1377 Pope Gregory XI moved back again to Rome after the popes
had been exiles for seventy years  during which much had happened to
undermine the papal power and supremacy  Yet the discredit into which
the papacy had fallen during its stay at Avignon was as nothing compared
with the disasters which befell it after the return to Rome 

 Sidenote  Election of Urban VI  1378  

Gregory died the year after his return and the cardinals assembled to
choose his successor  A great part of them were French  They had found
Rome in a sad state of ruin and disorder and heartily regretted the gay
life and the comforts and luxuries of Avignon  They determined therefore
to select a pope who would take them back to the banks of the Rhone 
While they were deliberating  the Roman populace was yelling outside the
conclave and demanding that a Roman be chosen  or at least an Italian  A
simple Italian monk was accordingly selected  Urban VI  who it was
supposed would agree to the wishes of the cardinals 

 Sidenote  Election of an anti pope  Clement VII  

The new pope  however  soon showed that he had no idea of returning to
Avignon  He treated the cardinals with harshness and proposed a stern
reformation of their habits  The cardinals speedily wearied of this
treatment  they retired to the neighboring Anagni and declared that they
had been frightened by the Roman mob into selecting the obnoxious Urban 
They then elected a new pope  who took the title of Clement VII 
returned to Avignon  and established his court there  Urban  although
deserted by his cardinals  had no intention of yielding and proceeded to
create twenty eight new cardinals 

 Sidenote  The Great Schism  

This double election was the beginning of the  Great Schism   which was
to last for forty years and expose the papacy to new attacks on every
side  There had been many anti popes in earlier centuries  set up
usually by the emperors  but there had ordinarily been little question
as to who was really the legitimate pope  In the present case Europe was
seriously in doubt  for it was difficult to decide whether the election
of Urban had really been forced and was consequently invalid as the
cardinals claimed  No one  therefore  could be perfectly sure which of
the rival popes was the real successor of St  Peter  There were now two
colleges of cardinals whose very existence depended upon the exercise of
their right of choosing the pope  It was natural that Italy should
support Urban VI  while France as naturally obeyed Clement VII  England 
hostile to France  accepted Urban  Scotland  hostile to England 
supported Clement 

 Sidenote  The Church divided within itself and the consequences  

Each of two men  with seemingly equal right  now claimed to be Christ s
vicar on earth  each proposed to enjoy to the full the vast prerogatives
of the head of Christendom  and each denounced  and attempted to depose 
the other  The schism in the headship of the Church naturally extended
to the bishoprics and abbeys  and everywhere there were rival prelates 
each of whom could claim that he had been duly confirmed by one pope or
the other  All this produced an unprecedented scandal in the Church  It
emphasized all the abuses among the clergy and gave free rein to those
who were inclined to denounce the many evils which had been pointed out
by Wycliffe and his followers  The condition was  in fact  intolerable
and gave rise to widespread discussion  not only of the means by which
the schism might be healed  but of the nature and justification of the
papacy itself  The discussion which arose during these forty years of
uncertainty did much to prepare the mind of western Europe for the
Protestant revolt in the sixteenth century 

 Sidenote  Idea of the supremacy of a general council  

The selfish and futile negotiations between the colleges of cardinals
and the popes justified the notion that there might perhaps be a power
in Christendom superior even to that of the pope  Might not a council 
representing all Christendom  and inspired by the Holy Ghost  judge even
a pope  Such councils had been held in the East during the later Roman
Empire  beginning with the first general or ecumenical council of Nicæa
under Constantine  They had established the teachings of the Church and
had legislated for all Christian people and clergy  205 

 Sidenote  Question whether the pope or a general council is the supreme
authority in the Church  

As early as 1381 the University of Paris advocated the summoning of a
general council which should adjust the claims of the rival popes and
give Christendom once more a single head  This raised the question
whether a council was really superior to the pope or not  Those who
believed that it was  maintained that the Church at large had deputed
the election of the pope to the cardinals and that it might  therefore 
interfere when the cardinals had brought the papacy into disrepute  that
a general assembly of all Christendom  speaking under the inspiration of
the Holy Spirit  was a higher authority than even the successor of St 
Peter  Others strenuously denied this  They claimed that the pope
received his authority over the Church immediately from Christ  and that
he had always possessed supreme power from the very first  although he
had not always exercised it and had permitted the earlier councils a
certain freedom  No council  they urged  could be considered a general
one which was called against the will of the pope  because  without the
bishop of the Roman or mother church  the council obviously could not
lay claim to represent all Christendom  The defenders of the papal power
maintained  moreover  that the pope was the supreme legislator  that he
might change or annul the act of any council or of a previous pope  that
he might judge others but might not himself be judged by any one  206 

 Sidenote  The Council of Pisa  1409 adds a third rival pope  

After years of discussion and fruitless negotiations between the rival
popes and their cardinals  members of both of the colleges decided in
1409 to summon a council at Pisa  which should put an end to the schism 
While large numbers of churchmen answered the summons and the various
monarchs took an active interest in the council  its action was hasty
and ill advised  Gregory XII  the Roman pope  elected in 1406  and
Benedict XIII  the Avignon pope  elected in 1394  were solemnly summoned
from the doors of the cathedral at Pisa  As they failed to appear they
were condemned for contumacy and deposed  A new pope was then elected 
and on his death a year later  he was succeeded by the notorious John
XXIII  who had been a soldier of fortune in his earlier days  John was
selected on account of his supposed military prowess  This was
considered essential in order to guard the papal territory against the
king of Naples  who had announced his intention of getting possession of
Rome  Neither of the deposed popes yielded  and as they each continued
to enjoy a certain support  the Council of Pisa  instead of healing the
schism  added a third person who claimed to be the supreme ruler of
Christendom  207 

 Sidenote  The Council of Constance meets  1414  

115  The failure of the Council of Pisa made it necessary to summon
another congress of Christendom  Through the influence of the emperor
Sigismund  John XXIII reluctantly agreed that the council should be held
in Germany  in the imperial town of Constance  The Council of Constance 
which began to assemble in the fall of 1414  is one of the most
noteworthy international assemblies ever held  It lasted for over three
years and excited the deepest interest throughout Europe  There were in
attendance  besides the pope and the emperor elect  twenty three
cardinals  thirty three archbishops and bishops  one hundred and fifty
abbots  and one hundred dukes and earls  as well as hundreds of lesser
persons 

 Sidenote  The three great objects of the Council of Constance  

Three great tasks confronted the council   1  the healing of the schism 
which involved the disposal of the three existing popes and the
selection of a single universally acknowledged head of the Church   2 
the extirpation of heresy  which  under the influence of Huss  was
threatening the authority of the Church in Bohemia   3  a general
reformation of the Church  in head and members  

 Sidenote  The healing of the schism  

 Sidenote  The decree  Sacrosancta   1415  

1  The healing of the long schism was the most important of the
council s achievements  John XXIII was very uncomfortable in Constance 
He feared not only that he would be forced to resign but that there
might be an investigation of his very dubious past  In March he fled in
disguise from Constance  leaving his cardinals behind him  The council
was dismayed at the pope s departure  as it feared that he would
dissolve it as soon as he was out of its control  It thereupon issued a
famous decree  April 6  1415  declaring its superiority to the pope  It
claimed that a general council had its power immediately from Christ 
Every one  even the pope  who should refuse to obey its decrees or
instructions should be suitably punished 

A long list of terrible crimes of which John was suspected  was drawn up
and he was formally deposed  He received but little encouragement in
his opposition to the council and soon surrendered unconditionally 
Gregory XII  the Roman pope  showed himself amenable to reason and
relieved the perplexity of the council by resigning in July  The third
pope  the obstinate Benedict XIII  flatly refused to resign  But the
council induced the Spaniards  who were his only remaining supporters 
to desert him and send envoys to Constance  Benedict was then deposed
 July  1417  and in the following November the cardinals who were at the
council were permitted to elect a new pope  Martin V  and so the Great
Schism was brought to an end 

 Sidenote  John Huss  

2  During the first year of its sessions the Council of Constance was
attempting to stamp out heresy as well as to heal the schism  The
marriage of an English king  Richard II  to a Bohemian princess shortly
before Wycliffe s death  had encouraged some intercourse between Bohemia
and England and had brought the works of the English reformer to the
attention of those in Bohemia who were intent upon the improvement of
the Church  Among these the most conspicuous was John Huss  b  about
1369   whose ardent devotion to the interests of the Bohemian nation and
enthusiasm for reform secured for him great influence in the University
of Prague  with which he was connected 

Huss reached the conclusion that Christians should not be forced to obey
those who were living in mortal sin and were apparently destined never
to reach heaven themselves  This view was naturally denounced by the
Church as a most dangerous error  destructive of all order and
authority  As his opponents urged  the regularly appointed authorities
must be obeyed  not because they are good men but because they govern in
virtue of the law  In short  Huss appeared not only to defend the
heresies of Wycliffe  but at the same time to preach a doctrine
dangerous alike to the power of the civil government and of the Church 

 Sidenote  The  safe conduct   

Huss felt confident that he could convince the council of the truth of
his views and willingly appeared at Constance  He was provided with a
 safe conduct   a document in which Emperor Sigismund ordered that no
one should do him any violence and which permitted the bearer to leave
Constance whenever he wished  In spite of this he was speedily arrested
and imprisoned  in December  1414  His treatment well illustrates the
mediæval attitude towards heresy  When Sigismund indignantly protested
against the violation of his safe conduct  he was informed that the law
did not recognize faith pledged to suspected heretics  for they were out
of the king s jurisdiction  The council declared that no pledge which
was prejudicial to the Catholic faith was to be observed  In judging
Sigismund s failure to enforce his promise of protection to Huss it must
be remembered that heresy was at that time considered a far more
terrible crime than murder  and that it was the opinion of the most
authoritative body in Christendom that Sigismund would do a great wrong
if he prevented the trial of Huss 

 Sidenote  Trial of Huss  

Huss was treated in what would seem to us a very harsh way  but from the
standpoint of the council he was given every advantage  By special favor
he was granted a public hearing  The council was anxious that Huss
should retract  but no form of retraction could be arranged to which he
would agree  The council  in accordance with the usages of the time 
demanded that he should recognize the error of all the propositions
which they had selected from his writings  that he should retract them
and never again preach them  and that he should agree to preach the
contrary  The council did not consider it its business to decide whether
Huss was right or wrong  but simply whether his doctrines  which they
gathered from his books  were in accordance with the traditional views
of the Church 

 Sidenote  Conviction and execution of Huss  July  1415  

Finally  the council condemned Huss as a convicted and impenitent
heretic  On July 6  1415  he was taken out before the gates of the city
and given one more chance to retract  As he refused  he was degraded
from the priesthood and handed over to the civil government to be
executed for heresy  which  as we have seen  the state regarded as a
crime and undertook to punish  208  The civil authorities made no
further investigation but accepted the verdict of the council and burned
Huss upon the spot  His ashes were thrown into the Rhine lest they
should become an object of veneration among his followers 

 Sidenote  The Hussite wars  1419 1431  

The death of Huss rather promoted than checked the spread of heresy in
Bohemia  A few years later the Germans undertook a series of crusades
against the Bohemians  This embittered the national animosity between
the two races  which has even yet by no means died out  The heretics
proved valiant fighters and after several bloody wars succeeded in
repulsing the enemy and even invaded Germany 

 Sidenote  Opportunity of the council to reform the church  

3  The third great task of the Council of Constance was the general
reformation of the Church  After John s flight it had claimed the right
 in the decree  Sacrosancta   to reform even the papacy  This was a
splendid opportunity at least to mitigate the abuses in the Church  The
council was a great representative body  and every one was looking to it
to remedy the old evils which had become more pronounced than ever
during the Great Schism  Many pamphlets were published at the time by
earnest men denouncing the corrupt practices of the clergy  The evils
were of long standing and have all been described in earlier
chapters  209 

 Sidenote  The failure of the council to effect any definite reforms  

Although every one recognized the abuses  the council found itself
unable to remedy them or to accomplish the hoped for reformation  After
three years of fruitless deliberations the members of the assembly
became weary and hopeless  They finally contented themselves with
passing a decree  Oct  9  1417  declaring that the neglect to summon
general councils in the past had fostered all the evils in the Church
and that thereafter councils should be regularly summoned at least every
ten years  210  In this way it was hoped that the absolute power of the
popes might be checked in somewhat the same way that the Parliament in
England and the Estates General in France controlled the monarch 

 Sidenote  Abuses enumerated by the council  

After the passing of this decree the council drew up a list of abuses
demanding reform  which the new pope was to consider with certain of its
members after the main body of the council had returned home  Chief
among the questions which the council enumerated for consideration were
the number  character  and nationality of the cardinals  the benefices
to which the pope had a right to appoint  what cases might be brought
before his court  for what reason and in what manner the pope might be
corrected or deposed  how heresy might be extirpated  and the matter of
dispensations  indulgences  etc 

Aside from the healing of the schism  the results of the Council of
Constance were slight  It had burned Huss but had by no means checked
heresy  It had considered for three years the reformation of the Church
but had at last confessed its inability to carry it out  The pope later
issued a few reform decrees  but the state of the Church was not
materially bettered 

 Sidenote  Council of Basel  1431 1449  

116  The sturdy resistance of the Bohemians to those who proposed to
bring them back to the orthodox faith by arms finally attracted the
attention of Europe and called forth considerable sympathy  In 1431 the
last of the crusades against them came to an ignominious end  and Martin
V was forced to summon a new council in order to consider the policy
which should be adopted toward the heretics  The Council of Basel lasted
for no less than eighteen years  At first its prestige was sufficient to
enable it to dominate the pope  and it reached its greatest authority
in 1434 after it had arranged a peace with the moderate party of the
Bohemian heretics  The council  however  continued its hostility towards
Pope Eugene IV  elected in 1431   and in 1437 he declared the council
dissolved and summoned a new one to meet at Ferrara  The Council of
Basel thereupon deposed Eugene and chose an anti pope  This conduct did
much to discredit the idea of a general council in the eyes of Europe 
The assembly gradually dwindled away and finally in 1449 acknowledged
the legitimate pope once more 

 Sidenote  Council of Ferrara Florence  1438 1439  

 Sidenote  Union of Eastern and Western Churches  

Meanwhile the Council of Ferrara 211  had taken up the momentous
question of consolidating the Eastern and Western Churches  The empire
of the East was seriously threatened by the on coming Ottoman Turks  who
had made conquests even west of Constantinople  The Eastern emperor s
advisers urged that if a reconciliation could be arranged with the
Western Church  the pope might use his influence to supply arms and
soldiers to be used against the Mohammedans  When the representatives of
the Eastern Church met with the Council of Ferrara the differences in
doctrine were found to be few  but the question of the headship of the
Church was a most difficult one  A form of union was  nevertheless 
agreed upon in which the Eastern Church accepted the headship of the
pope   saving the privileges and rights of the patriarchs of the East  

 Sidenote  Results of the Council of Ferrara  

While Eugene received the credit for healing the breach between the East
and the West  the Greek prelates  upon returning home  were hailed with
indignation and branded as robbers and matricides for the concessions
which they had made  The chief results of the council were  1  the
advantage gained by the pope in once more becoming the recognized head
of Christendom in spite of the opposition of the Council of Basel  and
 2  the fact that certain learned Greeks remained in Italy  and helped
to stimulate the growing enthusiasm for Greek literature 

No more councils were held during the fifteenth century  and the popes
were left to the task of reorganizing their dominions in Italy  They
began to turn their attention very largely to their interests as Italian
princes  and some of them  beginning with Nicholas V  1447 1455   became
the patrons of artists and men of letters  There is probably no period
in the history of the papacy when the head of the Church was more
completely absorbed in forwarding his political interests and those of
his relatives  and in decorating his capital  than in the seventy years
which elapsed between 1450 and the beginning of the German revolt
against the Church 


     General Reading   CREIGHTON   History of the Papacy   Longmans 
     Green   Co   6 vols    2 00 each   Vol  I  is perhaps the best
     treatment of the Great Schism and the Council of Constance  PASTOR 
      History of the Popes   Herder  6 vols    18 00   Vol  I  Book 1 
     gives the most recent and scholarly account from the standpoint of
     a Roman Catholic 




CHAPTER XXII

THE ITALIAN CITIES AND THE RENAISSANCE


 Sidenote  Italy the center of European culture in the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries  

117  While England and France were settling their differences in the
wretched period of the Hundred Years  War  and the little German
principalities  left without a leader  212  were busied with their petty
concerns  Italy was the center of European culture  Its
cities   Florence  Venice  Milan  and the rest   reached a degree of
prosperity and refinement undreamed of beyond the Alps  Within their
walls learning and art made such extraordinary progress that this period
has received a special name   the  Renaissance   213  or new birth  The
Italian towns  like those of ancient Greece  were really little states 
each with its own peculiar life and institutions  Of these city states a
word must be said before considering the new enthusiasm for the works of
the Romans and Greeks and the increasing skill which the Italian artists
displayed in painting  sculpture  and architecture 

 Sidenote  Map of Italy in the fourteenth century  

The map of Italy at the beginning of the fourteenth century was still
divided into three zones  as it had been in the time of the
Hohenstaufens  To the south lay the kingdom of Naples  Then came the
states of the Church  extending diagonally across the peninsula  To the
north and west lay the group of city states to which we now turn our
attention 

 Sidenote  Venice and its relations with the East  

Of these none was more celebrated than Venice  which in the history of
Europe ranks in importance with Paris and London  This singular town was
built upon a group of sandy islets lying in the Adriatic Sea about two
miles from the mainland  It was protected from the waves by a long 
narrow sand bar  similar to those which fringe the Atlantic coast from
New Jersey southward  Such a situation would not ordinarily have been
deliberately chosen as the site of a great city  but its very desolation
and inaccessibility had recommended it to its first settlers  who  in
the middle of the fifth century  had fled from their homes on the
mainland to escape the savage Huns  214  As time went on the location
proved to have its advantages commercially  and even before the Crusades
Venice had begun to engage in foreign trade  Its enterprises carried it
eastward  and it early acquired possessions across the Adriatic and in
the Orient  215  The influence of this intercourse with the East is
plainly shown in the celebrated church of St  Mark  whose domes and
decorations suggest Constantinople rather than Italy 

 Illustration  A Scene in Venice 

 Illustration  St Mark s  Venice 

 Sidenote  Venice extends her sway on the Italian mainland  

 Sidenote  The aristocratic government of Venice  

It was not until early in the fifteenth century that Venice found it to
her interest to extend her sway upon the Italian mainland  She doubtless
believed it dangerous to permit her rival  Milan  to get possession of
the Alpine passes through which her goods found their way north  It may
be  too  that she preferred to draw her food supplies from the
neighborhood instead of transporting them across the Adriatic from her
eastern possessions  Moreover  all the Italian cities except Venice
already controlled a larger or smaller area of country about them 
Although Venice was called a republic  there was a strong tendency
toward a government of the few  About the year 1300 all the townsmen
except the members of certain noble families were excluded from the
Grand Council  which was supposed to represent the people at large 

In 1311 the famous Council of Ten was created  whose members were
elected by the Grand Council for one year  The whole government 
domestic and foreign  was placed in the hands of this smaller council 
in conjunction with the doge  i e   duke   the nominal head of the
republic  but they were both held strictly accountable to the Grand
Council for all that they did  The government was thus concentrated in
the hands of a very few  Its proceedings were carried on with great
secrecy  so that public discussion  such as prevailed in Florence and
led to innumerable revolutions there  was unheard of in Venice  The
Venetian merchant was a busy person who was quite willing that the state
should exercise its functions without his interference  In spite of the
aristocratic measures of the council  there was little tendency to
rebellion  so common in the other Italian towns  The republic of Venice
maintained pretty much the same form of government from 1300 until its
destruction by Napoleon in 1797 

 Sidenote  Milan and the despotically governed towns of northern Italy  

118  Milan was the most conspicuous example of the large class of
Italian cities which were governed by an absolute and despotic ruler 
who secured control of a town either by force or guile  and then managed
its affairs for his own personal advantage  At the opening of the
fourteenth century a great part of the towns which had leagued
themselves against Frederick Barbarossa 216  had become little
despotisms  Their rulers were constantly fighting among themselves 
conquering  or being conquered by  their neighbors  The practices of the
Visconti  the family who seized the government of Milan  offer a fair
example of the policy of the Italian tyrants 

The power of the Visconti was first established by the archbishop of
Milan  He imprisoned  1277  in three iron cages the leading members of
the family who were in control of the city government at the moment  and
had his nephew  Matteo Visconti  appointed by the emperor as the
imperial representative  Before long Matteo was generally recognized as
the ruler of Milan  and was followed by his son  For over a century and
a half some one of the family always showed himself skillful enough to
hold his precarious position 

 Illustration  Tomb of Gian Galeazzo Visconti 

 Sidenote  Gian Galeazzo Visconti  1385 1402  

The most distinguished of the Visconti despots was Gian Galeazzo  He
began his reign by capturing and poisoning his uncle  who was ruling
over a portion of the already extensive territory of the Visconti  217 
It seemed for a time that he might conquer all of northern Italy  but
his progress was checked by the republic of Florence and then cut short
by premature death  Gian Galeazzo exhibited all the characteristic
traits of the Italian despots  He showed himself a skillful and
successful ruler  able to organize his government admirably  He gathered
literary men about him  and the beautiful buildings which were begun by
him indicate his enthusiasm for art  Yet he was utterly unprincipled 
and resorted to the most hideous methods in order to gain possession of
coveted towns which he could not conquer or buy outright 

 Sidenote  Position and character of the Italian despots  

There are many stories of the incredible ferocity exhibited by the
Italian despots  218  It must be remembered that they were very rarely
legitimate rulers  but usurpers  who could only hope to retain their
power so long as they could keep their subjects in check and defend
themselves against equally illegitimate usurpers in the neighboring
cities  This situation developed a high degree of sagacity  and many of
the despots found it to their interest to govern well and even to give
dignity to their rule by patronizing artists and men of letters  But the
despot usually made many bitter enemies and was almost necessarily
suspicious of treason on the part of those about him  He was ever
conscious that at any moment he might fall a victim to the dagger or the
poison cup 

 Sidenote  The  condottieri   

The Italian towns carried on their wars among themselves largely by
means of hired troops  When a military expedition was proposed  a
bargain was made with one of the leaders   condottieri    who provided
the necessary force  As the soldiers had no more interest in the
conflict than did those whom they opposed  who were likewise hired for
the occasion  the fight was not usually very bloody  for the object of
each side was to capture the other without unnecessarily rough
treatment 

It sometimes happened that the leader who had conquered a town for his
employer appropriated the fruits of the victory for himself  This
occurred in the case of Milan in 1450  The Visconti family having died
out  the citizens hired a certain captain  named Francesco Sforza  to
assist them in a war against Venice  whose possessions now extended
almost to those of Milan  When Sforza had repelled the Venetians  the
Milanese found it impossible to get rid of him  and he and his
successors became rulers over the town 

 Sidenote  Machiavelli s  Prince   

An excellent notion of the position and policy of the Italian despots
may be derived from a little treatise called  The Prince   written by
the distinguished Florentine historian  Machiavelli  The writer appears
to have intended his book as a practical manual for the despots of his
time  It is a cold blooded discussion of the ways in which a usurper may
best retain his control over a town after he has once got possession of
it  The author even takes up the questions as to how far princes should
consider their promises when it is inconvenient to keep them  and how
many of the inhabitants the despot may wisely kill  Machiavelli
concludes that the Italian princes who have not observed their
engagements over scrupulously  and who have boldly put their political
adversaries out of the way  have fared better than their more
conscientious rivals 

 Sidenote  Florence  

119  The history of Florence  perhaps the most important of the Italian
cities  differs in many ways from that of Venice and of the despotisms
of which Milan is an example  In Florence all classes claimed the right
to interest themselves in the government  This led to constant changes
in the constitution and to frequent struggles between the different
political parties  When one party got the upper hand it generally
expelled its chief opponents from the city  Exile was a terrible
punishment to a Florentine  for Florence was not merely his native
city   it was his  country   and loved and honored as such 

 Sidenote  The Medici  

 Sidenote  Lorenzo the Magnificent  

By the middle of the fifteenth century Florence had come under the
control of the great family of the Medici  whose members played the
rôle of very enlightened political bosses  By quietly watching the
elections and secretly controlling the selection of city officials  they
governed without letting it be suspected that the people had lost their
power  The most distinguished member of the house of Medici was Lorenzo
the Magnificent  d  1492   under his rule Florence reached the height of
its glory in art and literature 

 Illustration  The Palace of the Medici in Florence 

 Sidenote  Character of Florentine culture  

As one wanders about Florence to day  he is impressed with the
contradictions of the Renaissance period  The streets are lined with the
palaces of the noble families to whose rivalries much of the continual
disturbance was due  The lower stories of these buildings are
constructed of great stones  like fortresses  and their windows are
barred like those of a prison  yet within they were often furnished with
the greatest taste and luxury  For in spite of the disorder  against
which the rich protected themselves by making their houses half
strongholds  the beautiful churches  noble public buildings  and works
of art which now fill the museums indicate that mankind has never 
perhaps  reached a higher degree of perfection in the arts of peace than
amidst the turmoil of this restless town 

 Florence was essentially the city of intelligence in modern times 
Other nations have surpassed the Italians in their genius     But
nowhere else except at Athens has the whole population of a city been so
permeated with ideas  so highly intellectual by nature  so keen in
perception  so witty and so subtle  as at Florence  The fine and
delicate spirit of the Italians existed in quintessence among the
Florentines  And of this superiority not only they  but the inhabitants
also of Rome and Lombardy and Naples were conscious     The primacy of
the Florentines in literature  the fine arts  law  scholarship 
philosophy  and science was acknowledged throughout Italy   Symonds  

 Sidenote  The Renaissance  or  new birth   

120  The thirteenth century had been  as we have seen  a period of great
enthusiasm for learning  The new universities attracted students from
all parts of Europe  and famous thinkers like Albertus Magnus  Thomas
Aquinas  and Roger Bacon wrote great treatises on religion  science  and
philosophy  The public delighted in the songs and romances composed and
recited in the language of the people  The builders contrived a new and
beautiful style of architecture  and  with the aid of the sculptors 
produced buildings which have never since been surpassed and rarely
equaled  Why  then  are the two succeeding centuries called the period
of the  new birth    the Renaissance   as if there was a sudden
reawakening after a long sleep  as if Europe first began in the
fourteenth century to turn to books and art 

The word  renaissance  was originally used by writers who had very
little appreciation of the achievements of the thirteenth century  They
imagined that there could have been no high degree of culture during a
period when the Latin and Greek classics  which seemed so all important
to them  were not carefully studied  But it is now coming to be
generally recognized that the thirteenth century had worthy intellectual
and artistic ambitions  although they were different both from those of
Greece and Rome and from our own 

We cannot  therefore  conceive the  new birth  of the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries quite as it was viewed by writers of a century ago 
who failed to do justice to the preceding period  Nevertheless  about
the middle of the fourteenth century  a very great and fundamental
change did begin in thought and taste  in books  buildings  and
pictures  and this change we may very well continue to call the
 Renaissance   We can best judge of its nature by considering the work
of the two greatest men of the fourteenth century  Dante and Petrarch 

 Sidenote  Dante  1264 1321  

Dante was first and foremost a poet  and is often ranked with Homer 
Virgil  and Shakespeare  He is  however  interesting to the historian
for other things than his flights of fancy and the music of his verse 
He had mastered all the learning of his day  he was a scientist and a
scholar as well as a poet  His writings show us how the world appeared
about the year 1300 to a very acute mind  and what was the range of
knowledge available to the most thoughtful men of that day 

 Sidenote  Dante s use of Italian  

Dante was not a churchman  as were all the scholars whom we have
hitherto considered  He was the first literary layman of renown since
Boethius  219  and he was interested in helping other laymen who knew
only their mother tongue to the knowledge heretofore open only to those
who could read Latin  In spite of his ability to write Latin  he chose
the mother tongue for his great poem   The Divine Comedy   Italian was
the last of the important modern languages to develop  perhaps because
in Italy Latin remained longest intelligible to the mass of the people 
But Dante believed that the exclusive use of Latin for literary
purposes had already in his time become an affectation  He was confident
that there were many people  both men and women  who knew only Italian 
who would gladly read not only his verses but his treatise on
science    The Banquet   220  as he poetically calls it 

 Sidenote  Extent of Dante s knowledge  

Dante s writings indicate that mediæval scholars were by no means so
ignorant of the universe as they are popularly supposed to have been 
Although they believed  like the ancients  that the earth was the center
around which the sun and stars revolved  they were familiar with some
important astronomical phenomena  They knew that the earth was a sphere
and guessed very nearly its real size  They knew that everything that
had weight was attracted towards its center  and that there would be no
danger of falling off should one get on the opposite side of the globe 
they realized also that when it was day on one side of the earth it was
night on the other 

 Sidenote  Dante s veneration for the ancient writers  

While Dante shows a keen interest in the theological studies so popular
in his time and still speaks of Aristotle as  the Philosopher   he
exhibits a profound admiration for the other great authors of Rome and
Greece  When in a vision he visits the lower world  Virgil is his guide 
He is permitted to behold the region inhabited by the spirits of
virtuous pagans  and there he finds Horace and Ovid  and Homer  the
sovereign poet  As he reclines upon the green turf he sees a goodly
company of ancient worthies   Socrates  Plato  and other Greek
philosophers  Cæsar  Cicero  Livy  Seneca  and many others  He is so
overcome by the honor of sitting among such great men that he finds no
words to report what passed between them  He feels no horror for their
paganism  and while he believes that they are not admitted to the
beatific joys of heaven  he assigns them a comfortable abode  where they
hold dignified converse with  faces neither sad nor glad   221 

 Sidenote  Petrarch  1304 1374  

121  The veneration for the ancient writers felt by Dante becomes a
burning enthusiasm with Petrarch  who has been well called  the first
modern man   He was the first scholar and man of letters to desert
entirely the mediæval learning and lead his contemporaries back to a
realization of the beauty and value of Greek and Roman literature  In
the mediæval universities  logic  theology  and the interpretation of
Aristotle were the chief subjects of study  While scholars in the
twelfth and thirteenth centuries possessed and read most of the Latin
writers who have come down to us  they failed to appreciate their beauty
and would never have dreamed of making them the basis of a liberal
education  222 

 Illustration  Petrarch 

Petrarch declares that when a boy he delighted in the sonorous language
of Cicero even before he could understand its meaning  As the years went
on he became convinced that he could have no higher aim in life than
that of collecting copies of all the Latin classics upon which he could
lay hands  He was not only an indefatigable scholar himself  but he
possessed the power of stimulating  by his example  the intellectual
ambition of those with whom he came in contact  He rendered the study of
the Latin classics popular among cultivated persons  and by his own
untiring efforts to discover the lost or forgotten works of the great
writers of antiquity he roused a new enthusiasm for the formation of
libraries  223 

 Sidenote  Obstacles to the study of the classics  

It is hard for us to imagine the obstacles which confronted Petrarch and
the scholars of the early Renaissance  They possessed no good editions
of the Roman and Greek authors  in which the correct wording had been
determined by a careful comparison of all the known ancient copies  They
considered themselves fortunate to secure a single manuscript of even
the best known authors  and they could have no assurance that it was not
full of mistakes  Indeed  the texts were so corrupted by the
carelessness of the copyists that Petrarch declares that if Cicero or
Livy should return and stumblingly read his own writings  he would
promptly pronounce them the work of another  perhaps a barbarian 

 Sidenote  Petrarch s European reputation and influence  

Petrarch enjoyed an unrivaled influence throughout western Europe  akin
to that of Erasmus and Voltaire in later times  He was in constant
communication with scholars  not only in Italy  but in the countries
beyond the Alps  From his numerous letters which have been preserved  a
great deal may be learned of the intellectual life of the time  224 

 Sidenote  Petrarch has no sympathy with the popular studies of his
time  

It is clear that he not only promoted the new study of the Roman
writers  but that he also did much to discredit the learning which was
popular in the universities  He refused to include the works of the
great scholastic writers of the thirteenth century in his library  Like
Roger Bacon he was disgusted by the reverence in which the bad
translations of Aristotle were held  As for the popular study of logic 
Petrarch declared that it was good enough for boys  but that nothing
irritated him more than to find a person of mature years devoting
himself to the subject 

 Sidenote  Contrast between Petrarch s and Dante s attitude toward their
mother tongue  

While Petrarch is far better known for his beautiful Italian verses than
for his long Latin poems  histories  and essays  he did not share
Dante s confidence in the dignity of their mother tongue  He even
depreciates his Italian sonnets as mere popular trifles written in his
youth  It was not unnatural that he and those in whom he aroused an
enthusiasm for Latin literature should look scornfully upon Italian  It
seemed to them a crude form of speech  good enough perhaps for the
common people and for the transaction of the daily business of life  but
immeasurably inferior to the language in which their predecessors  the
Roman poets and prose writers  had written  The Italians  it must be
remembered  felt the same pride in Latin literature that we feel in the
works of Chaucer and Shakespeare  The Italian scholars of the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries merely turned back to their own earlier national
literature for their models  and tried their best to imitate the
language and style of its masters 

 Sidenote  The humanists  

122  Those who devoted themselves to the study and imitation first of
Roman  and later of Greek literature  are commonly called  humanists   a
name derived from the Latin word  humanitas   that is  culture 
especially in the sense of literary appreciation  They no longer paid
much attention to Peter Lombard s  Sentences   They had  indeed  little
taste for theology  but looked to Cicero for all those accomplishments
which go to the making of a man of refinement 

 Sidenote  Reason for the enthusiastic study of the classics  

The  humanities   as Greek and Latin are still called  became almost a
new religion among the Italian scholars during the century following
Petrarch s death  In order to understand their exclusive attention to
ancient literature we must remember that they did not have a great many
of the books that we prize most highly nowadays  Now  every nation of
Europe has an extensive literature in its own particular tongue  which
all can read  Besides admirable translations of all the works of
antiquity  there are innumerable masterpieces  like those of
Shakespeare  Voltaire  and Goethe  which were unheard of four centuries
ago  Consequently we can now acquaint ourselves with a great part of the
best that has been written in all ages without knowing either Latin or
Greek  The Middle Ages enjoyed no such advantage  So when men began to
tire of theology  logic  and Aristotle s scientific treatises  they
naturally turned back with single hearted enthusiasm to the age of
Augustus  and  later  to that of Pericles  for their models of literary
style and for their ideals of life and conduct 

 Sidenote  Pagan tendencies of the Italian humanists  

A sympathetic study of the pagan authors led many of the humanists to
reject the mediæval view of the relation of this life to the next  225 
They reverted to the teachings of Horace and ridiculed the
self sacrifice of the monk  They declared that it was right to make the
most of life s pleasures and needless to worry about the world to come 
In some cases the humanists openly attacked the teachings of the Church 
but generally they remained outwardly loyal to it and many of them even
found positions among the officers of the papal curia 

 Sidenote  The classics become the basis of a liberal education  

Humanism produced a revolution in the idea of a liberal education  In
the sixteenth century  through the influence of those who visited Italy 
the schools of Germany  England  and France began to make Latin and
Greek literature  rather than logic and other mediæval subjects  the
basis of their college course  It is only within the last generation
that Latin and Greek have begun to be replaced in our colleges by a
variety of scientific and historical studies  and many would still
maintain  with the humanists of the fifteenth century  that Latin and
Greek are better worth studying than any other subjects 

 Sidenote  Ignorance of Greek in the Middle Ages  

The humanists of the fourteenth century ordinarily knew no Greek  Some
knowledge of that language lingered in the West all through the Middle
Ages  but we hear of no one attempting to read Plato  Demosthenes 
Æschylus  or even Homer  and these authors were scarcely ever found in
the libraries  Petrarch and his followers were naturally much interested
in the constant references to Greek literature which occur in Cicero and
Horace  both of whom freely recognized their debt to Athens  Shortly
after Petrarch s death the city of Florence called to its university a
professor of Greek  Chrysoloras from Constantinople 

 Sidenote  Revival of Greek studies in Italy  

 Sidenote  Chrysoloras in Florence  

A young Florentine law student  Leonardo Bruni  tells us of a dialogue
which he had with himself when he heard of the coming of Chrysoloras 
 Art thou not neglecting thy best interests if thou failest now to get
an insight into Homer  Plato  Demosthenes  and the other great poets 
philosophers  and orators of whom they are telling such wonderful
things  Thou  too  mightest commune with them and imbue thyself with
their wisdom  Wouldst thou let the golden opportunity slip  For seven
hundred years no one in Italy has known Greek literature  and yet we
agree that all language comes from the Greeks  How greatly would
familiarity with that language advantage thee in promoting thy knowledge
and in the mere increase of thy pleasure  There are teachers of Roman
law to be found everywhere  and thou wilt never want an opportunity to
continue that study  but there is but one teacher of Greek  and if he
escapes thee there will be no one from whom thou canst learn  

 Sidenote  The knowledge of Greek becomes common in Europe  

Many students took advantage of the opportunity to study Greek  and
Chrysoloras prepared the first modern Greek grammar for their use 
Before long the Greek classics became as well known as the Latin 
Italians even went to Constantinople to learn the language  and the
diplomatic negotiations which the Eastern Church carried on with the
Western  with the hope of gaining help against the Turks  brought some
Greek scholars to Italy  In 1423 an Italian scholar arrived at Venice
with no less than two hundred and thirty eight Greek books  thus
transplanting a whole literature to a new and fruitful soil  226  Greek
as well as Latin books were carefully copied and edited  and beautiful
libraries were established by the Medici  the duke of Urbino  and Pope
Nicholas V  who founded the great library of the Vatican  227  still one
of the most important collections of books in the world 

 Sidenote  Advantages of printing with movable types  

123  It was the glory of the Italian humanists to revive the knowledge
and appreciation of the ancient literatures  but it remained for patient
experimenters in Germany and Holland to perfect a system by which books
could be multiplied rapidly and cheaply  The laborious copying of books
by hand 228  had several serious disadvantages  The best copyists were 
it is true  incredibly dexterous with their quills  and made their
letters as clear and small as if they had been printed  But the work was
necessarily very slow  When Cosimo  the father of Lorenzo the
Magnificent  wished to form a library  he applied to a book contractor 
who procured forty five copyists  By working hard for nearly two years
these men were able to produce only two hundred volumes 

Moreover  it was impossible before the invention of printing to have two
books exactly alike  Even with the greatest care a scribe could not hope
to avoid all mistakes  and a careless copyist was sure to make a great
many  The universities required their students to report immediately any
mistakes discovered in their text books  in order that the error might
be promptly rectified and not lead to a misunderstanding of the author 
With the invention of printing it became possible to produce in a short
time a great many copies of a given book which were exactly alike 
Consequently  if great care were taken to see that the types were
properly set  the whole edition  not simply a single copy  might be
relied upon as correct 

 Illustration  Closing Lines of the Psalter of 1459  much reduced  229  

 Sidenote  The earliest printed books  

 Sidenote  Black letter  

 Sidenote  Roman letters  

 Sidenote  Italics  

The earliest book of any considerable size to be printed was the Bible 
which appears to have been completed at Mayence in the year 1456  A year
later the famous Mayence Psalter was finished  the first dated book 
There are  however  earlier examples of little books printed with
engraved blocks and even with movable types  In the German towns  where
the art spread rapidly  the printers adhered to the style of letters
which the scribe had found it convenient to make with his quill  the
so called  Gothic   or black letter  230  In Italy  where the first
printing press was set up in 1466  a type was soon adopted which
resembled the letters used in ancient Roman inscriptions  This was quite
similar to the style of letter commonly used to day  The Italians also
invented the compressed  italic  type  which enabled them to get a great
many words on a page  The early printers generally did their work
conscientiously  and the very first book printed is in most respects as
well done as any later book 

 Sidenote  Importance of Italian art in the Renaissance period  

124  The stimulus of the antique ideals of beauty and the renewed
interest in man and nature is nowhere more apparent than in the art of
the Renaissance period in Italy  The bonds of tradition  which had
hampered mediæval art  231  were broken  The painters and sculptors
continued  it is true  to depict the same religious subjects which their
mediæval predecessors had chosen  But in the fourteenth century the
Italian artists began to draw their inspiration from the fragments of
antique art which they found about them and from the world full of life
and beauty in which they lived  Above all  they gave freer rein to their
own imagination  The tastes and ideals of the individual artist were no
longer repressed but became the dominant element in his work  The
history of art becomes  during the Renaissance  a history of artists 

 Sidenote  Italian architecture  

 Sidenote  Italy inherits the art of Greece and Rome  

The Gothic style in architecture had never taken root in Italy  The
Italians had continued to build their churches in a more or less
modified Romanesque 232  form  While the soaring arches and delicate
tracery of the Gothic cathedral had become the ideal of the North  in
Italy the curving lines and harmonious proportions of the dome inspired
the best efforts of the Renaissance builders  They borrowed many fine
details  such as capitals and cornices  from the antique  and also  what
was far more important  the simplicity and beauty of proportion which
characterized classical architecture  Just as Italy had inherited  in a
special sense  the traditions of classical literature  so it was natural
that it should be more directly affected than the rest of Europe by the
remains of Greek and Roman art  It is in harmony of proportion and
beauty of detail that the great charm of the best Renaissance buildings
consists 

 Sidenote  Niccola of Pisa  1206 1280  

It is  perhaps  in sculpture that the influence of the antique models
was earliest and most obviously shown  The sculptor  Niccola of Pisa
 Niccola Pisano   stands out as the first distinguished leader in the
forward movement  It is evident that he studied certain fragments of
antique sculpture  a sarcophagus and a marble vase that had been found
in Pisa  with the greatest care and enthusiasm  He frankly copied from
them many details  and even several whole figures  in the reliefs on his
most famous work  the pulpit in the baptistery at Pisa  233  But while
sculpture was the first of the arts to feel the new impetus  its
progress was slow  it was not until the fifteenth century that it began 
in Italy  to develop on wholly independent and original lines 

 Sidenote  Frescoes and easel pictures  

The paintings of the period of the early Renaissance were usually
frescoes  that is  they were painted directly upon the plaster walls of
churches and sometimes of palaces  A few pictures  chiefly altar pieces 
were executed on wooden panels  but it was not until the sixteenth
century that easel paintings  that is  detached pictures on canvas 
wood  or other material  became common 

 Illustration  Relief by Niccola of Pisa from Pulpit at Pisa  showing
Influence of Antique Models 

 Sidenote  Giotto  1266    1337  

In the fourteenth century there was an extraordinary development in the
art of painting under the guidance and inspiration of the first great
Italian painter  Giotto  Before his time the frescoes  like the
illuminations in the manuscripts of which we have spoken in a previous
chapter  were exceedingly stiff and unlifelike  With Giotto there comes
a change  Antique art did not furnish him with any models to copy  for
whatever the ancients had accomplished in painting had been
destroyed  234  He had therefore to deal with the problems of his art
unaided  and of course he could only begin their solution  His trees and
landscapes look like caricatures  his faces are all much alike  the
garments hang in stiff straight folds  But he aimed to do what the
earlier painters apparently did not dream of doing  that is  paint
living  thinking  feeling men and women  He was not even satisfied to
confine himself to the old biblical subjects  Among his most famous
frescoes are the scenes from the life of St  Francis  235  a theme which
appealed very strongly to the imagination of people and artists alike
all through the fourteenth century 

 Sidenote  Renaissance artists often practiced several arts  

Giotto s dominating influence upon the art of his century is due partly
to the fact that he was a builder as well as a painter  and also
designed reliefs for sculpture  This practicing of several different
arts by the same artist was one of the striking features of the
Renaissance period 

 Sidenote  Italian art in the fifteenth century  

125  During the fifteenth century  which is known as the period of the
Early Renaissance  art in Italy developed and progressed steadily 
surely  and with comparative rapidity  toward the glorious heights of
achievement which it reached in the following century  The traditions of
the Middle Ages were wholly thrown aside  the lessons of ancient art
thoroughly learned  As the artists became more complete masters of their
tools and of all the technical processes of their art  they found
themselves ever freer to express in their work what they saw and felt 

 Sidenote  Florence the art center of Italy  

Florence was the great center of artistic activity during the fifteenth
century  The greatest sculptors and almost all of the most famous
painters and architects of the time either were natives of Florence or
did their best work there  During the first half of the century
sculpture again took the lead  The bronze doors of the baptistery at
Florence by Ghiberti  which were completed about 1450  are among the
very best products of Renaissance sculpture  Michael Angelo declared
them worthy to be the doors of paradise  A comparison of them with the
doors of the cathedral of Pisa  which date from the end of the twelfth
century  furnishes a striking illustration of the change that had taken
place  A contemporary of Ghiberti  Luca della Robbia  1400 1482   is
celebrated for his beautiful reliefs in glazed baked clay and in marble 
of which many may be seen in Florence 

 Illustration  BRONZE DOORS OF THE CATHEDRAL AT PISA

 TWELFTH CENTURY  

 Illustration  GHIBERTI S DOORS AT FLORENCE 

 Illustration  Relief by Luca della Robbia 

One of the best known painters of the first half of the fifteenth
century  Fra 236  Angelico  was a monk  His frescoes on the walls of the
monastery of San Marco  and elsewhere  reflect a love of beauty and a
cheerful piety  in striking contrast to the fiery zeal of
Savonarola  237  who  later in the century  went forth from this same
monastery to denounce the vanities of the art loving Florentines  238 

 Sidenote  Rome becomes the center of artistic activity  

126  Florence reached the height of its preëminence as an art center
during the reign of Lorenzo the Magnificent  who was an ardent patron of
all the arts  With his death  1492   and the subsequent brief but
overwhelming influence of Savonarola  this preëminence passed to Rome 
which was fast becoming one of the great capitals of Europe  The
art loving popes  Julius II and Leo X  239  took pains to secure the
services of the most distinguished artists and architects of the time in
the building and adornment of St  Peter s and the Vatican  i e   the
papal church and palace 

 Sidenote  The church of St  Peter  

The idea of the dome as the central feature of a church  which appealed
so strongly to the architects of the Renaissance  reached its highest
realization in rebuilding the ancient church of St  Peter  The task was
begun in the fifteenth century  in 1506 it was taken up by Pope Julius
II with his usual energy  and it was continued all through the sixteenth
century and well into the seventeenth  under the direction of a
succession of the most famous artist architects of the time  including
Raphael and Michael Angelo  The plan was changed repeatedly  but in its
final form the building is a Latin cross surmounted by a great dome  one
hundred and thirty eight feet in diameter  The dimensions and
proportions of this greatest of all churches never fail to impress the
beholder with something like awe 

 Sidenote  Height of Renaissance art  

 Sidenote  Da Vinci  Michael Angelo  Raphael  

During the sixteenth century the art of the Renaissance reached its
highest development  Among all the great artists of this period three
stand out in heroic proportions  Leonardo da Vinci  Michael Angelo  and
Raphael  The first two not only practiced  but achieved almost equal
distinction in  the three arts of architecture  sculpture  and
painting  240  It is impossible to give in a few lines any idea of the
beauty and significance of the work of these great geniuses  Both
Raphael and Michael Angelo left behind them so many and such magnificent
frescoes and paintings  and in the case of Michael Angelo statues as
well  that it is easy to appreciate their importance  Leonardo  on the
other hand  left but little completed work  His influence on the art of
his time  which was probably greater than that of either of the others 
came from his many sidedness  his originality  and his unflagging
interest in the discovery and application of new methods  He was almost
more experimenter than artist 

 Illustration  St  Peter s and the Vatican  Rome 

 Sidenote  The Venetian school  

 Sidenote  Titian  1477 1576  

While Florence could no longer boast of being the art center of Italy 
it still produced great artists  among whom Andrea del Sarto may be
especially mentioned  241  But the most important center of artistic
activity outside of Rome in the sixteenth century was Venice  The
distinguishing characteristic of the Venetian pictures is their glowing
color  This is strikingly exemplified in the paintings of Titian  the
most famous of all the Venetian painters 

 Sidenote  Painting in northern Europe  

 Sidenote  Dürer  1471 1528  

It was natural that artists from the northern countries should be
attracted by the renown of the Italian masters and  after learning all
that Italy could teach them  should return home to practice their art in
their own particular fashion  About a century after Giotto s time two
Flemish brothers  Van Eyck by name  showed that they were not only able
to paint quite as excellent pictures as the Italians of their day  but
they also discovered a new way of mixing their colors superior to that
employed in Italy  Later  when painting had reached its height in Italy 
Albrecht Dürer and Hans Holbein the Younger 242  in Germany vied with
even Raphael and Michael Angelo in the mastery of their art  Dürer is
especially celebrated for his wonderful woodcuts and copperplate
engravings  in which field he has perhaps never been excelled  243 

 Sidenote  Rubens  1577 1640  and Rembrandt  1607 1669  

 Sidenote  Van Dyck  1599 1641  and his portraits  

 Sidenote  Velasquez  

When  in the seventeenth century  painting had declined south of the
Alps  Dutch and Flemish masters   above all  Rubens and
Rembrandt   developed a new and admirable school of painting  To Van
Dyck  another Flemish master  we owe many noble portraits of
historically important persons  244  Spain gave to the world in the
seventeenth century a painter whom some would rank higher than even the
greatest artists of Italy  namely  Velasquez  1599 1660   His genius 
like that of Van Dyck  is especially conspicuous in his marvellous
portraits 

 Illustration  GIOTTO S MADONNA 

 Illustration  HOLY FAMILY BY ANDREA DEL SARTO 

 Sidenote  Geographical knowledge in the Middle Ages  

 Sidenote  Marco Polo  

127  Shortly after the invention of printing  which promised so much for
the diffusion of knowledge  the horizon of western Europe was further
enlarged by a series of remarkable sea voyages which led to the
exploration of the whole globe  The Greeks and Romans knew little about
the world beyond southern Europe  northern Africa  and western Asia  and
much that they knew was forgotten during the Middle Ages  The Crusades
took many Europeans as far east as Egypt and Syria  As early as Dante s
time two Venetian merchants  the Polo brothers  visited China and were
kindly received at Pekin by the emperor of the Mongols  On a second
journey they were accompanied by Marco Polo  the son of one of the
brothers  When they got safely back to Venice in 1295  after a journey
of twenty years  Marco gave an account of his experiences which filled
his readers with wonder  Nothing stimulated the interest of the West
more than his fabulous description of the golden island of Zipangu
 Japan  and of the spice markets of the Moluccas and Ceylon  245 

 Sidenote  The discoveries of the Portuguese in the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries  

About the year 1318 Venice and Genoa opened up direct communication by
sea with the towns of the Netherlands  246  Their fleets  which touched
at the port of Lisbon  aroused the commercial enterprise of the
Portuguese  who soon began to undertake extended maritime expeditions 
By the middle of the fourteenth century they had discovered the Canary
Islands  Madeira  and the Azores  Before this time no one had ventured
along the coast of Africa beyond the arid region of Sahara  The country
was forbidding  there were no ports  and mariners were  moreover 
hindered in their progress by the general belief that the torrid region
was uninhabitable  In 1445  however  some adventurous sailors came
within sight of a headland beyond the desert and  struck by its
luxuriant growth of tropical trees  they called it Cape Verde  the green
cape   Its discovery put an end once for all to the idea that there were
only parched deserts to the south 

For a generation longer the Portuguese continued to venture farther and
farther along the coast  in the hope of finding it coming to an end  so
that they might make their way by sea to India  At last  in 1486  Diaz
rounded the Cape of Good Hope  Twelve years later  1498  Vasco da Gama 
spurred on by Columbus  great discovery  after sailing around the Cape
of Good Hope and northward beyond Zanzibar  steered straight across the
Indian Ocean and reached Calicut  in Hindustan  by sea 

 Sidenote  The spice trade  

These adventurers were looked upon with natural suspicion by the
Mohammedan spice merchants  who knew very well that their object was to
establish a direct trade between the spice islands and western Europe 
Hitherto the Mohammedans had had the monopoly of the spice trade between
the Moluccas and the eastern ports of the Mediterranean  where the
products were handed over to Italian merchants  The Mohammedans were
unable  however  to prevent the Portuguese from concluding treaties with
the Indian princes and establishing trading stations at Goa and
elsewhere  In 1512 a successor of Vasco da Gama reached Java and the
Moluccas  where the Portuguese speedily built a fortress  By 1515
Portugal had become the greatest among maritime powers  and spices
reached Lisbon regularly without the intervention of the Italian towns 
which were mortally afflicted by the change 

 Sidenote  Importance of spices in encouraging navigation  

There is no doubt that the desire to obtain spices was the main reason
for the exploration of the globe  This motive led European navigators to
try in succession every possible way to reach the East  by going around
Africa  by sailing west in the hope of reaching the Indies  before they
knew of the existence of America  then  after America was discovered  by
sailing around it to the north or south  and even sailing around Europe
to the north  It is hard for us to understand this enthusiasm for
spices  for which we care much less nowadays  One former use of spices
was to preserve food  which could not then as now be carried rapidly 
while still fresh  from place to place  nor did our conveniences then
exist for keeping it by the use of ice  Moreover  spice served to make
even spoiled food more palatable than it would otherwise have been 

 Illustration  The Voyages of Discovery 

 Sidenote  Idea of reaching the spice islands by sailing westward  

It inevitably occurred to thoughtful men that the East Indies could be
reached by sailing westward  The chief authority upon the form and size
of the earth was still the ancient astronomer  Ptolemy  who lived about
A D  150  He had reckoned the earth to be about one sixth smaller than
it is  and as Marco Polo had given an exaggerated idea of the distance
which he and his companions had traveled eastward  it was supposed that
it could not be a very long journey from Europe across the Atlantic to
Japan 

 Sidenote  Columbus discovers America  1492  

The first plan for sailing west was  perhaps  submitted to the
Portuguese king in 1474  by Toscanelli  a Florentine physician  In 1492 
as we all know  a Genoese navigator  Columbus  b  1451   who had had
much experience on the sea  got together three little ships and
undertook the journey westward to Zipangu  which he hoped to reach in
five weeks  After thirty two days from the time he left the Canary
Islands he came upon land  the island of San Salvador  and believed
himself to be in the East Indies  Going on from there he discovered the
island of Cuba  which he believed to be the mainland of Asia  and then
Haiti  which he mistook for the longed for Zipangu  Although he made
three later expeditions and sailed down the coast of South America as
far as the Orinoco  he died without realizing that he had not been
exploring the coast of Asia  247 

 Sidenote  Magellan s expedition around the world  

After the bold enterprises of Vasco da Gama and Columbus  an expedition
headed by Magellan succeeded in circumnavigating the globe  There was
now no reason why the new lands should not become more and more familiar
to the European nations  The coast of North America was explored
principally by English navigators  who for over a century pressed north 
still in the vain hope of finding a northwest passage to the spice
islands 

 Sidenote  The Spanish conquests in America  

Cortez began the Spanish conquests in the western world by undertaking
the subjugation of the Aztec empire in Mexico in 1519  A few years later
Pizarro established the Spanish power in Peru  It is hardly necessary to
say that Europeans exhibited an utter disregard for the rights of the
people with whom they came in contact  and treated them with
contemptuous cruelty  Spain now superseded Portugal as a maritime power
and her importance in the sixteenth century is to be attributed largely
to the wealth which came to her from her possessions in the New World 

 Sidenote  The Spanish main  

By the end of the century the Spanish main  i e   the northern coast of
South America  was much frequented by adventurous seamen  who combined
in about equal parts the occupations of merchant  slaver  and pirate 
Many of these hailed from English ports  and it is to them that England
owes the beginning of her commercial greatness  248 

 Sidenote  Copernicus  1473 1543  discovers that the earth is not the
center of the universe  

128  While Columbus and the Portuguese navigators were bringing hitherto
unknown regions of the earth to the knowledge of Europe  a Polish
astronomer  Kopernik  commonly known by his Latinized name  Copernicus  
was reaching the conclusion that the ancient writers had been misled in
supposing that the earth was the center of the universe  He discovered
that  with the other planets  the earth revolved about the sun  This
opened the way to an entirely new conception of the heavenly bodies and
their motions  which has formed the basis of modern astronomy 

It was naturally a great shock to men to have it suggested that their
dwelling place  instead of being God s greatest work to which He had
subordinated everything  was but a tiny speck in comparison to the whole
universe  and its sun but one of an innumerable host of similar bodies 
each of which might have its particular family of planets revolving
about it  Theologians  both Protestant and Catholic  declared the
statements of Copernicus foolish and wicked and contrary to the
teachings of the Bible  He was prudent enough to defer the publication
of his great work until just before his death  he thus escaped any
persecution to which his discovery might have subjected him 

 Sidenote  Miscellaneous inventions  

In addition to the various forms of progress of which we have spoken 
the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries witnessed the invention or wide
application of a considerable number of practical devices which were
unknown to the Greeks and Romans  Examples of these are  besides
printing  the compass  gunpowder  spectacles  and a method of not merely
softening but of thoroughly melting iron so that it could be cast 

 Sidenote  The fourteenth and fifteenth centuries not merely a period of
revival  

The period of which we have been speaking was  in short  by no means
merely distinguished for the revival of classical learning  It was not
simply a re birth of the ancient knowledge and art  but a time during
which Europe laid the foundations for a development essentially
different from that of the ancient world and for achievements undreamed
of by Aristotle or Pliny 


     General Reading   The culture of Italy during the fourteenth and
     fifteenth centuries is best treated by BURCKHARDT   The
     Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy   The Macmillan Company 
      4 00   This is especially adapted for the rather advanced student 
     The towns are interestingly described in SYMONDS   Age of Despots 
      Scribner s Sons   2 00   For Florence and the Medici  see
     ARMSTRONG   Lorenzo de  Medici and Florence in the Fifteenth
     Century   G P  Putnam s Sons   1 50   MACHIAVELLI S  Prince  may be
     had in translation  Clarendon Press   1 10   The best prose
     translation of DANTE S  Divine Comedy  is that of Charles Eliot
     Norton  Houghton  Mifflin   Co   3 vols    4 50   In ROBINSON and
     ROLFE   Petrarch the First Modern Scholar and Man of Letters   G P 
     Putnam s Sons   2 00   the reader will find much material to
     illustrate the beginnings of humanism  The volume consists mainly
     of Petrarch s own letters to his friends  The introduction gives a
     much fuller account of his work than it was possible to include in
     the present volume  For similar material from other writers of the
     time  see WHITCOMB   A Literary Source Book of the Italian
     Renaissance   Philadelphia   1 00   The autobiography of Benvenuto
     Cellini is a very amusing and instructive book by one of the
     well known artists of the sixteenth century  Roscoe s translation
     in the Bohn series  The Macmillan Company   1 00  is to be
     recommended for school libraries 

     The greatest of the sources for the lives of the artists is VASARI 
      Lives of Seventy of the Most Eminent Painters  Sculptors  and
     Architects   This may be had in the Temple Classics  The Macmillan
     Company  8 vols   50 cents each  or a selection of the more
     important lives admirably edited in Blashfield and Hopkins 
     carefully annotated edition  Scribner s Sons  4 vols    8 00  
     Vasari was a contemporary of Michael Angelo and Cellini  and writes
     in a simple and charming style  The outlines of the history of the
     various branches of art  with ample bibliographies  are given in
     the  College Histories of Art   edited by John C  Van Dyke  viz  
     VAN DYKE   The History of Painting   HAMLIN   The History of
     Architecture   and MARQUAND and FROTHINGHAM   The History of
     Sculpture   Longmans  Green   Co   each  2 00   Larger works with
     more illustrations  which might be found in any good town library
     are  FERGUSSON   History of Modern Architecture   LÜBKE   History
     of Sculpture   WOLTMANN and WOERMANN   History of Painting   and
     FLETCHER   A History of Architecture   Two companies publish very
     inexpensive reproductions of works of art  the so called Perry
     pictures at a cent apiece  and the still better Cosmos pictures
      Cosmos Picture Company  New York   costing somewhat more 

     For the invention of printing see DE VINNE   The Invention of
     Printing   unfortunately out of print  and BLADES   Pentateuch of
     Printing   London   4 75   Also PUTNAM   Books and their Makers
     during the Middle Ages   Vol  I  G P  Putnam s Sons   2 50  




CHAPTER XXIII

EUROPE AT THE OPENING OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY


129  Two events took place in the early sixteenth century which
fundamentally influenced the history of Europe   1  By a series of royal
marriages a great part of western Europe was brought under the control
of a single ruler  Emperor Charles V  He inherited Burgundy  Spain 
portions of Italy  and the Austrian territories  and  in 1519  he was
chosen emperor  There had been no such dominion as his in Europe since
the time of Charlemagne  Within its bounds lay Vienna  Brussels  Madrid 
Palermo  Naples  Milan  even the city of Mexico  Its creation and the
struggles which accompanied its dissolution form one of the most
important chapters in the history of modern Europe   2  Just at the time
that Charles was assuming the responsibilities that his vast domains
brought with them  the first successful revolt against the mediæval
Church was beginning  This was to result in the disruption of the Church
and the establishment of two great religious parties  the Catholic and
the Protestant  which have endured down to the present time  The purpose
of the present chapter is to describe the origin  extent  and character
of the empire of Charles V  and to prepare the reader to grasp the
 political  import of the Protestant revolt 

Before mentioning the family alliances which led to the consolidation of
such tremendous political power in the hands of one person  it will be
necessary  first  to note the rise of the house of Hapsburg to which
Charles belonged  and secondly  to account for the appearance in
European affairs of Spain  which has hitherto scarcely come into our
story 

 Sidenote  Reasons why the German kings failed to establish a strong
state  

The German kings had failed to create a strong kingdom such as those
over which Louis XI of France and Henry VII of England ruled  Their fine
title of  emperor  had made them a great deal of trouble  as we have
seen  249  Their attempts to keep Italy as well as Germany under their
rule  and the alliance of the mighty Bishop of Rome with their enemies
had well nigh ruined them  Their position was further weakened by their
failure to render their office strictly hereditary  Although the
emperors were often succeeded by their sons  each new emperor had to be
 elected   and those great vassals who controlled the election naturally
took care to bind the candidate by solemn promises not to interfere with
their privileges and independence  The result was that  after the
downfall of the Hohenstaufens  Germany fell apart into a great number of
practically independent states  of which none were very large and some
were extremely small 

 Sidenote  Rudolf of Hapsburg gets possession of Austria  

After an interregnum  Rudolf of Hapsburg had been chosen emperor in
1273  250  The original seat of the Hapsburgs  who were destined to play
a great part in European affairs  was in northern Switzerland  where the
vestiges of their original castle may still be seen  Rudolf was the
first prominent member of the family  he established its position and
influence by seizing the duchies of Austria and Styria  which were to
become  under his successors  the nucleus of the extensive Austrian
possessions 

 Sidenote  The imperial title becomes practically hereditary in the
house of Austria  

About a century and a half after the death of Rudolf the electors began
regularly to choose as emperor the ruler of the Austrian possessions  so
that the imperial title became  to all intents and purposes  hereditary
in the Hapsburg line  251  The Hapsburgs were  however  far more
interested in adding to their family domains than in advancing the
interests of the now almost defunct Holy Roman Empire  This  in the
memorable words of Voltaire  had ceased to be either holy  or Roman  or
an empire 

 Sidenote  Maximilian I  1493 1519  extends the power of the Hapsburgs
over the Netherlands and Spain  

Maximilian I  who was emperor at the opening of the sixteenth century 
was absorbed in his foreign enterprises rather than in the improvement
of the German government  Like so many of his predecessors  he was
especially anxious to get possession of northern Italy  By his marriage
with the daughter of Charles the Bold he brought the Netherlands into
what proved a fateful union with Austria  252  Still more important was
the extension of the power of the Hapsburgs over Spain  a country which
had hitherto had almost no connection with Germany 

 Sidenote  Arab civilization in Spain  

130  The Mohammedan conquest served to make the history of Spain very
different from that of the other states of Europe  One of its first and
most important results was the conversion of a great part of the
inhabitants to Mohammedanism  253  During the tenth century  which was
so dark a period in the rest of Europe  the Arab civilization in Spain
reached its highest development  The various elements in the population 
Roman  Gothic  Arab  and Berber  appear to have been thoroughly
amalgamated  Agriculture  industry  commerce  art  and the sciences made
rapid progress  Cordova  with its half million of inhabitants  its
stately palaces  its university  its three thousand mosques and three
hundred public baths  was perhaps unrivaled at that period in the whole
world  There were thousands of students at the university of Cordova at
a time when  in the North  only clergymen had mastered even the simple
arts of reading and writing  This brilliant civilization lasted 
however  for hardly more than a hundred years  By the middle of the
eleventh century the caliphate of Cordova had fallen to pieces  and
shortly afterwards the country was overrun by new invaders from Africa 

 Sidenote  The rise of new Christian kingdoms in Spain  

Meanwhile the vestiges of the earlier Christian rule continued to exist
in the mountain fastnesses of northern Spain  Even as early as the year
1000  254  several small Christian kingdoms  Castile  Aragon  and
Navarre  had come into existence  Castile  in particular  began to push
back the demoralized Arabs and  in 1085  reconquered Toledo from them 
Aragon also widened its bounds by incorporating Barcelona and conquering
the territory watered by the Ebro  By 1250  the long war of the
Christians against the Mohammedans  which fills the mediæval annals of
Spain  had been so successfully prosecuted that Castile extended to the
south coast and included the great towns of Cordova and Seville  The
kingdom of Portugal was already as large as it is to day 

 Sidenote  Granada and Castile  

The Moors  as the Spanish Mohammedans were called  maintained themselves
for two centuries more in the mountainous kingdom of Granada  in the
southern part of the peninsula  During this period  Castile  which was
the largest of the Spanish kingdoms and embraced all the central part of
the peninsula  was too much occupied by internal feuds and struggles
over the crown to wage successful war against the Moorish kingdom to the
south 

 Sidenote  Marriage of Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon  

 Sidenote  Granada  the last Moorish stronghold  falls  

The first Spanish monarch whose name need be mentioned here was Queen
Isabella of Castile  who  in 1469  concluded an all important marriage
with Ferdinand  the heir of the crown of Aragon  It is with the
resulting union of Castile and Aragon that the great importance of Spain
in European history begins  For the next hundred years Spain was to
enjoy more military power than any other European state  Ferdinand and
Isabella undertook to complete the conquest of the peninsula  and in
1492  after a long siege  the city of Granada fell into their hands  and
therewith the last vestige of Moorish domination disappeared  255 

 Illustration  EUROPE IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY 

 Sidenote  Spain s income from the New World enables her to become a
European power  

In the same year that the conquest of the peninsula was completed  the
discoveries of Columbus  made under the auspices of Queen Isabella 
opened up the sources of undreamed of wealth beyond the seas  The
transient greatness of Spain in the sixteenth century is largely to be
attributed to the riches which poured in from her American possessions 
The shameless and cruel looting of the Mexican and Peruvian cities by
Cortez and Pizarro  and the products of the silver mines of the New
World  enabled Spain to assume  for a time  a position in Europe which
her internal strength and normal resources would never have permitted 

 Sidenote  Persecution of the Jews and Moors  

 Sidenote  The revival of the Inquisition  

Unfortunately  the most industrious  skillful  and thrifty among the
inhabitants of Spain  i e   the Moors and the Jews  who well nigh
supported the whole kingdom with the products of their toil  were
bitterly persecuted by the Christians  So anxious was Isabella to rid
her kingdom of the infidels that she revived the court of the
Inquisition  256  For several decades its tribunals arrested and
condemned innumerable persons who were suspected of heresy  and
thousands were burned at the stake during this period  These wholesale
executions have served to associate Spain especially with the horrors of
the Inquisition  Finally  in 1609  the Moors were driven out of the
country altogether  The persecution diminished or disheartened the most
useful and enterprising portion of the Spanish people  and speedily and
permanently crippled a country which in the sixteenth century was
granted an unrivaled opportunity to become a flourishing and powerful
monarchy 

 Sidenote  Heritage of Charles V  

Maximilian  the German emperor  was not satisfied with securing Burgundy
for his house by his marriage with the daughter of Charles the Bold  He
also arranged a marriage between their son  Philip  and Joanna  the
daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella  Philip died in 1506  and his poor
wife  Joanna  became insane with grief and was thus incapacitated for
ruling  So their eldest son  Charles  could look forward to an
unprecedented accumulation of glorious titles as soon as his
grand fathers  Maximilian and Ferdinand  should pass away  257  He was
soon to be duke of Brabant  margrave of Antwerp  count of Holland 
archduke of Austria  count of Tyrol  king of Castile  Aragon  and
Naples  and of the vast Spanish possessions in America   to mention a
few of his more important titles 

 Sidenote  Charles and his Spanish possessions  

Ferdinand died in 1516  and Charles  now a lad of sixteen  who had been
born and reared in the Netherlands  was much bewildered when he landed
in his Spanish dominions  His Flemish advisers were distasteful to the
haughty Spaniards  suspicion and opposition awaited him in each of his
several Spanish kingdoms  for he found by no means a united Spain  Each
kingdom demanded special recognition of its rights and suggested
important reforms before it would acknowledge Charles as its king 

 Sidenote  Charles elected emperor  1519  

It seemed as if the boy would have his hands full in asserting his
authority as  king of Spain   nevertheless  a still more imposing title
and still more perplexing responsibilities were to fall upon his
shoulders before he was twenty years old  It had long been Maximilian s
ambition that his grandson should succeed him upon the imperial throne 
After his death in 1519 the electors finally chose Charles instead of
the rival candidate  Francis I of France  By this election the king of
Spain  who had not yet been in Germany and who never learned its
language  became its ruler at a critical juncture  when the teachings of
Luther were producing unprecedented dissension and political
distraction  We shall hereafter refer to him by his imperial title of
Charles V 

 Illustration  Charles V 

131  In order to understand the Europe of Charles V and the constant
wars which occupied him all his life  we must turn back and review the
questions which had been engaging the attention of his fellow kings
before he came to the throne  It is particularly necessary to see
clearly how Italy had suddenly become the center of commotion   the
battlefield for Spain  France  and Germany 

 Sidenote  Charles VIII of France invades Italy  

Charles VIII of France  1483 1498  possessed little of the practical
sagacity of his father  Louis XI  He dreamed of a mighty expedition
against the Turks and of the conquest of Constantinople  As the first
step he determined to lead an army into Italy and assert his claim 
inherited from his father  to the kingdom of Naples  which was in the
hands of the house of Aragon  258  While Italy had everything to lose by
permitting a powerful monarch to get a foothold in the South  there was
no probability that the various little states into which the peninsula
was divided would lay aside their perpetual animosities and combine
against the invader  On the contrary  Charles VIII was urged by some of
the Italians themselves to come 

 Sidenote  Savonarola and Charles VIII  

Had Lorenzo the Magnificent still been alive  he might have organized a
league to oppose the French king  but he had died in 1492  two years
before Charles started  Lorenzo s sons failed to maintain the influence
over the people of Florence which their father had enjoyed  and the
leadership of the city fell into the hands of the Dominican friar 
Savonarola  whose fervid preaching attracted and held for a time the
attention of the fickle Florentine populace  He believed himself to be a
prophet  and proclaimed that God was about to scourge Italy for its
iniquities  and that men should flee before His wrath by renouncing
their lives of sin and pleasure 

When Savonarola heard of the French invasion  it appeared to him that
this was indeed the looked for scourge of God  which might afflict  but
would also purify  the Church  His prophecies seemed to be fulfilled 
and his listeners were stricken with terror  As Charles approached
Florence  the people rose in revolt against the Medici  sacked their
palaces  and drove out the three sons of Lorenzo  Savonarola became the
chief figure in the new republic which was established  Charles was
admitted into Florence  but his ugly  insignificant figure disappointed
the Florentines  They soon made it clear to him that they would not
regard him in any sense as a conqueror  and would oppose a prolonged
occupation by the French  Savonarola said to him   The people are
afflicted by your stay in Florence  and you waste your time  God has
called you to renew His Church  Go forth to your high calling lest God
visit you in His wrath and choose another instrument in your stead to
carry out His designs   So  after a week s stay  the French army left
Florence and proceeded on its southward journey 

 Sidenote  The popes since the Great Schism  

The next power with which Charles VIII had to deal was represented by a
person in every way the opposite of the Dominican monk  Pope Alexander
VI  After the troubles of the Great Schism and the councils  the popes
had set to work to organize their possessions in central Italy into a
compact principality  For a time they seemed to be little more than
Italian princes  But they did not make rapid progress in their political
enterprises because  in the first place  they were usually advanced in
years before they came to power and so had little time to carry out
their projects  and  in the second place  they showed too much anxiety
to promote the interests of their relatives  The selfish  unscrupulous
means employed by these worldly prelates naturally brought great
discredit upon the Church 

 Sidenote  Pope Alexander VI and Cæsar Borgia  

There was probably never a more openly profligate Italian despot than
Alexander VI  1493 1503  of the notorious Spanish house of Borgia  He
frankly set to work to advance the interests of his children  as if he
were merely a secular ruler  For one of his sons  Cæsar Borgia  he
proposed to form a duchy east of Florence  Cæsar outdid his father in
crime  He not only entrapped and mercilessly slaughtered his enemies 
but had his brother assassinated and thrown into the Tiber  Both he and
his father were accused of constant recourse to poisoning  in which art
they were popularly supposed to have gained extraordinary proficiency 
It is noteworthy that when Machiavelli prepared his  Prince   259  he
chose for his hero Cæsar Borgia  as possessing in the highest degree
those qualities which went to make up a successful Italian ruler 

The pope was greatly perturbed by the French invasion  and in spite of
the fact that he was the head of Christendom  he entered into
negotiations with the Turkish sultan in the hope of gaining aid against
the French king  He could not  however  prevent Charles from entering
Rome and later continuing on his way to Naples 

 Sidenote  Charles VIII leaves Italy unconquered  

The success of the French king seemed marvelous  for even Naples
speedily fell into his hands  But he and his troops were demoralized by
the wines and other pleasures of the South  and meanwhile his enemies at
last began to form a combination against him  Ferdinand of Aragon was
fearful lest he might lose Sicily  and Maximilian objected to having the
French control Italy  Charles  situation became so precarious that he
may well have thought himself fortunate  at the close of 1495  to
escape  with the loss of only a single battle  from the country he had
hoped to conquer 

 Sidenote  Results of Charles  expedition  

The results of Charles  expedition appear at first sight trivial  in
reality they were momentous  In the first place  it was now clear to
Europe that the Italians had no real national feeling  however much they
might despise the  barbarians  who lived north of the Alps  From this
time down to the latter half of the nineteenth century  Italy was
dominated by foreign nations  especially Spain and Austria  In the
second place  the French learned to admire the art and culture of Italy 
The nobles began to change their feudal castles  which since the
invention of gunpowder were no longer impregnable  into luxurious
country houses  The new scholarship of Italy took root and flourished
not only in France  but in England and Germany as well  Consequently 
just as Italy was becoming  politically  the victim of foreign
aggressions  it was also losing  never to regain  that intellectual
preëminence which it had enjoyed since the revival of interest in
classical literature 

 Sidenote  Savonarola s reforms in Florence  

After Charles VIII s departure  Savonarola continued his reformation
with the hope of making Florence a model state which should lead to the
regeneration of the world  At first he carried all before him  and at
the Carnival of 1496 there were no more of the gorgeous exhibitions and
reckless gayety which had pleased the people under Lorenzo the
Magnificent  The next year the people were induced to make a great
bonfire  in the spacious square before the City Hall  of all the
 vanities  which stood in the way of a godly life  frivolous and immoral
books  pictures  jewels  and trinkets 

 Sidenote  Savonarola condemned and executed  1498  

Savonarola had enemies  however  even in his own Dominican order  while
the Franciscans were naturally jealous of his renown and maintained that
he was no real prophet  What was more serious  Alexander VI was bitterly
hostile to the reforming friar because he urged the Florentines to
remain in alliance with France  Before long even the people began to
lose confidence in him  He was arrested by the pope s order in 1497 and
condemned as a heretic and despiser of the Holy See  He was hanged  and
his body burned  in the same square where the  vanities  had been
sacrificed hardly more than a twelvemonth before 

 Sidenote  Louis XII s Italian policy  

In the same year  1498   the romantic Charles VIII died without leaving
any male heirs and was succeeded by a distant relative  Louis XII  who
renewed the Italian adventures of his predecessor  As his grandmother
was a member of the Milanese house of the Visconti  Louis laid claim to
Milan as well as to Naples  He quickly conquered Milan  and then
arranged a secret treaty with Ferdinand of Aragon  1500  for the
division of the kingdom of Naples between them  It was not hard for the
combined French and Spanish troops to conquer the country  but the two
allies soon disagreed  and four years later Louis sold his title to
Naples for a large sum to Ferdinand 

 Sidenote  Pope Julius II  

132  Pope Julius II  who succeeded the unspeakable Alexander VI  1503  
was hardly more spiritual than his predecessor  He was a warlike and
intrepid old man  who did not hesitate on at least one occasion to put
on a soldier s armor and lead his troops in person  Julius was a
Genoese  and harbored an inveterate hatred against Genoa s great
commercial rival  Venice  The Venetians especially enraged the pope by
taking possession of some of the towns on the northern border of his
dominions  and he threatened to reduce their city to a fishing village 
The Venetian ambassador replied   As for you  Holy Father  if you are
not more reasonable  we shall reduce you to a village priest  

 Sidenote  League of Cambray against Venice  1508  

With the pope s encouragement  the League of Cambray was formed in 1508
for the express purpose of destroying one of the most important Italian
states  The Empire  France  Spain  and the pope were to divide among
them Venice s possessions on the mainland  Maximilian was anxious to
gain the districts bordering upon Austria  Louis XII to extend the
boundaries of his new duchy of Milan  while the pope and Ferdinand were
also to have their appropriate shares 

Venice was quickly reduced to a few remnants of its Italian domains  but
the Venetians hastened to make their peace with the pope  who  after
receiving their humble submission  gave them his forgiveness  In spite
of his previous pledges to his allies  the pope now swore to exterminate
the  barbarians  whom he had so recklessly called in  He formed an
alliance with Venice and induced the new king of England  Henry VIII  to
attack the French king  As for Maximilian  the pope declared him as
 harmless as a newborn babe   This  Holy League  against the French led
to their loss of Milan and their expulsion from the Italian peninsula in
1512  but it in no way put an end to the troubles in Italy 

 Sidenote  Pope Leo X  1513 1521  

The bellicose Julius was followed in 1513 by Leo X  a son of Lorenzo the
Magnificent  Like his father  he loved art and literature  but he was
apparently utterly without religious feelings  He was willing that the
war should continue  in the hope that he might be able to gain a couple
of duchies for his nephews 

 Sidenote  Francis I of France  1515 1547  

Louis XII died and left his brilliant cousin and successor  Francis I 
to attempt once more to regain Milan  The new king was but twenty years
old  gracious in manner  and chivalrous in his ideals of conduct  His
proudest title was  the gentleman king   Like his contemporaries  Leo X 
and Henry VIII of England  he patronized the arts  and literature
flourished during his reign  He was not  however  a wise statesman  he
was unable to pursue a consistent policy  but  as Voltaire says   did
everything by fits and starts  

 Sidenote  Francis I in Italy  

 Sidenote  The republic of Florence becomes the grand duchy of Tuscany  

He opened his reign by a very astonishing victory  He led his troops
into Italy over a pass which had hitherto been regarded as impracticable
for cavalry  and defeated the Swiss  who were in the pope s pay  at
Marignano  He then occupied Milan and opened negotiations with Leo X 
who was glad to make terms with the victorious young king  The pope
agreed that Francis should retain Milan  and Francis on his part acceded
to Leo s plan for turning over Florence once more to the Medici  This
was done  and some years later this wonderful republic became the grand
duchy of Tuscany  governed by a line of petty princes under whom its
former glories were never renewed  260 

 Sidenote  Sources of discord between France and the Hapsburgs  

Friendly relations existed at first between the two young sovereigns 
Francis I and Charles V  but there were several circumstances which led
to an almost incessant series of wars between them  France was clamped
in between the northern and southern possessions of Charles  and had at
that time no natural boundaries  Moreover  there was a standing dispute
over portions of the Burgundian realms  for both Charles and Francis
claimed the  duchy  of Burgundy and the neighboring  county  of
Burgundy  commonly called Franche Comté  Charles also believed that 
through his grandfather  Maximilian  he was entitled to Milan  which the
French kings had set their hearts upon acquiring  For a generation the
rivals fought over these and other matters  and the wars between Charles
and Francis were but the prelude to a conflict lasting over two
centuries between France and the overgrown power of the house of
Hapsburg 

 Sidenote  Henry VIII of England  1509 1547  

In the impending struggle it was natural that both monarchs should try
to gain the aid of the king of England  whose friendship was of the
greatest importance to each of them  and who was by no means loath to
take a hand in European affairs  Henry VIII had succeeded his father
 Henry VII  in 1509 at the age of eighteen  Like Francis  he was
good looking and graceful  and in his early years made a very happy
impression upon those who came in contact with him  He gained much
popularity by condemning to death the two men who had been most active
in extorting the  benevolences  which his father had been wont to
require of unwilling givers  With a small but important class  his
learning brought him credit  He married  for his first wife  an aunt of
Charles V  Catherine of Aragon  and chose as his chief adviser Thomas
Wolsey  whose career and sudden downfall were to be strangely associated
with the fate of the unfortunate Spanish princess  261 

 Sidenote  Charles V goes to Germany  

In 1520 Charles V started for Germany to receive the imperial crown at
Aix la Chapelle  On his way he landed in England with the purpose of
keeping Henry from forming an alliance with Francis  He judged the best
means to be that of freely bribing Wolsey  who had been made a cardinal
by Leo X  and who was all powerful with Henry  Charles therefore
bestowed on the cardinal a large annuity in addition to one which he had
granted him somewhat earlier  He then set sail for the Netherlands 
where he was duly crowned king of the Romans  From there he proceeded 
for the first time  to Germany  where he summoned his first diet at
Worms  The most important business of the assembly proved to be the
consideration of the case of a university professor  Martin Luther  who
was accused of writing heretical books  and who had in reality begun
what proved to be the first successful revolt against the seemingly
all powerful mediæval Church 


     General Reading   For the Italian wars of Charles VIII and Louis
     XII   Cambridge Modern History   The Macmillan Company   3 75 per
     vol    Vol  I  Chapter IV  JOHNSON   Europe in the Sixteenth
     Century   The Macmillan Company   1 75   Chapter I  DYER and
     HASSALL   Modern Europe   The Macmillan Company  6 vols    2 00
     each   Vol  I  CREIGHTON   History of the Papacy   see above  p 
     320   Vols  IV  V  For Savonarola   Cambridge Modern History   Vol 
     I  Chapter V  CREIGHTON  Vol  IV  Chapter VIII  LEA   History of
     the Inquisition   see above  p  232   Vol  III  pp  209 237 
     SYMONDS   Age of Despots   see above  p  352   Chapter IX  PASTOR 
      History of the Popes   see above  p  320   Vol  V  For Spain 
      Cambridge Modern History   Vol  I  Chapter XI 




CHAPTER XXIV

GERMANY BEFORE THE PROTESTANT REVOLT


 Sidenote  Two unsuccessful revolts preceded the Protestant revolution  

133  By far the most important event in the sixteenth century and one of
the most momentous in the history of the western world  was the revolt
of a considerable portion of northern and western Europe from the
mediæval Church  There had been but two serious rebellions earlier  The
first of these was that of the Albigenses in southern France in the
thirteenth century  this had been fearfully punished  and the
Inquisition had been established to ferret out and bring to trial those
who were disloyal to the Church  Then  some two centuries later  the
Bohemians  under the inspiration of Wycliffe s writings  had attempted
to introduce customs different from those which prevailed elsewhere in
the Church  They  too  had been forced  after a terrific series of
conflicts  once more to accept the old system 

 Sidenote  Luther secedes from the Church  1520  

Finally  however  in spite of the great strength and the wonderful
organization of the Church  it became apparent that it was no longer
possible to keep all of western Europe under the sway of the pope  In
the autumn of 1520  Professor Martin Luther called together the students
of the University of Wittenberg  led them outside the town walls  and
there burned the constitution and statutes of the mediæval Church  i e  
the canon law  In this way he publicly proclaimed and illustrated his
purpose to repudiate the existing Church with many of its doctrines and
practices  Its head he defied by destroying the papal bull directed
against his teachings 

 Sidenote  Origin of the two great religious parties in western
Europe   the Catholics and Protestants  

Other leaders  in Germany  Switzerland  England  and elsewhere 
organized separate revolts  rulers decided to accept the teachings of
the reformers  and used their power to promote the establishment of
churches independent of the pope  In this way western Europe came to be
divided into two great religious parties  The majority of its people
continued to regard the pope as their religious head and to accept the
institutions under which their forefathers had lived since the times of
Theodosius  In general  those regions  except England  which had formed
a part of the Roman empire remained Roman Catholic in their belief  On
the other hand  northern Germany  a part of Switzerland  England 
Scotland  and the Scandinavian countries sooner or later rejected the
headship of the pope and many of the institutions and doctrines of the
mediæval Church  and organized new religious institutions  The
Protestants  as those who seceded from the Church of Rome were called 
by no means agreed among themselves what particular system should
replace the old one  They were at one  however  in ceasing to obey the
pope and in proposing to revert to the early Church as their model and
accepting the Bible as their sole guide  262 

 Sidenote  Revolt against the mediæval Church implied a general
revolution  

To revolt against the Church was to inaugurate a fundamental revolution
in many of the habits and customs of the people  It was not merely a
change of religious belief  for the Church permeated every occupation
and dominated every social interest  For centuries it had directed and
largely controlled education  high and low  Each and every important act
in the home  in the guild  in the town  was accompanied by religious
ceremonies  The clergy of the Roman Catholic Church had hitherto written
most of the books  they sat in the government assemblies  acted as the
rulers  most trusted ministers  constituted  in short  outside of Italy 
the only really educated class  Their rôle and the rôle of the Church
were incomparably more important than that of any church which exists
to day 

 Sidenote  The wars of religion  

Just as the mediæval Church was by no means an exclusively religious
institution  so the Protestant revolt was by no means simply a religious
change  but a social and political one as well  The conflicts which the
attempt to overthrow this institution  or rather social order  brought
about were necessarily terrific  They lasted for more than two centuries
and left no interest  public or private  social or individual  earthly
or heavenly  unaffected  Nation rose against nation  kingdom against
kingdom  households were divided among themselves  wars and commotion 
wrath and desolation  treachery and cruelty filled the states of western
Europe 

Our present object is to learn how this successful revolt came about 
what was its real nature  and why the results were what they were  In
order to do this  it is necessary to turn to the Germany in which Luther
lived and see how the nation had been prepared to sympathize with his
attack on the Church 

 Sidenote  Germany of to day  

134  To us to day  Germany means the German Empire  one of the three or
four best organized and most powerful of the European states  It is a
compact federation  somewhat like that of the United States  made up of
twenty two monarchies and three little city republics  Each member of
the union manages its local affairs  but leaves all questions of
national importance to be settled by the central government at Berlin 
This federation is  however  of very recent date  being scarcely more
than thirty years old 

 Sidenote  The  Germanies  of the sixteenth century  

In the time of Charles V there was no such Germany as this  but only
what the French called  the Germanies   i e   two or three hundred
states  which differed greatly from one another in size and character 
One had a duke  another a count at its head  while some were ruled over
by archbishops  bishops  or abbots  There were many cities  like
Nuremberg  Augsburg  Frankfort  and Cologne  which were just as
independent as the great duchies of Bavaria  Würtemberg  and Saxony 
Lastly there were the knights  whose possessions might consist of no
more than a single strong castle with a wretched village lying at its
foot  Their trifling territories must  however  be called states  for
some of the knights were at that time as sovereign and independent as
the elector of Brandenburg  who was one day to become the king of
Prussia  and long after  the emperor of Germany 

 Illustration  GERMANY IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY 

 Sidenote  The seven electors and the other greater German princes  

As for the emperor  he no longer had any power to control his vassals 
He could boast of unlimited pretensions and a great past  but he had
neither money nor soldiers  At the time of Luther s birth the
poverty stricken Frederick III might have been seen picking up a free
meal at a monastery  or riding behind a slow but economical ox team  The
real power in Germany lay in the hands of the more important vassals 
First and foremost among these were the seven electors  so called
because  since the thirteenth century  they had enjoyed the right to
elect the emperor  Three of them were archbishops  kings in all but name
of considerable territories on the Rhine  namely  of the electorates of
Mayence  Treves  and Cologne  263  Near them  to the south  was the
region ruled over by the elector of the Palatinate  to the northeast
were the territories of the electors of Brandenburg and of Saxony  the
king of Bohemia made the seventh of the group  Beside these states  the
dominions of other rulers scarcely less important than the electors
appear on the map  Some of these territories  like Würtemberg  Bavaria 
Hesse  and Baden  are familiar to us to day as members of the present
German empire  but all of them have been much enlarged since the
sixteenth century by the absorption of the little states that formerly
lay within and about them  264 

 Sidenote  The towns  

The towns  which had grown up since the great economic revolution that
had brought in commerce and the use of money in the thirteenth century 
were centers of culture in the north of Europe  just as those of Italy
were in the south  Nuremberg  the most beautiful of the German cities 
still possesses a great part of the extraordinary buildings and works of
art which it produced in the sixteenth century  Some of the towns held
directly of the emperor  and were consequently independent of the
particular prince within whose territory they were situated  These were
called  free   or  imperial   cities and must be reckoned among the
states of Germany 

 Illustration  Wall of the formerly Free Town of Rothenburg 

 Sidenote  The knights  

The knights  who ruled over the smallest of the German territories  had
once formed an important military class  but the invention of gunpowder
and of new methods of fighting had made their individual prowess of
little avail  As their tiny realms were often too small to support them 
they frequently turned to out and out robbery for a living  They hated
the cities because the prosperous burghers were able to live in a
luxurious comfort which the poor knights envied but could not imitate 
They hated the princes because these were anxious to incorporate into
their own territories the inconvenient little districts controlled by
the knights  many of whom  like the free cities  held directly of the
emperor  and were consequently practically independent 

 Sidenote  Complexity of the map of Germany  

It would be no easy task to make a map of Germany in the time of Charles
V sufficiently detailed to show all the states and scattered fragments
of states  If  for example  the accompanying map were much larger and
indicated all the divisions  it would be seen that the territory of the
city of Ulm completely surrounded the microscopic possessions of a
certain knight  the lord of Eybach  and two districts belonging to the
abbot of Elchingen  On its borders lay the territories of four
knights   the lords of Rechberg  Stotzingen  Erbach  and
Wiesensteig   and of the abbots of Söflingen and Wiblingen  besides
portions of Würtemberg and outlying Austrian possessions  The main cause
of this bewildering subdivision of Germany was the habit of dealing with
a principality as if it were merely private property which might be
divided up among several children  or disposed of piecemeal  quite
regardless of the wishes of the inhabitants 

 Sidenote  No central power to maintain order  

 Sidenote  Neighborhood war  

It is clear that these states  little and big  all tangled up with one
another  would be sure to have disputes among themselves which would
have to be settled in some way  It would appear to have been absolutely
necessary under the circumstances that there should be some superior
court or judge to adjust differences between the many members of the
empire  as well as a military or police force to carry out the will of
the tribunal  should one of the parties concerned resist its decrees 
But although there was an imperial court  it followed the emperor about
and was therefore hard to get at  Moreover  even if a decision was
obtained from it  there was no way for the aggrieved party to secure
the execution of the judgment  for the emperor had no force sufficient
to coerce the larger states  The natural result was a resort to
self help  Neighborhood war was permitted by law if only some courteous
preliminaries were observed  For instance  a prince or town was required
to give warning three days in advance before attacking another member of
the empire  265 

 Sidenote  The German diet  

 Sidenote  Effort to better the German government  

Toward the end of the fifteenth century the terrible disorder and
uncertainty which resulted from the absence of a strong central
government led to serious efforts upon the part of the  diet   or
national assembly  to remedy the evils  It was proposed to establish a
court to settle all disputes which should arise among the rulers of the
various states  This was to be held permanently in some convenient
place  The empire was also to be divided into districts  or  circles  
in each of which a military force was to be organized and maintained to
carry out the law and the decisions of the court  Little was
accomplished  however  for some years  although the diet met more
frequently and regularly  and this gave an opportunity to discuss public
questions  The towns began to send delegates to the diet in 1487  but
the restless knights and some of the other minor nobles had no part in
the deliberations and did not always feel that the decisions of the
assembly were binding upon them  Of the diets which met almost every
year during the Lutheran period in some one of the great German cities 
we shall hear more later 

 Sidenote  Contradiction between Catholic and Protestant writers  

135  It is natural that Protestant and Catholic writers should differ in
their views of Germany at this period  Among Protestants there has
always been a tendency to see the dark side of affairs  for this exalted
the work of Luther and made him appear the savior of his people  On the
other hand  the Catholic historians have devoted years of research to an
attempt to prove that conditions were  on the whole  happy and serene
and full of hope for the future before Luther and the other
revolutionary leaders brought division and ruin upon the fatherland by
attacking the Church 

 Sidenote  Corresponding contradictions in the conditions in Germany  

As a matter of fact  the life and thought of Germany during the fifty
years preceding the opening of the Protestant revolt present all sorts
of contradictions and anomalies  The period was one of marked progress 
The people were eager to learn  and they rejoiced in the recent
invention of printing which brought them the new learning from Italy and
hints of another world beyond the seas  Foreigners who visited Germany
were astonished at the prosperity  wealth  and luxury of the rich
merchants  who often spent their money in the encouragement of art and
literature and in the founding of schools and libraries 

On the other hand  there was great ill feeling between the various
classes  the petty princes  the townspeople  the knights  and the
peasants  It was generally believed by the other classes that the wealth
of the merchants could only be accounted for by deceit  usury  and sharp
dealing  Never was begging more prevalent  superstition more rife 
vulgarity and coarseness more apparent  Attempts to reform the
government and stop neighborhood war met with little success  Moreover 
the Turks were advancing steadily upon Christendom  The people were
commanded by the pope to send up a prayer each day as the noon bell
rang  that God might deliver them from the on coming infidel 

Yet we need not be astonished by these contradictions  for history
teaches that all periods of progress are full of them  Any newspaper
will show how true this is to day  we are  as a nation  good and bad 
rich and poor  peaceful and warlike  learned and ignorant  satisfied and
discontented  civilized and barbarous  all at once 

 Sidenote  Four important characteristics of the time which serve to
explain the Protestant revolt  

In considering the condition of the Church and of religion in Germany 
four things are particularly important as explaining the origin and
character of the Protestant revolt  First  there was an extraordinary
enthusiasm for all the pomp and ceremony of the old religion  and a
great confidence in pilgrimages  relics  miracles  and all those things
which the Protestants were soon to discard  Secondly  there was a
tendency to read the Bible and to dwell upon the attitude of the sinner
toward God  rather than upon the external acts of religion  Thirdly 
there was a conviction  especially among scholars  that the theologians
had made religion needlessly complicated with their fine spun logical
distinctions  And lastly  there was the old and very general belief that
the Italian prelates  including the pope  were always inventing new
plans for getting money out of the Germans  whom they regarded as a
stupid people  easily hoodwinked  These four matters we shall consider
in turn 

 Sidenote  Enthusiasm for religious ceremonies and observances  

136  Never had the many ceremonies and observances of the mediæval
Church attracted more attention or been carried out on a more prodigious
scale than during the latter part of the fifteenth  and the opening
years of the sixteenth century  It seemed as if all Germany agreed to
join in one last celebration of the old religion  unprecedented in
magnificence  before its people parted into two irreconcilable parties 
Great numbers of new churches were erected  and adorned with the richest
productions of German art  Tens of thousands of pilgrims flocked to the
various sacred places  and gorgeous ecclesiastical processions moved
through the streets of the prosperous imperial towns 

 Sidenote  Relics  

The princes rivaled each other in collecting the relics of saints  which
were venerated as an aid to salvation  The elector of Saxony  Frederick
the Wise  who was later to become Luther s protector  had accumulated no
less than five thousand of these sacred objects  In a catalogue of them
we find the rod of Moses  a bit of the burning bush  thread spun by the
Virgin  etc  The elector of Mayence possessed even a larger collection 
which included forty two whole bodies of saints and some of the earth
from a field near Damascus out of which God was supposed to have created
man 

 Sidenote  The treasury of  good works   

It was the teaching of the Church that prayers  fasts  masses 
pilgrimages  and other  good works  might be accumulated and form a
treasury of spiritual goods  Those who were wanting in good deeds might 
therefore  have their deficiencies offset by the inexhaustible surplus
of righteous deeds which had been created by Christ and the saints 

 Sidenote  Popular reliance upon outward religious acts  

The idea was certainly a beautiful one  that Christians should thus be
able to help one another by their good works  and that the strong and
faithful worshiper could aid the weak and indifferent  Yet the
thoughtful teachers in the Church realized that the doctrine of the
treasury of good works might be gravely misunderstood  and there was
certainly a strong inclination among the people to believe that God
might be propitiated by various outward acts  attendance at church
ceremonies  giving of alms  the veneration of relics  the making of
pilgrimages  etc  It was clear that the hope of profiting by the good
works of others might lead to the neglect of the true welfare of the
soul 

 Sidenote  Demand for more spiritual religion  

137  In spite  however  of the popular confidence in outward acts and
ceremonies  from which the heart was often absent  there were many signs
of a general longing for deeper and more spiritual religion than that of
which we have been speaking  The new art of printing was used to
increase the number of religious manuals  These all emphasized the
uselessness of outward acts without true contrition and sorrow for sin 
and urged the sinner to rely upon the love and forgiveness of God 

 Sidenote  The Bible in German before Luther  

All good Christians were urged  moreover  to read the Bible  of which
there were a number of editions in German  besides little books in which
portions of the New Testament were given  There are many indications
that the Bible was commonly read before Luther s time  266 

It was natural  therefore  that the German people should take a great
interest in the new and better translation of the Scriptures which
Luther prepared  Preaching had also become common  as common perhaps as
it is now  before the Protestants appeared  Some towns even engaged
special preachers of known eloquence to address their citizens
regularly 

These facts would seem to justify the conclusion that there were many
before Luther appeared who were approaching the ideas of religion which
later appealed especially to the Protestants  The insistence of the
Protestants upon salvation through faith alone in God  their suspicion
of ceremonies and  good works   their reliance upon the Bible  and the
stress they laid upon preaching   all these were to be found in Germany
and elsewhere before Luther began to preach 

 Sidenote  The German humanists  

 Sidenote  Rudolph Agricola  1442 1485  

138  Among the critics of the churchmen  monks  and theologians  none
were more conspicuous than the humanists  The Renaissance in Italy 
which may be said to have begun with Petrarch and his library  has
already been described  The Petrarch of Germany was Rudolph Agricola 
who  while not absolutely the first German to dedicate himself to
classical studies  was the first who by his charming personality and
varied accomplishments stimulated others  as Petrarch had done  to carry
on the pursuits which he himself so much enjoyed  Unlike most of the
Italian humanists  however  Agricola and his followers were interested
in the language of the people as well as in Latin and Greek  and
proposed that the works of antiquity should be translated into German 
Moreover  the German humanists were generally far more serious and
devout than the Italian scholars 

 Sidenote  The humanists desire to reform the German universities  

As the humanists increased in numbers and confidence they began to
criticise the excessive attention given in the German universities 267 
to logic and the scholastic theology  These studies had lost their
earlier vitality 268  and had degenerated into fruitless disputations 
The bad Latin which the professors used themselves and taught their
students  and the preference still given to Aristotle over all other
ancient writers  disgusted the humanists  They therefore undertook to
prepare new and better text books  and proposed that the study of the
Greek and Roman poets and orators should be introduced into the schools
and colleges  Some of the classical scholars were for doing away with
theology altogether  as a vain  monkish study which only obscured the
great truths of religion  The old fashioned professors  on their part 
naturally denounced the new learning  which they declared made pagans of
those who became enamored of it  Sometimes the humanists were permitted
to teach their favorite subjects in the universities  but as time went
on it became clear that the old and the new teachers could not work
amicably side by side 

 Sidenote  The humanist satire on the monks and theologians  the
so called  Letters of Obscure Men   

At last  a little before Luther s public appearance  a conflict occurred
between the  poets   as the humanists were fond of calling themselves 
and the  barbarians   as they called the theologians and monkish
writers  An eminent Hebrew scholar  Reuchlin  had become involved in a
bitter controversy with the Dominican professors of the University of
Cologne  His cause was championed by the humanists  who prepared an
extraordinary satire upon their opponents  They wrote a series of
letters  which were addressed to one of the Cologne professors and
purported to be from his former students and admirers  In these letters
the writers take pains to exhibit the most shocking ignorance and
stupidity  They narrate their scandalous doings with the ostensible
purpose of obtaining advice as to the best way to get out of their
scrapes  They vituperate the humanists in comically bad Latin  which is
perhaps the best part of the joke  269  In this way those who later
opposed Luther and his reforms were held up to ridicule in these letters
and their opposition to progress seemed clearly made out 

 Sidenote  Erasmus of Rotterdam  1467  1536  

139  The acknowledged prince of the humanists was Erasmus  No other man
of letters  unless it be Voltaire  has ever enjoyed such a European
reputation during his lifetime  He was venerated by scholars far and
wide  even in Spain and Italy  Although he was born in Rotterdam he was
not a Dutchman  but a citizen of the world  he is  in fact  claimed by
England  France  and Germany  He lived in each of these countries for a
considerable period and in each he left his mark on the thought of the
time  Erasmus  like most of the northern humanists  was deeply
interested in religious reform  and he aspired to give the world a
higher conception of religion and the Church than that which generally
prevailed  He clearly perceived  as did all the other intelligent people
of the time  the vices of the prelates  priests  and especially of the
monks  Against the latter he had a personal grudge  for he had been
forced into a monastery when he was a boy  and always looked back to the
life there with disgust  Erasmus reached the height of his fame just
before the public appearance of Luther  consequently his writings afford
an admirable means of determining how he and his innumerable admirers
felt about the Church and the clergy before the opening of the great
revolt 

 Sidenote  Erasmus  edition of the New Testament  

Erasmus spent some time in England between the years 1498 and 1506  and
made friends of the scholars there  He was especially fond of Sir Thomas
More  who wrote the famous  Utopia   and of a young man  John Colet  who
was lecturing at Oxford upon the Epistles of St  Paul  270  Colet s
enthusiasm for Paul appears to have led Erasmus to direct his vast
knowledge of the ancient languages to the explanation of the New
Testament  This was only known in the common Latin version  the
Vulgate   into which many mistakes and misapprehensions had crept 
Erasmus felt that the first thing to do  in order to promote higher
ideas of Christianity  was to purify the sources of the faith by
preparing a correct edition of the New Testament  Accordingly  in 1516 
he published the original Greek text with a new Latin translation and
explanations which mercilessly exposed the mistakes of the great body of
theologians 

 Illustration  Portrait of Erasmus by Holbein 

Erasmus would have had the Bible in the hands of every one  In the
introduction to his edition of the New Testament he says that women
should read the Gospels and the Epistles of Paul as well as the men 
The peasant in the field  the artisan in his shop  and the traveler on
the highroad should while away the time with passages from the Bible 

 Sidenote  Erasmus  idea of true religion  

Erasmus believed that the two arch enemies of true religion were  1 
paganism   into which many of the more enthusiastic Italian humanists
fell in their admiration for the ancient literatures   and  2  the
popular confidence in mere outward acts and ceremonies  like visiting
the graves of saints  the mechanical repetition of prayers  and so
forth  He claimed that the Church had become careless and had permitted
the simple teachings of Christ to be buried under myriads of dogmas
introduced by the theologians   The essence of our religion   he says 
 is peace and harmony  These can only exist where there are few dogmas
and each individual is left to form his own opinion upon many matters  

 Sidenote  In his  Praise of Folly  Erasmus attacks the evils in the
Church  

In his celebrated  Praise of Folly   271  Erasmus has much to say of the
weaknesses of the monks and theologians  and of the foolish people who
thought that religion consisted simply in pilgrimages  the worship of
relics  and the procuring of indulgences  Scarcely one of the abuses
which Luther later attacked escaped Erasmus  satirical pen  The book is
a mixture of the lightest humor and the bitterest earnestness  As one
turns its pages one is sometimes tempted to think Luther half right when
he declared Erasmus  a regular jester who makes sport of everything 
even of religion and Christ himself   Yet there was in this humorist a
deep seriousness that cannot be ignored  Erasmus was really directing
his extraordinary industry  knowledge  and insight  not toward a revival
of classical literature  but to  a renaissance of Christianity   He
believed  however  that revolt from the pope and the Church would
produce a great disturbance and result in more harm than good  He
preferred to trust in the slower but surer effects of enlightenment and
knowledge  Popular superstitions and any undue regard for the outward
forms of religion would  he argued  be outgrown and quietly disappear as
mankind became more cultivated 

To Erasmus and his many sympathizers  culture  promoted especially by
classical studies  should be the chief agency in religious reform 
Nevertheless  just as Erasmus thought that his dreams of a peaceful
reform were to be realized  as he saw the friends and patrons of
literature   Maximilian  Henry VIII  Francis I   on the thrones of
Europe  and a humanist pope  Leo X  at the head of the Church  a very
different revolution from that which he had planned  had begun and was
to embitter his declining years 

 Sidenote  Sources of discontent in Germany with the policy of the papal
court  

140  The grudge of Germany against the papal court never found a more
eloquent expression than in the verses of its greatest minnesinger 
Walther von der Vogelweide  Three hundred years before Luther s time he
declared that the pope was making merry over the stupid Germans   All
their goods will be mine  their silver is flowing into my far away
chest  their priests are living on poultry and wine and leaving the
silly layman to fast   Similar sentiments may be found in the German
writers of all the following generations  Every one of the sources of
discontent with the financial administration of the Church which the
councils had tried to correct 272  was particularly apparent in Germany 
The great German prelates  like the archbishops of Mayence  Treves 
Cologne  and Salzburg  were each required to contribute no less than ten
thousand gold guldens to the papal treasury upon having their election
duly confirmed by the pope  and many thousands more were expected from
them when they received the pallium  273  The pope enjoyed the right to
fill many important benefices in Germany  and frequently appointed
Italians  who drew the revenue without dreaming of performing any of the
duties attached to the office  A single person frequently held several
church offices  For example  early in the sixteenth century  the
Archbishop of Mayence was at the same time Archbishop of Magdeburg and
Bishop of Halberstadt  In some instances a single person had accumulated
over a score of benefices 

It is impossible to exaggerate the impression of deep and widespread
discontent with the condition of the Church which one meets in the
writings of the early sixteenth century  The whole German people  from
the rulers down to the humblest tiller of the fields  felt themselves
unjustly used  The clergy were denounced as both immoral and
inefficient  One devout writer exclaims that young men are considered
quite good enough to be priests to whom one would not intrust the care
of a cow  While the begging friars  the Franciscans  Dominicans  and
Augustinians 274   were scorned by many  they  rather than the secular
clergy  appear to have carried on the real religious work  It was an
Augustinian monk  we shall find  who preached the new gospel of
justification by faith 

Very few indeed thought of withdrawing from the Church or of attempting
to destroy the power of the pope  All that most of the Germans wished
was that the money which  on one pretense or another  flowed toward Rome
should be kept at home  and that the clergy should be upright  earnest
men who should conscientiously perform their religious duties  One
patriotic writer  however  Ulrich von Hutten  was preaching something
very like revolution at the same time that Luther began his attack on
the pope 

 Sidenote  Ulrich von Hutten  1488 1523  

Hutten was the son of a poor knight  but early tired of the monotonous
life of the castle and determined to seek the universities and acquaint
himself with the ancient literatures  of which so much was being said 
In order to carry on his studies he visited Italy and there formed a
most unfavorable impression of the papal court and of the Italian
churchmen  whom he believed to be oppressing his beloved fatherland 
When the  Letters of Obscure Men  appeared  he was so delighted with
them that he prepared a supplementary series in which he freely
satirized the theologians  Soon he began to write in German as well as
in Latin  in order the more readily to reach the ears of the people  In
one of his pamphlets attacking the popes he explains that he has himself
seen how Leo X spends the money which the Germans send him  A part goes
to his relatives  a part to maintain the luxurious papal court  and a
part to worthless companions and attendants  whose lives would shock any
honest Christian 

In Germany  of all the countries of Europe  conditions were such that
Luther s appearance wrought like an electric shock throughout the
nation  leaving no class unaffected  Throughout the land there was
discontent and a yearning for betterment  Very various  to be sure  were
the particular longings of the prince and the scholar  of knight 
burgher  and peasant  but almost all were ready to consider  at least 
the teachings of one who presented to them a new conception of salvation
which made the old Church superfluous 


     General Reading   The most complete account of the conditions in
     Germany before Luther is to be found in JANSSEN   History of the
     German People   Herder  Vols  I and II   6 25    Cambridge Modern
     History   The Macmillan Company   3 75 per vol    Vol  I  Chapters
     IX and XIX  CREIGHTON   History of the Papacy   see Vol  I  p 
     320   Vol  VI  Chapters I and II  and BEARD   Martin Luther   P 
     Green  London   1 60   Chapters I and III  are excellent treatments
     of the subject  For Erasmus  see EMERTON S charming  Desiderius
     Erasmus   G P  Putnam s Sons   1 50   which gives a considerable
     number of his letters 




CHAPTER XXV

MARTIN LUTHER AND HIS REVOLT AGAINST THE CHURCH


 Sidenote  Luther s birth and education  

141  Martin Luther was of peasant origin  His father was very poor  and
was trying his fortune as a miner near the Harz Mountains when his
eldest son  Martin  was born in 1483  Martin sometimes spoke  in later
life  of the poverty and superstition which surrounded him in his
childhood  of how his mother carried on her back the wood for the
household and told him stories of a witch who had made away with the
village priest  The boy was sent early to school  for his father was
determined that his eldest son should be a lawyer  At eighteen  Martin
entered the greatest of the north German universities  at Erfurt  where
he spent four years  There he became acquainted with some of the young
humanists  for example  the one who is supposed to have written a great
part of the  Letters of Obscure Men   He was interested in the various
classical writers  but devoted the usual attention to logic and
Aristotle 

 Sidenote  Luther decides to become a monk  

Suddenly  when he had completed his college course and was ready to
enter the law school  he called his friends together for one last hour
of pleasure  and the next morning he led them to the gate of an
Augustinian monastery  where he bade them farewell and turning his back
on the world became a mendicant friar  That day  July 17  1505  when the
young master of arts  regardless of his father s anger and
disappointment  sought salvation within the walls of a monastery  was
the beginning of a religious experiment which had momentous consequences
for the world 

 Sidenote  Luther s disappointment in the monastery  

Luther later declared that  if ever a monk got to heaven through
monkery   he was assuredly among those who merited salvation  So great
was his ardor  so nervously anxious was he to save his soul by the
commonly recognized means of fasts  vigils  prolonged prayers  and a
constant disregard of the usual rules of health  that he soon could no
longer sleep  He fell into despondency  and finally into despair  The
ordinary observance of the rules of the monastery  which satisfied most
of the monks  failed to give him peace  He felt that even if he
outwardly did right he could never purify all his thoughts and desires 
His experience led him to conclude that neither the Church nor the
monastery provided any device which enabled him to keep his affections
always centered on what he knew to be holy and right  Therefore they
seemed to him to fail and to leave him  at heart  a hopelessly corrupt
sinner  justly under God s condemnation 

 Sidenote  Justification by faith  not through  good works   

Gradually a new view of Christianity came to him  The head of the
monastery bade him trust in God s goodness and mercy and not to rely
upon his own  good works   He began to study the writings of St  Paul
and of Augustine  and from them was led to conclude that man was
incapable  in the sight of God  of any good works whatsoever  and could
only be saved by faith in God s promises  This gave him much comfort 
but it took him years to clarify his ideas and to reach the conclusion
that the existing Church was opposed to the idea of justification by
faith  because it fostered what seemed to him a delusive confidence in
 good works   He was thirty seven years old before he finally became
convinced that it was his duty to become the leader in the destruction
of the old order 

 Sidenote  Luther becomes a teacher in the University of Wittenberg 
1508  

It was no new thing for a young monk  suddenly cut off from the sunshine
and hoping for speedy spiritual peace  to suffer disappointment and fall
into gloomy forebodings  as did Brother Martin  He  however  having
fought the battle through to victory  was soon placed in a position to
bring comfort to others similarly afflicted with doubts as to their
power to please God  In 1508 he was called to the new university which
Frederick the Wise  elector of Saxony  had established at Wittenberg  We
know little of his early years as a professor  but he soon began to
lecture on the epistles of Paul and to teach his students the doctrine
of justification by faith 

 Illustration  Luther 

 Sidenote  Luther s visit to Rome  

Luther had as yet no idea of attacking the Church  When  about 1511  he
journeyed to Rome on business of his order  he devoutly visited all the
holy places for the good of his soul  and was almost tempted to wish
that his father and mother were dead  so that he might free them from
purgatory by his pious observances  Yet he was shocked by the impiety of
the Italian churchmen and the scandalous stories about popes Alexander
VI and Julius II  the latter of whom was just then engaged in his
warlike expeditions into northern Italy  The evidences of immorality on
the part of the popes may well have made it easier for him later to
reach the conclusion that the head of the Church was the chief enemy of
religion 

 Sidenote  Luther teaches a new kind of theology  

Before long he began to encourage his students to defend his favorite
beliefs in the debates in which they took part  For instance  one of the
candidates for a degree  under Luther s inspiration  attacked the old
theology against which the humanists had been fighting   It is an
error   he says   to declare that no one can become a theologian without
Aristotle  on the contrary  no one can become a theologian except it be
without him   Luther desired the students to rely upon the Bible 
Paul s writings above all  and upon the church fathers  especially
Augustine  275 

 Sidenote  Luther s theses on indulgences  

142  In October  1517  Tetzel  a Dominican monk  began granting
indulgences in the neighborhood of Wittenberg  and making claims for
them which appeared to Luther wholly irreconcilable with the deepest
truths of Christianity as he understood and taught them  He therefore 
in accordance with the custom of the time  wrote out a series of
ninety five statements in regard to indulgences  These he posted on the
church door and invited any one interested in the matter to enter into a
discussion with him on the subject  which he believed was very ill
understood  In posting these  theses   as they were called  Luther did
not intend to attack the Church  and had no expectation of creating a
sensation  The theses were in Latin and addressed only to scholars  It
turned out  however  that every one  high and low  learned and
unlearned  was ready to discuss the perplexing theme of the nature of
indulgences  The theses were promptly translated into German  printed 
and scattered throughout the land 

 Sidenote  The nature of indulgences  

In order to understand the indulgence  it must be remembered that the
priest had the right to forgive the sin of the truly contrite sinner who
had duly confessed his evil deeds  276  Absolution freed the sinner from
the deadly guilt which would otherwise have dragged him down to hell 
but it did not free him from the penalties which God  or his
representative  the priest  might choose to impose upon him  Serious
penances had earlier been imposed by the Church for wrongdoing  but in
Luther s time the sinner who had been absolved was chiefly afraid of the
sufferings reserved for him in purgatory  It was there that his soul
would be purified by suffering and prepared for heaven  The indulgence
was a pardon  usually granted by the pope  through which the contrite
sinner escaped a part  or all  of the punishment which remained even
after he had been absolved  The pardon did not therefore forgive the
guilt of the sinner  for that had necessarily to be removed before the
indulgence was granted  it only removed or mitigated the penalties which
even the forgiven sinner would  without the indulgence  have expected to
undergo in purgatory  277 

The first indulgences for the  dead  had been granted shortly before the
time of Luther s birth  By securing one of these  the relatives or
friends of those in purgatory might reduce the period of torment which
the sufferers had to undergo before they could be admitted to heaven 
Those who were in purgatory had  of course  been duly absolved of the
guilt of their sins before their death  otherwise their souls would have
been lost and the indulgence could not advantage them in any way 

 Sidenote  Leo X issues indulgences in connection with the rebuilding of
St  Peter s  

With a view of obtaining funds from the Germans to continue the
reconstruction of the great church of St  Peter  278  Leo X had arranged
for the extensive grant of indulgences  both for the living and for the
dead  The contribution for them varied greatly  the rich were required
to pay a considerable sum  while the  very  poor were to receive these
pardons gratis  The representatives of the pope were naturally anxious
to collect all the money possible  and did their best to induce every
one to secure an indulgence  either for himself or for his deceased
friends in purgatory  In their zeal they made many reckless claims for
the indulgences  to which no thoughtful churchman or even layman could
listen without misgivings 

 Sidenote  Contents of Luther s theses  

Luther was not the first to criticise the current notions of
indulgences  but his theses  owing to the vigor of their language and
the existing irritation of the Germans against the administration of the
Church  first brought the subject into prominence  He declared that the
indulgence was very unimportant and that the poor man would better spend
his money for the needs of his household  The truly repentant  he
argued  do not flee punishment  but bear it willingly in sign of their
sorrow  Faith in God  not the procuring of pardons  brings forgiveness 
and every Christian who feels true contrition for his sins will receive
full remission of the punishment as well as of the guilt  Could the pope
know how his agents misled the people  he would rather have St  Peter s
burn to ashes than build it up with money gained under false pretenses 
Then  Luther adds  there is danger that the common man will ask awkward
questions  For example   If the pope releases souls from purgatory for
money  why not for charity s sake   or   Since the pope is rich as
Crœsus  why does he not build St  Peter s with his own money  instead
of taking that of the poor man   279 

 Sidenote  Luther summoned to Rome  

143  The theses were soon forwarded to Rome  and a few months after they
were posted Luther received a summons to appear at the papal court to
answer for his heretical assertions  Luther still respected the pope as
the head of the Church  but he had no wish to risk his safety by going
to Rome  As Leo X was anxious not to offend so important a person as the
elector of Saxony  who intervened for Luther  he did not press the
matter  and agreed that Luther should confer with the papal emissaries
in Germany 

 Sidenote  The discussion continues  

Brother Martin was induced to keep silence for a time  but was aroused
again by a great debate arranged at Leipsic in the summer of 1519  Here
Eck  a German theologian noted for his devotion to the pope and his
great skill in debate  challenged one of Luther s colleagues  Carlstadt 
to discuss publicly some of the matters in which Luther himself was
especially interested  Luther therefore asked to be permitted to take
part 

 Sidenote  The debate at Leipsic  1519  

The discussion turned upon the powers of the pope  Luther  who had been
reading church history  declared that the pope had not enjoyed his
supremacy for more than four hundred years  This statement was
inaccurate  but  nevertheless  he had hit upon an argument against the
customs of the Roman Catholic Church which has ever since been
constantly urged by Protestants  They assert that the mediæval Church
and the papacy developed slowly  and that the apostles knew nothing of
masses  indulgences  purgatory  and the headship of the Bishop of Rome 

 Sidenote  Eck forces Luther to admit that the Council of Constance was
wrong and Huss right  

Eck promptly pointed out that Luther s views resembled those of Wycliffe
and Huss  which had been condemned by the Council of Constance  Luther
was forced reluctantly to admit that the council had condemned some
thoroughly Christian teachings  This was a decisive admission  Like
other Germans  Luther had been accustomed to abhor Huss and the
Bohemians  and to regard with pride the great general Council of
Constance  which had been held in Germany and under the auspices of its
emperor  He now admitted that even a general council could err  and was
soon convinced  that we are all Hussites  without knowing it  yes  Paul
and St  Augustine were good Hussites   Luther s public encounter with a
disputant of European reputation  and the startling admissions which he
was compelled to make  first made him realize that he might become the
leader in an attack on the Church  He began to see that a great change
and upheaval was unavoidable 

 Sidenote  Luther and the humanists natural allies  

144  As Luther became a confessed revolutionist he began to find friends
among other revolutionists and reformers  He had some ardent admirers
even before the disputation at Leipsic  especially at Wittenberg and in
the great city of Nuremberg  To the humanists  Luther seemed a natural
ally  They might not understand his religious beliefs  but they clearly
saw that he was beginning to attack a class of people that they
disliked  particularly the old fashioned theologians who venerated
Aristotle  He felt  moreover  as they did in regard to the many vices in
the Church  and was becoming suspicious of the begging monks  although
he was himself at the head of the Wittenberg monastery  So those who had
defended Reuchlin were now ready to support Luther  to whom they wrote
encouraging letters  Luther s works were published by Erasmus  printer
at Basel  and sent to Italy  France  England  and Spain 

 Sidenote  Erasmus  attitude toward the Lutheran movement  

But Erasmus  the mighty sovereign of the men of letters  refused to take
sides in the controversy  He asserted that he had not read more than a
dozen pages of Luther s writings  Although he admitted that  the
monarchy of the Roman high priest was  in its existing condition  the
pest of Christendom   he believed that a direct attack upon it would do
no good  Luther  he urged  would better be discreet and trust that
mankind would become more intelligent and outgrow their false ideas 

 Sidenote  Contrast between Luther and Erasmus  

To Erasmus  man was capable of progress  cultivate him and extend his
knowledge  and he would grow better and better  He was a free agent 
with  on the whole  upright tendencies  To Luther  on the other hand 
man was utterly corrupt  and incapable of a single righteous wish or
deed  His will was enslaved to evil  and his only hope lay in the
recognition of his absolute inability to better himself  and in a humble
reliance upon God s mercy  By faith only  not by conduct  could he be
saved  Erasmus was willing to wait until every one agreed that the
Church should be reformed  Luther had no patience with an institution
which seemed to him to be leading souls to destruction by inducing men
to rely upon their good works  Both men realized that they could not
agree  For a time they expressed respect for each other  but at last
they became involved in a bitter controversy in which they gave up all
pretense to friendship  Erasmus declared that Luther  by scorning good
works and declaring that no one could do right  had made his followers
indifferent to their conduct  and that those who accepted Luther s
teachings straightway became pert  rude fellows  who would not take off
their hats to him on the street 

 Sidenote  Ulrich von Hutten espouses Luther s cause  

Ulrich von Hutten  on the other hand  warmly espoused Luther s cause as
that of a German patriot and an opponent of Roman tyranny  intrigue  and
oppression   Let us defend our freedom   he wrote   and liberate the
long enslaved fatherland  We have God on our side  and if God be with
us  who can be against us   Hutten enlisted the interest of some of the
other knights  who offered to defend Luther should the churchmen attack
him  and invited him to take refuge in their castles 

 Sidenote  Luther begins to use violent language  

145  Thus encouraged  Luther  who gave way at times to his naturally
violent disposition  became threatening  and suggested that the civil
power should punish the churchmen and force them to reform their
conduct   We punish thieves with the gallows  bandits with the sword 
heretics with fire  why should we not  with far greater propriety 
attack with every kind of weapon these very masters of perdition  the
cardinals  popes  and the whole mob in the Roman Sodom    The die is
cast   he writes to a friend   I despise Rome s wrath as I do her favor 
I will have no reconciliation or intercourse with her in all time to
come  Let her condemn and burn my writings  I will  if fire can be
found  publicly condemn and burn the whole papal law  

 Sidenote  Luther s and Hutten s appeal to the German people  

 Sidenote  Luther s  Address to the German Nobility   

Hutten and Luther vied with one another during the year 1520 in
attacking the pope and his representatives  They both possessed a fine
command of the German language  and they were fired by a common hatred
of Rome  Hutten had little or none of Luther s religious fervor  but he
could not find colors too dark in which to picture to his countrymen
the greed of the papal curia  which he described as a vast den  to which
everything was dragged which could be filched from the Germans  Of
Luther s popular pamphlets  the first really famous one was his  Address
to the German Nobility   in which he calls upon the rulers of Germany 
especially the knights  to reform the abuses themselves  since he
believed that it was vain to wait for the Church to do so 

He explains that there are three walls behind which the papacy had been
wont to take refuge when any one proposed to remedy its abuses  There
was  first  the claim that the clergy formed a separate class  superior
even to the civil rulers  who might not punish a churchman  no matter
how bad he was  Secondly  the pope claimed to be superior to a council 
so that even the representatives of the Church might not correct him 
And  lastly  the pope assumed the sole right to interpret the meaning of
the Scriptures  consequently he could not be refuted by arguments from
the Bible  Thus the pope had stolen the three rods with which he might
have been punished  Luther claimed to cast down these defenses by
denying  to begin with  that there was anything especially sacred about
a clergyman except the duties which he had been designated to perform 
If he did not attend to his work he might be deprived of his office at
any moment  just as one would turn off an incompetent tailor or farmer 
and in that case he became a simple layman again  Luther claimed that it
was the right and duty of the civil government to punish a churchman who
does wrong just as if he were the humblest layman  When this first wall
was destroyed the others would fall easily enough  for the dominant
position of the clergy was the very corner stone of the mediæval
Church  280 

 Sidenote  Luther advocates social as well as religious reforms  

The pamphlet closes with a long list of evils which must be done away
with before Germany can become prosperous  Luther saw that his view of
religion really implied a social revolution  He advocated reducing the
monasteries to a tenth of their number and permitting those who were
disappointed in the good they got from living in them freely to leave 
He would not have them prisons  but hospitals and refuges for the
soul sick  He points out the evils of pilgrimages and of the numerous
church holidays  which interfere with daily work  The clergy  he urged 
should be permitted to marry and have families like other citizens  The
universities should be reformed  and  the accursed heathen  Aristotle  
should be cast out from them 

It should be noted that Luther appeals to the authorities not in the
name of religion chiefly  but in that of public order and prosperity  He
says that the money of the Germans flies feather light over the Alps to
Italy  but it suddenly becomes like lead when there is a question of its
coming back  He showed himself a master of vigorous language  and his
denunciations of the clergy and the Church resounded like a trumpet call
in the ears of his countrymen 

 Sidenote  Luther attacks the sacramental system in his  Babylonian
Captivity of the Church   1520  

Luther had said little of the doctrines of the Church in his  Address to
the German Nobility   but within three or four months he issued a second
work  in which he sought to overthrow the whole system of the
sacraments  as it had been taught by Peter Lombard and the theologians
of the thirteenth century  281  Four of the seven
sacraments  ordination  marriage  confirmation  and extreme unction  he
rejected altogether  He completely revised the conception of the Mass 
or the Lord s Supper  He stripped the priest of his singular powers by
denying that he performed the miracle of transubstantiation or offered
a sacrifice for the living and the dead when he officiated at the Lord s
Supper  The priest was  in his eyes  only a minister  in the Protestant
sense of the word  one of whose chief functions was preaching 

 Sidenote  Luther excommunicated  

146  Luther had long expected to be excommunicated  But it was not until
late in 1520 that his adversary  Eck  arrived in Germany with a papal
bull condemning many of Luther s assertions as heretical and giving him
sixty days in which to recant  Should he fail to come to himself within
that time  he and all who adhered to or favored him were to be
excommunicated  and any place which harbored him should fall under the
interdict  Now  since the highest power in Christendom had pronounced
Luther a heretic  he should unhesitatingly have been delivered up by the
German authorities  But no one thought of arresting him 

 Sidenote  The German authorities reluctant to publish the bull against
Luther  

The bull irritated the German princes  whether they liked Luther or not 
they decidedly disliked to have the pope issuing commands to them  Then
it appeared to them very unfair that Luther s personal enemy should have
been intrusted with the publication of the bull  Even the princes and
universities that were most friendly to the pope published the bull with
great reluctance  The students of Erfurt and Leipsic pursued Eck with
pointed allusions to Pharisees and devil s emissaries  In many cases the
bull was ignored altogether  Luther s own sovereign  the elector of
Saxony  while no convert to the new views  was anxious that Luther s
case should be fairly considered  and continued to protect him  One
mighty prince  however  the young emperor Charles V  promptly and
willingly published the bull  not  however  as emperor  but as ruler of
the Austrian dominions and of the Netherlands  Luther s works were
burned at Louvain  Mayence  and Cologne  the strongholds of the old
theology 

 Sidenote  Luther defies pope and emperor  

 Hard it is   Luther exclaimed   to be forced to contradict all the
prelates and princes  but there is no other way to escape hell and
God s anger   Never had one man so unreservedly declared war upon pretty
much the whole consecrated order of things  As one power arrayed against
an equal  the Wittenberg professor opposed himself to pope and emperor 
giving back curse for curse and fagot for fagot  His students were
summoned to witness  the pious  religious spectacle   when he cast Leo s
bull on the fire  along with the canon law and one of the books of
scholastic theology which he most disliked 

 Sidenote  Hutten s plan for an immediate destruction of the old
Church  

Never was the temptation so great for Luther to encourage a violent
demolition of the old structure of the Church as at this time  Hutten
was bent upon the speedy carrying out of the revolution which both he
and Luther were forwarding by their powerful writings  Hutten had taken
refuge in the castle of the leader of the German knights  Franz von
Sickingen  who he believed would be an admirable military commander in
the coming contest for truth and liberty  Hutten frankly proposed to the
young emperor that the papacy should be abolished  that the property of
the Church should be confiscated  and that ninety nine out of a hundred
of the clergy should be dispensed with as superfluous  In this way
Germany would be freed  he argued  from the control of the  parsons  and
from their corruption  From the vast proceeds of the confiscation the
state might be strengthened and an army of knights might be maintained
for the defense of the empire 

 Sidenote  Views of the papal representative on public opinion in
Germany  

Public opinion appeared ready for a revolution   I am pretty familiar
with the history of this German nation   Leo s representative  Aleander 
remarked   I know their past heresies  councils  and schisms  but never
were affairs so serious before  Compared with present conditions  the
struggle between Henry IV and Gregory VII was as violets and roses    
These mad dogs are now well equipped with knowledge and arms  they boast
that they are no longer ignorant brutes like their predecessors  they
claim that Italy has lost the monopoly of the sciences and that the
Tiber now flows into the Rhine    Nine tenths of the Germans   he
calculated   are shouting  Luther   and the other tenth goes so far at
least as  Death to the Roman curia   

 Sidenote  Luther s attitude toward a violent realization of his
reforms  

Luther was too frequently reckless and violent in his writings  He often
said that bloodshed could not be avoided when it should please God to
visit his judgments upon the stiff necked and perverse generation of
 Romanists   as the Germans contemptuously called the supporters of the
pope  Yet he always discouraged precipitate reform  He was reluctant to
make changes  except in belief  He held that so long as an institution
did not mislead  it did no harm  He was  in short  no fanatic at heart 
The pope had established himself without force  so would he be crushed
by God s word without force  This  we may assume  was Luther s most
profound conviction  even in the first period of enthusiasm and
confidence  He perhaps never fully realized how different Hutten s ideas
were from his own  for the poet knight died while still a young man  And
as for Franz von Sickingen  Luther soon learned to execrate the
ruthless  worldly soldier who brought discredit by his violence upon the
cause of reform 

 Sidenote  Charles V s want of sympathy with the German reformers  

147  Among the enemies of the German reformers none was more important
than the young emperor  It was toward the end of the year 1520 that
Charles came to Germany for the first time  After being crowned king of
the Romans at Aix la Chapelle  he assumed  with the pope s consent  the
title of emperor elect  as his grandfather Maximilian had done  He then
moved on to the town of Worms  where he was to hold his first diet and
face the German situation 

Although scarcely more than a boy in years  Charles had already begun to
take life very seriously  He had decided that Spain  not Germany  was to
be the bulwark and citadel of all his realms  Like the more enlightened
of his Spanish subjects  he realized the need of reforming the Church 
but he had no sympathy whatever with any change of doctrine  He
proposed to live and die a devout Catholic of the old type  such as his
orthodox ancestors had been  He felt  moreover  that he must maintain
the same religion in all parts of his heterogeneous dominions  If he
should permit the Germans to declare their independence of the Church 
the next step would be for them to claim that they had a right to
regulate their government regardless of their emperor 

 Sidenote  Luther summoned to the diet at Worms  

Upon arriving at Worms the case of Luther was at once forced upon
Charles  attention by the assiduous papal representative  Aleander  who
was indefatigable in urging him to outlaw the heretic without further
delay  While Charles seemed convinced of Luther s guilt  he could not
proceed against him without serious danger  The monk had become a
national hero and had the support of the powerful elector of Saxony 
Other princes  who had ordinarily no wish to protect a heretic  felt
that Luther s denunciation of the evils in the Church and of the actions
of the pope was very gratifying  After much discussion it was finally
arranged  to the great disgust of the zealous Aleander  that Luther
should be summoned to Worms and be given an opportunity to face the
German nation and the emperor  and to declare plainly whether he was the
author of the heretical books ascribed to him  and whether he still
adhered to the doctrines which the pope had declared wrong 

The emperor accordingly wrote the  honorable and respected  Luther a
very polite letter  ordering him to appear at Worms and granting him a
safe conduct thither  Luther said  on receiving the summons  that if he
was going to Worms merely to retract  he might better stay in
Wittenberg  where he could  if he would  abjure his errors quite as well
as on the Rhine  If  on the other hand  the emperor wished him to come
to Worms in order that he might be put to death  he was quite ready to
go   for  with Christ s help  I will not flee and leave the Word in the
lurch  My revocation will be in this wise   Earlier I said that the
pope was God s vicar  now I revoke and say  the pope is Christ s enemy
and an envoy of the devil   

148  Luther accordingly set out for Worms accompanied by the imperial
herald  He enjoyed a triumphal progress through the various places on
his way and preached repeatedly  in spite of the fact that he was an
excommunicated heretic  He found the diet in a great state of commotion 
The papal representative was the object of daily insults  and Hutten and
Sickingen talked of scattering Luther s enemies by a sally from the
neighboring castle of Ebernburg 

 Sidenote  Luther before the diet  

It was not proposed to give Luther an opportunity to defend his beliefs
before the diet  When he appeared before  emperor and empire   he was
simply asked if a pile of his Latin and German works were really his 
and  if so  whether he revoked what he had said in them  To the first
question the monk replied in a low voice that he had written these and
more  As to the second question  which involved the welfare of the soul
and the Word of God  he asked that he might have a little while to
consider 

The following day  in a Latin address which he repeated in German  he
admitted that he had been overviolent in his attacks upon his opponents 
but he said that no one could deny that  through the popes  decrees  the
consciences of faithful Christians had been miserably ensnared and
tormented  and their goods and possessions  especially in Germany 
devoured  Should he recant those things which he had said against the
pope s conduct he would only strengthen the papal tyranny and give an
opportunity for new usurpations  If  however  adequate arguments against
his position could be found in the Scriptures  he would gladly and
willingly recant  He could not  however  accept the decision either of
pope or of council  since both  he believed  had made mistakes and
contradicted themselves   I must   he concluded   allow my conscience
to be controlled by God s Word  Recant I can not and will not  for it is
hazardous and dishonorable to act against one s conscience  

 Sidenote  The emperor forced by the law to outlaw Luther  

There was now nothing for the emperor to do but to outlaw Luther  who
had denied the binding character of the commands of the head of the
Church and of the highest Christian tribunal  a general council  His
argument that the Scriptures sustained him in his revolt could not be
considered by the diet  282 

 Sidenote  The Edict of Worms  1521  

Aleander was accordingly assigned the agreeable duty of drafting the
famous Edict of Worms  This document declared Luther an outlaw on the
following grounds  that he disturbed the recognized number and
celebration of the sacraments  impeached the regulations in regard to
marriage  scorned and vilified the pope  despised the priesthood and
stirred up the laity to dip their hands in the blood of the clergy 
denied free will  taught licentiousness  despised authority  advocated a
brutish existence  and was a menace to Church and State alike  Every one
was forbidden to give the heretic food  drink  or shelter  and required
to seize him and deliver him to the emperor 

Moreover  the decree provides that  no one shall dare to buy  sell 
read  preserve  copy  print  or cause to be copied or printed any books
of the aforesaid Martin Luther  condemned by our holy father the pope 
as aforesaid  or any other writings in German or Latin hitherto composed
by him  since they are foul  noxious  suspected  and published by a
notorious and stiff necked heretic  Neither shall any one dare to affirm
his opinions  or proclaim  defend  or advance them in any other way
that human ingenuity can invent   notwithstanding that he may have put
some good into his writings in order to deceive the simple man   283 

For the last time the empire had recognized its obligation to carry out
the decrees of the Bishop of Rome   I am becoming ashamed of my
fatherland   Hutten cried  So general was the disapproval of the edict
that few were willing to pay any attention to it  Charles immediately
left Germany  and for nearly ten years was occupied outside it with the
government of Spain and a succession of wars 


     General Reading   BEARD   Martin Luther   see above  p  386   is
     probably the best account in English of Luther before his
     retirement to the Wartburg  KÖSTLIN   Life of Luther   Scribner s
     Sons   2 50   is excellent  An account of Luther and Hutten by a
     learned Roman Catholic writer may be found in JANSSEN   History of
     the German People   see above  p  386   Vol  III  CREIGHTON 
      History of the Papacy   see above  p  320   Vol  VI  Chapters III
     and V are devoted to Luther and the diet of Worms 




CHAPTER XXVI

COURSE OF THE PROTESTANT REVOLT IN GERMANY

1521 1555


 Sidenote  Luther begins a new translation of the Bible in the
Wartburg  

149  As Luther neared Eisenach upon his way home from Worms he was
seized by a band of men and conducted to the Wartburg  a castle
belonging to the elector of Saxony  Here he was concealed until any
danger from the action of the emperor or diet should pass by  His chief
occupation during several months of hiding was to begin a new
translation of the Bible into German  He had finished the New Testament
before he left the Wartburg in March  1522 

Up to this time  German editions of the Scriptures  while not uncommon 
were poor and obscure  Luther s task was a difficult one  He said with
truth that  translation is not an art to be practiced by every one  it
demands a right pious  true  industrious  reverent  Christian 
scholarly  experienced  and well trained mind   He had studied Greek for
only two or three years  and he knew far less Hebrew than Greek 
Moreover  there was no generally accepted form of the German language of
which he could make use  Each region had its peculiar dialect which
seemed outlandish to the neighboring district 

 Sidenote  Luther s Bible the first important book in modern German  

He was anxious above all that the Bible should be put into language that
would seem perfectly clear and natural to the common folk  So he went
about asking the mothers and children and the laborers questions which
might draw out the expression that he was looking for  It sometimes took
him two or three weeks to find the right word  But so well did he do
his work that his Bible may be regarded as a great landmark in the
history of the German language  It was the first book of any importance
written in modern German  and it has furnished an imperishable standard
for the language 

 Sidenote  General discussion of public questions in pamphlets and
satires  

Previous to 1518 there had been very few books or pamphlets printed in
German  The translation of the Bible into language so simple that even
the unlearned might profit by it was only one of the signs of a general
effort to awaken the minds of the common people  Luther s friends and
enemies also commenced to write for the great German public in its own
language  The common man began to raise his voice  to the scandal of the
learned 

Hundreds of pamphlets  satires  and pictorial caricatures have come down
to us which indicate that the religious and other questions of the day
were often treated in somewhat the same spirit in which our comic papers
deal with political problems and discussions now  We find  for instance 
a correspondence between Leo X and the devil  and a witty dialogue
between Franz von Sickingen and St  Peter at the gate of heaven  In the
latter Peter confesses that he has never heard of the right  to loose
and to bind   of which his successors say so much  He refuses to discuss
military matters with Sickingen  but calls in St  George  who is
supposed to be conversant with the art of war  In another satire  a
vacation visit of St  Peter to the earth is described  He is roughly
treated  especially by the soldiers at an inn  and hastens back to
heaven with a sad tale of the evil plight of Germany  of how badly
children are brought up  and how unreliable the servants are  284 

 Sidenote  Divergent notions of how the Church should actually be
reformed  

150  Hitherto there had been a great deal of talk of reform  but as yet
nothing had actually been done  There was no sharp line drawn between
the different classes of reformers  All agreed that something should be
done to better the Church  few realized how divergent were the real ends
in view  The princes listened to Luther because they hoped to control
the churchmen and their property and check the outflow of money to Rome 
The knights  under Sickingen  hated the princes  of whose increasing
power they were jealous  Their idea of  righteousness  involved the
destruction of the existing rulers and the exaltation of their own
class  The peasants heard Luther gladly because he seemed to furnish new
proofs of the injustice of the dues which they paid to their lords  The
higher clergy were bent upon escaping the papal control  and the lower
clergy wished to have their marriages sanctioned  It is clear that
religious motives must have been often subordinated to other interests 

Disappointment and chagrin awaited Luther when each of the various
parties began to carry out its particular notions of reform  His
doctrines were misunderstood  distorted  and dishonored  He sometimes
was driven to doubt if his belief in justification by faith were not
after all a terrible mistake  His first shock came from Wittenberg 

 Sidenote  Carlstadt advocates breaking up the monasteries  

While Luther was still at the Wartburg  Carlstadt  one of his colleagues
in the university  became convinced that the monks and nuns ought to
leave their cloisters and marry like other people  This was a serious
proposition for two reasons  In the first place  those who deserted the
cloister were violating an oath which they had voluntarily taken  in the
second place  if the monasteries were broken up the problem would
present itself of the disposal of the property  which had been given to
them by pious persons for the good of their souls  and with the
expectation that the monks would give the donors the benefit of their
prayers  Nevertheless  the monks began to leave Luther s own monastery 
and the students and citizens to tear down the images of the saints in
the churches  The Lord s Supper was no longer celebrated in the form of
the Mass  since that was declared to be an idolatrous worshiping of the
bread and wine  Then Carlstadt reached the conclusion that all learning
was superfluous  for the Scriptures said plainly that God had concealed
himself from the wise and revealed the truth unto babes  He astonished
the tradespeople by consulting them in regard to obscure passages in the
Bible  The school at Wittenberg was turned into a bake shop  The
students  who had been attracted to the university from all parts of
Germany  began to return home  and the professors prepared to emigrate 

 Sidenote  Luther returns to Wittenberg and explains his plan of reform 
1522  

When the news of these events reached Luther  he left his concealment 
regardless of the danger  and returned to Wittenberg  Here he preached a
series of vigorous sermons in which he pleaded for moderation and
reason  With some of the changes advocated by Carlstadt he sympathized 
He would  for instance  have done away with the adoration of the host
and the celebration of private masses  On the other hand  he disapproved
of the disorderly breaking up of the monasteries  although he held that
those who had accepted the doctrine of justification by faith might lay
aside their cowls  since they had taken their vows when they were under
the misapprehension that they could save themselves by good works  Those
who remained in the monasteries were not  moreover  to beg any longer 
but should earn an honest livelihood 

 Sidenote  Luther advocates patience and moderation  

Luther felt that all changes in religious practices should be made by
the government  it should not be left to  Mr  Everybody    Herr Omnes  
to determine what should be rejected and what retained  If the
authorities refused to act  then there was nothing to do but to be
patient and use one s influence for good   Teach  speak  write  and
preach that the ordinances of man are naught  Advise that no one shall
any more become a priest  monk  or nun  and that those who occupy such
positions shall leave them  Give no more money for papal privileges 
candles  bells  votive tablets  and churches  but say that a Christian
life consists in faith and love  Let us keep this up for two years and
you will see where pope  bishop  monks  nuns  and all the hocus pocus
of the papal government will be  it will vanish away like smoke   God 
Luther urged  has left us free to choose whether we shall marry  become
monks  fast  confess  or place images in the churches  These things are
not vital to salvation  and each may do what seems to him to be helpful
in his particular case 

 Sidenote  Impossibility of peaceful reform  

Luther s plan of moderation was  however  wholly impracticable  The
enthusiasm of those who rejected the old views led to a whole hearted
repudiation of everything which suggested their former beliefs  Few
could look with forbearance upon the symbols and practices of a form of
religion which they had learned to despise  Moreover  many who had no
deep religious feelings delighted in joining in the destruction of the
paintings  stained glass  and statues in the churches  simply from a
love of disorder 

 Sidenote  Franz von Sickingen attacks the Archbishop of Treves  

151  Luther was soon to realize that a peaceful revolution was out of
the question  His knightly adherents  Hutten and Franz von Sickingen 
were the first to bring discredit upon the religious movement by their
violence  In the autumn of 1522 Sickingen declared war upon his
neighbor  the Archbishop of Treves  in order to make a beginning in the
knights  proposed attack upon the princes in general  He promised the
people of Treves  to free them from the heavy  unchristian yoke of the
parsons and to lead them into evangelical liberty   He had already
abolished the Mass in his castle and given shelter to some of Luther s
followers  But Franz  in undertaking to put the gospel  as he understood
it  in practice by arms  had other than religious motives  His
admiration of Luther probably had but little to do with his anxiety to
put down a hated ecclesiastical prince and seize his property 

 Sidenote  Confederation of knights broken up by the princes  

 Sidenote  Death of Franz von Sickingen and Hutten  

The Archbishop of Treves proved himself a sagacious military commander
and gained the support of his subjects  Franz was forced to retire to
his castle  where he was besieged by the neighboring elector of the
Palatinate and the landgrave of Hesse  a friend of Luther s  The walls
of the stronghold were battered down by the  unchristian cannonading  
and the  executor of righteousness   as Franz was called  was fatally
injured by a falling beam  A few months later  Hutten died  a miserable
fugitive in Switzerland  A confederation of the knights  of which
Sickingen had been the head  aroused the apprehension of the princes 
who gathered sufficient forces to destroy more than twenty of the
knights  castles  So Hutten s great plan for restoring the knights to
their former influence came to a sad and sudden end  It is clear that
these men had little in common with Luther  yet they talked much of
evangelical reform  and he was naturally blamed for their misdeeds 
Those who adhered to the old Church now felt that they had conclusive
proof that heresy led to anarchy  and since it threatened the civil
government as well as the Church  they urged that it should be put down
with fire and sword 

 Sidenote  Hadrian VI confesses the evil deeds of the papacy  

152  While Luther was in the Wartburg  the cultured and worldly Leo X
had died and had been succeeded by a devout professor of theology  who
had once been Charles V s tutor  The new pope  Hadrian VI  was honest
and simple  and a well known advocate of reform without change of
belief  He believed that the German revolt was a divine judgment called
down by the wickedness of men  especially of the priests and prelates 
He freely confessed  through his legate  in a meeting of the German diet
at Nuremberg  that the popes had been perhaps the most conspicuous
sinners   We well know that for many years the most scandalous things
have happened in this holy see  of Rome    abuses in spiritual matters 
violations of the canons   that  in short  everything has been just the
opposite of what it should have been  What wonder  then  if the disease
has spread from the head to the members  from the popes to the lower
clergy  We clergymen have all strayed from the right path  and for a
long time there has been no one of us righteous  no  not one  

 Sidenote  Hadrian s denunciation of Luther  

In spite of this honest confession  Hadrian was unwilling to listen to
the grievances of the Germans until they had put down Luther and his
heresies  He was  the pope declared  a worse foe to Christendom than the
Turk  There could be nothing fouler or more disgraceful than Luther s
teachings  He sought to overthrow the very basis of religion and
morality  He was like Mohammed  but worse  for he would have the
consecrated monks and nuns marry  Nothing would be securely established
among men if every presumptuous upstart should insist that he had the
right to overturn everything which had been firmly established for
centuries and by saints and sages 

 Sidenote  The action of the diet of Nuremberg  1522  

The diet was much gratified by the pope s frank avowal of the sins of
his predecessors  in which it heartily concurred  It was glad that the
pope was going to begin his reform at home  but it strenuously refused
to order the enforcement of the Edict of Worms for fear of stirring up
new troubles  The Germans were too generally convinced that they were
suffering from the oppression of the Roman curia to permit Luther to be
injured  His arrest would seem an attack upon the freedom of gospel
teaching and a defence of the old system  it might even lead to civil
war  So the diet advised that a Christian council be summoned in Germany
to be made up of laymen as well as clergymen  who should be charged to
speak their opinions freely and say  not what was pleasant  but what was
true  In the meantime  only the pure gospel should be preached according
to the teaching of the Christian Church  As to the complaint of the pope
that the monks had deserted their monasteries and the priests taken
wives  these were not matters with which the civil authority had
anything to do  As the elector of Saxony observed  he paid no attention
to the monks when they ran into the monastery  and he saw no reason for
noticing when they ran out  Luther s books were  however  to be no
longer published  and learned men were to admonish the erring preachers 
Luther  himself  was to hold his peace  This doubtless gives a fair
idea of public opinion in Germany  It is noteworthy that Luther did not
seem to the diet to be a very discreet person and it showed no
particular respect for him 

 Sidenote  Accession of Pope Clement VII  

153  Poor Hadrian speedily died  worn out with the vain effort to
correct the abuses close at home  He was followed by Clement VII  a
member of the house of Medici  less gifted but not less worldly than Leo
X  A new diet  called in 1524  adhered to the policy of its predecessor 
It was far from approving of Luther  but it placed no effective barrier
in the way of his work 

 Sidenote  The formation of a Catholic party at Regensburg  

The papal legate  realizing the hopelessness of inducing all the members
of the diet to coöperate with him in bringing the country once more
under the pope s control  called together at Regensburg a certain number
of rulers whom he believed to be rather more favorably disposed toward
the pope than their fellows  Among these were Charles V s brother 
Ferdinand  Duke of Austria  the two dukes of Bavaria  the archbishops of
Salzburg and of Trent  and the bishops of Bamberg  Speyer  Strasburg 
etc  By means of certain concessions on the part of the pope  he induced
all these to unite in opposing the Lutheran heresy  The chief concession
was a reform decree which provided that only authorized preachers should
be tolerated  and that these should base their teaching on the works of
the four great church fathers  Ambrose  Jerome  Augustine  and Gregory
the Great  The clergy were to be subjected to careful discipline  there
was to be no more financial oppression and no unseemly payments demanded
for performing the church services  Abuses arising from the granting of
indulgences were to be remedied and the excessive number of holidays
reduced 

 Sidenote  Religious division of Germany  

 Sidenote  Beginning of a reform within the Catholic Church  

This agreement of Regensburg is of great importance  for it served to
separate Germany into two camps  Austria  Bavaria  and the great
ecclesiastical states in the south definitely took sides with the pope
against Luther  and to this day they still remain Catholic countries 
In the north  on the other hand  it became more and more apparent that
the princes proposed to secede from the Catholic Church  Moreover  the
skillful diplomacy of the papal legate was really the beginning of a
reformation of the old Church in Germany  Many of the abuses were done
away with  and the demand for reform  without revolution in doctrine and
institutions  was thereby gratified  285  A German Bible for Catholic
readers was soon issued  and a new religious literature grew up designed
to prove the truth of the beliefs sanctioned by the Roman Catholic
Church and to spiritualize its institutions and rites 

 Sidenote  Luther s rash talk about the princes and nobles serves to
encourage the revolt of the peasants  

154  In 1525 the conservative party  who were frankly afraid of Luther 
received a new and terrible proof  as it seemed to them  of the noxious
influence of his teachings  The peasants rose  in the name of  God s
justice   to avenge their wrongs and establish their rights  Luther was
not responsible for the civil war which ensued  but he had certainly
helped to stir up discontent  He had asserted that  owing to the habit
of foreclosing small mortgages   any one with a hundred guldens could
gobble up a peasant a year   The German feudal lords he had declared to
be hangmen  who knew only how to swindle the poor man   Such fellows
were formerly called rascals  but now must we call them  Christian and
revered princes    Wise rulers are rare indeed   they are usually either
great fools or the worst rogues on earth   Yet in spite of his harsh
talk about the princes  Luther really relied upon them to forward his
movement  and he justly claimed that he had greatly increased their
power by destroying the authority of the pope and subjecting the clergy
in all things to the government 

 Sidenote  The demands of the peasants in the  Twelve Articles   

Some of the demands of the peasants were perfectly reasonable  The most
popular expression of their needs was the dignified  Twelve
Articles   286  In these they claimed that the Bible did not sanction
many of the dues which the lords demanded of them  and that as
Christians they should no longer be held as serfs  They were willing to
pay all the old and well established dues  but they asked to be properly
remunerated for extra services demanded by the lord  They thought too
that each community should have the right freely to choose its own
pastor and to dismiss him if he proved negligent or inefficient 

 Sidenote  Demands of the working classes of the towns  

Much more radical demands came from the working classes in the towns 
who in some cases joined the country people in their revolt  The
articles drawn up in the town of Heilbronn  for example  give a good
idea of the sources of discontent  The church property was to be
confiscated and used for the good of the community  except in so far as
it was necessary to support the pastors chosen by the people  The clergy
and nobility were to be deprived of all their privileges and powers  so
that they could no longer oppress the poor man 

 Sidenote  Luther urges the government to suppress the revolt  

There were  moreover  leaders who were still more violent  who proposed
to kill the  godless  priests and nobles  Hundreds of castles and
monasteries were destroyed by the frantic peasantry  and some of the
nobility were murdered with shocking cruelty  Luther tried to induce the
peasants  with whom  as the son of a peasant  he was at first inclined
to sympathize  to remain quiet  but when his warnings proved vain  he
attacked the rebels violently  He declared that they were guilty of the
most fearful crimes  for which they deserved death of both body and soul
many times over  They had broken their allegiance  they had wantonly
plundered and robbed castles and monasteries  and lastly  they had tried
to cloak their dreadful sins with excuses from the Gospel  He therefore
urged the government to put down the insurrection   Have no pity on the
poor folk  stab  smite  throttle  who can  

 Sidenote  The peasant revolt put down with great cruelty  

Luther s advice was followed with terrible literalness by the German
rulers  and the nobility took fearful revenge for the depredations of
the peasants  In the summer of 1525 the chief leader of the peasants
was defeated and killed  and it is estimated that ten thousand peasants
were put to death  many with the utmost cruelty  Few rulers or lords
introduced any reforms  and the misfortunes due to the destruction of
property and to the despair of the peasants cannot be imagined  The
people concluded that the new gospel was not for them  and talked of
Luther as  Dr  Lügner   i e   liar  The old exactions of the lords of
the manors were in no way lightened  and the situation of the peasants
for centuries following the great revolt was worse rather than better 

 Sidenote  Catholic and Protestant unions of the German princes  

155  The terror inspired by the peasant war led to new measures against
further attempts to change the religious beliefs of the land  The League
of Dessau was formed among some of the leading rulers of central and
northern Germany  to stamp out  the accursed Lutheran sect   The union
included Luther s arch enemy  Duke George of Saxony  the electors of
Brandenburg and Mayence  and two princes of Brunswick  The rumor that
the emperor  who had been kept busy for some years by his wars with
Francis I  was planning to come to Germany in order to root out the
growing heresy  led the few princes who openly favored Luther to unite
also  Among these the chief were the new elector of Saxony  John
Frederick  and Philip  landgrave of Hesse  These two proved themselves
the most ardent and conspicuous defenders of the Protestant faith in
Germany 

 Sidenote  The diet of Speyer gives to the individual rulers the right
to determine the religion of their subjects  1526  

A new war  in which Francis and the pope sided against the emperor 
prevented Charles from turning his attention to Germany  and he
accordingly gave up the idea of enforcing the Edict of Worms against the
Lutherans  Since there was no one who could decide the religious
question for all the rulers  the diet of Speyer  1526  determined that 
pending the meeting of a general council  each ruler  and each knight
and town owing immediate allegiance to the emperor  should decide
individually what particular form of religion should prevail in his
realm  Each prince was  so to live  reign  and conduct himself as he
would be willing to answer before God and His Imperial Majesty   For the
moment  then  the various German governments were left to determine the
religion of their subjects 

Yet all still hoped that one religion might ultimately be agreed upon 
Luther trusted that all Christians would sometime accept the new gospel 
He was willing that the bishops should be retained  and even that the
pope should still be regarded as a sort of presiding officer in the
Church  As for his enemies  they were equally confident that the
heretics would in time be suppressed as they had always been in the
past  and that harmony would thus be restored  Neither party was right 
for the decision of the diet of Speyer was destined to become a
permanent arrangement  and Germany remained divided between different
religious faiths 

 Sidenote  Charles V again intervenes in the religious controversy in
Germany  

New sects opposed to the old Church had begun to appear  Zwingli  a
Swiss reformer  was gaining many followers  and the Anabaptists were
rousing Luther s apprehensions by their radical plans for doing away
with the Catholic religion  As the emperor found himself able for a
moment to attend to German affairs he bade the diet  again meeting at
Speyer in 1529  to order the enforcement of the edict against the
heretics  No one was to preach against the Mass and no one was to be
prevented from attending it freely 

 Sidenote  Origin of the term  Protestant   

This meant that the  Evangelical  princes would be forced to restore the
most characteristic Catholic ceremony  As they formed only a minority in
the diet  all that they could do was to draw up a  protest   signed by
John Frederick  Philip of Hesse  and fourteen of the imperial towns
 Strasburg  Nuremberg  Ulm  etc    In this they claimed that the
majority had no right to abrogate the edict of the former diet of Speyer
for that had passed unanimously and all had solemnly pledged themselves
to observe the agreement  They therefore appealed to the emperor and a
future council against the tyranny of the majority  287  Those who
signed this appeal were called from their action  Protestants   Thus
originated the name which came to be generally applied to those who do
not accept the rule and teachings of the Roman Catholic Church 

 Sidenote  Preparations for the diet of Augsburg  

156  Since the diet at Worms the emperor had resided in Spain  busied
with a succession of wars carried on with the king of France  It will be
remembered that both Charles and Francis claimed Milan and the duchy of
Burgundy  and they sometimes drew the pope into their conflicts  288 
But in 1530 the emperor found himself at peace for the moment and held a
brilliant diet of his German subjects at Augsburg in the hope of
settling the religious problem  which  however  he understood very
imperfectly  He ordered the Protestants to draw up a statement of
exactly what they believed  which should serve as a basis for
discussion  Melanchthon  Luther s most famous friend and colleague  who
was noted for his great learning and moderation  was intrusted with the
delicate task 

 Sidenote  The Augsburg Confession  

The Augsburg Confession  as his declaration was called  is an historical
document of great importance for the student of the Protestant
revolt  289  Melanchthon s gentle and conciliatory disposition led him
to make the differences between his belief and that of the old Church
seem as few and slight as possible  He showed that both parties held the
same fundamental views of Christianity  The Protestants  however 
defended their rejection of a number of the practices of the Roman
Catholics  such as the celibacy of the clergy and the observance of
fast days  There was little or nothing in the Augsburg Confession
concerning the organization of the Church 

 Sidenote  Charles V s attempt at pacification  

Certain theologians  some of whom  like Eck  had been loud in their
denunciations of Luther  were ordered by the emperor to prepare a
refutation of the Protestant views  The statement of the Catholics
admitted that a number of Melanchthon s positions were perfectly
orthodox  but the portion of the Augsburg Confession which dealt with
the practical reforms introduced by the Protestants was rejected
altogether  Charles declared the Catholic statement to be  Christian and
judicious  and commanded the Protestants to accept it  They were to
cease troubling the Catholics and were to give back all the monasteries
and church property which they had seized  The emperor agreed to urge
the pope to call a council to meet within a year  This  he hoped  would
be able to settle all differences and reform the Church according to the
views of the Catholics 

 Sidenote  Progress of Protestantism up to the Peace of Augsburg  1555  

157  It is unnecessary to follow in detail the progress of Protestantism
in Germany during the quarter of a century succeeding the diet of
Augsburg  Enough has been said to show the character of the revolt and
the divergent views taken by the German princes and people  For ten
years after the emperor left Augsburg he was kept busy in southern
Europe by new wars  and in order to secure the assistance of the
Protestants  he was forced to let them go their own way  Meanwhile the
number of rulers who accepted Luther s teachings gradually increased 
Finally there was a brief war between Charles and the Protestant
princes  but the origin of the conflict was mainly political rather than
religious  It occurred to the youthful Maurice  Duke of Saxony  that by
aiding the emperor against the Protestants he might find a good excuse
for dispossessing his Protestant relative  John Frederick  of his
electorate  There was but little fighting done  Charles V brought his
Spanish soldiers into Germany and captured both John Frederick and his
ally  Philip of Hesse  the chief leaders of the Lutheran cause  whom he
kept prisoners for several years  290 

 Sidenote  The Peace of Augsburg  

This episode did not check the progress of Protestantism  Maurice  who
had been granted John Frederick s electorate  soon turned about and
allied himself with the Protestants  The king of France promised them
help against his enemy  the emperor  and Charles was forced to agree to
a preliminary peace with the Protestants  Three years later  in 1555 
the religious Peace of Augsburg was ratified  Its provisions are
memorable  Each German prince and each town and knight immediately under
the emperor was to be at liberty to make a choice between the beliefs of
the venerable Catholic Church and those embodied in the Augsburg
Confession  If  however  an ecclesiastical prince  an archbishop 
bishop  or abbot  declared himself a Protestant  he must surrender his
possessions to the Church  Every one was either to conform to the
religious practices of his particular state  or emigrate 

 Sidenote  The principle that the government should determine the
religion of its subjects  

This religious peace in no way established freedom of conscience  except
for the rulers  Their power  it must be noted  was greatly increased 
inasmuch as they were given the control of religious as well as of
secular matters  This arrangement which permitted the ruler to determine
the religion of his realm was natural  and perhaps inevitable  in those
days  The Church and the civil government had been closely associated
with one another for centuries  No one as yet dreamed that every
individual  so long as he did not violate the law of the land  might
safely be left quite free to believe what he would and to practice any
religious rites which afforded him help and comfort 

 Sidenote  Weaknesses of the Peace of Augsburg  

There were two noteworthy weaknesses in the Peace of Augsburg which were
destined to make trouble  In the first place  only one group of
Protestants was included in it  The now numerous followers of the
French reformer  Calvin  and of the Swiss reformer  Zwingli  who were
hated alike by Catholic and Lutheran  were not recognized  Every German
had to be either a Catholic or a Lutheran in order to be tolerated  In
the second place  the clause which decreed that ecclesiastical princes
converted to Protestantism should surrender their property could not be
enforced  for there was no one to see to its execution 




CHAPTER XXVII

THE PROTESTANT REVOLT IN SWITZERLAND AND ENGLAND


158  For at least a century after Luther s death the great issue between
Catholics and Protestants dominates the history of all the countries
with which we have to do  except Italy and Spain  where Protestantism
never took permanent root  In Switzerland  England  France  and Holland
the revolt against the mediæval Church produced profound changes  which
must be understood in order to follow the later development of these
countries 

 Sidenote  Origin of the Swiss Confederation  

We turn first to Switzerland  lying in the midst of the great chain of
the Alps which extends from the Mediterranean to Vienna  During the
Middle Ages  the region destined to be included in the Swiss
Confederation formed a part of the empire  and was scarcely
distinguishable from the rest of southern Germany  As early as the
thirteenth century the three  forest  cantons on the shores of the
winding lake of Lucerne had formed a union to protect their liberties
against the encroachments of their neighbors  the Hapsburgs  It was
about this tiny nucleus that Switzerland gradually consolidated  In 1315
the cantons gained their first great victory over the Hapsburgs at
Morgarten and thereupon solemnly renewed their league  This was soon
joined by Lucerne and the free imperial towns of Zurich and Berne  By
brave fighting the Swiss were able to frustrate the renewed efforts of
the Hapsburgs to subjugate them  Later  when a still more formidable
enemy  Charles the Bold  undertook to conquer them they put his armies
to rout at Granson and Murten  1476   291 

 Illustration  The Swiss Confederation 

 Sidenote  Switzerland becomes a separate country  mixed nationality of
its people  

Various districts in the neighborhood successively joined the Swiss
union  and even the region lying on the Italian slopes of the Alps was
brought under its control  Gradually the bonds between the members of
the union and the empire were broken  They were recognized as being no
more than  relatives  of the empire  in 1499 they were finally freed
from the jurisdiction of the emperor  and Switzerland became a
practically independent country  Although the original union had been
made up of German speaking people  considerable districts had been
annexed in which Italian or French was spoken  292  The Swiss did not 
therefore  form a compact  well defined nation  and for some centuries
their confederation was weak and ill organized 

 Sidenote  Zwingli  1484 1531  leads the revolt in Switzerland against
the Church  

159  In Switzerland the leader of the revolt against the Church was
Zwingli  who was a year younger than Luther and like him was the son of
peasant parents  Zwingli s father was prosperous  however  and the boy
had the best education which could be obtained  at Basel and Vienna  His
later discontent with the old Church came not through spiritual
wrestlings in the monastery  but from the study of the classics and of
the Greek New Testament  Zwingli had become a priest and settled at the
famous monastery of Einsiedeln near the lake of Zurich  This was the
center of pilgrimages on account of a wonder working image in the cell
of St  Meinrad   Here   he says   I began to preach the Gospel of Christ
in the year 1516  before any one in my locality had so much as heard the
name of Luther  

 Sidenote  Zwingli denounces the abuses in the Church and the traffic in
soldiers  

Three years later he was called to an influential position as preacher
in the cathedral of Zurich  and there his great work began  Through his
efforts a Dominican who was preaching indulgences was expelled from the
country  He then began to denounce the abuses in the Church as well as
the shameless traffic in soldiers  which he had long regarded as a blot
upon his country s honor  293  The pope had found the help of the Swiss
troops indispensable  and had granted annuities and lucrative positions
in the Church to influential Swiss  who were expected to work in his
interest  So  from the first  Zwingli was led to combine with his
religious reform a political reform which should put the cantons on
better terms with one another and prevent the destruction of their young
men in wars in which they had no possible interest  A new demand of the
pope for troops in 1521 led Zwingli to attack him and his commissioners 
 How appropriate   he exclaims   that they should have red hats and
cloaks  If we shake them  crowns and ducats fall out  If we wring them 
out runs the blood of your sons and brothers and fathers and good
friends   294 

 Sidenote  Zurich  under the influence of Zwingli  begins a reform  

Such talk soon began to arouse comment  and the old forest cantons were
for a violent suppression of the new teacher  but the town council of
Zurich stanchly supported their priest  Zwingli then began to attack
fasts and the celibacy of the clergy  In 1523 he prepared a complete
statement of his belief  in the form of sixty seven theses  In these he
maintained that Christ was the only high priest and that the Gospel did
not gain its sanction from the authority of the Church  He denied the
existence of purgatory and rejected those practices of the Church which
Luther had already set aside  Since no one presented himself to refute
Zwingli  the town council ratified his conclusions and so withdrew from
the Roman Catholic Church  The next year the Mass  processions  and the
images of the saints were abolished  the shrines were opened and the
relics buried 

 Sidenote  Other towns follow Zurich s example  

Some other towns followed Zurich s example  but the original cantons
about the lake of Lucerne  which feared that they might lose the great
influence that  in spite of their small size  they had hitherto enjoyed 
were ready to fight for the old faith  The first armed collision  half
political and half religious  between the Swiss Protestants and
Catholics took place at Kappel in 1531  and Zwingli fell in the battle 
The various cantons and towns never came to an agreement in religious
matters  and Switzerland is still part Catholic and part Protestant 

The chief importance for the rest of Europe of Zwingli s revolt was the
influence of his conception of the Lord s Supper  He not only denied
transubstantiation  295  but also the  real presence  of Christ in the
elements  in which Luther believed   and conceived the bread and wine to
be mere symbols  Those in Germany and England who accepted Zwingli s
idea added one more to the Protestant parties  and consequently
increased the difficulty of reaching a general agreement among those who
had revolted from the Church  296 

 Sidenote  Calvin  1509 1564  and the Presbyterian Church  

160  Far more important than Zwingli s teachings  especially for England
and America  was the work of Calvin  which was carried on in the ancient
city of Geneva on the very outskirts of the Swiss confederation  It was
Calvin who organized the Presbyterian Church and formulated its beliefs 
He was born in northern France in 1509  he belonged  therefore  to the
second generation of Protestants  He was early influenced by the
Lutheran teachings  which had already found their way into France  A
persecution of the Protestants under Francis I drove him out of the
country and he settled for a time in Basel  297 

 Sidenote  Calvin s  Institutes of Christianity   

Here he issued the first edition of his great work   The Institutes of
Christianity   which has been more widely discussed than any other
Protestant theological treatise  It was the first orderly exposition of
the principles of Christianity from a Protestant standpoint  Like Peter
Lombard s  Sentences   it formed a convenient manual for study and
discussion  The  Institutes  are based upon the infallibility of the
Bible and reject the infallibility of the Church and the pope  Calvin
possessed a remarkably logical mind and a clear and admirable style  The
French version of his great work is the first example of the successful
use of that language in an argumentative treatise 

 Sidenote  Calvin s reformation in Geneva  

Calvin was called to Geneva about 1540 and intrusted with the task of
reforming the town  which had secured its independence of the duke of
Savoy  He drew up a constitution and established an extraordinary
government  in which the church and the civil government were as closely
associated as they had ever been in any Catholic country  298  The
Protestantism which found its way into France was that of Calvin  not
that of Luther  and the same may be said of Scotland 

 Sidenote  The gradual revolt of England from the Church  

161  The revolt of England from the mediæval Church was very gradual and
halting  Although there were some signs that Protestantism was gaining a
foothold in the island not long after Luther s burning of the canon law 
a generation at least passed away before the country definitely
committed itself  upon the accession of Queen Elizabeth in 1558  to the
change in religion  It seems at first sight as if the revolution were
due mainly to the irritation of Henry VIII against the pope  who refused
to grant the king a divorce from his first wife in order that he might
marry a younger and prettier woman  But a permanent change in the
religious convictions of a whole people cannot fairly be attributed to
the whim of even so despotic a ruler as Henry  There were changes taking
place in England before the revolt similar to those which prepared the
way in Germany for Luther s success 

 Sidenote  John Colet  

English scholars began  in the latter part of the fifteenth century  to
be affected by the new learning which came to them from Italy 
Colet  299  among others  strove to introduce the study of Greek in
Oxford  Like Luther he found himself especially attracted by St  Paul 
and had begun to teach the doctrine of justification by faith long
before the German reformer was heard of 

 Sidenote  Sir Thomas More and his  Utopia   

The most distinguished writer of the period was  perhaps  Sir Thomas
More  The title of his famous little book   Utopia   i e   Nowhere  
published about 1515  has become synonymous with ideal and impracticable
schemes for bettering the world  He pictures the happy conditions in an
undiscovered land where a perfect form of government has done away with
all the evils which he observes about him in the England of his day  The
Utopians  unlike the English  fought only to keep out invaders or to
free others from tyranny  and never undertook wars of aggression such as
Henry VIII was constantly contemplating  In Utopia no one was persecuted
for his religion so long as he treated others fairly  300 

 Sidenote  The English admirers of Erasmus  

When Erasmus came to England about 1500 he was delighted with the
society which he found  and we may assume that his views  which we have
before described  301  represented those of a considerable number of
intelligent Englishmen  It was at the house of More that he finished the
 Praise of Folly   and he carried on his studies with such success in
England and found such congenial companions there that it seemed to him
that it was hardly worth while to go to Italy for intellectual
inspiration  There is every reason to suppose that there were  in
England  many who were quite conscious of the vices of the churchmen and
who were ready to accept a system which would abolish those practices
that had come to seem useless and pernicious 

 Sidenote  Wolsey s policy of peace and his idea of the balance of
power  

162  Henry VIII s minister  Cardinal Wolsey  deserves great credit for
having constantly striven to discourage his sovereign s ambition to take
part in the wars on the continent  The cardinal s argument that England
could become great by peace better than by war was a momentous
discovery  Peace he felt would be best secured by maintaining the
 balance of power  on the continent so that no ruler should become
dangerous by unduly extending his sway  For example  he thought it good
policy to side with Charles when Francis was successful  and then with
Francis after his terrible defeat at Pavia  1525  when he fell into the
hands of Charles  This idea of the balance of power came to be
recognized later by the European countries as a very important
consideration in determining their policy  But Wolsey was not long to be
permitted to put his enlightened ideas in practice  His fall and the
progress of Protestantism in England are both closely associated with
the notorious divorce case of Henry VIII 

 Illustration  Henry VIII of England 

 Sidenote  Henry VIII s divorce case  

It will be remembered that Henry had married Catherine of Aragon  the
aunt of Charles V  Only one of their children  Mary  had survived to
grow up  Henry was very anxious to have a son and heir  for he was
fearful lest a woman might not be permitted to succeed to the throne 
Moreover  Catherine  who was older than he  had become distasteful to
him 

Catherine had first married Henry s older brother  who had died almost
immediately after the marriage  Since it was a violation of the rule of
the Church to marry a deceased brother s wife  Henry professed to fear
that he was committing a sin by retaining Catherine as his wife and
demanded to be divorced from her on the ground that his marriage had
never been legal  His anxiety to rid himself of Catherine was greatly
increased by the appearance at court of a black eyed girl of sixteen 
named Anne Boleyn  with whom the king fell in love 

 Sidenote  Clement VII refuses to divorce Henry  

 Sidenote  Fall of Wolsey  

Unfortunately for his case  his marriage with Catherine had been
authorized by a dispensation from the pope  so that Clement VII  to whom
the king appealed to annul the marriage  could not  even if he had been
willing to alienate the queen s nephew  Charles V  have granted Henry s
request  Wolsey s failure to induce the pope to permit the divorce
excited the king s anger  and with rank ingratitude for his minister s
great services  Henry drove him from office  1529  and seized his
property  From a life of wealth which was fairly regal  Wolsey was
precipitated into extreme poverty  An imprudent but innocent act of his
soon gave his enemies a pretext for charging him with treason  but the
unhappy man died on his way to London before his head could be brought
to the block 

 Sidenote  Henry forces the English clergy to recognize him as the
supreme head of the Church of England  

163  The king s next move was to bring a preposterous charge against the
whole English clergy by declaring that  in submitting to Wolsey s
authority as papal legate  they had violated an ancient law forbidding
papal representatives to appear in England without the king s
permission  Yet Henry had approved Wolsey s appointment as papal legate 
The clergy met at Canterbury and offered to buy pardon for their alleged
offense by an enormous grant of money  But Henry refused to forgive them
unless they would solemnly acknowledge him to be the supreme head of the
English Church  This they accordingly did  302  they agreed  moreover 
to hold no general meetings or pass any rules without the king s
sanction  The submission of the clergy ensured Henry against any future
criticism on their part of the measures he proposed to take in the
matter of his divorce 

 Sidenote  Parliament forbids all appeals to the pope  1533  

 Sidenote  An English court declares Henry s marriage with Catherine
void  

He now induced Parliament to threaten to cut off the income which the
pope had been accustomed to receive from newly appointed bishops  The
king hoped in this way to bring Clement VII to terms  He failed 
however  in this design and  losing patience  married Anne Boleyn
secretly without waiting for the divorce  Parliament was then persuaded
to pass the Act of Appeals  declaring that lawsuits of all kinds should
be finally and definitely decided within the realm  and that no appeal
might be made to any one outside the kingdom  Catherine s appeal to the
pope was thus rendered illegal  When  shortly after  her marriage was
declared void by a Church court summoned by Henry  she had no remedy 
Parliament also declared Henry s marriage with Catherine unlawful and
that with Anne legal  Consequently it was decreed that Elizabeth  Anne s
daughter  who was born in 1533  was to succeed her father on the throne 
instead of Mary  the daughter of Catherine 

 Sidenote  The Act of Supremacy and the denial of the pope s authority
over England  

In 1534 the English Parliament completed the revolt of the English
Church from the pope by assigning to the king the right to appoint all
the English prelates and to enjoy all the income which had formerly
found its way to Rome  In the Act of Supremacy  Parliament declared the
king to be  the only supreme head in earth of the Church of England  
and that he should enjoy all the powers which the title naturally
carried with it  Two years later every officer in the kingdom  whether
lay or ecclesiastical  was required to swear to renounce the authority
of the Bishop of Rome  Refusal to take this oath was to be adjudged high
treason  Many were unwilling to deny the pope s headship merely because
king and Parliament renounced it  and this legislation led to a
persecution in the name of treason which was even more horrible than
that which had been carried on in the supposed interest of religion 

 Sidenote  Henry VIII no Protestant  

 Sidenote  The English Bible  

It must be carefully noted that Henry VIII was not a Protestant in the
Lutheran sense of the word  He was led  it is true  by Clement VII s
refusal to declare his first marriage illegal  to break the bond between
the English and the Roman Church  and to induce the English clergy and
Parliament to acknowledge him as supreme head in the religious as well
as in the temporal interests of the country  No earlier English
sovereign had ever ventured to go so far as this in the previous
conflicts with Rome  He was ready  too  as we shall see  to appropriate
the property of the monasteries on the ground that these institutions
were so demoralized as to be worse than useless  Important as these acts
were  they did not lead Henry to accept the teachings of Protestant
leaders  like Luther  Zwingli  or Calvin  He shared the popular distrust
of the new doctrines  and showed himself anxious to explain the old ones
and free them from the objections which were beginning to be urged
against them  A proclamation was made  under the authority of the king 
in which the sacraments of baptism  penance  and the Mass were
explained  Henry also authorized a new translation of the Bible into
English  A fine edition of this was printed  1539   and every parish was
ordered to obtain a copy and place it in the parish church  where all
the people could readily make use of it 

 Sidenote  Henry s anxiety to prove himself a good Catholic  

Henry was anxious to prove that he was orthodox  especially after he had
seized the property of the monasteries and the gold and jewels which
adorned the receptacles in which the relics of the saints were kept  He
presided in person over the trial of one who accepted the opinion of
Zwingli  that the body and blood of Christ were not present in the
sacrament  He quoted Scripture to prove the contrary  and the prisoner
was condemned and burned as a heretic 

 Sidenote  The  Six Articles   

In 1539 Parliament passed a statute called the  Six Articles   These
declared first that the body and blood of Christ were actually present
in the bread and the wine of the Lord s Supper  whoever ventured
publicly to question this was to be burned  For speaking against five
other tenets 303  of the old Church  offenders were to suffer
imprisonment and loss of goods for the first offense  and to be hanged
for the second  Two bishops  who had ventured to go farther in the
direction of Protestantism than Henry himself had done  were driven from
office and some offenders were put to death under this act 

 Sidenote  Henry s tyranny  

 Sidenote  Execution of Sir Thomas More  

164  Henry was heartless and despotic  With a barbarity not uncommon in
those days  he allowed his old friend and adviser  Sir Thomas More  to
be beheaded for refusing to pronounce the marriage with Catherine void 
He caused numbers of monks to be executed for refusing to swear that his
first marriage was illegal and for denying his title to supremacy in the
Church  Others he permitted to die of starvation and disease in the
filthy prisons of the time  Many Englishmen would doubtless have agreed
with one of the friars who said humbly   I profess that it is not out of
obstinate malice or a mind of rebellion that I do disobey the king  but
only for the fear of God  that I offend not the Supreme Majesty  because
our Holy Mother  the Church  hath decreed and appointed otherwise than
the king and Parliament hath ordained  

 Sidenote  Dissolution of the English monasteries  

Henry wanted money  some of the English abbeys were rich  and the monks
were quite unable to defend themselves against the charges which were
brought against them  The king sent commissioners about to inquire into
the moral state of the monasteries  A large number of scandalous tales
were easily collected  some of which were undoubtedly true  The monks
were doubtless often indolent and sometimes wicked  Nevertheless  they
were kind landlords  hospitable to the stranger  and good to the poor 
The plundering of the smaller monasteries  with which the king began 
led to a revolt  due to a rumor that the king would next proceed to
despoil the parish churches as well  This gave Henry an excuse for
attacking the larger monasteries  The abbots and priors who had taken
part in the revolt were hanged and their monasteries confiscated  Other
abbots  panic stricken  confessed that they and their monks had been
committing the most loathsome sins and asked to be permitted to give up
their monasteries to the king  The royal commissioners then took
possession  sold every article upon which they could lay hands 
including the bells and the lead on the roofs  The picturesque remains
of the great abbey churches are still among the chief objects of
interest to the sight seer in England  The monastery lands were  of
course  appropriated by the king  They were sold for the benefit of the
government or given to nobles whose favor the king wished to secure 

 Sidenote  Destruction of shrines and images for the benefit of the
king s treasury  

Along with the destruction of the monasteries went an attack upon the
shrines and images in the churches  which were adorned with gold and
jewels  The shrine of St  Thomas of Canterbury was destroyed and the
bones of the saint were burned  An old wooden figure revered in Wales
was used to make a fire to burn an unfortunate friar who maintained that
in things spiritual the pope rather than the king should be obeyed 
These acts suggest the Protestant attacks on images which occurred in
Germany  Switzerland  and the Netherlands  The object of the king and
his party was probably in the main a mercenary one  although the reason
urged for the destruction was the superstitious veneration in which the
relics and images were popularly held 

 Sidenote  Henry s third marriage and the birth of Edward VI  

Henry s domestic troubles by no means came to an end with his marriage
with Anne Boleyn  Of her  too  he soon tired  and three years after
their marriage he had her executed on a series of monstrous charges 
The next day he married his third wife  Jane Seymour  who was the mother
of his son and successor  Edward VI  Jane died a few days after her
son s birth  and later Henry married in succession three other women who
are historically unimportant since they left no children as claimants
for the crown  Henry took care that his three children  all of whom were
destined to reign  should be given their due place by act of Parliament
in the line of inheritance  304  His death in 1547 left the great
problem of Protestantism and Catholicism to be settled by his son and
daughters 

 Sidenote  Edward VI s ministers introduce Protestant practices  

165  While the revolt of England against the ancient Church was carried
through by the government at a time when the greater part of the nation
was still Catholic  there was undoubtedly  under Henry VIII  an
ever increasing number of aggressive and ardent Protestants who
applauded the change  During the six years of the boy Edward s reign  he
died in 1553 at the age of sixteen  those in charge of the government
favored the Protestant party and did what they could to change the faith
of all the people by bringing Protestant teachers from the Continent 

A general demolition of all the sacred images was ordered  even the
beautiful stained glass  the glory of the cathedrals  was destroyed 
because it often represented saints and angels  The king was to appoint
bishops without troubling to observe the old forms of election  and
Protestants began to be put into the high offices of the Church 
Parliament turned over to the king the funds which had been established
for the purpose of having masses chanted for the dead  and decreed that
thereafter the clergy should be free to marry 

 Sidenote  The prayer book and the  Thirty Nine Articles   

A prayer book in English was prepared under the auspices of Parliament
not very unlike that used in the Church of England to day  Moreover 
forty two articles of faith were drawn up by the government  which were
to be the standard of belief for the country  These  in the time of
Queen Elizabeth  were revised and reduced to the famous  Thirty Nine
Articles   which still constitute the creed of the Church of
England  305 

 Sidenote  Protestantism partially discredited by Edward s ministers  

The changes in the church services must have sadly shocked a great part
of the English people  who had been accustomed to watch with awe and
expectancy the various acts associated with the many church ceremonies
and festivals  306  Earnest men who watched the misrule of those who
conducted Edward s government in the name of Protestantism  must have
concluded that the reformers were chiefly intent upon advancing their
own interests by plundering the Church  We get some idea of the
desecrations of the time from the fact that Edward was forced to forbid
 quarreling and shooting in churches  and  the bringing of horses and
mules through the same  making God s house like a stable or common inn  
Although many were heartily in favor of the recent changes it is no
wonder that after Edward s death there was a revulsion in favor of the
old religion 

 Sidenote  Queen Mary  1553 1558  and the Catholic reaction  

166  Edward VI was succeeded in 1553 by his half sister Mary  who had
been brought up in the Catholic faith and held firmly to it  Her ardent
hope of bringing her kingdom back once more to her religion did not seem
altogether ill founded  for the majority of the people were still
Catholics at heart  and many who were not disapproved of the policy of
Edward s ministers  who had removed abuses  in the devil s own way  by
breaking in pieces  

 Sidenote  Mary s marriage with Philip II of Spain  

The Catholic cause appeared  moreover  to be strengthened by Mary s
marriage with the Spanish prince  Philip II  the son of the orthodox
Charles V  But although Philip later distinguished himself  as we shall
see  by the merciless way in which he strove to put down heresy within
his realms  he never gained any great influence in England  By his
marriage with Mary he acquired the title of king  but the English took
care that he should have no hand in the government  nor be permitted to
succeed his wife on the English throne 

 Sidenote  The  Kneeling Parliament   1554  

Mary succeeded in bringing about a nominal reconciliation between
England and the Roman Church  In 1554 the papal legate restored to the
communion of the Catholic Church the  Kneeling Parliament   which
theoretically  of course  represented the nation 

 Sidenote  Persecution of the Protestants under Mary  

During the last four years of Mary s reign the most serious religious
persecution in English history occurred  No less than 277 persons were
put to death for denying the teachings of the Roman Church  The majority
of the victims were humble artisans and husbandmen  The two most notable
sufferers were Bishops Latimer and Ridley  who were burned in Oxford 
Latimer cried to his fellow martyr in the flames   Be of good cheer and
play the man  we shall this day light such a candle in England as shall
never be put out  

 Sidenote  Mary s failure to restore the Catholic religion in England  

It was Mary s hope and belief that the heretics sent to the stake would
furnish a terrible warning to the Protestants and check the spread of
the new teachings  but it fell out as Latimer had prophesied 
Catholicism was not promoted  on the contrary  doubters were only
convinced of the earnestness of the Protestants who could die with such
constancy  307 




CHAPTER XXVIII

THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION  PHILIP II


 Sidenote  The conservative or Catholic reformation  

167  There had been many attempts  as we have seen  before Luther s
appearance  to better the clergy and remedy the evils in the Church
without altering its organization or teachings  Hopeful progress toward
such a conservative reform had been made even before the Protestants
threw off their allegiance to the pope  308  Their revolt inevitably
hastened and stimulated the reform of the ancient Church  to which the
greater part of western Europe still remained faithful  The Roman
Catholic churchmen were aroused to great activity by the realization
that they could no longer rely upon the general acceptance of their
teachings  They were forced to defend the beliefs and ceremonies of
their Church from the attacks of the Protestants  to whose ranks whole
countries were deserting  If the clergy were to make head against the
dreaded heresy which threatened their position and power  they must
secure the loyalty of the people to them and to the great institution
which they represented  by leading upright lives  giving up the old
abuses  and thus regaining the confidence of those intrusted to their
spiritual care 

A general council was accordingly summoned at Trent to consider once
more the remedying of the long recognized evils  and to settle
authoritatively numerous questions of belief upon which theologians had
differed for centuries  New religious orders sprang up  whose object was
better to prepare the priests for their work and to bring home religion
to the hearts of the people  Energetic measures were taken to repress
the growth of heresy in countries which were still Roman Catholic and to
prevent the dissemination of Protestant doctrines in books and
pamphlets  Above all  better men were placed in office  from the pope
down  The cardinals  for example  were no longer merely humanists and
courtiers  but among them might be found the leaders of religious
thought in Italy  Many practices which had formerly irritated the people
were permanently abolished  These measures resulted in a remarkable
reformation of the ancient Church  such as the Council of Constance had
striven in vain to bring about  309  Before turning to the terrible
struggles between the two religious parties in the Netherlands and
France during the latter half of the sixteenth century  a word must be
said of the Council of Trent and of an extraordinarily powerful new
religious order  the Jesuits 

 Sidenote  Charles V s confidence in the settlement of the religious
differences by a council  

Charles V  who did not fully grasp the irreconcilable differences
between Protestant and Catholic beliefs  made repeated efforts to bring
the two parties together by ordering the Protestants to accept what
seemed to him a simple statement of the Christian faith  He had great
confidence that if representatives of the old and the new beliefs could
meet one another in a church council all points of disagreement might be
amicably settled  The pope was  however  reluctant to see a council
summoned in Germany  for he had by no means forgotten the conduct of the
Council of Basel  To call the German Protestants into Italy  on the
other hand  would have been useless  for none of them would have
responded or have paid any attention to the decisions of a body which
would appear to them to be under the pope s immediate control  It was
only after years of delay that in 1545  just before Luther s death  a
general council finally met in the city of Trent  on the border between
Germany and Italy 

 Sidenote  The Council of Trent  1545 1563  sanctions the teaching of
the Roman Catholic Church  

As the German Protestants were preoccupied at the moment by an
approaching conflict with the emperor and  moreover  hoped for nothing
from the council s action  they did not attend its sessions 
Consequently the papal representatives and the Roman Catholic prelates
were masters of the situation  The council immediately took up just
those matters in which the Protestants had departed farthest from the
old beliefs  In its early sessions it proclaimed all those accursed who
taught that the sinner was saved by faith alone  or who questioned man s
power  with God s aid  to forward his salvation by good works  Moreover 
it declared that if any one should say  as did the Protestants  that the
sacraments were not all instituted by Christ   or that they are more or
less than seven  to wit  Baptism  Confirmation  the Eucharist  Penance 
Extreme Unction  Ordination  and Matrimony  or even that any one of
these is not truly and properly a sacrament  let him be accursed   The
ancient Latin translation of the Bible  the Vulgate  was fixed as the
standard  No one should presume to question its accuracy so far as
doctrine was concerned  or be permitted to publish any interpretation of
the Bible differing from that of the Church 

 Sidenote  Reform measures of the council  

While the council thus finally rejected any possibility of compromise
with the Protestants  it took measures to do away with the abuses of
which the Protestants complained  The bishops were ordered to reside in
their respective dioceses  to preach regularly  and to see that those
who were appointed to church benefices should fulfill the duties of
their offices and not merely enjoy the revenue  Measures were also taken
to improve education and secure the regular reading of the Bible in
churches  monasteries  and schools 

 Sidenote  Final sessions of the Council of Trent  1562 1563  

 Sidenote  Importance of the council s work  

When the council had been in session for something more than a year  its
meetings were interrupted by various unfavorable conditions  Little was
accomplished for a number of years  but in 1562 the members once more
reassembled to prosecute their work with renewed vigor  Many more of the
doctrines of the Roman Church in regard to which there had been some
uncertainty  were carefully defined  and the teachings of the heretics
explicitly rejected  A large number of decrees directed against existing
abuses were also ratified   The Canons and Decrees of the Council of
Trent   which fill a stout volume  provided a new and solid foundation
for the law and doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church  and they
constitute an historical source of the utmost importance  310  They
furnish  in fact  our most complete and authentic statement of the Roman
Catholic form of Christianity  They  however  only restate long accepted
beliefs and sanction the organization of the Church briefly described in
an earlier chapter  XVI  

 Sidenote  Ignatius Loyola  1491 1556  the founder of the Jesuits  

168  Among those who  during the final sessions of the council  sturdily
opposed every attempt to reduce in any way the exalted powers of the
pope  was the head of a new religious society  which was becoming the
most powerful organization in Europe  The Jesuit order  or Society of
Jesus  was founded by a Spaniard  Ignatius Loyola  He had been a soldier
in his younger days  and while bravely fighting for his king  Charles V 
had been wounded by a cannon ball  1521   Obliged to lie inactive for
weeks  he occupied his time in reading the lives of the saints  and
became filled with a burning ambition to emulate their deeds  Upon
recovering he dedicated himself to the service of the Lord  donned a
beggar s gown  and started on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem  When there he
began to realize that he could do little without an education  So he
returned to Spain and  although already thirty three years old  took his
place beside the boys who were learning the elements of Latin grammar 
After two years he entered a Spanish university  and later went to Paris
to carry on his theological studies 

In Paris he sought to influence his fellow students at the university 
and finally  in 1534  seven of his companions agreed to follow him to
Palestine  or  if they were prevented from that  to devote themselves to
the service of the pope  On arriving in Venice they found that war had
broken out between that republic and the Turks  They accordingly gave up
their plan for converting the infidels in the Orient and  with the
pope s permission  began to preach in the neighboring towns  explaining
the Scriptures and bringing comfort to those in the hospitals  When
asked to what order they belonged  they replied   to the Society of
Jesus  

 Sidenote  Rigid organization and discipline of the Jesuits  

In 1538 Loyola summoned his disciples to Rome  and there they worked out
the principles of their order  The pope then incorporated these in a
bull in which he gave his sanction to the new society  311  The
organization was to be under the absolute control of a  general   who
was to be chosen for life by the general assembly of the order  Loyola
had been a soldier  and he laid great and constant stress upon the
source of all efficient military discipline  namely  absolute and
unquestioning obedience  This he declared to be the mother of all virtue
and happiness  Not only were all the members to obey the pope as
Christ s representative on earth  and undertake without hesitation any
journey  no matter how distant or perilous  which he might command  but
each was to obey his superiors in the order as if he were receiving
directions from Christ in person  He must have no will or preference of
his own  but must be as the staff which supports and aids its bearer in
any way in which he sees fit to use it  This admirable organization and
incomparable discipline were the great secret of the later influence of
the Jesuits 

 Sidenote  Objects and methods of the new order  

The object of the society was to cultivate piety and the love of God 
especially through example  The members were to pledge themselves to
lead a pure life of poverty and devotion  Their humility was to show
itself in face and attitude  so that their very appearance should
attract those with whom they came in contact to the service of God  The
methods adopted by the society for reaching its ends are of the utmost
importance  A great number of its members were priests  who went about
preaching  hearing confession  and encouraging devotional exercises  But
the Jesuits were teachers as well as preachers and confessors  They
clearly perceived the advantage of bringing young people under their
influence  and they became the schoolmasters of Catholic Europe  So
successful were their methods of instruction that even Protestants
sometimes sent their children to them 

 Sidenote  Rapid increase of the Jesuits in numbers  

 Sidenote  Their missions and explorations  

It was originally proposed that the number of persons admitted to the
order should not exceed sixty  but this limit was speedily removed  and
before the death of Loyola over a thousand persons had joined the
society  Under his successor the number was trebled  and it went on
increasing for two centuries  The founder of the order had been  as we
have seen  attracted to missionary work from the first  and the Jesuits
rapidly spread not only over Europe  but throughout the whole world 
Francis Xavier  one of Loyola s original little band  went to Hindustan 
the Moluccas  and Japan  Brazil  Florida  Mexico  and Peru were soon
fields of active missionary work at a time when Protestants scarcely
dreamed as yet of carrying Christianity to the heathen  We owe to the
Jesuits  reports much of our knowledge of the condition of America when
white men first began to explore Canada and the Mississippi valley  for
the followers of Loyola boldly penetrated into regions unknown to
Europeans  and settled among the natives with the purpose of bringing
the Gospel to them  312 

 Sidenote  Their fight against the Protestants  

Dedicated as they were to the service of the pope  the Jesuits early
directed their energies against Protestantism  They sent their members
into Germany and the Netherlands  and even made strenuous efforts to
reclaim England  Their success was most apparent in southern Germany and
Austria  where they became the confessors and confidential advisers of
the rulers  They not only succeeded in checking the progress of
Protestantism  but were able to reconquer for the pope districts in
which the old faith had been abandoned 

 Sidenote  Accusations brought against the Jesuits  

Protestants soon realized that the new order was their most powerful and
dangerous enemy  Their apprehensions produced a bitter hatred which
blinded them to the high purposes of the founders of the order and led
them to attribute an evil purpose to every act of the Jesuits  The
Jesuits  air of humility the Protestants declared to be mere hypocrisy
under which they carried on their intrigues  The Jesuits  readiness to
adjust themselves to circumstances and the variety of the tasks that
they undertook seemed to their enemies a willingness to resort to any
means in order to reach their ends  They were popularly supposed to
justify the most deceitful and immoral measures on the ground that the
result would be  for the greater glory of God   The very obedience of
which the Jesuits said so much was viewed by the hostile Protestant as
one of their worst offenses  for he believed that the members of the
order were the blind tools of their superiors and that they would not
hesitate even to commit a crime if so ordered 

 Sidenote  Decline and abolition of the Jesuits  1773  

 Sidenote  Reëstablishment of the order  1814  

Doubtless there have been many unscrupulous Jesuits and some wicked
ones  and as time went on the order degenerated just as the earlier
ones had done  In the eighteenth century it was accused of undertaking
great commercial enterprises  and for this and other reasons lost the
confidence of even the Catholics  The king of Portugal was the first to
banish the Jesuits  and then France  where they had long been very
unpopular with an influential party of the Catholics  expelled them in
1764  Convinced that the order could no longer serve any useful purpose 
the pope abolished it in 1773  It was  however  restored in 1814  and
now again has thousands of members 

 Illustration  Philip II of Spain 

 Sidenote  Philip II  the chief enemy of Protestantism among the rulers
of Europe  

169  The chief ally of the pope and the Jesuits in their efforts to
check Protestantism in the latter half of the sixteenth century was the
son of Charles V  Philip II  Like the Jesuits he enjoys a most
unenviable reputation among Protestants  Certain it is that they had no
more terrible enemy among the rulers of the day than he  He closely
watched the course of affairs in France and Germany with the hope of
promoting the cause of the Catholics  He eagerly forwarded every
conspiracy against England s Protestant queen  Elizabeth  and finally
manned a mighty fleet with the purpose of overthrowing her  He resorted 
moreover  to incredible cruelty in his attempts to bring back his
possessions in the Netherlands to what he considered the true faith 

 Sidenote  Division of the Hapsburg possessions between the German and
Spanish branches  

Charles V  crippled with the gout and old before his time  laid down the
cares of government in 1555 1556  To his brother Ferdinand  who had
acquired by marriage the kingdoms of Bohemia and Hungary  Charles had
earlier transferred the German possessions of the Hapsburgs  To his
son  Philip II  1556 1598   he gave Spain with its great American
colonies  Milan  the kingdom of the Two Sicilies  and the
Netherlands  313 

 Sidenote  Philip II s fervent desire to stamp out Protestantism  

Charles had constantly striven to maintain the old religion within his
dominions  He had never hesitated to use the Inquisition in Spain and
the Netherlands  and it was the great disappointment of his life that a
part of his empire had become Protestant  He was  nevertheless  no
fanatic  Like many of the princes of the time  he was forced to take
sides on the religious question without  perhaps  himself having any
deep religious sentiments  The maintenance of the Catholic faith he
believed to be necessary in order that he should keep his hold upon his
scattered and diverse dominions  On the other hand  the whole life and
policy of his son Philip were guided by a fervent attachment to the old
religion  He was willing to sacrifice both himself and his country in
his long fight against the detested Protestants within and without his
realms  And he had vast resources at his disposal  for Spain was a
strong power  not only on account of her income from America  but also
because her soldiers and their commanders were the best in Europe at
this period 

 Sidenote  The Netherlands  

170  The Netherlands  314  which were to cause Philip his first and
greatest trouble  included seventeen provinces which Charles V had
inherited from his grandmother  Mary of Burgundy  They occupied the
position on the map where we now find the kingdoms of Holland and
Belgium  Each of the provinces had its own government  but Charles had
grouped them together and arranged that the German empire should protect
them  In the north the hardy Germanic population had been able  by means
of dikes which kept out the sea  to reclaim large tracts of lowlands 
Here considerable cities had grown up   Harlem  Leyden  Amsterdam  and
Rotterdam  To the south were the flourishing towns of Ghent  Bruges 
Brussels  and Antwerp  which had for hundreds of years been centers of
manufacture and trade 

 Sidenote  Philip II s harsh attitude toward the Netherlands  

Charles  in spite of some very harsh measures  had retained the loyalty
of the people of the Netherlands  for he was himself one of them and
they felt a patriotic pride in his achievements  Toward Philip their
attitude was very different  His sour face and haughty manner made a
disagreeable impression upon the people at Brussels when Charles V first
introduced him to them as their future ruler  He was to them a Spaniard
and a foreigner  and he ruled them as such after he returned to Spain 
Instead of attempting to win them by meeting their legitimate demands 
he did everything to alienate all classes in his Burgundian realm and
increase their natural hatred and suspicion of the Spaniards  The people
were forced to house Spanish soldiers whose insolence drove them nearly
to desperation  A half sister of the king  the duchess of Parma  who did
not even know their language  was given to them as their regent  Philip
put his trust in a group of upstarts rather than in the nobility of the
provinces  who naturally felt that they should be given some part in the
direction of affairs 

 Sidenote  The Inquisition in the Netherlands  

What was still worse  Philip proposed that the Inquisition should carry
on its work far more actively than hitherto and put an end to the heresy
which appeared to him to defile his fair realms  The Inquisition was no
new thing to the provinces  Charles V had issued the most cruel edicts
against the followers of Luther  Zwingli  and Calvin  According to a law
of 1550  heretics who persistently refused to recant were to be burned
alive  Even those who confessed their errors and abjured their heresy
were  if men  to lose their heads  if women  to be buried alive  In both
cases their property was to be confiscated  The lowest estimate of those
who were executed in the Netherlands during Charles  reign is fifty
thousand  Although these terrible laws had not checked the growth of
Protestantism  all of Charles  decrees were solemnly reënacted by Philip
in the first month of his reign 

 Sidenote  Protest against Philip s policy  

 Sidenote  The  Beggars   

For ten years the people suffered Philip s rule  but their king  instead
of listening to the protests of their leaders who were quite as earnest
Catholics as himself  appeared to be bent on the destruction of the
land  So in 1566 some five hundred of the nobles  who were later joined
by many of the citizens  pledged themselves to make a common stand
against Spanish tyranny and the Inquisition  Although they had no idea
as yet of a revolt  they planned a great demonstration during which they
presented a petition to the duchess of Parma requesting the suspension
of the king s edicts  The story is that one of the duchess  councilors
assured her that she had no reason to fear these  beggars   This name
was voluntarily assumed by the petitioners and an important group of the
insurgents in the later troubles were known as  Beggars  

 Sidenote  The image breaking Protestants  

 Sidenote  Philip sends the duke of Alva to the Netherlands  

The Protestant preachers now took courage  and large congregations
gathered in the fields to hear them  Excited by their exhortations 
those who were converted to the new religion rushed into the Catholic
churches  tore down the images  broke the stained glass windows  and
wrecked the altars  The duchess of Parma was just succeeding in quieting
the tumult when Philip took a step which led finally to the revolt of
the Netherlands  He decided to dispatch to the low countries the
remorseless duke of Alva  whose conduct has made his name synonymous
with blind and unmeasured cruelty 

171  The report that Alva was coming caused the flight of many of those
who especially feared his approach  William of Orange  who was to be the
leader in the approaching war against Spain  went to Germany  Thousands
of Flemish weavers fled across the North Sea  and the products of their
looms became before long an important article of export from England 

 Sidenote  Alva s cruel administration  1567 1573  

 Sidenote  The Council of Blood  

Alva brought with him a fine army of Spanish soldiers  ten thousand in
number and superbly equipped  He judged that the wisest and quickest way
of pacifying the discontented provinces was to kill all those who
ventured to criticise  the best of kings   of whom he had the honor to
be the faithful servant  He accordingly established a special court for
the speedy trial and condemnation of all those whose fidelity to Philip
was suspected  This was popularly known as the Council of Blood  for its
aim was not justice but butchery  Alva s administration from 1567 to
1573 was a veritable reign of terror  He afterwards boasted that he had
slain eighteen thousand  but probably not more than a third of that
number were really executed 

 Sidenote  William of Orange  called the Silent  1533 1584  

The Netherlands found a leader in William  Prince of Orange and Count of
Nassau  He is a national hero whose career bears a striking resemblance
to that of Washington  Like the American patriot  he undertook the
seemingly hopeless task of freeing his people from the oppressive rule
of a distant king  To the Spaniards he appeared to be only an
impoverished nobleman at the head of a handful of armed peasants and
fishermen  contending against the sovereign of the richest realm in the
world 

 Sidenote  William the Silent collects an army  

William had been a faithful servant of Charles V and would gladly have
continued to serve his son after him had the oppression and injustice of
the Spanish dominion not become intolerable  But Alva s policy convinced
him that it was useless to send any more complaints to Philip  He
accordingly collected a little army in 1568 and opened the long struggle
with Spain 

 Sidenote  Differences between the northern i e   Dutch  provinces and
the southern  

William found his main support in the northern provinces  of which
Holland was the chief  The Dutch  who had very generally accepted
Protestant teachings  were purely German in blood  while the people of
the southern provinces  who adhered  as they still do  to the Roman
Catholic faith  were more akin to the population of northern France 

 Sidenote  William chosen governor of Holland and Zealand  1572  

The Spanish soldiers found little trouble in defeating the troops which
William collected  Like Washington again  he seemed to lose almost every
battle and yet was never conquered  The first successes of the Dutch
were gained by the  sea beggars    freebooters who captured Spanish
ships and sold them in Protestant England  Finally they seized the town
of Brille and made it their headquarters  Encouraged by this  many of
the towns in the northern provinces of Holland and Zealand ventured to
choose William as their governor  although they did not throw off their
allegiance to Philip  In this way these two provinces became the nucleus
of the United Netherlands 

 Sidenote  Both the northern and southern provinces combine against
Spain  1576  

Alva recaptured a number of the revolted towns and treated their
inhabitants with his customary cruelty  even women and children were
slaughtered in cold blood  But instead of quenching the rebellion  he
aroused even the Catholic southern provinces to revolt  He introduced an
unwise system of taxation which required that ten per cent of the
proceeds of every sale should be paid to the government  This caused
the thrifty Catholic merchants of the southern towns to close their
shops in despair 

 Sidenote  The  Spanish fury   

After six years of this tyrannical and mistaken policy  Alva was
recalled  His successor soon died and left matters worse than ever  The
leaderless soldiers  trained in Alva s school  indulged in wild orgies
of robbery and murder  they plundered and partially reduced to ashes the
rich city of Antwerp  The  Spanish fury   as this outbreak was called 
together with the hated taxes  created such general indignation that
representatives from all of Philip s Burgundian provinces met at Ghent
in 1576 with the purpose of combining to put an end to the Spanish
tyranny 

 Sidenote  The Union of Utrecht  

 Sidenote  The northern provinces declare themselves independent of
Spain  1581  

This union was  however  only temporary  Wiser and more moderate
governors were sent by Philip to the Netherlands  and they soon
succeeded in again winning the confidence of the southern provinces  So
the northern provinces went their own way  Guided by William the Silent 
they refused to consider the idea of again recognizing Philip as their
king  In 1579 seven provinces  Holland  Zealand  Utrecht  Gelderland 
Overyssel  Groningen  and Friesland  all lying north of the mouths of
the Rhine and the Scheldt  formed the new and firmer Union of Utrecht 
The articles of this union served as a constitution for the United
Provinces which  two years later  at last formally declared themselves
independent of Spain 

 Sidenote  Assassination of William the Silent  

Philip realized that William was the soul of the revolt and that without
him it might not improbably have been put down  The king therefore
offered a patent of nobility and a large sum of money to any one who
should make away with the Dutch patriot  After several unsuccessful
attempts  William  who had been chosen hereditary governor of the United
Provinces  was shot in his house at Delft  1584  He died praying the
Lord to have pity upon his soul and  on this poor people  

 Sidenote  Reasons why the Dutch finally won their independence  

 Sidenote  Independence of the United Provinces acknowledged by Spain 
1648  

The Dutch had long hoped for aid from Queen Elizabeth or from the
French  but had heretofore been disappointed  At last the English queen
decided to send troops to their assistance  While the English rendered
but little actual help  Elizabeth s policy so enraged Philip that he at
last decided to attempt the conquest of England  The destruction of the
great fleet which he equipped for that purpose interfered with further
attempts to subjugate the United Provinces  which might otherwise have
failed to preserve their liberty in spite of their heroic resistance 
Moreover  Spain s resources were being rapidly exhausted and the state
was on the verge of bankruptcy in spite of the wealth which it had been
drawing from across the sea  But even when Spain had to surrender the
hope of winning back the lost provinces  which now became a small but
important European power  she refused formally to acknowledge their
independence until 1648 315   Peace of Westphalia  

172  The history of France during the latter part of the sixteenth
century is little more than a chronicle of a long and bloody series of
civil wars between the Catholics and Protestants  Each party  however 
had political as well as religious objects  and the religious issues
were often almost altogether obscured by the worldly ambition of the
leaders 

 Sidenote  Beginnings of Protestantism in France  

 Sidenote  Lefèvre  1450 1537  

 Sidenote  Persecution of the Protestants under Francis I  

 Sidenote  Massacre of the Waldensians  1545  

Protestantism began in France 316  in much the same way as in England 
Those who had learned from the Italians to love the Greek language 
turned to the New Testament in the original and commenced to study it
with new insight  Lefèvre  the most conspicuous of these Erasmus like
reformers  translated the Bible into French and began to preach
justification by faith before he had ever heard of Luther  He and his
followers won the favor of Margaret  the sister of Francis I and queen
of the little kingdom of Navarre  and under her protection they were
left unmolested for some years  The Sorbonne  the famous theological
school at Paris  finally stirred up the suspicions of the king against
the new ideas  While  like his fellow monarchs  Francis had no special
interest in religious matters  he was shocked by an act of desecration
ascribed to the Protestants  and in consequence forbade the circulation
of Protestant books  About 1535 several adherents of the new faith were
burned  and Calvin was forced to flee to Basel  where he prepared a
defense of his beliefs in his  Institutes of Christianity   This is
prefaced by a letter to Francis in which he pleads with him to protect
the Protestants  317  Francis  before his death  became so intolerant
that he ordered the massacre of three thousand defenseless peasants who
dwelt on the slopes of the Alps  and whose only offense was adherence to
the simple teachings of the Waldensians  318 

 Sidenote  Persecution under Henry II  1547 1559  

Francis  son  Henry II  1547 1559   swore to extirpate the Protestants 
and hundreds of them were burned  Nevertheless  Henry s religious
convictions did not prevent him from willingly aiding the German
Protestants against his enemy Charles V  especially when they agreed to
hand over to him three bishoprics which lay on the French
boundary   Metz  Verdun  and Toul 

 Sidenote  Francis II  1559 1560  Mary  Queen of Scots  and the Guises  

Henry II was accidentally killed in a tourney and left his kingdom to
three weak sons  the last scions of the house of Valois  who succeeded
in turn to the throne during a period of unprecedented civil war and
public calamity  The eldest son  Francis II  a boy of sixteen  succeeded
his father  His chief importance for France arose from his marriage with
the

RELATIONS OF THE GUISES  MARY STUART  THE VALOIS  AND THE BOURBONS

Claude  duke of                                                     Francis I  d  1547 
Guise  d  1527                                                           
                                                                         
                                                                         
                                                                         
Francis  duke    Charles      Mary  m  James V of Scotland               
of Guise        cardinal of            son of Henry VIII s          Henry II  d  1559   m  Catherine
 murdered 1563   Lorraine                     sister                                       de  Medici
                                                                                         
                                                                                         
                                                         
                                                                          
                                                                          
             Mary Stuart  m   Francis II    Charles IX    Henry III    Margaret  m  Henry IV  d  1610  
            Queen of Scots      d  1560       d  1574       d  1589                  king of Navarre 
                              without       without       without                   a descendant
                                heirs         heirs         heirs                    through the
Henry  duke of                                                                     younger   Bourbon  
Guise  killed                                                                       line from St  Louis
    1588                                                                                    
                                                                                            
          James VI of Scotland                                                    Louis XIII  d  1643  
              I of England                                                          by Henry s second
            by Mary s second                                                          marriage with
             marriage with                                                          Mary de  Medici
             Lord Darnley                                                                   
                                                                                   Louis XIV  d  1715 
                                                                                            
                                                                                    Louis XV  d  1774 
                                                                                    great grandson of
                                                                                       Louis XIV

daughter of King James V of Scotland  Mary Stuart  who became famous as
Mary  Queen of Scots  Her mother was the sister of two very ambitious
French nobles  the duke of Guise and the cardinal of Lorraine  Francis
II was so young that Mary s uncles  the Guises  eagerly seized the
opportunity to manage his affairs for him  The duke put himself at the
head of the army  and the cardinal of the government  When the king
died  after reigning but a year  the Guises were naturally reluctant to
surrender their power  and many of the woes of France for the next forty
years were due to the machinations which they carried on in the name of
the Holy Catholic religion 

 Sidenote  The queen mother  Catherine de  Medici  

 Sidenote  The Bourbons  

173  The new king  Charles IX  1560 1574   was but ten years old  and
his mother  Catherine de  Medici  of the famous Florentine family 
claimed the right to conduct the government for her son  The rivalries
of the time were complicated by the existence of a younger branch of the
French royal family  namely  the Bourbons  one of whom was king of
Navarre  The Bourbons formed an alliance with the Huguenots  319  as the
French Calvinists were called 

 Sidenote  The Huguenots and their political ambition  

Many of the leading Huguenots  including their chief Coligny  belonged
to noble families and were anxious to play a part in the politics of the
time  This fact tended to confuse religious with political motives  In
the long run this mixture of motives proved fatal to the Protestant
cause in France  but for the time being the Huguenots formed so strong a
party that they threatened to get control of the government 

 Sidenote  Catherine grants conditional toleration to the Protestants 
1562  

Catherine tried at first to conciliate both parties  and granted a
Decree of Toleration  1562  suspending the former edicts against the
Protestants and permitting them to assemble for worship during the
daytime and outside of the towns  Even this restricted toleration of the
Protestants appeared an abomination to the more fanatical Catholics  and
a savage act of the duke of Guise precipitated civil war 

 Sidenote  The massacres of Vassy and the opening of the wars of
religion  

As he was passing through the town of Vassy on a Sunday he found a
thousand Huguenots assembled in a barn for worship  The duke s followers
rudely interrupted the service  and a tumult arose in which the troops
killed a considerable number of the defenseless multitude  The news of
this massacre aroused the Huguenots and was the beginning of a war which
continued  broken only by short truces  until the last weak descendant
of the house of Valois ceased to reign  As in the other religious wars
of the time  both sides exhibited the most inhuman cruelty  France was
filled for a generation with burnings  pillage  and every form of
barbarity  The leaders of both the Catholic and the Protestant party  as
well as two of the French kings themselves  fell by the hands of
assassins  and France renewed in civil war all the horrors of the
English invasion in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries 

 Sidenote  Coligny s influence and plan for a national war against
Philip II  

In 1570 a brief peace was concluded  The Huguenots were to be tolerated 
and certain towns were assigned to them  including La Rochelle  where
they might defend themselves in case of renewed attacks from the
Catholics  For a time both the king and the queen mother were on the
friendliest terms with the Huguenot leader Coligny  who became a sort of
prime minister  He was anxious that Catholics and Protestants should
join in a great national war against Spain  In this way the people of
France would combine  regardless of their differences in religion  in a
patriotic effort to win the county of Burgundy and a line of fortresses
to the north and east  which seemed naturally to belong to France rather
than to Spain  Coligny did not  of course  overlook the consideration
that in this way he could aid the Protestant cause in the Netherlands 

 Sidenote  The massacre of St  Bartholomew s Day  1572  

The strict Catholic party of the Guises frustrated this plan by a most
fearful expedient  They easily induced Catherine de  Medici to believe
that she was being deceived by Coligny  and an assassin was engaged to
put him out of the way  but the scoundrel missed his aim and only
wounded his victim  Fearful lest the young king  who was faithful to
Coligny  should discover her part in the attempted murder  the queen
mother invented a story of a great Huguenot conspiracy  The credulous
king was deceived  and the Catholic leaders at Paris arranged that at a
given signal not only Coligny  but all the Huguenots  who had gathered
in great numbers in the city to witness the marriage of the Protestant
Henry of Navarre with the king s sister  should be massacred on the eve
of St  Bartholomew s Day  August 23  1572  

 Sidenote  The Holy League  

The signal was duly given  and no less than two thousand persons were
ruthlessly murdered in Paris before the end of the next day  The news of
this attack spread into the provinces and it is probable that  at the
very least  ten thousand more Protestants were put to death outside of
the capital  Both the pope and Philip II expressed their gratification
at this signal example of French loyalty to the Church  Civil war again
broke out  and the Catholics formed the famous Holy League  under the
leadership of Henry of Guise  for the advancement of their interests and
the extirpation of heresy 

 Sidenote  Question of the succession to the French throne  

Henry III  1574 1589   the last of the sons of Henry II  who succeeded
Charles IX  had no heirs  and the great question of succession arose 
The Huguenot  Henry of Navarre  was the nearest male relative  but the
League could never consent to permit the throne of France to be sullied
by heresy  especially as their leader  Henry of Guise  was himself
anxious to become king 

 Sidenote  War of the Three Henrys  1585 1589  

Henry III was driven weakly from one party to the other  and it finally
came to a war between the three Henrys   Henry III  Henry of Navarre 
and Henry of Guise  1585 1589   It ended in a characteristic way  Henry
the king had Henry of Guise assassinated  The sympathizers of the League
then assassinated Henry the king  which left the field to Henry of
Navarre  He ascended the throne as Henry IV 320  in 1589  and is an
heroic figure in the line of French kings 

 Sidenote  Henry IV  1589 1610  becomes a Catholic  

174  The new king had many enemies  and his kingdom was devastated and
demoralized by years of war  He soon saw that he must accept the
religion of the majority of his people if he wished to reign over them 
He accordingly asked to be readmitted to the Catholic Church  1593  
excusing himself on the ground that  Paris was worth a mass   He did not
forget his old friends  however  and in 1598 he issued the Edict of
Nantes 

 Sidenote  The Edict of Nantes  1598  

By this edict of toleration the Calvinists were permitted to hold
services in all the towns and villages where they had previously held
them  but in Paris and a number of other towns all Protestant services
were prohibited  The Protestants were to enjoy the same political rights
as Catholics  and to be eligible to public office  A number of fortified
towns were to remain in the hands of the Huguenots  particularly La
Rochelle  Montauban  and Nîmes  Henry s only mistake lay in granting the
Huguenots the exceptional privilege of holding and governing fortified
towns  In the next generation  this privilege aroused the suspicion of
the king s minister  Richelieu  who attacked the Huguenots  not so much
on religious grounds  as on account of their independent position in the
state  which suggested that of the older feudal nobles 

 Sidenote  Ministry of Sully  

Henry IV chose Sully  an upright and able Calvinist  for his chief
minister  Sully set to work to reëstablish the kingly power  which had
suffered greatly under the last three brothers of the house of Valois 
He undertook to lighten the tremendous burden of debt which weighed upon
the country  He laid out new roads and canals  and encouraged
agriculture and commerce  he dismissed the useless noblemen and officers
whom the government was supporting without any advantage to itself  Had
his administration not been prematurely interrupted  France might have
reached unprecedented power and prosperity  but religious fanaticism put
an end to his reforms 

 Sidenote  Assassination of Henry IV  1610  

In 1610 Henry IV  like William the Silent  was assassinated just in the
midst of his greatest usefulness to his country  Sully could not agree
with the regent  Henry s widow  and retired to his castle  where he
dictated his memoirs  which give a remarkable account of the stirring
times in which he had played so important a part  Before many years 
Richelieu  perhaps the greatest minister France has ever had  rose to
power  and from 1624 to his death in 1642 he governed France for Henry s
son  Louis XIII  1610 1643   Something will be said of his policy in
connection with the Thirty Years  War  321 

 Sidenote  England under Elizabeth  1558 1603  

175  The long and disastrous civil war between Catholics and
Protestants  which desolated France in the sixteenth century  had
happily no counterpart in England  During her long and wise reign Queen
Elizabeth 322  succeeded not only in maintaining peace at home  but in
frustrating the conspiracies and attacks of Philip II  which threatened
her realm from without  Moreover  by her interference in the
Netherlands  she did much to secure their independence of Spain 

 Sidenote  Elizabeth restores the Protestant service  

Upon the death of Catholic Mary and the accession of her sister
Elizabeth in 1558  the English government became once more Protestant 
Undoubtedly a great majority of Elizabeth s subjects would have been
satisfied to have had her return to the policy of her father  Henry
VIII  They still venerated the Mass and the other ancient ceremonies 
although they had no desire to acknowledge the supremacy of the pope
over their country  Elizabeth believed  however  that Protestantism
would finally prevail  She therefore reintroduced the Book of Prayer of
Edward VI  with some modifications  and proposed that all her subjects
should conform in public to the form of worship sanctioned by the state 
Elizabeth did not adopt the Presbyterian organization  which had a good
many advocates  but retained the old system of church government with
its archbishops  bishops  deans  etc  Naturally  however  Protestant
clergymen were substituted for the Catholics who had held office under
Mary  Elizabeth s first Parliament gave to the queen the power though
not the title of supreme head of the English church 

 Sidenote  Presbyterian Church established in Scotland  

Elizabeth s position in regard to the religious question was first
threatened by events in Scotland  There  shortly after her accession 
the ancient Church was abolished  largely in the interest of the nobles 
who were anxious to get the lands of the bishops into their own hands
and enjoy the revenue from them  John Knox  a veritable second Calvin in
his stern energy  secured the introduction of the Presbyterian form of
faith and church government which still prevail in Scotland 

 Sidenote  Mary Stuart the Scotch queen  becomes the hope of the
Catholics  

In 1561 the Scotch queen  Mary Stuart  whose French husband  Francis II 
had just died  landed at Leith  She was but nineteen years old  of great
beauty  and  by reason of her Catholic faith and French training  almost
a foreigner to her subjects  Her grandmother was a sister of Henry VIII 
and Mary claimed to be the rightful heiress to the English throne should
Elizabeth die childless  Consequently the beautiful Queen of Scots
became the hope of all those  including Philip II and Mary s relatives 
the Guises  who wished to bring back England and Scotland to the Roman
Catholic faith 

 Sidenote  Mary s suspicious conduct  

 Sidenote  Mary flees to England  1568  

Mary made no effort to undo the work of John Knox  but she quickly
discredited herself with both Protestants and Catholics by her conduct 
After marrying her second cousin  Lord Darnley  she discovered that he
was a dissolute scapegrace  and came to despise him  She then formed an
attachment for a reckless nobleman named Bothwell  The house near
Edinburgh in which the wretched Darnley was lying ill was blown up one
night with gunpowder  and he was killed  The public suspected that both
Bothwell and the queen were implicated  How far Mary was responsible for
her husband s death no one can be sure  It is certain that she later
married Bothwell and that her indignant subjects thereupon deposed her
as a murderess  After fruitless attempts to regain her power  she
abdicated in favor of her infant son  James VI  and then fled to England
to appeal to Elizabeth  While the prudent Elizabeth denied the right of
the Scotch to depose their queen  she took good care to keep her rival
practically a prisoner 

 Sidenote  The rising in the north  1569  and Catholic plans for
deposing Elizabeth  

176  As time went on it became increasingly difficult for Elizabeth to
adhere to her policy of moderation in the treatment of the Catholics  A
rising in the north of England  1569  showed that there were many who
would gladly reëstablish the Catholic faith by freeing Mary and placing
her on the English throne  This was followed by the excommunication of
Elizabeth by the pope  who at the same time absolved her subjects from
their allegiance to their heretical ruler  Happily for Elizabeth the
rebels could look for no help either from Alva or the French king  The
Spaniards had their hands full  for the war in the Netherlands had just
begun  and Charles IX  who had accepted Coligny as his adviser  was at
that moment in hearty accord with the Huguenots  The rising in the north
was suppressed  but the English Catholics continued to harbor
treasonable designs and to look to Philip for help  They opened
correspondence with Alva and invited him to come with six thousand
Spanish troops to dethrone Elizabeth and make Mary Stuart queen of
England in her stead  Alva hesitated  for he characteristically thought
that it would be better to kill Elizabeth  or at least capture her 
Meanwhile the plot was discovered and came to naught 

 Sidenote  English mariners capture Spanish ships  

Although Philip found himself unable to harm England  the English
mariners  like the Dutch  sea beggars   caused great loss to Spain  In
spite of the fact that Spain and England were not openly at war  the
English seamen extended their operations as far as the West Indies  and
seized Spanish treasure ships  with the firm conviction that in robbing
Philip they were serving God  The daring Sir Francis Drake even
ventured into the Pacific  where only the Spaniards had gone heretofore 
and carried off much booty on his little vessel  the  Pelican   At last
he took  a great vessel with jewels in plenty  thirteen chests of silver
coin  eighty pounds weight of gold  and twenty six tons of silver   He
then sailed around the world  and on his return presented his jewels to
Elizabeth  who paid little attention to the expostulations of the king
of Spain  323 

 Sidenote  Relations between England and Catholic Ireland  

One hope of the Catholics has not yet been mentioned  namely  Ireland 
whose relations with England from very early times down to the present
day form one of the most cheerless pages in the history of Europe 
Ireland was no longer  as it had been in the time of Gregory the Great 
a center of culture  324  The population was divided into numerous clans
and their chieftains fought constantly with one another as well as with
the English  who were vainly endeavoring to subjugate the island  Under
Henry II and later kings England had conquered a district in the eastern
part of Ireland  and here the English managed to maintain a foothold in
spite of the anarchy outside  Henry VIII had suppressed a revolt of the
Irish and assumed the title of King of Ireland  Mary had hoped to
promote better relations by colonizing Kings County and Queens County
with Englishmen  This led  however  to a long struggle which only ended
when the colonists had killed all the natives in the district they
occupied 

Elizabeth s interest in the perennial Irish question was stimulated by
the probability that Ireland might become a basis for Catholic
operations  since Protestantism had made little progress among its
simple and half barbarous people  Her fears were realized  Several
attempts were made by Catholic leaders to land troops in Ireland with
the purpose of making the island the base for an attack on England 
Elizabeth s officers were able to frustrate these enterprises  but the
resulting disturbances greatly increased the misery of the Irish  In
1582 no less than thirty thousand people are said to have perished 
chiefly from starvation 

 Sidenote  Persecution of the English Catholics  

As Philip s troops began to get the better of the opposition in the
southern Netherlands  the prospect of sending a Spanish army to England
grew brighter  Two Jesuits were sent to England in 1580 to strengthen
the adherents of their faith and were supposed to be urging them to
assist the foreign force against their queen when it should come 
Parliament now grew more intolerant and ordered fines and imprisonment
to be inflicted on those who said or heard mass  or who refused to
attend the English services  One of the Jesuits was cruelly tortured and
executed for treason but the other escaped to the continent 

 Sidenote  Plans to assassinate Elizabeth  

In the spring of 1582 the first attempt to assassinate the heretical
queen was made at Philip s instigation  It was proposed that  when
Elizabeth was out of the way  the duke of Guise should see that an army
was sent to England in the interest of the Catholics  But Guise was kept
busy at home by the War of the Three Henrys  and Philip was left to
undertake the invasion of England by himself 

 Sidenote  Execution of Mary Queen of Scots  1587  

Mary did not live to witness the attempt  She became implicated in
another plot for the assassination of Elizabeth  Parliament now realized
that as long as Mary lived Elizabeth s life was in constant danger 
whereas  if Mary were out of the way  Philip would have no interest in
the death of Elizabeth  since Mary s son  James VI of Scotland  was a
Protestant  Elizabeth was therefore reluctantly persuaded by her
advisers to sign a warrant for Mary s execution in 1587  325 

 Sidenote  Destruction of Philip s Armada  1588  

Philip by no means gave up his project of reclaiming Protestant England 
In 1588 he brought together a great fleet  including his best and
largest warships  which was proudly called by the Spaniards the
 Invincible Armada   i e   fleet   This was to sail up the Channel to
Flanders and bring over the duke of Parma and his veterans  who  it was
expected  would soon make an end of Elizabeth s raw militia  The English
ships were inferior to those of Spain in size although not in number 
but they had trained commanders  such as Drake and Hawkins  These famous
captains had long sailed the Spanish Main and knew how to use their
cannon without getting near enough to the Spaniards to suffer from their
short range weapons  When the Armada approached  it was permitted by the
English fleet to pass up the Channel before a strong wind which later
became a storm  The English ships then followed and both fleets were
driven past the coast of Flanders  Of the hundred and twenty Spanish
ships  only fifty four returned home  the rest had been destroyed by
English valor  or by the gale to which Elizabeth herself ascribed the
victory  326  The defeat of the Armada put an end to the danger from
Spain 

 Sidenote  Prospects of the Catholic cause at the opening of the reign
of Philip II  

177  As we look back over the period covered by the reign of Philip II 
it is clear that it was a most notable one in the history of the
Catholic Church  When he ascended the throne Germany  as well as
Switzerland and the Netherlands  had become largely Protestant  England 
however  under his Catholic wife  Mary  seemed to be turning back to the
old religion  while the French monarchs showed no inclination to
tolerate the heretical Calvinists  Moreover  the new and enthusiastic
order of the Jesuits promised to be a potent agency in inducing the
disaffected people to accept once more the supremacy of the pope and the
doctrines of the ancient church as formulated by the Council of Trent 
The tremendous power and apparently boundless resources of Spain
itself   which were viewed by the rest of Europe with the gravest
apprehension  not to say terror   Philip was willing to dedicate to the
extirpation of heresy in his own dominions and the destruction of
Protestantism throughout western Europe 

 Sidenote  Outcome of Philip s policy  

When Philip died all was changed  England was hopelessly Protestant  the
 Invincible Armada  had been miserably wrecked  and Philip s plan for
bringing England once more within the fold of the Roman Catholic Church
was forever frustrated  In France the terrible wars of religion were
over  and a powerful king  lately a Protestant himself  was on the
throne  who not only tolerated the Protestants but chose one of them for
his chief minister  and would brook no more meddling of Spain in French
affairs  A new Protestant state  the United Netherlands  had actually
appeared within the bounds of the realm bequeathed to Philip by his
father  In spite of its small size this state was destined to play  from
that time on  quite as important a part in European affairs as the harsh
Spanish stepmother from whose control it had escaped 

 Sidenote  Decline of Spain after the sixteenth century  

Spain itself had suffered most of all from Philip s reign  327  His
domestic policy and his expensive wars had weakened a country which had
never been intrinsically strong  The income from across the sea was
bound to decrease as the mines were exhausted  The final expulsion of
the industrious Moors  shortly after Philip s death  left the indolent
Spaniards to till their own fields  which rapidly declined in fertility
under their careless cultivation  Poverty was deemed no disgrace but
manual labor was  Some one once ventured to tell a Spanish king that
 not gold and silver but sweat is the most precious metal  a coin which
is always current and never depreciates   but it was a rare form of
currency in the Spanish peninsula  After Philip II s death Spain sinks
to the rank of a secondary European power 




CHAPTER XXIX

THE THIRTY YEARS  WAR


 Sidenote  The Thirty Years  War really a series of wars  

178  The last great conflict caused by the differences between the
Catholics and Protestants was fought out in Germany during the first
half of the seventeenth century  It is generally known as the Thirty
Years  War  1618 1648   but there was in reality a series of wars  and
although the fighting was done upon German territory  Sweden  France 
and Spain played quite as important a part as Germany 

 Sidenote  Weaknesses of the Peace of Augsburg  

Just before the abdication of Charles V  the Lutheran princes had forced
the emperor to acknowledge their right to their own religion and to the
church property which they had appropriated  The religious Peace of
Augsburg had  however  as we have seen  328  two great weaknesses  In
the first place  only those Protestants who held the Lutheran faith were
to be tolerated  The Calvinists  who were increasing in numbers  were
not included in the peace  In the second place  the peace did not put a
stop to the seizure of church property by the Protestant princes 

 Sidenote  Spread of Protestantism  

During the last years of Ferdinand I s reign and that of his successor
there was little trouble  Protestantism  however  made rapid progress
and invaded Bavaria  the Austrian possessions  and above all  Bohemia 
where the doctrines of Huss had never died out  So it looked for a time
as if even the German Hapsburgs were to see large portions of their
territory falling away from the old Church  But the Catholics had in the
Jesuits a band of active and efficient missionaries  They not only
preached and founded schools  but also succeeded in gaining the
confidence of some of the German princes  whose chief advisers they
became  Conditions were very favorable  at the opening of the
seventeenth century  for a renewal of the religious struggle 

 Sidenote  Formation of the Protestant Union and the Catholic League  

The Lutheran town of Donauwörth permitted the existence of a monastery
within its limits  In 1607 a Protestant mob attacked the monks as they
were passing in procession through the streets  Duke Maximilian of
Bavaria  an ardent Catholic  on the border of whose possessions the town
lay  gladly undertook to punish this outrage  His army entered
Donauwörth  reëstablished the Catholic worship  and drove out the
Lutheran pastor  This event led to the formation of the Protestant Union
under the leadership of Frederick  elector of the Palatinate  The Union
included by no means all the Protestant princes  for example  the
Lutheran elector of Saxony refused to have anything to do with the
Calvinistic Frederick  The next year the Catholics  on their part 
formed the Catholic League under a far more efficient head  namely 
Maximilian of Bavaria  329 

 Sidenote  Bohemia revolts from the Hapsburg rule  1618  

 Sidenote  Frederick  elector of the Palatinate  chosen king of
Bohemia  

These were the preliminaries of the Thirty Years  War  Hostilities began
in Bohemia  which had been added to the Hapsburg possessions through the
marriage of Ferdinand I  The Protestants were so strong in that country
that they had forced the emperor in 1609 to grant them privileges
greater even than those enjoyed by the Huguenots in France  The
government  however  failed to observe this agreement  and the
destruction of two Protestant churches resulted in a revolution at
Prague in 1618  Three representatives of the emperor were seized by the
irritated Bohemian leaders and thrown out of the window of the palace 
After this emphatic protest against the oppressive measures of the
government  Bohemia endeavored to establish itself once more as an
independent kingdom  It renounced the rule of the Hapsburgs and chose
Frederick  the elector of the Palatinate  as its new king  He appeared
to the Bohemians to possess a double advantage  in the first place  he
was the head of the Protestant Union  and in the second  he was the
son in law of the king of England  James I  to whom they looked for
help 

 Sidenote  Failure of the Bohemian revolt  

 Sidenote  Battle on the White Hill  1620  

The Bohemian venture proved a most disastrous one for Germany and for
Protestantism  The new emperor  Ferdinand II  1619 1637   who was at
once an uncompromising Catholic and a person of considerable ability 
appealed to the League for assistance  Frederick  the new king of
Bohemia  showed himself entirely unequal to the occasion  He and his
English wife  the Princess Elizabeth  made a bad impression on the
Bohemians  and they failed to gain the support of the neighboring
Lutheran elector of Saxony  A single battle  which the army of the
League under Maximilian won in 1620  put to flight the poor  winter
king   as he was derisively called on account of his reign of a single
season  The emperor and the duke of Bavaria set vigorously to work to
suppress Protestantism within their borders  The emperor arbitrarily
granted the eastern portion of the Palatinate to Maximilian and gave him
the title of Elector  without consulting the diet 

 Sidenote  England and France unable to assist the Protestants  

179  Matters were becoming serious for the Protestant party  and England
might have intervened had it not been that James I believed that he
could by his personal influence restore peace to Europe and induce the
emperor and Maximilian of Bavaria to give back the Palatinate to the
 winter king   Even France might have taken a hand  for although
Richelieu  then at the head of affairs  had no love for the Protestants 
he was still more bitterly opposed to the Hapsburgs  However  his hands
were tied for the moment  for he was just undertaking to deprive the
Huguenots of their strong towns 

 Sidenote  Christian IV of Denmark invades Germany  but is defeated  

 Sidenote  Wallenstein  

A diversion came  nevertheless  from without  Christian IV  king of
Denmark  invaded northern Germany in 1625 with a view of relieving his
fellow Protestants  In addition to the army of the League which was
dispatched against him  a new army was organized by the notorious
commander  Wallenstein  The emperor was poor and gladly accepted the
offer of this ambitious Bohemian nobleman 330  to collect an army which
should support itself upon the proceeds of the war  to wit  confiscation
and robbery  Christian met with two serious defeats in northern Germany 
even his peninsula was invaded by the imperial forces  and in 1629 he
agreed to retire from the conflict 

 Sidenote  The Edict of Restitution  1629  

 Sidenote  Dismissal of Wallenstein  

 Sidenote  Appearance of Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden  1594 1632  

The emperor was encouraged by the successes of the Catholic armies to
issue that same year an Edict of Restitution  In this he ordered the
Protestants throughout Germany to give back all the church possessions
which they had seized since the religious Peace of Augsburg  1555  
These included two archbishoprics  Magdeburg and Bremen   nine
bishoprics  about one hundred and twenty monasteries  and other church
foundations  Moreover  he decreed that only the Lutherans might enjoy
the practice of their religion  the other  sects  were to be broken up 
As Wallenstein was preparing to execute this decree in his usual
merciless fashion  the war took a new turn  The League had become
jealous of a general who threatened to become too powerful  and it
accordingly joined in the complaints  which came from every side  of the
terrible extortions and incredible cruelty practiced by Wallenstein s
troops  The emperor consented  therefore  to dismiss this most competent
commander and lose a large part of his army  Just as the Catholics were
thus weakened  a new enemy arrived upon the scene who was far more
dangerous than any they had yet had to face  Gustavus Adolphus  king of
Sweden  331 

 Sidenote  The kingdom of Sweden  

 Sidenote  Gustavus Vasa  1523 1560  

180  We have had no occasion hitherto to speak of the Scandinavian
kingdoms of Norway  Sweden  and Denmark  which the northern German
peoples had established about Charlemagne s time  but from now on they
begin to take part in the affairs of central Europe  The Union of Calmar
 1397  had brought these three kingdoms  previously separate  under a
single ruler  About the time that the Protestant revolt began in Germany
the union was broken by the withdrawal of Sweden  Gustavus Vasa  a
Swedish noble  led the movement and was subsequently chosen king of
Sweden  1523   In the same year Protestantism was introduced  Vasa
confiscated the church lands  got the better of the aristocracy  and
started Sweden on its way toward national greatness  Under his successor
the eastern shores of the Baltic were conquered and the Russians cut off
from the sea 

 Sidenote  Motives of Gustavus Adolphus in invading Germany  1630  

Gustavus Adolphus  1594 1632  was induced to invade Germany for two
reasons  In the first place  he was a sincere and enthusiastic
Protestant and by far the most generous and attractive figure of his
time  He was genuinely afflicted by the misfortunes of his Protestant
brethren and anxious to devote himself to their welfare  Secondly  he
dreamed of extending his domains so that one day the Baltic might
perhaps become a Swedish lake  He undoubtedly hoped by his invasion not
only to free his co religionists from the oppression of the emperor and
of the League  but to gain a strip of territory for Sweden 

 Sidenote  Destruction of Magdeburg  1631  

 Sidenote  Gustavus Adolphus victorious at Breitenfeld  1631  

Gustavus was not received with much cordiality at first by the
Protestant princes of the north  but they were brought to their senses
by the awful destruction of Magdeburg by the troops of the League under
General Tilly  Magdeburg was the most important town of northern
Germany  When it finally succumbed after an obstinate and difficult
siege  twenty thousand of its inhabitants were killed and the town
burned to the ground  Although Tilly s reputation for cruelty is quite
equal to that of Wallenstein  he was probably not responsible for the
fire  After Gustavus Adolphus had met Tilly near Leipsic and
victoriously routed the army of the League  the Protestant princes began
to look with more favor on the foreigner  Gustavus then moved westward
and took up his winter quarters on the Rhine 

 Sidenote  Wallenstein recalled  

 Sidenote  Gustavus Adolphus killed at Lützen  1632  

The next spring he entered Bavaria and once more defeated Tilly  who was
mortally wounded in the battle   and forced Munich to surrender  There
seemed now to be no reason why he should not continue his way to Vienna 
At this juncture the emperor recalled Wallenstein  who collected a new
army over which the emperor gave him absolute command  After some delay
Gustavus met Wallenstein on the field of Lützen  in November  1632 
where  after a fierce struggle  the Swedes gained the victory  But they
lost their leader and Protestantism its hero  for the Swedish king
ventured too far into the lines of the enemy and was surrounded and
killed 

 Sidenote  Murder of Wallenstein  

 Sidenote  Battle of Nördlingen  1634  

The Swedes did not  however  retire from Germany  but continued to
participate in the war  which now degenerated into a series of raids by
leaders whose soldiers depopulated the land by their unspeakable
atrocities  Wallenstein roused the suspicions of the Catholics by
entering into mysterious negotiations with Richelieu and with the German
Protestants  This treasonable correspondence quickly reached the ears of
the emperor  Wallenstein  who had long been detested by even the
Catholics  was deserted by his soldiers and murdered  in 1634   to the
great relief of all parties  In the same year the imperial army won the
important battle of Nördlingen  one of the most bloody and at the same
time decisive engagements of the war  Shortly after  the elector of
Saxony withdrew from his alliance with the Swedes and made peace with
the emperor  It looked as if the war were about to come to an end  for
many others among the German princes were quite ready to lay down their
arms  332 

 Sidenote  Richelieu renews the struggle of France against the
Hapsburgs  

181  Just at this critical moment Richelieu decided that it would be to
the interest of France to renew the old struggle with the Hapsburgs by
sending troops against the emperor  France was still shut in  as she had
been since the time of Charles V  by the Hapsburg lands  Except on the
side toward the ocean her boundaries were in the main artificial ones 
and not those established by great rivers and mountains  She therefore
longed to weaken her enemy and strengthen herself by winning Roussillon
on the south  and so make the crest of the Pyrenees the line of
demarcation between France and Spain  She dreamed  too  of extending her
sway toward the Rhine by adding the county of Burgundy  i e  
Franche Comté  and a number of fortified towns which would afford
protection against the Spanish Netherlands 

 Sidenote  Richelieu checks Spanish aggression in Italy  

Richelieu had been by no means indifferent to the Thirty Years  War  He
had encouraged the Swedish king to intervene  and had supplied him with
funds if not with troops  Moreover  he himself had checked Spanish
progress in northern Italy  In 1624 Spanish troops had invaded the
valley of the Adda  a Protestant region  with the evident purpose of
conquest  This appeared a most serious aggression to Richelieu  for if
the Spanish won the valley of the Adda  the last barrier between the
Hapsburg possessions in Italy and in Germany would be removed  French
troops were dispatched to drive out the Spaniards  but it was in the
interest of France rather than in that of the oppressed Calvinists  for
whom Richelieu could hardly have harbored a deep affection  A few years
later it became a question whether a Spanish or a French candidate
should obtain the vacant duchy of Mantua  and Richelieu led another
French army in person to see that Spain was again discomfited  It was 
then  not strange that he should decide to deal a blow at the emperor
when the war appeared to be coming to a close that was tolerably
satisfactory from the standpoint of the Hapsburgs 

 Sidenote  Richelieu s intervention prolongs the war  

Richelieu declared war against Spain in May  1635  He had already
concluded an alliance with the chief enemies of the house of Austria 
Sweden agreed not to negotiate for peace until France was ready for it 
The United Provinces joined France  as did some of the German princes 
So the war was renewed  and French  Swedish  Spanish  and German
soldiers ravaged an already exhausted country for a decade longer  The
dearth of provisions was so great that the armies had to move quickly
from place to place in order to avoid starvation  After a serious defeat
by the Swedes  the emperor  Ferdinand III  1637 1657  sent a Dominican
monk to expostulate with Cardinal Richelieu for his crime in aiding the
German and Swedish heretics against the unimpeachably orthodox Austria 

 Sidenote  France succeeds Spain in the military supremacy of western
Europe  

The cardinal had  however  just died  December  1642   well content with
the results of his diplomacy  The French were in possession of
Roussillon and of Artois  Lorraine  and Alsace  The military exploits of
the French generals  especially Turenne and Condé  during the opening
years of the reign of Louis XIV  1643 1715  showed that a new period had
begun in which the military and political supremacy of Spain was to give
way to that of France 

 Sidenote  Close of the Thirty Years  War  1648  

182  The participants in the war were now so numerous and their objects
so various and conflicting  that it is not strange that it required some
years to arrange the conditions of peace even when every one was ready
for it  It was agreed  1644  that France and the empire should negotiate
at Münster  and the emperor and the Swedes at Osnabrück   both of which
towns lie in Westphalia  For four years the representatives of the
several powers worked upon the difficult problem of satisfying every
one  but at last the treaties of Westphalia were signed late in 1648 
Their provisions continued to be the basis of the international law of
Europe down to the French Revolution 

 Sidenote  Provisions of the treaties of Westphalia  

The religious troubles in Germany were settled by extending the
toleration of the Peace of Augsburg so as to include the Calvinists as
well as the Lutherans  The Protestant princes were  regardless of the
Edict of Restitution  to retain the lands which they had in their
possession in the year 1624  and each ruler was still to have the right
to determine the religion of his state  The dissolution of the German
empire was practically acknowledged by permitting the individual states
to make treaties among themselves and with foreign powers  this was
equivalent to recognizing the practical independence which they had  as
a matter of fact  already long enjoyed  A part of Pomerania and the
districts at the mouth of the Oder  the Elbe  and the Weser were ceded
to Sweden  This territory did not  however  cease to form a part of the
empire  for Sweden was thereafter to have three votes in the German
diet 

As for France  it was definitely given the three bishoprics of Metz 
Verdun  and Toul  which Henry II had bargained for when he allied
himself with the Protestants a century earlier  333  The emperor also
ceded to France all his rights in Alsace  although the city of Strasburg
was to remain with the empire  Lastly  the independence both of the
United Netherlands and of Switzerland was acknowledged  334 

 Sidenote  Disastrous results of the war in Germany  

The accounts of the misery and depopulation of Germany caused by the
Thirty Years  War are well nigh incredible  Thousands of villages were
wiped out altogether  in some regions the population was reduced by one
half  in others to a third  or even less  of what it had been at the
opening of the conflict  The flourishing city of Augsburg was left with
but sixteen thousand souls instead of eighty thousand  The people were
fearfully barbarized by privation and suffering and by the atrocities
of the soldiers of all the various nations  Until the end of the
eighteenth century Germany was too exhausted and impoverished to make
any considerable contribution to the culture of Europe  Only one hopeful
circumstance may be noted as we leave this dreary subject  After the
Peace of Westphalia the elector of Brandenburg was the most powerful of
the German princes next to the emperor  As king of Prussia he was
destined to create another European power  and at last to humble the
house of Hapsburg and create a new German empire in which Austria should
have no part 


     General Reading   The most complete and scholarly account of the
     Thirty Years  War to be had in English is GINDELY   History of the
     Thirty Years  War   G P  Putnam s Sons  2 vols    3 50  




CHAPTER XXX

STRUGGLE IN ENGLAND FOR CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT


 Sidenote  The question of absolute or limited monarchy in England  

183  The great question which confronted England in the seventeenth
century was whether the king should be permitted to rule the people  as
God s representative  or should submit to the constant control of the
nation s representatives  i e   Parliament  In France the Estates
General met for the last time in 1614  and thereafter the French king
made laws and executed them without asking the advice of any one except
his immediate counselors  In general  the rulers on the continent
exercised despotic powers  and James I of England and his son Charles I
would gladly have made themselves absolute rulers  for they entertained
the same exalted notions of the divine right of kings which prevailed
across the English Channel  England finally succeeded  however  in
adjusting the relations between king and Parliament in a very happy way 
so as to produce a limited  or constitutional  monarchy  The long and
bitter struggle between the house of Stuart and the English Parliament
plays an important rôle in the history of Europe at large  as well as in
that of England  After the French Revolution  at the end of the
eighteenth century  the English system began to become popular on the
continent  and it has now replaced the older absolute monarchy in all
the kingdoms of western Europe 

 Sidenote  Accession of James I  1603 1625  

On the death of Elizabeth in 1603  James I  the first of the Stuarts 
ascended the English throne  He was  it will be remembered  the son of
Mary Queen of Scots  and was known in Scotland as James VI 
consequently England and Scotland now came under the same ruler  This
did not  however  make the relations between the two countries much
happier  for a century to come at least 

 Sidenote  James  belief in the  divine right  of kings  

The chief interest of James  reign lay in his tendency to exalt the
royal prerogative  and in the systematic manner in which he extolled
absolute monarchy in his writings and speeches and discredited it by his
conduct  James was an unusually learned man  for a king  but his
learning did not enlighten him in matters of common sense  As a man and
a ruler  he was far inferior to his unschooled and light hearted
contemporary  Henry IV of France  Henry VIII had been a heartless
despot  and Elizabeth had ruled the nation in a high handed manner  but
both of them had known how to make themselves popular and had had the
good sense to say as little as possible about their rights  James  on
the contrary  had a fancy for discussing his high position 

 Sidenote  His own expression of his claims  

 As for the absolute prerogative of the crown   he declares   that is no
subject for the tongue of a lawyer  nor is it lawful to be disputed  It
is atheism and blasphemy to dispute what God can do      so it is
presumption and high contempt in a subject to dispute what a king can
do  or say that a king cannot do this or that   The king  James claimed 
could make any kind of law or statute that he thought meet  without any
advice from Parliament  although he might  if he chose  accept its
suggestions   He is overlord of the whole land  so is he master over
every person who inhabiteth the same  having power over the life and
death of every one of them  for although a just prince will not take the
life of one of his subjects without a clear law  yet the same laws
whereby he taketh them are made by himself and his predecessors  so the
power flows always from himself   A good king will act according to law 
but he is above the law and is not bound thereby except voluntarily and
for good example giving to his subjects 

 Sidenote  The theory of  divine right   

These theories  taken from James  work on  The Law of Free Monarchies  
seem strange and unreasonable to us  But he was really only claiming the
rights which his predecessors had enjoyed  and such as were conceded to
the kings of France until the French Revolution  According to the theory
of  divine right   the king did not owe his power to the nation but to
God  who had appointed him to be the father of his people  From God he
derived all the prerogatives necessary to maintain order and promote
justice  consequently he was responsible to God alone  and not to the
people  for the exercise of his powers  It is unnecessary to follow in
detail the troubles between James and his Parliament and the various
methods which he invented for raising money without the sanction of
Parliament  for all this forms only the preliminary to the fatal
experience of James  son  Charles I 

 Sidenote  James I s foreign policy  

In his foreign policy James showed as little sense as in his relations
with his own people  He refused to help his son in law when he became
king of Bohemia  335  But when the Palatinate was given by the emperor
to Maximilian of Bavaria  James struck upon the extraordinary plan of
forming an alliance with the hated Spain and inducing its king to
persuade the emperor to reinstate the  winter king  in his former
possessions  In order to conciliate Spain  Charles  Prince of Wales  was
to marry a Spanish princess  Naturally this proposal was very unpopular
among the English Protestants  and it finally came to nothing 

 Sidenote  Literature in the time of Elizabeth and James I  

 Sidenote  Shakespeare  1564 1616  

 Sidenote  Francis Bacon  1561 1626  

 Sidenote  The King James translation of the Bible  

Although England under James I failed to influence deeply the course of
affairs in Europe at large  his reign is distinguished by the work of
unrivaled writers who gave England a literature which outshone that of
any other of the European countries  Shakespeare is generally admitted
to have been the greatest dramatist the world has ever produced  While
he wrote many of his plays before the death of Elizabeth   Othello  
 King Lear   and  The Tempest  belong to the reign of James  Francis
Bacon  philosopher and statesman  did much for the advancement of
scientific research by advocating new methods of reasoning based upon a
careful observation of natural phenomena instead of upon Aristotle s
logic  He urged investigators to take the path already indicated over
three centuries earlier by his namesake  Roger Bacon  336  The most
worthy monument of the strong and beautiful English of the period is to
be found in the translation of the Bible  prepared in James  reign and
still generally used in all the countries where English is spoken  337 

 Sidenote  Charles I  1625 1649  

184  Charles I was somewhat more dignified than his father  but he was
quite as obstinately set upon having his own way and showed no more
skill in winning the confidence of his subjects  He did nothing to
remove the disagreeable impressions of his father s reign and began
immediately to quarrel with Parliament  When that body refused to grant
him any money  mainly because they thought that it was likely to be
wasted by his favorite  the duke of Buckingham  Charles formed the plan
of winning their favor by a great military victory 

After James I had reluctantly given up his cherished Spanish alliance 
Charles had married a French princess  Henrietta Maria  the daughter of
Henry IV  In spite of this marriage Charles now proposed to aid the
Huguenots whom Richelieu was besieging in their town of La Rochelle  He
also hoped to gain popularity by prosecuting a war against Spain  whose
king was energetically supporting the Catholic League in Germany 
Accordingly  in spite of Parliament s refusal to grant him the
necessary funds  he embarked in war  With only the money which he could
raise by irregular means  Charles arranged an expedition to take Cadiz
and the Spanish treasure ships which arrived there once a year from
America  laden with gold and silver  The expedition failed  as well as
Charles  attempt to help the Huguenots 

 Sidenote  Charles  exactions and arbitrary acts  

In his attempts to raise money without a regular grant from Parliament 
Charles had resorted to vexatious exactions  The law prohibited him from
asking for  gifts  from his people  but it did not forbid his asking
them to  lend  him money  however little prospect there might be of his
ever repaying it  Five gentlemen who refused to pay such a forced loan
were imprisoned by the mere order of the king  This raised the question
of whether the king had the right to send to prison those whom he wished
without showing legal cause for their arrest 

 Sidenote  The Petition of Right  

This and other attacks upon the rights of his subjects roused
Parliament  In 1628 that body drew up the celebrated Petition of
Right  338  which is one of the most important documents in the history
of the English Constitution  In it Parliament called the king s
attention to his illegal exactions  and to the acts of his agents who
had in sundry ways molested and disquieted the people of the realm 
Parliament therefore  humbly prayed  the king that no man need
thereafter  make or yield any gift  loan  benevolence  tax  or such like
charge  without consent of Parliament  that no free man should be
imprisoned or suffer any punishment except according to the laws and
statutes of the realm as presented in the Great Charter  and that
soldiers should not be quartered upon the people on any pretext
whatever  Very reluctantly Charles consented to this restatement of the
limitations which the English had always  in theory at least  placed
upon the arbitrary power of their king 

 Sidenote  Religious differences between Charles and the Commons  

The disagreement between Charles and Parliament was rendered much more
serious by religious differences  The king had married a Catholic
princess  and the Catholic cause seemed to be gaining on the continent 
The king of Denmark had just been defeated by Wallenstein and Tilly  and
Richelieu had succeeded in depriving the Huguenots of their cities of
refuge  Both James and Charles had shown their readiness to enter into
engagements with France and Spain to protect English Catholics  and
there was evidently a growing inclination in England to revert to the
older ceremonies of the Church  which shocked the more strongly
Protestant members of the House of Commons  The communion table was
again placed by many clergymen at the eastern end of the church and
became fixed there as an altar  and portions of the service were once
more chanted 

 Illustration  Charles I  After a painting by Vandyke  

 Sidenote  Charles dissolves Parliament  1629  and determines to rule by
himself  

These  popish practices   with which the king was supposed to
sympathize  served to widen the breach between him and the Commons which
had been opened by the king s attempt to raise taxes on his own account 
The Parliament of 1629  after a stormy session  was dissolved by the
king  who determined to rule thereafter by himself  For eleven years no
new Parliament was summoned 

185  Charles was not well fitted by nature to try the experiment of
personal government  Moreover  the methods resorted to by his ministers
to raise money without recourse to Parliament rendered the king more and
more unpopular and prepared the way for the triumphant return of
Parliament 

 Sidenote  Charles  financial exactions  

According to an ancient law of England  those who had a certain amount
of land must become knights  but since the decay of the feudal system 
landowners had given up the meaningless form of qualifying themselves as
knights  It now occurred to the king s government that a large amount of
money might be raised by fining these delinquents  Other unfortunates
who had settled within the boundaries of the royal forests were either
heavily fined or required to pay enormous arrears of rent 

In addition to these sources of income  Charles applied to his subjects
for  ship money   339  He was anxious to equip a fleet  but instead of
requiring the various ports to furnish ships  as was the ancient custom 
he permitted them to buy themselves off by contributing to the fitting
out of large ships owned by himself  Even those living inland were asked
for ship money  The king maintained that this was not a tax but simply a
payment by which his subjects freed themselves from the duty of
defending their country  John Hampden  a squire of Buckinghamshire  made
a bold stand against this illegal demand by refusing to pay twenty
shillings of ship money which was levied upon him  The case was tried
before the king s judges  a bare majority of whom decided against
Hampden  But the trial made it tolerably clear that the country would
not put up long with the king s despotic policy 

 Sidenote  William Laud made Archbishop of Canterbury  

In 1633 Charles made William Laud Archbishop of Canterbury  Laud
believed that the English Church would strengthen both itself and the
government by following a middle course which should lie between that
of the Church of Rome and that of Calvinistic Geneva  He declared that
it was the part of good citizenship to conform outwardly to the services
of the state church  but that the state should not undertake to oppress
the individual conscience  and that every one should be at liberty to
make up his own mind in regard to the interpretation to be given to the
Bible and to the church fathers  As soon as he became archbishop he
began a series of visitations through his province  Every clergyman who
refused to conform to the Prayer Book  or opposed the placing of the
communion table at the east end of the church  or declined to bow at the
name of Jesus  was  if obstinate  to be brought before the king s
special Court of High Commission to be tried and if convicted to be
deprived of his benefice 

 Sidenote  The different sects of Protestants  

Laud s conduct was no doubt gratifying to the High Church party among
the Protestants  that is  those who still clung to some of the ancient
practices of the Roman Church  although they rejected the doctrine of
the Mass and refused to regard the pope as their head  The Low Church
party  or  Puritans   on the contrary  regarded Laud and his policy with
aversion  While  unlike the Presbyterians  they did not urge the
abolition of the bishops  they disliked all  superstitious usages   as
they called the wearing of the surplice by the clergy  the use of the
sign of the cross at baptism  the kneeling posture in partaking of the
communion  The Presbyterians  who are often confused with the Puritans 
agreed with them in many respects  but went farther and demanded the
introduction of Calvin s system of church government  340 

 Sidenote  The Independents  

 Sidenote  The Pilgrim Fathers  

Lastly  there was an ever increasing number of Separatists  or
Independents  These rejected both the organization of the Church of
England and that of the Presbyterians  and desired that each religious
community should organize itself independently  The government had
forbidden these Separatists to hold their little meetings  which they
called  conventicles   and about 1600 some of them fled to Holland  The
community of them which established itself at Leyden dispatched the
 Mayflower   in 1620  with colonists  since known as the Pilgrim
Fathers  to the New World across the sea  341  It was these colonists
who laid the foundations of a  New England  which has proved a worthy
offspring of the mother country  The form of worship which they
established in their new home is still known as Congregational  342 

 Sidenote  Charles summons Parliament once more  to aid him in fighting
the Scotch Presbyterians  1640  

186  In 1640 Charles found himself forced to resort to Parliament  for
he was involved in a war with Scotland which he could not carry on
without money  There the Presbyterian system had been pretty generally
introduced by John Knox in Queen Mary s time  but the bishops had been
permitted to maintain a precarious existence in the interest of the
nobles who enjoyed their revenues  James I had always had a strong
dislike for Presbyterianism  He once said   A Scottish presbytery
agreeth as well with the monarchy as God with the devil  Then Jack and
Tom and Will and Dick shall meet and at their pleasure censure me and my
council   He much preferred a few bishops appointed by himself to
hundreds of presbyteries over whose sharp eyes and sharper tongues he
could have little control  So bishops were reappointed in Scotland in
the early years of his reign and got back some of their powers  The
Presbyterians  however  were still in the majority  and they continued
to regard the bishops as the tools of the king 

 Sidenote  The National Covenant  1638  

An attempt on the part of Charles to force the Scots to accept a
modified form of the English Prayer Book led to the signing of the
National Covenant in 1638  This pledged those who attached their names
to it to reëstablish the purity and liberty of the Gospel  which  to
most of the Covenanters  meant Presbyterianism  Charles thereupon
undertook to coerce the Scots  Having no money  he bought on credit a
large cargo of pepper  which had just arrived in the ships of the East
India Company  and sold it cheap for ready cash  The soldiers  however 
whom he got together showed little inclination to fight the Scots  with
whom they were in tolerable agreement on religious matters  Charles was
therefore at last obliged to summon a Parliament  which  owing to the
length of time it remained in session  is known as the Long Parliament 

 Sidenote  The measures of the Long Parliament against the king s
tyranny  

The Long Parliament began by imprisoning Strafford  the king s most
conspicuous minister  and Archbishop Laud in the Tower of London  The
help that Strafford had given to the king in ruling without Parliament
had mortally offended the House of Commons  They declared him guilty of
treason  and he was executed in 1641  in spite of Charles  efforts to
save him  Laud met the same fate four years later  Parliament also tried
to strengthen its position by passing the Triennial Bill  which provided
that it should meet at least once in three years  even if not summoned
by the king  The courts of Star Chamber and High Commission  which had
arbitrarily condemned a number of the king s opponents  were abolished 
and ship money declared illegal  343  In short  Charles  whole system of
government was abrogated  The efforts of the queen to obtain money and
soldiers from the pope  and a visit of Charles to Scotland  which
Parliament suspected was for the purpose of forcing the Scots to lend
him an army to use against themselves  led to the Grand Remonstrance  In
this all of Charles  errors were enumerated and a demand was made that
the king s ministers should thereafter be responsible to Parliament 
This document Parliament ordered to be printed and circulated throughout
the country 

 Sidenote  Charles  attempts to arrest five members of the House of
Commons  

Exasperated at the conduct of the Commons  Charles attempted to
intimidate the opposition by undertaking the arrest of five of its most
active leaders  whom he declared to be traitors  But when he entered the
House of Commons and looked around for his enemies  he found that they
had taken shelter in London  whose citizens later brought them back in
triumph to Westminster 

 Sidenote  The beginning of civil war  1642  

 Sidenote  Cavaliers and Roundheads  

187  Both Charles and Parliament now began to gather troops for the
inevitable conflict  and England was plunged into civil war  Those who
supported Charles were called  Cavaliers   They included not only most
of the aristocracy and the papal party  but also a number of members of
the House of Commons who were fearful lest Presbyterianism should
succeed in doing away with the English Church  The parliamentary party
was popularly known as the  Roundheads   since some of them cropped
their hair close because of their dislike for the long locks of their
more aristocratic and worldly opponents 

 Illustration  Oliver Cromwell 

 Sidenote  Oliver Cromwell  

The Roundheads soon found a distinguished leader in Oliver Cromwell 344 
 b  1599   a country gentleman and member of Parliament  who was later
to become the most powerful ruler of his time  Cromwell organized a
compact army of God fearing men  who indulged in no profane words or
light talk  as is the wont of soldiers  but advanced upon their enemies
singing psalms  The king enjoyed the support of northern England  and
also looked for help from Ireland  where the royal and Catholic causes
were popular 

 Sidenote  Battles of Marston Moor and Naseby  

 Sidenote  The losing cause of the king  

The war continued for several years  and a number of battles were fought
which  after the first year  went in general against the Cavaliers  The
most important of these were the battle of Marston Moor in 1644  and
that of Naseby the next year  in which the king was disastrously
defeated  The enemy came into possession of his correspondence  which
showed them how their king had been endeavoring to bring armies from
France and Ireland into England  This encouraged Parliament to prosecute
the war with more energy than ever  The king  defeated on every hand 
put himself in the hands of the Scotch army which had come to the aid of
Parliament  1646   and the Scotch soon turned him over to Parliament 
During the next two years Charles  while held in captivity  entered into
negotiations with the various parties in turn  but played fast and loose
with them all 

 Sidenote  Pride s Purge  

There were many in the House of Commons who still sided with the king 
and in December  1648  that body declared for a reconciliation with the
monarch  whom they had safely imprisoned in the Isle of Wight  The next
day Colonel Pride  representing the army   which constituted a party in
itself and was opposed to all negotiations between the king and the
Commons   stood at the door of the House with a body of soldiers and
excluded all the members who took the side of the king  This outrageous
act is known in history as Pride s Purge 

 Sidenote  Execution of Charles  1649  

In this way the House was brought completely under the control of those
most bitterly hostile to Charles  whom they now proposed to bring to
trial  They declared that the House of Commons  since it was chosen by
the people  was supreme in England and the source of all just power  and
that consequently neither king nor House of Lords was necessary  The
mutilated House appointed a special High Court of Justice made up of
Charles  sternest opponents  who alone would consent to sit in judgment
on him  They passed sentence upon him  and on January 30  1649  Charles
was beheaded in front of his palace of Whitehall  London  It must be
clear from the above account that it was not the nation at large which
demanded Charles  death  but a very small group of extremists who
claimed to be the representatives of the nation  345 

 Sidenote  England becomes a commonwealth or republic  

 Sidenote  Cromwell at the head of the government  

188  The Rump Parliament  as the remnant of the House of Commons was
contemptuously called  proclaimed England to be thereafter a
commonwealth  that is  a republic  without a king or House of Lords 
Cromwell  the head of the army  was the real ruler of England  He
derived his main support from the Independents  and it is very
surprising that he was able to maintain himself so long  considering
what a small portion of the English people was in sympathy with the
religious ideas of that sect and with the abolition of kingship  Even
the Presbyterians were on the side of Charles II  the legal heir to the
throne  Yet Cromwell represented the principles for which the opponents
of tyranny had been contending  He was  moreover  a vigorous and
skillful administrator  and had a well organized army of fifty thousand
men at his command  otherwise the republic could scarcely have lasted
more than a few months 

 Sidenote  Ireland and Scotland subdued  

Cromwell found himself confronted by every variety of difficulty  The
three kingdoms had fallen apart  The nobles and Catholics in Ireland
proclaimed Charles II as king  and Ormond  a Protestant leader  formed
an army of Irish Catholics and English royalist Protestants with a view
of overthrowing the Commonwealth  Cromwell accordingly set out for
Ireland  where  after taking Drogheda  he mercilessly slaughtered two
thousand of the  barbarous wretches   as he called them  Town after town
surrendered to Cromwell s army  and in 1652  after much cruelty  the
island was once more conquered  A large part of it was confiscated for
the benefit of the English  and the Catholic landowners were driven into
the mountains  In the meantime  1650  Charles II had landed in Scotland 
and upon his agreeing to be a Presbyterian king  the whole Scotch nation
was ready to support him  But Scotland was subdued even more promptly
than Ireland had been  So completely was the Scottish army destroyed
that Cromwell found no need to draw the sword again in the British
Isles 

 Sidenote  The Navigation Act  1651  

 Sidenote  Commercial war between Holland and England  

Although it would seem that Cromwell had enough to keep him busy at
home  he had already engaged in a victorious foreign war against the
Dutch  who had become dangerous commercial rivals of England  The ships
which went out from Amsterdam and Rotterdam were the best merchant
vessels in the world  and had got control of the carrying trade between
Europe and the colonies  In order to put an end to this  the English
Parliament passed the Navigation Act  1651   which permitted only
English vessels to bring goods to England  unless the goods came in
vessels belonging to the country which had produced them  This led to a
commercial war between Holland and England  and a series of battles was
fought between the English and Dutch fleets  in which sometimes one and
sometimes the other gained the upper hand  This war is notable as the
first example of the commercial struggles which were thereafter to take
the place of the religious conflicts of the preceding period 

 Sidenote  Cromwell dissolves the Long Parliament  1653   and is made
Lord Protector by his own Parliament  

Cromwell failed to get along with Parliament any better than Charles had
done  The Rump Parliament had become very unpopular  for its members  in
spite of their boasted piety  accepted bribes and were zealous in the
promotion of their relatives in the public service  At last Cromwell
upbraided them angrily for their injustice and self interest  which were
injuring the public cause  On being interrupted by a member  he cried
out   Come  come  we have had enough of this  I ll put an end to this 
It s not fit that you should sit here any longer   and calling in his
soldiers he turned the members out of the House and sent them home 
Having thus made an end of the Long Parliament  April  1653   he
summoned a Parliament of his own  made up of God fearing men whom he and
the officers of his army chose  This extraordinary body is known as
Barebone s Parliament  from a distinguished member  a London merchant 
with the characteristically Puritan name of Praisegod Barebone  Many of
these godly men were unpractical and hard to deal with  A minority of
the more sensible ones got up early one winter morning  December  1653 
and  before their opponents had a chance to protest  declared Parliament
dissolved and placed the supreme authority in the hands of Cromwell 

 Sidenote  The Protector s foreign policy  

For nearly five years Cromwell was  as Lord Protector   a title
equivalent to that of regent   practically king of England  although he
refused actually to accept the royal insignia  He did not succeed in
permanently organizing the government at home but showed remarkable
ability in his foreign negotiations  He formed an alliance with France 
and English troops aided the French in winning a great victory over
Spain  England gained thereby Dunkirk  and the West Indian island of
Jamaica  The French king  Louis XIV  at first hesitated to address
Cromwell  in the usual courteous way of monarchs  as  my cousin   but
soon admitted that he would have to call Cromwell  father  should he
wish it  as the Protector was undoubtedly the most powerful person in
Europe 

 Sidenote  Death of Cromwell  September  1658  

In May  1658  Cromwell fell ill  and as a great storm passed over
England at that time  the Cavaliers asserted that the devil had come to
fetch home the soul of the usurper  Cromwell was dying  it is true  but
he was no instrument of the devil  He closed a life of honest effort for
his fellow beings with a last touching prayer to God  whom he had
consistently sought to serve   Thou hast made me  though very unworthy 
a mean instrument to do Thy people some good and Thee service  and many
of them have set too high a value upon me  though others wish and would
be glad of my death  Pardon such as desire to trample upon the dust of a
poor worm  for they are Thy people too  and pardon the folly of this
short prayer  even for Jesus Christ s sake  and give us a good night  if
it be Thy pleasure  Amen   346 

 Sidenote  The Restoration  

 Sidenote  Charles II welcomed back as king  1660  

189  After Cromwell s death his son Richard  who succeeded him  found
himself unable to carry on the government  He soon abdicated  and the
remnants of the Long Parliament met once more  But the power was really
in the hands of the soldiers  In 1660 George Monk  who was in command of
the forces in Scotland  came to London with a view of putting an end to
the anarchy  He soon concluded that no one cared to support the Rump 
and that body peacefully disbanded of its own accord  Resistance would
have been vain in any case with the army against it  The nation was glad
to acknowledge Charles II  whom every one preferred to a government by
soldiers  A new Parliament  composed of both houses  was assembled 
which welcomed a messenger from the king and solemnly resolved that 
 according to the ancient and fundamental laws of this kingdom  the
government is  and ought to be  by king  lords  and commons   Thus the
Puritan revolution and the ephemeral republic was followed by the
 Restoration  of the Stuarts 

 Sidenote  Character of Charles II  

Charles II was quite as fond as his father of having his own way  but he
was a man of more ability  He disliked to be ruled by Parliament  but 
unlike his father  he was unwilling to arouse the nation against him  He
did not propose to let anything happen which would send him on his
travels again  He and his courtiers were fond of pleasure of a
light minded and immoral kind  The licentious dramas of the Restoration
seem to indicate that those who had been forced by the Puritans to give
up their legitimate pleasures now welcomed the opportunity to indulge in
reckless gayety without regard to the bounds imposed by custom and
decency 

 Sidenote  Religious measures adopted by Parliament  

 Sidenote  The Act of Uniformity  

 Sidenote  The Dissenters  

Charles  first Parliament was a moderate body  but his second was made
up almost wholly of Cavaliers  and it got along  on the whole  so well
with the king that he did not dissolve it for eighteen years  It did not
take up the old question  which was still unsettled  as to whether
Parliament or the king was really supreme  It showed its hostility 
however  to the Puritans by a series of intolerant acts  which are very
important in English history  It ordered that no one should hold a
municipal office who had not received the Eucharist according to the
rites of the Church of England  This was aimed at both the Presbyterians
and the Independents  By the Act of Uniformity  1662   every clergyman
who refused to accept everything contained in the Book of Common Prayer
was to be excluded from holding his benefice  Two thousand clergymen
thereupon resigned their positions for conscience  sake  These laws
tended to throw all those Protestants who refused to conform to the
Church of England into a single class  still known as Dissenters  It
included the Independents  the Presbyterians  and the newer bodies of
the Baptists  and the Society of Friends  commonly known as Quakers 
These sects abandoned any idea of controlling the religion or politics
of the country  and asked only that they might be permitted to worship
in their own way outside of the English Church 

 Sidenote  Toleration favored by the king  

 Sidenote  The Conventicle Act  

 Sidenote  The Test Act  

Toleration found an unexpected ally in the king  who  in spite of his
dissolute habits  had interest enough in religion to have secret
leanings toward Catholicism  He asked Parliament to permit him to
moderate the rigor of the Act of Uniformity by making some exceptions 
He even issued a declaration in the interest of toleration  with a view
of bettering the position of the Catholics and nonconformists  Suspicion
was  however  aroused lest this toleration might lead to the restoration
of  popery   and Parliament passed the harsh Conventicle Act  1664  
Any adult attending a conventicle  that is to say  any religious meeting
not held in accordance with the practice of the English Church  was
liable to penalties which culminated in transportation to some distant
colony  Samuel Pepys  who saw some of the victims of this law upon their
way to a terrible exile  notes in his famous diary   They go like lambs
without any resistance  I would to God that they would conform or be
more wise and not be catched   A few years later Charles issued a
declaration giving complete religious liberty to Roman Catholics as well
as to Dissenters  Parliament not only forced him to withdraw this
enlightened measure but passed the Test Act  which excluded every one
from public office who did not accept the Anglican views 

 Sidenote  War with Holland  

The old war with Holland  begun by Cromwell  was renewed under Charles
II  who was earnestly desirous to increase English commerce and to found
new colonies  The two nations were very evenly matched on the sea  but
in 1664 the English seized some of the West Indian Islands from the
Dutch and also their colony on Manhattan Island  which was renamed New
York in honor of the king s brother  In 1667 a treaty was signed by
England and Holland which confirmed these conquests  Three years later
Charles was induced by Louis XIV to conclude a secret treaty  by which
he engaged to aid Louis in a fresh war upon Holland  Louis cherished a
grudge against Holland for preventing him from seizing the Spanish
Netherlands  to which he asserted a claim on behalf of his Spanish
wife  347  In return for Charles  promised aid  Louis was to support him
with money and troops whenever Charles thought fit publicly to declare
himself a Catholic  he had already acknowledged his conversion to a
select circle  But Charles  nephew  William of Orange   the
great grandson of William the Silent   who was later to become king of
England  encouraged the Dutch to withstand  and Louis was forced to
relinquish his purpose of conquering this stubborn people  Peace was
concluded in 1674  and England and Holland soon became allies against
Louis  who was now recognized as the greatest danger which Europe had to
face 

 Sidenote  James II  1685 1688  

190  Upon Charles  death he was succeeded by his brother James  who was
an avowed Catholic and had married  as his second wife  a Catholic  Mary
of Modena  He was ready to reëstablish Catholicism in England regardless
of what it might cost him  Mary  James  daughter by his first wife  had
married William  Prince of Orange  the head of the United Netherlands 
The nation might have tolerated James so long as they could look forward
to the accession of his Protestant daughter  But when a son was born to
his Catholic second wife  and James showed unmistakably his purpose of
favoring the Catholics  messengers were dispatched by a group of
Protestants to William of Orange  asking him to come and rule over them 

                     Charles I  m  Henrietta Maria
                    1625 1649    
                                 
                                                   
                                                   
Charles II  Mary  m  William II  Anne Hyde  m  James II  m  Mary of Modena
 1660 1685          Prince of                 1685 1688  
                    Orange                               
                                                         
                                                         
            William III  m  Mary  Anne         James Francis Edward 
             1688 1702          1702 1714        the Old Pretender

 Sidenote  The revolution of 1688 and the accession of William III 
1688 1702  

William landed in November  1688  and marched upon London  where he
received general support from all the English Protestants  regardless of
party  James started to oppose William  but his army refused to fight 
and his courtiers deserted him  William was glad to forward James 
flight to France  as he would hardly have known what to do with him had
James insisted on remaining in the country  A new Parliament declared
the throne vacant  on the ground that King James II   by the advice of
the Jesuits and other wicked persons  having violated the fundamental
laws and withdrawn himself out of the kingdom  had abdicated the
government  

 Sidenote  The Declaration of Rights  

A Declaration of Rights was then drawn up  condemning James  violation
of the constitution and appointing William and Mary joint sovereigns 
The Declaration of Rights  which is an important monument in English
constitutional history  once more stated the fundamental rights of the
English nation and the limitations which the Petition of Right and Magna
Charta had placed upon the king  By this peaceful revolution of 1688 the
English rid themselves of the Stuarts and their claims to rule by divine
right  and once more declared themselves against the domination of the
Church of Rome 


     General Reading   GARDINER   The First Two Stuarts and the Puritan
     Revolution   Charles Scribner s Sons   1 00   GARDINER 
      Constitutional Documents of the Puritan Revolution   Clarendon
     Press   2 25   For Cromwell  CARLYLE   The Hero as King  in  Heroes
     and Hero Worship   MORLEY   Oliver Cromwell   The Century Company 
      3 50   For the Puritans  CAMPBELL   The Puritans in Europe 
     Holland  England  and America   2 vols   Harper   5 00   FISKE 
      The Beginnings of New England   Houghton  Mifflin   Co    2 00  
     MACAULAY   Essay on Milton  




CHAPTER XXXI

THE ASCENDENCY OF FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV


 Sidenote  France at the accession of Louis XIV  1643 1715  

191  Under the despotic rule of Louis XIV  1643 1715  France enjoyed a
commanding influence in European affairs  After the wars of religion
were over  the royal authority had been reëstablished by the wise
conduct of Henry IV  Richelieu had solidified the monarchy by depriving
the Huguenots of the exceptional privileges granted to them for their
protection by Henry IV  he had also destroyed the fortified castles of
the nobles  whose power had greatly increased during the turmoil of the
Huguenot wars  His successor  Cardinal Mazarin  who conducted the
government during Louis XIV s boyhood  was able to put down a last
rising of the discontented nobility  348 

 Sidenote  What Richelieu and Mazarin had done for the French Monarchy  

When Mazarin died in 1661  he left to the young monarch a kingdom such
as no previous French king had enjoyed  The nobles  who for centuries
had disputed the power with Hugh Capet and his successors  were no
longer feudal lords but only courtiers  The Huguenots  whose claim to a
place in the state beside the Catholics had led to the terrible civil
wars of the sixteenth century  were reduced in numbers and no longer
held fortified towns from which they could defy the king s agents 
Richelieu and Mazarin had successfully taken a hand in the Thirty Years 
War  and France had come out of it with enlarged territory and increased
importance in European affairs 

 Sidenote  The government of Louis XIV  

Louis XIV carried the work of these great ministers still farther  He
gave that form to the French monarchy which it retained until the
French Revolution  He made himself the very mirror of kingship  His
marvelous court at Versailles became the model and the despair of other
less opulent and powerful princes  who accepted his theory of the
absolute power of kings but could not afford to imitate his luxury  By
his incessant wars of aggression he kept Europe in turmoil for over half
a century  The distinguished generals who led his newly organized
troops  and the wily diplomats who arranged his alliances and negotiated
his treaties  made France feared and respected by even the most powerful
of the other European states 

 Sidenote  The theory of the  divine right  of kings in France  

192  Louis XIV had the same idea of kingship that James I had tried in
vain to induce the English people to accept  God had given kings to men 
and it was His will that monarchs should be regarded as His lieutenants
and that all those subject to them should obey them absolutely  without
asking any questions or making any criticisms  for in yielding to their
prince they were really yielding to God Himself  If the king were good
and wise  his subjects should thank the Lord  if he proved foolish 
cruel  or perverse  they must accept their evil ruler as a punishment
which God had sent them for their sins  But in no case might they limit
his power or rise against him  349 

 Sidenote  Different attitude of the English and French nations toward
absolute monarchy  

Louis had two great advantages over James  In the first place the
English nation has always shown itself far more reluctant than France to
place absolute power in the hands of its rulers  By its Parliament  its
courts  and its various declarations of the nation s rights  it had
built up traditions which made it impossible for the Stuarts to
establish their claim to be absolute rulers  In France  on the other
hand  there was no Great Charter or Bill of Rights  the Estates General
did not hold the purse strings  and the king was permitted to raise
money without asking their permission or previously redressing the
grievances which they chose to point out  They were therefore only
summoned at irregular intervals  When Louis XIV took charge of the
government  forty seven years had passed without a meeting of the
Estates General  and a century and a quarter was still to elapse before
another call to the representatives of the nation was issued in 1789 
Moreover  the French people placed far more reliance upon a powerful
king than the English  perhaps because they were not protected by the
sea from their neighbors  as England was  On every side France had
enemies ready to take advantage of any weakness or hesitation which
might arise from dissension between a parliament and the king  So the
French felt it best  on the whole  to leave all in the king s hands 
even if they suffered at times from his tyranny 

 Illustration  Louis XIV 

 Sidenote  Personal characteristics of Louis XIV  

Louis had another great advantage over James  He was a handsome man  of
elegant and courtly mien and the most exquisite perfection of manner 
even when playing billiards he retained an air of world mastery  The
first of the Stuarts  on the contrary  was a very awkward man  whose
slouching gait  intolerable manners  and pedantic conversation were
utterly at variance with his lofty pretensions  Louis added to his
graceful exterior a sound judgment and quick apprehension  He said
neither too much nor too little  He was  for a king  a hard worker and
spent several hours a day attending to the business of government  It
requires  in fact  a great deal of energy and application to be a real
despot  In order really to understand and to solve the problems which
constantly face the ruler of a great state  a monarch must  like
Frederick the Great or Napoleon  rise early and toil late  Louis was
greatly aided by the able ministers who sat in his council  but he
always retained for himself the place of first minister  He would never
have consented to be dominated by an adviser  as his father had been by
Richelieu   The profession of the king   he declared   is great  noble 
and delightful if one but feels equal to performing the duties which it
involves    and he never harbored a doubt that he himself was born for
the business 

 Sidenote  The king s palace at Versailles  

193  Louis XIV was careful that his surroundings should suit the
grandeur of his office  His court was magnificent beyond anything that
had been dreamed of in the West  He had an enormous palace constructed
at Versailles  just outside of Paris  with interminable halls and
apartments and a vast garden stretching away behind it  About this a
town was laid out  where those who were privileged to be near his
majesty or supply the wants of the royal court lived  This palace and
its outlying buildings  including two or three less gorgeous residences
for the king when he occasionally tired of the ceremony of Versailles 
probably cost the nation about a hundred million dollars  in spite of
the fact that thousands of peasants and soldiers were forced to turn to
and work without remuneration  The furnishings and decorations were as
rich and costly as the palace was splendid  For over a century
Versailles continued to be the home of the French kings and the seat of
their government 

 Illustration  The King s Bedroom in the Palace of Versailles 

 Sidenote  Life at Louis XIV s court  

This splendor and luxury helped to attract the nobility  who no longer
lived on their estates in well fortified castles  planning how they
might escape the royal control  They now dwelt in the effulgence of the
king s countenance  They saw him to bed at night and in stately
procession they greeted him in the morning  It was deemed a high honor
to hand him his shirt as he was being dressed  or  at dinner  to provide
him with a fresh napkin  Only by living close to the king could the
courtiers hope to gain favors  pensions  and lucrative offices for
themselves and their friends  and perhaps occasionally to exercise some
little influence upon the policy of the government  For they were now
entirely dependent upon the good will of their monarch  350 

 Sidenote  The reforms of Colbert  

The reforms which Louis carried out in the earlier part of his reign
were largely the work of the great financier  Colbert  to whom France
still looks back with gratitude  He early discovered that Louis 
officials were stealing and wasting vast sums  The offenders were
arrested and forced to disgorge  and a new system of bookkeeping was
introduced similar to that employed by business men  He then turned his
attention to increasing the manufactures of France by establishing new
industries and seeing that the older ones kept to a high standard  which
would make French goods sell readily in foreign markets  He argued
justly that if foreigners could be induced to buy French goods  these
sales would bring gold and silver into the country and so enrich it  He
made rigid rules as to the width and quality of cloths which the
manufacturers might produce and the dyes which they might use  He even
reorganized the old mediæval guilds  for through them the government
could keep its eye on all the manufacturing that was done  and this
would have been far more difficult if every one had been free to carry
on any trade which he might choose  There were serious drawbacks to this
kind of government regulation  but France accepted it  nevertheless  for
many years  351 

 Sidenote  Art and literature in the reign of Louis XIV  

It was  however  as a patron of art and literature that Louis XIV gained
much of his celebrity  Molière  who was at once a playwright and an
actor  delighted the court with comedies in which he delicately
satirized the foibles of his time  Corneille  who had gained renown by
the great tragedy of  The Cid  in Richelieu s time  found a worthy
successor in Racine  the most distinguished perhaps of French tragic
poets  The charming letters of Madame de Sévigné are models of prose
style and serve at the same time to give us a glimpse into the more
refined life of the court  In the famous memoirs of Saint Simon  the
weaknesses of the king  as well as the numberless intrigues of the
courtiers  are freely exposed with inimitable skill and wit 

 Sidenote  The government fosters the development of the French
language and literature  

Men of letters were generously aided by the king with pensions  Colbert
encouraged the French Academy  which had been created by Richelieu  This
body gave special attention to making the French tongue more eloquent
and expressive by determining what words should be used  It is now the
greatest honor that a Frenchman can obtain to be made one of the forty
members of this association  A magazine which still exists  the  Journal
des Savants   was founded for the promotion of science  Colbert had an
astronomical observatory built at Paris  and the Royal Library  which
only possessed about sixteen thousand volumes  began to grow into that
great collection of two and a half million volumes  by far the largest
in existence  which to day attracts scholars to Paris from all parts of
the world  In short  Louis and his ministers believed one of the chief
objects of any government to be the promotion of art  literature  and
science  and the example they set has been followed by almost every
modern state  352 

 Sidenote  Louis XIV s warlike enterprises  

194  Unfortunately for France  the king s ambitions were by no means
altogether peaceful  Indeed  he regarded his wars as his chief glory  He
employed a carefully reorganized army and the skill of his generals in a
series of inexcusable attacks on his neighbors  in which he finally
squandered all that Colbert s economies had accumulated and led France
to the edge of financial ruin 

 Sidenote  He aims to restore the  natural boundaries  of France  

Louis XIV s predecessors had had  on the whole  little time to think of
conquest  They had first to consolidate their realms and gain the
mastery of their feudal dependents  who shared the power with them  then
the claims of the English Edwards and Henrys had to be met  and the
French provinces freed from their clutches  lastly  the great religious
dispute was only settled after many years of disintegrating civil war 
But Louis was now at liberty to look about him and consider how he
might best realize the dream of his ancestors and perhaps reëstablish
the ancient boundaries which Cæsar reported that the Gauls had occupied 
The  natural limits  of France appeared to be the Rhine on the north and
east  the Jura Mountains and the Alps on the southeast  and to the south
the Mediterranean and the Pyrenees  Richelieu had believed that it was
the chief end of his ministry to restore to France the boundaries
determined for it by nature  Mazarin had labored hard to win Savoy and
Nice  and to reach the Rhine on the north  Before his death France at
least gained Alsace and reached the Pyrenees   which   as the treaty
with Spain says  1659    formerly divided the Gauls from Spain  

 Sidenote  Louis lays claim to the Spanish Netherlands  

Louis first turned his attention to the conquest of the Spanish
Netherlands  to which he laid claim through his wife  the elder sister
of the Spanish king  Charles II  1665 1700   In 1667 he surprised Europe
by publishing a little treatise in which he set forth his claims not
only to the Spanish Netherlands  but even to the whole Spanish monarchy 
By confounding the kingdom of France with the old empire of the Franks
he could maintain that the people of the Netherlands were his subjects 

 Sidenote  The invasion of the Netherlands  1667  

Louis placed himself at the head of the army which he had reformed and
reorganized  and announced that he was to undertake a  journey   as if
his invasion was only an expedition into another part of his undisputed
realms  He easily took a number of towns on the border  and completely
conquered Franche Comté  This was an outlying province of Spain 
isolated from her other lands  and a most tempting morsel for the hungry
king of France  These conquests alarmed Europe  and especially Holland 
which could not afford to have the barrier between it and France
removed  for Louis would be an uncomfortable neighbor  A Triple
Alliance  composed of Holland  England  and Sweden  was accordingly
organized to induce France to make peace with Spain  Louis contented
himself for the moment with the dozen border towns that he had taken
and which Spain ceded to him on condition that he would return
Franche Comté  Peace of Aix la Chapelle  1668  

 Sidenote  Louis breaks up the Triple Alliance and allies himself with
Charles II of England  

The success with which Holland had held her own against the navy of
England 353  and brought the proud king of France to a halt  produced an
elation on the part of that tiny country which was very aggravating to
Louis  He was thoroughly vexed that he should have been blocked by so
trifling an obstacle as Dutch intervention  He consequently conceived a
strong dislike for the United Provinces  which was increased by the
protection that they afforded to political writers who annoyed him with
their attacks  He broke up the Triple Alliance by inducing Charles II of
England to conclude a treaty which arranged that England should help
France in a new war against the Dutch 

 Sidenote  Louis  invasion of Holland  1672  

Louis then startled Europe again by seizing the duchy of Lorraine  which
brought him to the border of Holland  At the head of a hundred thousand
men he crossed the Rhine  1672  and easily conquered southern Holland 
For the moment the Dutch cause appeared to be lost  But William of
Orange showed the spirit of his great ancestor  William the Silent  the
sluices in the dikes were opened and the country flooded  so the French
army was checked before it could take Amsterdam and advance into the
north  Holland found an ally in the elector of Brandenburg  and the war
became general  The emperor sent an army against Louis  and England
deserted him and made peace with Holland 

 Sidenote  Peace of Nimwegen  1678  

 Sidenote  Louis  encroachments on German territory  

When a general peace was concluded at Nimwegen  at the end of six years 
the chief provisions were that Holland should be left intact  and that
France should retain Franche Comté  which had been conquered by Louis in
person  This bit of the Burgundian heritage thus became at last a part
of France  after France and Spain had quarreled over it for a century
and a half  For the ten years following there was no open war  but Louis
busied himself in the interval by instituting courts in the debatable
region between France and Germany  to decide what neighboring districts
belonged to the various territories and towns which had been ceded to
France by the treaties of Westphalia and later ones  The vestiges of the
old feudal entanglements gave ample scope for claims  which were
reënforced by Louis  troops  Louis  moreover  seized the important free
city of Strasburg  and made many other less conspicuous but equally
unwarranted additions to his territory  The emperor was unable to do
more than protest against these outrageous encroachments  for he was
fully occupied with the Turks  who had just laid siege to Vienna  354 

 Sidenote  Situation of the Huguenots at the beginning of Louis XIV s
reign  

195  Louis XIV exhibited as woeful a want of statesmanship in the
treatment of his Protestant subjects as in the prosecution of disastrous
wars  The Huguenots  deprived of their former military and political
power  had turned to manufacture  trade  and banking   as rich as a
Huguenot  had become a proverb in France  There were perhaps a million
of them among fifteen million Frenchmen  and they undoubtedly formed by
far the most thrifty and enterprising part of the nation  The Catholic
clergy  however  did not cease to urge the complete suppression of
heresy 

 Sidenote  Louis  policy of suppression  

Louis XIV had scarcely taken the reins of government into his own hands
before the perpetual nagging and injustice to which the Protestants had
been subjected at all times took a more serious form  Upon one pretense
or another their churches were demolished  Children were authorized to
renounce Protestantism when they reached the age of seven  If they were
induced by the offer of a toy or a sweetmeat to say  for example  the
words  Ave Maria   Hail  Mary   they might be taken from their parents
to be brought up in a Catholic school  In this way Protestant families
were pitilessly broken up  Rough and licentious dragoons were quartered
upon the Huguenots with the hope that the insulting behavior of the
soldiers might drive the heretics to accept the religion of the king 

 Sidenote  Revocation of the Edict of Nantes and its results  

At last Louis was led by his officials to believe that practically all
the Huguenots had been converted by these drastic measures  In 1685 
therefore  he revoked the Edict of Nantes  and the Protestants thereby
became outlaws and their ministers subject to the death penalty  Even
liberal minded Catholics  like the kindly writer of fables  La Fontaine 
and the charming letter writer  Madame de Sévigné  hailed the
reëstablishment of  religious unity  with delight  They believed that
only an insignificant and seditious remnant still clung to the beliefs
of Calvin  But there could have been no more serious mistake  Thousands
of the Huguenots succeeded in eluding the vigilance of the royal
officials and fled  some to England  some to Prussia  some to America 
carrying with them their skill and industry to strengthen France s
rivals  This was the last great and terrible example of that fierce
religious intolerance which had produced the Albigensian Crusade  the
Spanish Inquisition  and the Massacre of St  Bartholomew  355 

 Sidenote  Louis  operations in the Rhenish Palatinate  

Louis now set his heart upon conquering the Rhenish Palatinate  to which
he easily discovered that he had a claim  The rumor of his intention and
the indignation occasioned in Protestant countries by the revocation of
the Edict of Nantes  resulted in an alliance against the French king
headed by William of Orange  Louis speedily justified the suspicions of
Europe by a frightful devastation of the Palatinate  burning whole towns
and destroying many castles  including the exceptionally beautiful one
of the elector at Heidelberg  Ten years later  however  Louis agreed to
a peace which put things back as they were before the struggle began  He
was preparing for the final and most ambitious undertaking of his life 
which precipitated the longest and bloodiest war of all his warlike
reign 

 Illustration  TREATY OF UTRECHT 

 Sidenote  The question of the Spanish succession  

196  The king of Spain  Charles II  was childless and brotherless  and
Europe had long been discussing what would become of his vast realms
when his sickly existence should come to an end  Louis had married one
of his sisters  and the emperor  Leopold I  another  and these two
ambitious rulers had been considering for some time how they might
divide the Spanish possessions between the Bourbons and the Hapsburgs 
But when Charles II died  in 1700  it was discovered that he had left a
will in which he made Louis  younger grandson  Philip  the heir to his
twenty two crowns  but on the condition that France and Spain should
never be united 

 Sidenote  Louis  grandson  Philip  becomes king of Spain  

It was a weighty question whether Louis should permit his grandson to
accept this hazardous honor  Should Philip become king of Spain  Louis
and his family would control all of southwestern Europe from Holland to
Sicily  as well as a great part of North and South America  This would
mean the establishment of an empire more powerful than that of Charles
V  It was clear that the disinherited emperor and the ever watchful
William of Orange  now king of England  would never permit this
unprecedented extension of French influence  They had already shown
themselves ready to make great sacrifices in order to check far less
serious aggressions on the part of the French king  Nevertheless  family
pride and personal ambition led Louis criminally to risk the welfare of
his country  He accepted the will and informed the Spanish ambassador at
the French court that he might salute Philip V as his new king  The
leading French newspaper of the time boldly proclaimed that the Pyrenees
were no more 

 Sidenote  The War of the Spanish Succession  

King William soon succeeded in forming a new Grand Alliance  1701  in
which Louis  old enemies  England  Holland  and the emperor  were the
most important members  William himself died just as hostilities were
beginning  but the long War of the Spanish Succession was carried on
vigorously by the great English general  the duke of Marlborough  and
the Austrian commander  Eugene of Savoy  The conflict was even more
general than the Thirty Years  War  even in America there was fighting
between French and English colonists  which passes in American histories
under the name of Queen Anne s War  All the more important battles went
against the French  and after ten years of war  which was rapidly
ruining the country by the destruction of its people and its wealth 
Louis was willing to consider some compromise  and after long discussion
a peace was arranged in 1713 

 Sidenote  The Treaty of Utrecht  1713  

The Treaty of Utrecht changed the map of Europe as no previous treaty
had done  not even that of Westphalia  Each of the chief combatants got
its share of the Spanish booty over which they had been fighting  The
Bourbon Philip V was permitted to retain Spain and its colonies on
condition that the Spanish and French crowns should never rest on the
same head  To Austria fell the Spanish Netherlands  hereafter called the
Austrian Netherlands  which continued to form a barrier between Holland
and France  Holland received certain fortresses to make its position
still more secure  The Spanish possessions in Italy  i e   Naples and
Milan  were also given to Austria  and in this way Austria got the hold
on Italy which it retained until 1866  England acquired from France 
Nova Scotia  Newfoundland  and the Hudson Bay region  and so began the
expulsion of the French from North America  Besides these American
provinces she received the island of Minorca with its fortress  and the
rock and fortress of Gibraltar  which still gives her command of the
narrow entrance to the Mediterranean 

 Sidenote  The development of international law  

The period of Louis XIV is remarkable for the development of
international law  The incessant wars  the great alliances embracing
several powers  and the prolonged peace negotiations  such as those
which preceded the treaties of Westphalia and Utrecht  made increasingly
clear the need of well defined rules governing independent states in
their relations with one another both in peace and in war  It was of
the utmost importance to determine  for instance  the rights of
ambassadors and of the vessels of neutral powers not engaged in the war 
and what should be considered fair conduct in warfare and in the
treatment of prisoners 

 Sidenote  Grotius   War and Peace   

The first great systematic treatise on international law was published
by Grotius in 1625  when the horrors of the Thirty Years  War were
impressing men s minds with the necessity of finding some other means
than war of settling disputes between nations  Grotius   War and Peace 
was followed  in Louis XIV s time  by Pufendorf s  On the Law of Nature
and Nations   1672   While the rules laid down by these and later
writers on international law have by no means put an end to war  they
have prevented many conflicts by settling certain questions and by
increasing the ways in which nations may come to an understanding with
one another through their ambassadors without recourse to arms 

Louis XIV outlived his son and grandson  and left a sadly demoralized
kingdom to his five year old great grandson  Louis XV  1715 1774   The
national treasury was depleted  the people were reduced in numbers and
were in a miserable state  and the army  once the finest in Europe  was
in no condition to gain further victories  Later we must study the
conditions in France which led to the great Revolution  Now  however  we
turn to the rise of two new European powers  Prussia and Russia  which
began in the eighteenth century to play a prominent rôle in European
affairs 




CHAPTER XXXII

RISE OF RUSSIA AND PRUSSIA


197  We have had little occasion hitherto  in dealing with the history
of western Europe  to speak of the Slavic peoples  to whom the Russians 
Poles  Bohemians  and many other nations of eastern Europe belong 
Together they form the most numerous race in Europe  but  as has been
well said   they occupy a greater place on the map than in history   In
the eighteenth century  however  Russia began to take an increasingly
important part in European affairs  and it is now a great force in the
politics of the world  The realms of the Tsar which lie in Europe exceed
in extent those of all the other rulers of the continent put together 
and yet they are scarcely more than a quarter of his whole dominion 
which embraces northern and central Asia  and forms together an empire
occupying toward three times the area of the United States 

 Sidenote  Movements of the Slavs during the period of the German
invasions  

The Slavs were settled along the Dnieper  Don  and Vistula long before
the Christian era  After the East Goths had penetrated into the Roman
empire  the Slavs followed their example and invaded  ravaged  and
conquered the Balkan Peninsula  which they held for some time  When the
German Lombards went south into Italy  about 569  the Slavs pressed
behind them into Styria  Carinthia  and Carniola  where they still live
within the bounds of the Austrian empire  Other Slavic hordes had driven
the Germans across the Oder and upper Elbe  Later the German emperors 
beginning with Charlemagne  began to push them back  but the Bohemians
and Moravians still hold an advanced position on the borders of Bavaria
and Saxony 

 Sidenote  Beginnings of Russia  

In the ninth century some of the Northmen invaded the districts to the
east of the Baltic  while their relatives were causing grievous trouble
in France and England  It is generally supposed that one of their
leaders  Rurik  was the first to consolidate the Slavic tribes about
Novgorod into a sort of state in 862  Rurik s successor extended the
bounds of the new empire so as to include the important town of Kiev on
the Dnieper  The word  Russia  is probably derived from  Rous   the name
given by the neighboring Finns to the Norman adventurers  Before the end
of the tenth century the Greek form of Christianity was introduced and
the Russian ruler was baptized  The frequent intercourse with
Constantinople might have led to rapid advance in civilization had it
not been for a great disaster which put Russia back for centuries 

 Sidenote  The Tartar invasion of the thirteenth century  

Russia is geographically nothing more than an extension of the vast
plain of northern Asia  which the Russians were destined finally to
conquer  It was therefore exposed to the great invasion of the Tartars
or Mongols  who swept in from the east in the thirteenth century  The
powerful Tartar ruler  Genghiz Khan  1162 1227   conquered northern
China and central Asia  and the mounted hordes of his successors crossed
into Europe and overran Russia  which had fallen apart into numerous
principalities  The Russian princes became the dependents of the Great
Khan  and had frequently to seek his far distant court  some three
thousand miles away  where he freely disposed of both their crowns and
their heads  The Tartars exacted tribute of the Russians  but left them
undisturbed in their laws and religion 

 Sidenote  Influence of the Tartar occupation on manners and customs  

 Sidenote  Ivan the Terrible assumes the title of Tsar  

Of the Russian princes who went to prostrate themselves at the foot of
the Great Khan s throne  none made a more favorable impression upon him
than the prince of Moscow  in whose favor the Khan was wont to decide
all cases of dispute between the prince and his rivals  When the Mongol
power had begun to decline in strength and the princes of Moscow had
grown stronger  they ventured to kill the Mongol ambassadors sent to
demand tribute in 1480  and thus freed themselves from the Mongol yoke 
But the Tartar occupation had left its mark  for the princes of Moscow
imitated the Khans rather than the western rulers  of whom  in fact 
they knew nothing  In 1547 Ivan the Terrible assumed the Asiatic title
of Tsar  356  which appeared to him more worthy than that of king or
emperor  The costumes and etiquette of the court were also Asiatic  The
Russian armor suggested that of the Chinese  and their headdress was a
turban  It was the task of Peter the Great to Europeanize Russia 

 Sidenote  Peter the Great  1672 1725  

198  At the time of Peter s accession  Russia  which had grown greatly
under Ivan the Terrible and other enterprising rulers  still had no
outlet to the sea  In manners and customs the kingdom was Asiatic  and
its government was that of a Tartar prince  Peter had no quarrel with
the despotic power which fell to him and which the Russian monarchs
still exercise  since there is no parliament or constitution in that
country down to the present day  But he knew that Russia was very much
behind the rest of Europe  and that his crudely equipped soldiers could
never make head against the well armed and disciplined troops of the
West  He had no seaport and no ships  without which Russia could never
hope to take part in the world s affairs  His two great tasks were 
therefore  to introduce western habits and to  make a window   as he
expressed it  through which Russia might look abroad 

 Sidenote  Peter s travels in Europe  

In 1697 1698 Peter himself visited Germany  Holland  and England with a
view to investigating every art and science of the West  as well as the
most approved methods of manufacture  from the making of a man of war to
the etching of an engraving  Nothing escaped the keen eyes of this rude 
half savage northern giant  For a week he put on the wide breeches of a
Dutch laborer and worked in the shipyard at Saardam near Amsterdam  In
England  Holland  and Germany he engaged artisans  scientific men 
architects  ship captains  and those versed in artillery and the
training of troops  all of whom he took back with him to aid in the
reform and development of Russia 

 Sidenote  Suppression of revolt against foreign ideas  

He was called home by the revolt of the royal guard  who had allied
themselves with the very large party of nobles and churchmen who were
horrified at Peter s desertion of the habits and customs of his
forefathers  They hated what they called  German ideas   such as short
coats  tobacco smoking  and beardless faces  The clergy even suggested
that Peter was perhaps Antichrist  Peter took a fearful revenge upon the
rebels  and is said to have himself cut off the heads of many of them 
Like the barbarian that he was at heart  he left their heads and bodies
lying about all winter  unburied  in order to make the terrible results
of revolt against his power quite plain to all 

 Sidenote  Peter s reform measures  

Peter s reforms extended through his whole reign  He made his people
give up their cherished oriental beards and long flowing garments  He
forced the women of the better class  who had been kept in a sort of
oriental harem  to come out and meet the men in social assemblies  such
as were common in the West  He invited foreigners to settle in Russia 
and insured them protection  privileges  and the free exercise of their
religion  He sent young Russians abroad to study  He reorganized the
government officials on the model of a western kingdom  and made over
his army in the same way 

 Sidenote  Founding of a new capital  St  Petersburg  

Finding that the old capital of Moscow clung persistently to its ancient
habits  he prepared to found a new capital for his new Russia  He
selected for this purpose a bit of territory on the Baltic which he had
conquered from Sweden   very marshy  it is true  but where he might hope
to construct Russia s first real port  Here he built St  Petersburg at
enormous expense and colonized it with Russians and foreigners  Russia
was at last becoming a European power 

 Illustration  Northeastern Europe at the Opening of the Eighteenth
Century 

 Sidenote  The military prowess of Charles XII of Sweden  

In his ambition to get to the sea  Peter naturally collided with Sweden 
to which the provinces between Russia and the Baltic belonged  Never had
Sweden  or any other country  had a more warlike king than the one with
whom Peter had to contend  the youthful prodigy  Charles XII  When
Charles came to the throne in 1697 he was only fifteen years old  and it
seemed to the natural enemies of Sweden an auspicious time to profit by
the supposed weakness of the boy ruler  So a union was formed between
Denmark  Poland  and Russia  with the object of increasing their
territories at Sweden s expense  But Charles turned out to be a second
Alexander the Great in military prowess  He astonished Europe by
promptly besieging Copenhagen and forcing the king of Denmark to sign a
treaty of peace  He then turned like lightning against Peter  who was
industriously besieging Narva  and with eight thousand Swedes wiped out
an army of fifty thousand Russians  1700   Lastly he defeated the king
of Poland 

 Sidenote  Defeat and death of Charles XII  

Though Charles was a remarkable military leader  he was a foolish ruler 
He undertook to wrest Poland from its king  to whom he attributed the
formation of the league against him  He had a new king crowned at
Warsaw  whom he at last succeeded in getting recognized  He then turned
his attention to Peter  who had meanwhile been conquering the Baltic
provinces  This time fortune turned against the Swedes  The long march
to Moscow proved as fatal to them as to Napoleon a century later 
Charles XII was totally defeated in the battle of Pultowa  1709   He
fled to Turkey and spent some years there in vainly urging the Sultan to
attack Peter  At last he returned to his own kingdom  which he had
utterly neglected for years  He was killed in 1718 while besieging a
town 

 Sidenote  Russia acquires the Baltic provinces and attempts to get a
footing on the Black Sea  

Soon after Charles  death a treaty was concluded between Sweden and
Russia by which Russia gained Livonia  Esthonia  and the other Swedish
provinces at the eastern end of the Baltic  Peter had made less
successful attempts to get a footing on the Black Sea  He had first
taken Azof  which he soon lost during the war with Sweden  and then
several towns on the Caspian  It had become evident that if the Turks
should be driven out of Europe  Russia would be a mighty rival of the
western powers in the division of the spoils  357 

For a generation after the death of Peter the Great  Russia fell into
the hands of incompetent rulers  It only appears again as a European
state when the great Catherine II came to the throne in 1762  From that
time on  the western powers had always to consider the vast Slavic
empire in all their great struggles  They had also to consider a new
kingdom in northern Germany  which was just growing into a great power
as Peter began his work  This was Prussia  whose beginnings we must now
consider 

 Sidenote  Brandenburg and the Hohenzollerns  

199  The electorate of Brandenburg had figured on the map of Germany for
centuries  and there was no particular reason to suppose that it was to
become one day the dominant state in Germany  At the time of the Council
of Constance the old line of electors had died out  and the impecunious
Emperor Sigismund had sold it to a hitherto inconspicuous house  the
Hohenzollerns  which is known to us now through such names as those of
Frederick the Great  William I  the first German emperor  and his
grandson  the present emperor  Beginning with a strip of territory
extending some ninety or a hundred miles to the east and to the west of
the little town of Berlin  the successive representatives of the line
have gradually extended their boundaries until the present kingdom of
Prussia embraces nearly two thirds of Germany  Of the earlier little
annexations nothing need be said  While it has always been the pride of
the Hohenzollern family that practically every one of its reigning
members has added something to what his ancestors handed down to him  no
great extension took place until just before the Thirty Years  War 
About that time the elector of Brandenburg inherited Cleves  and thus
got his first hold on the Rhine district 

 Sidenote  Prussia acquired by the elector of Brandenburg  

 Sidenote  The elector of Brandenburg assumes the title of King of
Prussia  1701  

What was quite as important  he won  far to the east  the duchy of
Prussia  which was separated from Brandenburg by Polish territory 
Prussia was originally the name of a region on the Baltic inhabited by
heathen Slavs  These had been conquered in the thirteenth century by one
of the orders of crusading knights  who  when the conquest of the Holy
Land was abandoned  looked about for other occupation  The region
filled up with German colonists  but it came under the sovereignty of
the neighboring kingdom of Poland  whose king annexed the western half
of the territory of the Teutonic Order  as the German knights were
called  358  In Luther s day the Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights 
who happened to be a relative of the electors of Brandenburg  concluded
to abolish the order and become duke of Prussia  In good time his family
died out  and the duchy fell to the electors of Brandenburg  When one of
them was permitted by the emperor  in the year 1701  to assume the title
of king  he chose to be called King of Prussia  359 

 Sidenote  The Great Elector  1640 1688  

Brandenburg accepted the Protestant religion before Luther s death  but
played a pitiful part in the Thirty Years  War  Its real greatness dates
from the Great Elector  1640 1688   In the treaties of Westphalia he
acquired a goodly strip on the Baltic  and he succeeded in creating an
absolute monarchy on the model furnished by his contemporary  Louis XIV 
He joined England and Holland in their alliances against Louis  and the
army of Brandenburg began to be known and feared 

 Sidenote  Frederick William I  1713 1740  

While it was reserved for Frederick the Great to stir Europe to its
depths and establish the right of the new kingdom of Prussia to be
considered one of the great European powers  he owed to his father 
Frederick William I  the resources which made his victories possible 
Frederick William strengthened the government and collected an army
nearly as large as that maintained by France or Austria  He had 
moreover  by miserly thrift and entire indifference to the amenities and
luxuries of life  treasured up a large sum of money  Consequently
Frederick  upon his accession  had an admirable army ready for use and
an ample supply of gold  360 

 Sidenote  The Hapsburgs in Austria  

200  Prussia s aspiration to become a great European power made it
necessary for her to extend her territory  This inevitably brought her
into rivalry with Austria  It will be remembered that Charles V  shortly
after his accession  ceded to his brother  Ferdinand I  the German or
Austrian possessions of the house of Hapsburg  while he himself retained
the Spanish  Burgundian  and Italian dominions  Ferdinand  by a
fortunate marriage with the heiress of the kingdoms of Bohemia and
Hungary  greatly augmented his territory  Hungary was  however  almost
completely occupied by the Turks at that time  and till the end of the
seventeenth century the energies of the Austrian rulers were largely
absorbed in a long struggle against the Mohammedans 

 Sidenote  Conquests of the Turks in Europe  

A Turkish tribe from western Asia had  at the opening of the fourteenth
century  established themselves in western Asia Minor under their leader
Othman  d  1326   It was from him that they derived their name of
Ottoman Turks  to distinguish them from the Seljuk Turks  with whom the
crusaders had come into contact  The leaders of the Ottoman Turks showed
great energy  They not only extended their Asiatic territory far toward
the east  and later into Africa  but they gained a footing in Europe as
early as 1353  They gradually conquered the Slavic peoples in Macedonia
and occupied the territory about Constantinople  although it was a
hundred years before they succeeded in capturing the ancient capital of
the Eastern Empire 

 Sidenote  The defense of Europe against the Turks  

This advance of the Turks naturally aroused grave apprehensions in the
states of western Europe lest they too might be deprived of their
independence  The brunt of the defense against the common foe devolved
upon Venice and the German Hapsburgs  who carried on an almost
continuous war with the Turks for nearly two centuries  As late as 1683
the Mohammedans collected a large force and besieged Vienna  which might
very well have fallen into their hands had it not been for the timely
assistance which the city received from the king of Poland  From this
time on  the power of the Turks in Europe rapidly decreased  and the
Hapsburgs were able to regain the whole territory of Hungary and
Transylvania  their possession of which was formally recognized by the
Sultan in 1699 

 Sidenote  The question of the Austrian succession  

In 1740  a few months before the accession of Frederick II of Prussia 
the emperor Charles VI  who was the last representative of the direct
line of the Hapsburgs  died  Foreseeing the difficulties which would
arise at his death in regard to the inheritance of his possessions  he
had spent a great part of his life in trying to induce the European
powers to promise that his daughter  Maria Theresa  should be recognized
as his successor  England  Holland  and even Prussia were ready to bid
Godspeed to the new archduchess of Austria and queen of Hungary and
Bohemia  but France  Spain  and the neighboring Bavaria held back in the
hope of gaining some portion of the scattered Austrian dominions for
themselves  The duke of Bavaria insisted that he was the rightful heir
and managed to have himself elected emperor under the title of Charles
VII 

 Sidenote  Accession of Frederick II of Prussia  called  the Great  
1740 1786  

 Sidenote  Frederick s attack upon Silesia  

201  In his early years Frederick II grieved and disgusted his boorish
but energetic old father by his dislike for military life and his
interest in books and music  He was a particular admirer of the French
and preferred their language to his own  No sooner had he become king 
however  than he suddenly developed marvelous energy and skill in
warlike enterprises  He realized that Prussia must widen its boundaries 
and he saw no better way of accomplishing this than by robbing the
seemingly defenseless Maria Theresa of Silesia  a strip of territory
lying to the southeast of Brandenburg  He accordingly marched his army
into the coveted district  and occupied the important city of Breslau
without declaring war or offering any excuse except a vague claim to a
portion of the land 

 Sidenote  The War of the Austrian Succession  

France  stimulated by Frederick s example  joined with Bavaria in the
attack upon Maria Theresa  It seemed for a time as if her struggle to
maintain the integrity of her realm would be vain  but the loyalty of
all the various peoples under her scepter was roused by her
extraordinary courage and energy  The French were driven back  but Maria
Theresa was forced to grant Silesia to Frederick in order to induce him
to retire from the war  Finally  England and Holland joined in an
alliance for maintaining the balance of power  for they had no desire to
see France annex the Austrian Netherlands  On the death of the emperor
Charles VII  1745   Maria Theresa s husband  Francis  duke of Lorraine 
was chosen emperor  A few years later  1748  all the powers  tired of
the war  laid down their arms and agreed to what is called in diplomacy
the  status quo ante bellum   which simply means that things were to be
restored to the condition in which they had been before the opening of
hostilities 

 Sidenote  Frederick promotes the material development of Prussia  

 Sidenote  Frederick and Voltaire  

Frederick was  however  permitted to keep Silesia  which increased his
dominions by about one third of their former extent  He now turned his
attention to making his subjects happier and more prosperous  by
draining the swamps  promoting industry  and drawing up a new code of
laws  He found time  also  to gratify his interest in men of letters 
and invited Voltaire  the most distinguished writer of the eighteenth
century  to make his home at Berlin  It will not seem strange to any one
who knows anything of the character of these two men  that they
quarreled after two or three years  and that Voltaire left the Prussian
king with very bitter feelings  361 

 Sidenote  The Seven Years  War  

202  Maria Theresa was by no means reconciled to the loss of Silesia 
and she began to lay her plans for expelling the perfidious Frederick
and regaining her lost territory  This led to one of the most important
wars in modern history  in which not only almost every European power
joined  but which involved the whole world  from the Indian rajahs of
Hindustan to the colonists of Virginia and New England  This Seven
Years  War  1756 1763  will be considered in its broader aspects in the
next chapter  We note here only the part played in it by the king of
Prussia 

 Sidenote  The alliance against Prussia  

Maria Theresa s ambassador at Paris was so skillful in his negotiations
with the French court that in 1756 he induced it  in spite of its two
hundred years of hostility to the house of Hapsburg  to enter into an
alliance with Austria against Prussia  Russia  Sweden  and Saxony also
agreed to join in a concerted attack on Prussia  Their armies  coming as
they did from every point of the compass  threatened the complete
annihilation of Austria s rival  It seemed as if the new kingdom of
Prussia might disappear altogether from the map of Europe 

 Sidenote  Frederick s victorious defense  

However  it was in this war that Frederick earned his title of  the
Great  and showed himself the equal of the ablest generals the world has
seen  from Alexander to Napoleon  Learning the object of the allies  he
did not wait for them to declare war against him  but occupied Saxony at
once and then moved on into Bohemia  where he nearly succeeded in taking
the capital  Prague  Here he was forced to retire  but in 1757 he
defeated the French and his German enemies in the most famous  perhaps 
of his battles  at Rossbach  A month later he routed the Austrians at
Leuthen  not far from Breslau  Thereupon the Swedes and Russians retired
from the field and left Frederick for the moment master of the
situation 

 Sidenote  Frederick finally triumphs over Austria  

England now engaged the French and left Frederick at liberty to deal
with his other enemies  While he exhibited marvelous military skill  he
was by no means able to gain all the battles in which he engaged  For a
time  indeed  it looked as if he might after all be vanquished  But the
accession of a new Tsar  who was an ardent admirer of Frederick  led
Russia to conclude peace with Prussia  whereupon Maria Theresa
reluctantly agreed to give up once more her struggle with her inveterate
enemy 

 Sidenote  The kingdom of Poland and its defective constitution  

Frederick was able during his reign greatly to strengthen his kingdom by
adding to it the Polish regions which had hitherto divided his
possessions in Brandenburg from those which lay across the Vistula  The
kingdom of Poland  which in its declining years was to cause western
Europe much trouble  was shut in between Russia  Austria  and Prussia 
The Slavic population of this region had come under an able ruler about
the year 1000  and the Polish kings had succeeded for a time in
extending their power over a large portion of Russia  Moravia  and the
Baltic regions  They had never been able  however  to establish a
successful form of government  This was largely due to the fact that the
kings were elected by the nobles  the crown not passing from father to
son  as in the neighboring kingdoms  The elections were tumultuous
affairs  and foreigners were frequently chosen  Moreover  each noble had
the right to veto any law proposed in the diet  and consequently a
single person might prevent the passage of even the most important
measure  The anarchy which prevailed in Poland had become proverbial 

 Sidenote  The first partition of Poland  1772  

On the pretense that this disorderly country was a menace to their
welfare  the neighboring powers  Russia  Austria  and Prussia  agreed to
reduce the danger by each helping itself to a slice of the unfortunate
kingdom  This amicable arrangement resulted in what is known as the
first partition of Poland  It was succeeded by two others  1793 and
1795   by the last of which this ancient state was wiped from the map
altogether  362 

 Sidenote  Achievements of Frederick the Great  

When Frederick died  1786  he left the state which had been intrusted to
him by his father nearly doubled in size  He had rendered it illustrious
by his military glory  and had vastly increased its resources by
improving the condition of the people in the older portions of his
territory and by establishing German colonies in the desolate regions of
West Prussia  which he strove in this way to bind closely to the rest of
the kingdom 


     General Reading   TUTTLE   History of Prussia   4 vols   Houghton 
     Mifflin   Co    8 25   CARLYLE   Frederick the Great   3 vols  
     Chapman   2 25   LONGMAN  F W    Frederick the Great   Charles
     Scribner s Sons   1 00   RAMBAUD   History of Russia   2 vols  
     Coryell   Co    2 00   For Peter the Great and his Age 
     WALISZEWSKI   Life of Peter the Great   D  Appleton   Co    2 00  
     For the Seven Years  War and France  PERKINS   France under Louis
     XV   2 vols   Houghton  Mifflin   Co    4 00  




CHAPTER XXXIII

THE EXPANSION OF ENGLAND


203  In the last chapter we reviewed the progress of affairs in eastern
Europe and noted the appearance of two new and important powers  Prussia
and Russia  which  together with Austria  were engaged during the
eighteenth century in extending their bounds at the expense of their
weak neighbors  Poland and Turkey 

 Sidenote  In the eighteenth century England lays the foundation of her
commercial greatness  

In the west  England was rapidly becoming a dominant power  While she
did not play a very important part in the wars on the continent  she was
making herself mistress of the seas  At the close of the War of the
Spanish Succession her navy was superior to that of any other European
power  for both France and Holland had been greatly weakened by the long
conflict  Fifty years after the Treaty of Utrecht  England had succeeded
in driving the French from both North America and India and in laying
the foundation of her vast colonial empire  which still gives her the
commercial supremacy among the European countries 

 Sidenote  Questions settled by the accession of William and Mary  

With the accession of William and Mary  England may be regarded as
having practically settled the two great questions which had produced
such serious dissensions during the previous fifty years  In the first
place  the nation had clearly shown that it proposed to remain
Protestant  and the relations between the Church of England and the
dissenters were gradually being satisfactorily adjusted  In the second
place  the powers of the king had been carefully defined  and from the
opening of the eighteenth century to the present time no English monarch
has ventured to veto an act of Parliament  363 

 Sidenote  Queen Anne  1702 1714  

 Sidenote  The union of England and Scotland  1707  

William III was succeeded in 1702 by his sister in law  Anne  a younger
daughter of James II  Far more important than the war which her generals
carried on against Spain was the final union of England and Scotland  As
we have seen  the difficulties between the two countries had led to much
bloodshed and suffering ever since Edward I s futile attempt to conquer
Scotland  364  The two countries had  it is true  been under the same
ruler since the accession of James I  but each had maintained its own
independent parliament and system of government  Finally  in 1707  both
nations agreed to unite their governments into one  Forty five members
of the British House of Commons were to be chosen thereafter in
Scotland  and sixteen Scotch lords were to be added to the British House
of Lords  In this way the whole island of Great Britain was placed under
a single government  and the occasions for strife were thereby greatly
reduced 

 Sidenote  Accession of George I  1714 1727   the first of the house of
Hanover  

Since none of Anne s children survived her  she was succeeded  according
to an arrangement made before her accession  by the nearest Protestant
heir  This was the son of James I s granddaughter Sophia  She had
married the elector of Hanover 365   consequently the new king of
England  George I  was also elector of Hanover and a member of the Holy
Roman Empire 

 Sidenote  The king ceases to attend the meetings of the cabinet  which
comes to be regarded as the real governing body  

The new king was a German who could not speak English and was forced to
communicate with his ministers in bad Latin  The king s leading
ministers had come to form a little body by themselves  called the
 cabinet   As George could not understand the discussions he did not
attend the meetings of his ministers  and thereby set an example which
has been followed by his successors  In this way the cabinet came to
hold its meetings and transact its business independently of the king 
Before long it became a recognized principle in England that it was the
cabinet that really governed rather than the king  and that its members 
whether the king liked them or not  might retain their offices so long
as they continued to enjoy the confidence and support of Parliament 

                      James I  1603 1625 
                               
                                            
                                            
      Charles I                        Elizabeth  m  Frederick V 
      1625 1649                                                 Elector of the
                                                                Palatinate
                                                                 Winter King
                                                                of Bohemia 
                                                               
Charles II  1  Anne Hyde  m  James II  m   2  Mary of     Sophia  m  Ernest
 1660 1685                  1685 1689         Modena                 Augustus 
                                                                     Elector of
                                                                     Hanover
                                                                  
William III  m  Mary         Anne                                 
 1689 1702   1689 1694     1702 1714                         George I
                                                             1714 1727 
                                                                  
                                                             George II
                                  James  the                 1727 1760 
                                Old Pretender                     
                                                             Frederick 
                                                          Prince of Wales
                                Charles Edward                d  1751 
                              the Young Pretender                 
                                                                  
                                                            George III
                                                             1760 1820 

 Sidenote  England and the  balance of power   

204  William of Orange had been a continental statesman before he became
king of England  and his chief aim had always been to prevent France
from becoming over powerful  He had joined in the War of the Spanish
Succession in order to maintain the  balance of power  between the
various European countries  366  During the eighteenth century England
continued  for the same reason  to engage in the struggles between the
continental powers  although she had no expectation of attempting to
extend her sway across the Channel  The wars which she waged in order to
increase her own power and territory were carried on in distant parts of
the world  and more often on sea than on land 

 Sidenote  Peace under Walpole as prime minister  1721 1742  

For a quarter of a century after the Treaty of Utrecht  England enjoyed
peace  367  Under the influence of Walpole  who for twenty one years was
the head of the cabinet and the first to be called  prime minister  
peace was maintained within and without  Not only did Walpole avoid
going to war with other countries  but he was careful to prevent the
ill feeling at home from developing into civil strife  His principle was
to  let sleeping dogs lie   so he strove to conciliate the dissenters
and to pacify the Jacobites  368  as those were called who still desired
to have the Stuarts return 

 Sidenote  England in the War of the Austrian Succession  

 Sidenote   Prince Charlie   the Young Pretender  in Scotland  

When  in 1740  Frederick the Great and the French attacked Maria
Theresa  England s sympathies were with the injured queen  As elector of
Hanover  George II  who had succeeded his father in 1727   led an army
of German troops against the French and defeated them on the river Main 
Frederick then declared war on England  and France sent the grandson of
James II  369  the Young Pretender  as he was called  with a fleet to
invade England  The attempt failed  for the fleet was dispersed by a
storm  In 1745 the French defeated the English and Dutch forces in the
Netherlands  this encouraged the Young Pretender to make another attempt
to gain the English crown  He landed in Scotland  where he found support
among the Highland chiefs  and even Edinburgh welcomed  Prince
Charlie   He was able to collect an army of six thousand men  with which
he marched into England  He was quickly forced back into Scotland 
however  and after a disastrous defeat on Culloden Moor  1746  and many
romantic adventures  he was glad to reach France once more in safety 

205  Soon after the close of the War of the Austrian Succession in 1748 
England entered upon a series of wars which were destined profoundly to
affect not only her position  but also the fate of distant portions of
the globe  In order to follow these changes intelligently we must
briefly review the steps by which the various European states had
extended their sway over regions separated from them by the ocean 

 Sidenote  Colonial policy of Portugal  Spain  and Holland in the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries  

The voyages which had brought America and India within the ken of Europe
during the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries were  as we know 
mainly undertaken by the Portuguese and Spaniards  Portugal was the
first to realize the advantage of extending her commerce by establishing
stations in India and on the Brazilian coast of South America  then
Spain laid claim to Mexico  the West Indies  and a great part of South
America  These two powers found their first rival in the Dutch  for when
Philip II was able to add Portugal to the realms of the Spanish monarchs
for a few decades  1580 1640   he immediately closed the port of Lisbon
to the Dutch ships  Thereupon the United Provinces  whose merchants
could no longer procure the spices which the Portuguese brought from the
East  resolved to take possession of the source of supplies  They
accordingly expelled the Portuguese from a number of their settlements
in India and the Spice Islands and brought Java  Sumatra  and other
tropical regions under Dutch control  370 

 Sidenote  Settlements of the French and English in North America  

In North America the chief rivals were England and France  both of which
succeeded in establishing colonies in the early part of the seventeenth
century  Englishmen successively settled at Jamestown in Virginia
 1607   then in New England  Maryland  Pennsylvania  and elsewhere  The
colonies owed their growth to the influx of refugees   Puritans 
Catholics  and Quakers   who exiled themselves in the hope of gaining
the right freely to enjoy their particular forms of religion  371 

Just as Jamestown was being founded by the English the French were
making their first successful settlement in Nova Scotia and at Quebec 
Although England made no attempt to oppose the French occupation of
Canada  it progressed but slowly  In 1673 Marquette  a Jesuit
missionary  and Joliet  a merchant  discovered the Mississippi River  La
Salle sailed down the great stream and named the new country which he
entered Louisiana  after his king  The city of New Orleans was founded
near the mouth of the river in 1718  and the French established a chain
of forts between it and Montreal 

England was able  however  by the Treaty of Utrecht  to establish
herself in the northern regions  for France thereby ceded to her
Newfoundland  Nova Scotia  and the borders of Hudson Bay  While the
number of English in North America at the beginning of the Seven Years 
War is supposed to have been over a million  the French scarcely
exceeded a twentieth of that number  Yet careful observers at the time
were by no means sure that France was not destined to dominate the new
country  rather than England 

 Sidenote  Extent of India  

The rivalry of England and France was not confined to the wildernesses
of North America  occupied by half a million of savage red men  At the
opening of the eighteenth century both countries had gained a foothold
on the borders of the vast Indian empire  inhabited by two hundred
millions of people and the seat of an ancient and highly developed
civilization  One may gain some idea of the extent of India by laying
the map of Hindustan upon that of the United States  If the southernmost
point  Cape Comorin  be placed over New Orleans  Calcutta will lie
nearly over New York City and Bombay in the neighborhood of Des Moines 
Iowa 

 Sidenote  The Mongolian emperors of Hindustan  

A generation after Vasco da Gama landed in Calicut  372  a Mongolian
conqueror  Baber  373  had established his empire in India  The dynasty
of Mongolian rulers which he founded had been able to keep the whole
country under its control for toward two centuries  then their empire
had fallen apart in much the same way as that of Charlemagne had done 
Like the counts and dukes of the Carolingian period  the emperor s
officials  the subahdars and nawabs  nabobs   and the rajahs  i e  
Hindu princes temporarily subjugated by the Mongols  had gradually got
the power in their respective districts into their own hands  Although
the emperor  or Great Mogul  as the English called him  continued to
maintain himself in his capital of Delhi  he could no longer be said to
rule the country at the opening of the eighteenth century when the
French and English were seriously beginning to turn their attention to
his coasts 

 Sidenote  English and French settlements in India  

In the time of Charles I  1639   a village had been purchased by the
English East India Company on the southeastern coast of Hindustan  which
grew into the important English station of Madras  About a generation
later the district of Bengal was occupied and Calcutta founded  Bombay
was already an English station  The Mongolian emperor of India at first
scarcely deigned to notice the presence of a few foreigners on the
fringe of his vast realms  But before the end of the seventeenth century
hostilities began between the English East India Company and the native
rulers which made it plain that the foreigners would be forced to defend
themselves 

The English had not only to face the opposition of the natives  but that
of a European power as well  France also had an East India Company  and
Pondicherry  at the opening of the eighteenth century  was its chief
center with a population of sixty thousand  of which two hundred only
were Europeans  It soon became apparent that there was little danger
from the Great Mogul  moreover  the Portuguese and Dutch were out of the
race  So the native princes and the French and English were left to
fight among themselves for the supremacy 

 Sidenote  England victorious in the struggle for supremacy in America  

206  Just before the general clash of European rulers known as the Seven
Years  War came in 1756  the French and English had begun their struggle
for control in both America and India  In America the so called French
and Indian War began in 1754 between the English and French colonists 
General Braddock was sent from England to capture Fort Duquesne  which
the French had established to keep their rivals out of the Ohio valley 
Braddock knew nothing of border warfare  and he was killed and his
troops routed  Fortunately for England  France  as the ally of Austria 
was soon engaged in a war with Prussia that prevented her from giving
proper attention to her American possessions  A famous statesman  the
elder Pitt  was now at the head of the English ministry  He was able not
only to succor the hard pressed king of Prussia with money and men  but
also to support the militia of the thirteen American colonies  The
French forts at Ticonderoga and Niagara were taken in 1759  Quebec was
won in Wolfe s heroic attack  and the following year all Canada
submitted to the English  England s supremacy on the sea was
demonstrated by three admirals  each of whom destroyed a French fleet in
the same year that Quebec was lost to France 

 Sidenote  Dupleix and Clive in India  

In India conflicts between the French and the English had occurred
during the War of the Austrian Succession  The governor of the French
station of Pondicherry was Dupleix  a soldier of great energy  who
proposed to drive out the English and firmly establish the power of
France over Hindustan  His chances of success were greatly increased by
the quarrels among the native rulers  some of whom belonged to the
earlier Hindu inhabitants and some to the Mohammedan Mongolians who had
conquered India in 1526  Dupleix had very few French soldiers  but he
began the enlistment of the natives  a custom eagerly adopted by the
English  These native soldiers  whom the English called Sepoys  were
taught to fight in the manner of Europeans  374 

 Sidenote  Clive defeats Dupleix  

But the English colonists  in spite of the fact that they were mainly
traders  discovered among the clerks in Madras a leader equal in
military skill and energy to Dupleix himself  Robert Clive  who was but
twenty five years old at this time  organized a large force of Sepoys
and gained a remarkable ascendency over them by his astonishing bravery 
Dupleix paid no attention to the fact that peace had been declared in
Europe at Aix la Chapelle  but continued to carry on his operations
against the English  But Clive proved more than his equal and in two
years had established English supremacy in the southeastern part of
India 

 Sidenote  Clive renders English influence supreme in India  

 Sidenote  The  Black Hole  of Calcutta  

 Sidenote  Battle of Plassey  1757  

At the moment that the Seven Years  War was beginning  bad news reached
Clive from the English settlement of Calcutta  about a thousand miles to
the northeast of Madras  The subahdar of Bengal had seized the property
of some English merchants and imprisoned one hundred and forty five
Englishmen in a little room  where most of them died of suffocation
before morning  Clive hastened to Bengal  and with a little army of nine
hundred Europeans and fifteen hundred Sepoys he gained a great victory
at Plassey over the subahdar s army of fifty thousand men  Clive then
replaced the subahdar of Bengal by a man whom he believed to be friendly
to the English  Before the Seven Years  War was over the English had won
Pondicherry and deprived the French of all their former influence in the
region of Madras 

 Sidenote  England s gains in the Seven Years  War  

When the Seven Years  War was brought to an end in 1763 by the Treaty of
Paris  it was clear that England had gained far more than any other
power  She was to retain her two forts commanding the Mediterranean 
Gibraltar  and Port Mahon on the island of Minorca  in America  France
ceded to her the vast region of Canada and Nova Scotia  as well as
several of the islands in the West Indies  The region beyond the
Mississippi was ceded to Spain by France  who thus gave up all her
claims to North America  In India  France  it is true  received back the
towns which the English had taken from her  but she had permanently lost
her influence over the native rulers  for Clive had made the English
name greatly feared among them 

 Sidenote  Beginning of trouble with the American colonies  

207  England  with the help of her colonists  had thus succeeded in
driving the French from North America and in securing the continent 
with the exception of Mexico  for the English race  She was not 
however  long to enjoy her victory  for no sooner had the Peace of Paris
been signed than she and her American colonies became involved in a
dispute over taxation  which led to a new war and the creation of an
independent English speaking nation  the United States of America 

 Sidenote  The Stamp Act and its repeal  

It seemed right to England that the colonies should help pay the
expenses of the late war  which were very heavy  and also support a
small standing army of English soldiers  Parliament therefore passed the
Stamp Act in 1765  which required the colonists to pay for stamps to be
used on legal documents  The Americans declared that Parliament had no
right to tax them  since they were not represented in that body  The
opposition to the stamp tax was so great that Parliament repealed the
act  but with the explicit assertion that it nevertheless had the right
to tax the colonies as well as to make laws for them 

 Sidenote  Opposition to  taxation without representation   

The effort to make the Americans pay a very moderate import duty on tea
produced further trouble in 1773  The young men of Boston seditiously
boarded a tea ship in the harbor and threw the cargo into the water 
Burke  perhaps the most able member of the House of Commons  urged the
ministry to leave the Americans to tax themselves  but George III
 1760 1820  and Parliament as a whole could not forgive the colonists
their opposition  They believed that the trouble was largely confined to
New England and could be easily overcome  In 1774 acts were passed
prohibiting the landing and shipping of goods at Boston  and the colony
of Massachusetts was deprived of its former right to choose its judges
and the members of the upper house of its legislature  These
appointments were now placed in the hands of the king 

 Sidenote  The Continental Congress  

 Sidenote  Outbreak of war  

 Sidenote  Declaration of Independence  July 4  1776  

Such measures  instead of bringing Massachusetts to terms  so roused the
apprehension of the rest of the colonists that a congress was summoned 
and met at Philadelphia  This decided that all trade with Great Britain
should cease until the grievances of the colonies had been redressed 
The following year the Americans made a brave stand against British
troops at Lexington and in the battle of Bunker Hill  The new Congress
decided to prepare for war and raised an army which was put under the
command of George Washington  a Virginia planter who had gained some
distinction in the late French and Indian War  Up to this time the
colonies had not intended to secede from the mother country  but the
proposed compromises came to nothing  and in July  1776  Congress
declared that  these United States are  and of right ought to be  free
and independent  

 Sidenote  The United States seeks and receives aid from France  

This occurrence naturally excited great interest in France  The outcome
of the Seven Years  War had been most lamentable for that country  and
any trouble which came to her old enemy England could not but be a
source of congratulation to the French  The United States regarded
France as her natural ally and immediately sent Benjamin Franklin to
Versailles with the hope of obtaining the aid of the new French king 
Louis XVI  The king s ministers were doubtful whether the colonies could
long maintain their resistance against the overwhelming strength of the
mother country  It was only after the Americans had defeated Burgoyne at
Saratoga in 1777  that France concluded a treaty with the United States
in which the independence of the new republic was recognized  This was
tantamount to declaring war upon England  The enthusiasm for the
Americans was so great in France that a number of the younger nobles 
the most conspicuous of whom was Lafayette  crossed the Atlantic to
fight in the American army  375 

 Sidenote  Close of the war  1783  

 Sidenote  England acknowledges the independence of the United States  

In spite of the skill and heroic self sacrifice of Washington  the
Americans lost more battles than they gained  It is extremely doubtful
if they would have succeeded in bringing the war to a favorable close 
by forcing the English general  Cornwallis  to capitulate at Yorktown
 1781   had it not been for the aid of the French fleet  Before the war
was terminated by the Peace of Paris  1783   Spain had joined in the
hostilities  and the Spanish and French fleets laid siege to Gibraltar 
Their floating batteries were finally destroyed by the red hot shot of
the British  and the enemies of England gave up further attempts to
dislodge her from this important station  The chief result of the war
was the recognition by England of the United States  whose territory was
to extend to the Mississippi River  To the west of the Mississippi  the
vast territory of Louisiana still remained in the hands of Spain 

 Sidenote  Results in Europe of wars between Treaty of Utrecht and Peace
of Paris  

208  The results of the European wars during the sixty years which
elapsed between the Treaty of Utrecht and the Peace of Paris may be
summarized as follows  In the northeast two new powers  Russia and
Prussia  had come into the European family of nations  Prussia had
greatly extended her territory by gaining Silesia and West Poland  She
and Austria were  in the nineteenth century  to engage in a struggle for
supremacy in Germany  which was to result in substituting the present
German empire under the headship of the Hohenzollerns for the Holy Roman
Empire  of which the house of Hapsburg had so long been the nominal
chief 

 Sidenote  Origin of the  eastern question   

The power of the Sultan was declining so rapidly that Austria and Russia
were already considering the seizure of his European possessions  This
presented a new problem to the European powers  which came to be known
in the nineteenth century as the  eastern question   Were Austria and
Russia permitted to aggrandize themselves by adding the Turkish
territory to their possessions  it would gravely disturb the balance of
power which England had so much at heart  So it came about that  from
this time on  Turkey was admitted in a way to the family of western
European nations  for it soon appeared that some of the states of
western Europe were willing to form alliances with the Sultan  and even
aid him directly in defending himself against his neighbors 

 Sidenote  England s colonial possessions  

England had lost her American colonies  and by her perverse policy had
led to the creation of a sister state speaking her own language and
destined to occupy the central part of the North American continent from
the Atlantic to the Pacific  She still retained Canada  however  and in
the nineteenth century added a new continent in the southern hemisphere 
Australia  to her vast colonial empire  In India she had no further
rivals among European nations  and gradually extended her influence over
the whole region south of the Himalayas  In 1877 Queen Victoria was
proclaimed Empress of India as the successor of the Grand Mogul 

 Sidenote  France under Louis XV  1715 1774  

As for France  she had played a rather pitiful rôle during the long
reign of Louis XIV s great grandson  Louis XV  1715 1774   She had 
however  been able to increase her territory by the addition of
Lorraine  1766  and  in 1768  of the island of Corsica  A year later a
child was born in the Corsican town of Ajaccio  who one day  by his
genius  was to make France the center for a time of an empire rivaling
that of Charlemagne in extent  When the nineteenth century opened France
was no longer a monarchy  but a republic  and her armies were to occupy
in turn every European capital  from Madrid to Moscow  In order to
understand the marvelous transformations produced by the French
Revolution and the wars of Napoleon  we must consider somewhat carefully
the conditions in France which led to a great reform of her institutions
in 1789  and to the founding of a republic four years later 


     General Reading   For the French in America  PARKMAN   The Pioneers
     of France in the New World   Little  Brown   Co    2 00   also  A
     Half Century of Conflict   same publisher  2 vols    6 00   For
     India  MALLESON   Clive   Oxford  University Press  60 cents   and
     Macaulay s Essay on Clive  For the growth of the British Empire  H 
     DE B  GIBBINS   History of Commerce in Europe   The Macmillan
     Company  90 cents   and SEELEY   The Expansion of England   Little 
     Brown   Co    1 75  




CHAPTER XXXIV

THE EVE OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION


209  When we meet the words  French Revolution   they are pretty sure to
call up before our mind s eye the guillotine and its hundreds of
victims  the storming of the Bastile  the Paris mob shouting the
Marseillaise hymn as they parade the streets with heads of unfortunate
 aristocrats  on their pikes  Every one knows something of this terrible
episode in French history  Indeed  it has made so deep an impression on
posterity that we sometimes forget that the Reign of Terror was  not 
the French Revolution  Mere disorder and bloodshed never helped mankind
along  and the Revolution must assuredly have produced some great and
lasting alteration in France and in Europe to deserve to be ranked  as
it properly is  with the Renaissance and the Protestant Revolt  as one
of the three most momentous changes of the last six hundred years  The
Reign of Terror was  in fact  only a sequel to the  real  Revolution 

 Sidenote  The  Ancien Régime   

The French Revolution  in the truest sense of the term  was a great and
permanent reform  which did away with many absurd and vexatious laws and
customs  and with abuses of which the whole nation was heartily tired 
from the king down to the humblest peasant  Whenever a Frenchman  in the
eighteenth century  seriously considered the condition of his country 
most of the institutions in the midst of which he lived appeared to him
to be  abuses   contrary to reason and humanity  These vicious
institutions   relics of bygone times and outlived conditions   which
the Revolution destroyed forever  are known by the general name  Ancien
Régime   that is   the old system   Whole volumes have been written
about the causes of the French Revolution  The real cause is  however 
easily stated  the old system was bad  and almost every one  both high
and low  had come to realize that it was bad  and consequently the
French did away with it and substituted a modern and more rational order
for the long standing disorder 

 Sidenote  France not a well organized state in the eighteenth century  

Of the evils which the Revolution abolished  none was more important
than the confusion due to the fact that France was not in the eighteenth
century a well organized  homogeneous state whose citizens all enjoyed
the same rights and privileges  A long line of kings had patched it
together  adding bit by bit as they could  By conquest and bargain  by
marrying heiresses  and through the extinction of the feudal dynasties 
the original restricted domains of Hugh Capet about Paris and Orleans
had been gradually increased by his descendants until  when Louis XVI
came to the throne in 1774  he found himself ruler of practically the
whole territory which makes up France to day 

Some of the districts which the kings of France brought under their
sway  like Languedoc  Provence  Brittany  and Navarre  were considerable
states in themselves  each with its own laws  customs  and system of
government  When these provinces had come  at different times  into the
possession of the king of France  he had not changed their laws so as to
make them correspond with those of his other domains  He was satisfied
if his new provinces paid their due share of the taxes and treated his
officials with respect  In some cases the provinces retained their local
assemblies  and controlled  to a certain extent  their own affairs  The
provinces into which France was divided before the Revolution were not 
therefore  merely artificial divisions created for the purposes of
administrative convenience  like the modern French departments  376  but
represented real historical differences 

 Sidenote  Various systems of law  

While in a considerable portion of southern France the Roman law still
prevailed  in the central parts and in the west and north there were no
less than two hundred and eighty five different local codes of law in
force  so that one who moved from his own to a neighboring town might
find a wholly unfamiliar legal system 

 Illustration  The Provinces of France in the Eighteenth Century 
showing Interior Customs Lines 

 Sidenote  Interior customs lines  

Neither was France commercially a single state  The chief customs duties
were not collected upon goods as they entered French territory from a
foreign country  for the customs lines lay within France itself  so that
the central provinces about Paris were cut off from the outlying ones as
from a foreign land  377  A merchant of Bordeaux sending goods to Paris
would have to see that the duties were paid on them as they passed the
customs line  and  conversely  a merchant of Paris would have to pay a
like duty on commodities sent to places without the line 

 Sidenote  Inequalities of taxation illustrated by the salt tax  

The monstrous inequalities in levying one of the oldest and heaviest of
the taxes  i e   the salt tax  still better illustrates the strange
disorder that existed in France in the eighteenth century  The
government raised this tax by monopolizing the sale of salt and then
charging a high price for it  There would have been nothing remarkable
in this had the same price been charged everywhere  but as it was  the
people in one town might be forced to pay thirty times as much as their
neighbors in an adjacent district  The accompanying map shows how France
was arbitrarily divided  To take a single example  at Dijon  a certain
amount of salt cost seven francs  a few miles to the east  on entering
Franche Comté  one had to pay  for the same amount  twenty five francs 
to the north  in Burgundy  fifty eight francs  to the south  in the
region of the little salt tax  twenty eight francs  while still farther
off  in Gex  there was no tax whatever  The government had to go to
great expense to guard the boundary lines between the various districts 
for there was every inducement to smugglers to carry salt from those
parts of the country where it was cheap into the land of the great salt
tax 

 Sidenote  The privileged classes  

210  Besides these unfortunate local differences  there were class
differences which caused great discontent  All Frenchmen did not enjoy
the same rights as citizens  Two small but very important classes  the
nobility and the clergy  were treated differently by the state from the
rest of the people  They did not have to pay one of the heaviest of the
taxes  the notorious  taille   and on one ground or another they escaped
other burdens which the rest of the citizens bore  For instance  they
were not required to serve in the militia or help build the roads 

 Illustration  Map showing the Amount paid in the Eighteenth Century for
Salt in Various Parts of France 378  

 Sidenote  The Church  

We have seen how great and powerful the mediæval Church was  In France 
as in other Catholic countries of Europe  it still retained in the
eighteenth century a considerable part of the power that it had
possessed in the thirteenth  and it still performed important public
functions  It took charge of education and of the relief of the sick and
the poor  It was very wealthy and is supposed to have owned one fifth of
all the land in France  The clergy still claimed  as Boniface VIII had
done  that their property  being dedicated to God  was not subject to
taxation  They consented  however  to help the king from time to time by
a  free gift   as they called it  The church still collected the tithes
from the people  and its vast possessions made it very independent 
Those who did not call themselves Roman Catholics were excluded from
some of the most important rights of citizenship  Since the revocation
of the Edict of Nantes no Protestant could be legally married or have
the births of his children registered  or make a legal will 

 Sidenote  The clergy  

A great part of the enormous income of the church went into the pockets
of the higher clergy  the bishops  archbishops  and abbots  These were
appointed by the king  379  often from among his courtiers  and they
paid but little attention to their duties as officers of the church and
were generally nothing but  great lords with a hundred thousand francs
income   While they amused themselves at Versailles  the real work was
performed  and well performed  by the lower clergy  who often received
scarcely enough to keep soul and body together  We shall see that  when
the Revolution began  the parish priests sided with the people instead
of with their ecclesiastical superiors  380 

 Sidenote  The privileges of the nobility  

The privileges of the nobles  like those of the clergy  had originated
in the mediæval conditions described in an earlier chapter  381  A
detailed study of their rights would reveal many survivals of the
conditions which prevailed in the eleventh and twelfth centuries  when
the great majority of the people were serfs living upon the manors 
While serfdom had largely disappeared in France long before the
eighteenth century  and the peasants were generally free men who owned
or rented their land  the lords still enjoyed the right to collect a
variety of time honored dues from the inhabitants living within the
limits of the former manors 

The privileges and dues enjoyed by the nobles varied greatly in
different parts of France  It was quite common for the noble landowner
to have a right to a certain portion of the peasants  crops 
occasionally he could collect a toll on sheep and cattle driven past his
house  In some cases the lord maintained  as he had done in the Middle
Ages  the only mill  wine press  or oven within a certain district  and
could require every one to make use of these and pay him a share of the
product  Even when a peasant owned his land  the neighboring lord
usually had the right to exact one fifth of its value every time it was
sold  The nobles  too  enjoyed the aristocratic privilege of the hunt 
The game which they preserved for their amusement often did great damage
to the crops of the peasants  who were forbidden to interfere with
hares  deer  pigeons  etc 

All these privileges were vestiges of the powers which the nobles had
enjoyed when they ruled their estates as feudal lords  Louis XIV had  as
we know  induced them to leave their domains and gather round him at
Versailles  where all who could afford it lived for at least part of the
year  The higher offices in the army were reserved for the nobles  as
well as the easiest and most lucrative places in the church and about
the king s person  382 

 Sidenote  The third estate  

211  Everybody who did not belong to either the clergy or nobility was
regarded as being of the  third estate   The third estate was therefore
nothing more than the nation at large  which was made up in 1789 of
about twenty five million souls  The privileged classes can scarcely
have counted altogether more than two hundred and seventy thousand
individuals  A great part of the third estate lived in the country and
tilled the soil  Most historians have been inclined to make out their
condition as very bad indeed  They were certainly oppressed by an
abominable system of taxation and were irritated by the dues which they
had to pay to the lords  They also suffered frequently from local
famines  Yet there is no doubt that the evils of their situation have
been greatly exaggerated  When Thomas Jefferson traveled through France
in 1787 he reports that the country people appeared to be comfortable
and that they had plenty to eat  Arthur Young  a famous English traveler
who has left us an admirable account of his journeys in France during
the years 1787 1789  found much prosperity and contentment  although he
gives  too  some forlorn pictures of destitution 

 Sidenote  Favorable situation of the peasant in France compared with
other countries  

 Sidenote  Rapid increase of population in the eighteenth century  

The latter have often been unduly emphasized by historical writers  for
it has commonly been thought that the Revolution was to be explained by
the misery and despair of the people who could tolerate the old system
no longer  If  however  instead of comparing the situation of the French
peasant under the old régime with that of an English or American farmer
to day  we contrast his position with that of his fellow peasant in
Prussia  Austria  or Italy  it will be clear that in France the
agricultural classes were really much better off than elsewhere on the
continent  In Prussia  for example  the peasants were still serfs  they
had to work three whole days in each week for their lord  they could not
marry or dispose of their land without his permission  Moreover  the
fact that the population of France had steadily increased from seventeen
million after the close of the wars of Louis XIV to about twenty five
million at the opening of the Revolution  indicates that the general
condition of the people was improving rather than growing worse 

 Sidenote  Popular discontent  not the exceptionally miserable
condition of the French people  accounts for the Revolution  

The real reason why France was the first among the European countries to
carry out a great reform and do away with the irritating survivals of
feudalism was not that the nation was miserable and oppressed above all
others  but that it was sufficiently free and enlightened to realize the
evils and absurdities of the old régime  Mere oppression and misery does
not account for a revolution  there must also be active  discontent  
and of that there was a great abundance in France  as we shall see  The
French peasant no longer looked up to his lord as his ruler and
protector  but viewed him as a sort of legalized robber who demanded a
share of his precious harvest  whose officers awaited the farmer at the
crossing of the river to claim a toll  who would not let him sell his
produce when he wished  or permit him to protect his fields from the
ravages of the pigeons which it pleased the lord to keep  383 

 Sidenote  France still a despotism in the eighteenth century  

212  In the eighteenth century France was still the despotism that Louis
XIV had made it  384  Louis XVI once described it very well in the
following words   The sovereign authority resides exclusively in my
person  To me solely belongs the power of making the laws  and without
dependence or coöperation  The entire public order emanates from me  and
I am its supreme protector  My people are one with me  The rights and
interests of the nation are necessarily identical with mine and rest
solely in my hands   In short  the king still ruled  by the grace of
God   as Louis XIV had done  He needed to render account to no man for
his governmental acts  he was responsible to God alone  The following
illustrations will make clear the dangerous extent of the king s power 

 Sidenote  The king s control of the government funds  

In the first place  it was he who levied each year the heaviest of the
taxes  the hated  taille   from which the privileged classes were
exempted  This tax brought in about one sixth of the whole revenue of
the state  The amount collected was kept secret  and no report was made
to the nation of what was done with it or with any other part of the
king s income  Indeed  no distinction was made between the king s
private funds and the state treasury  whereas in England the monarch was
given a stated allowance  The king of France could issue as many drafts
payable to bearer as he wished  the royal officials must pay all such
orders and ask no questions  Louis XV is said to have spent no less than
seventy million dollars in this fashion in a single year 

 Sidenote   Lettres de cachet   

But the king not only controlled his subjects  purses  he had a terrible
authority over their persons as well  He could issue orders for the
arrest and arbitrary imprisonment of any one he pleased  Without trial
or formality of any sort  a person might be cast into a dungeon for an
indefinite period  until the king happened to remember him again or was
reminded of him by the poor man s friends  These notorious orders of
arrest were called  lettres de cachet   i e   sealed letters  They were
not difficult to obtain for any one who had influence with the king or
his favorites  and they furnished a particularly easy and efficacious
way of disposing of an enemy  These arbitrary orders lead one to
appreciate the importance of the provision of Magna Carta which
establishes that  no freeman shall be taken or imprisoned except by the
lawful sentence of his peers and in accordance with the law of the
land   Some of the most distinguished men of the time were shut up by
the king s order  often on account of books or pamphlets written by them
which displeased the king or those about him  The distinguished
statesman  Mirabeau  was imprisoned several times through  lettres de
cachet  obtained by his father as a means of checking his reckless
dissipation  385 

 Sidenote  Limitations placed upon the power of the French king  

213  Yet  notwithstanding the seemingly unlimited powers of the French
king  and in spite of the fact that France had no written constitution
and no legislative body to which the nation sent representatives  the
monarch was by no means absolutely free to do just as he pleased  He had
not the time nor inclination to carry on personally the government of
twenty five million subjects  and he necessarily and willingly left much
of the work to his ministers and the numerous public officials  who were
bound to obey the laws and regulations established for their control and
guidance 

 Sidenote  The  parlements  and their protests  

Next to the king s council the most important governmental bodies were
the higher courts of law  the  parlements   These resembled the English
Parliament in almost nothing but name  The French  parlements   of which
the most important one was at Paris and a dozen more were scattered
about the provinces  did not  however  confine themselves strictly to
the business of trying lawsuits  They claimed  and quite properly  that
when the king decided to make a new law he must send it to them to be
registered  else they would have no means of knowing just what the law
was of which they were to be the guardians  Now  although they
acknowledged that the right to make the laws belonged to the monarch 
they nevertheless often sent a  protest  to the king instead of
registering a law of which they disapproved  They would urge that the
ministers had abused His Majesty s confidence  They would see  too  that
their protest was printed and sold on the streets at a penny or two a
copy  so that people should get the idea that the  parlement  was
defending the nation against the oppressive measures of the king s
ministers 

When the king received one of these protests two alternatives were open
to him  He might recall the distasteful decree altogether or modify it
so as to suit the court  or he could summon the  parlement  before him
and in a solemn session  called a  lit de justice   command it with his
own mouth to register the law in its books  The  parlement  would then
reluctantly obey  but as the Revolution approached it began to claim
that a decree registered against its will was not valid 

 Sidenote  The  parlements  help to prepare the way for the
Revolution  

Struggles between the  parlements  and the ministers were very frequent
in the eighteenth century  They prepared the way for the Revolution 
first  by bringing important questions to the attention of the people 
for there were no newspapers and no parliamentary or congressional
debates to enable the public to understand the policy of the government 
Secondly  the  parlements  not only frankly criticised the proposed
measures of the king and his ministers  but they familiarized the nation
with the idea that the king was not really at liberty to alter what they
called  the fundamental laws  of the state  By this they meant that
there was an unwritten constitution  of which they were the guardians
and which limited the king s power  In this way they promoted the
growing discontent with a government which was carried on in secret  and
which left the nation at the mercy of the men in whom the king might for
the moment repose confidence 

 Sidenote  Public opinion  

It is a great mistake to suppose that public opinion did not exercise a
powerful check upon the king  even under the autocratic old régime  It
was  as one of Louis XVI s ministers declared   an invisible power
which  without treasury  guards  or an army  ruled Paris and the
court   yes  the very palace of the king   The latter half of the
eighteenth century was a period of outspoken and acrid criticism of the
whole existing social and governmental system  Reformers  among whom
many of the king s ministers were counted  loudly and eloquently
discussed the numerous abuses and the vicious character of the
government  which gradually came to seem just as bad to the people of
that day as it would to us now 

 Sidenote  Discussion of public questions  

Although there were no daily newspapers to discuss public questions 
large numbers of pamphlets were written and circulated by individuals
whenever there was an important crisis  and they answered much the same
purpose as the editorials in a modern newspaper  These pamphlets and the
books of the time sometimes treated the government  the clergy  or the
Catholic religion  with such open contempt  that the king  the clergy 
or the courts felt it necessary to prevent their circulation  The
 parlement  of Paris now and then ordered some offensive writing to be
burned by the common hangman  Several distinguished writers were even
imprisoned for expressing themselves too freely  and some booksellers
and printers banished  But the attempted suppression of free discussion
seemed an outrage to the more thoughtful among the public  and rather
promoted than prevented the consideration of the weaknesses of the
church and of the king s government 

 Illustration  Voltaire 

 Sidenote  Voltaire  1694 1778  

214  By far the most conspicuous and important reformer of the
eighteenth century was Voltaire  1694 1778   who was born twenty years
before Louis XIV died  and yet lived to see Louis XVI mount the throne 
 When the right sense of historical proportion is more fully developed
in men s minds  the name of Voltaire will stand out like the names of
the great decisive movements in the European advance  like the Revival
of Learning or the Reformation  The existence  character  and career of
this extraordinary person constituted in themselves a new and prodigious
era   Morley   To understand Voltaire and the secret of his fame would
be to understand France before the Revolution  His mission was to exalt
and popularize reason  and since a great part of the institutions of his
day were not based upon reason  but upon mere tradition  and were
utterly opposed to common sense   the touch of reason was fatal to the
whole structure  which instantly began to crumble  

 Sidenote  Voltaire s wide influence and popularity  

Voltaire had little respect for the past which had bequeathed to France
her disorderly government and  above all  her church  His keen eye was
continually discovering some new absurdity in the existing order  which 
with incomparable wit and literary skill  he would expose to his eager
readers  He was interested in almost everything  he wrote histories 
dramas  philosophic treatises  romances  epics  and innumerable letters
to his innumerable admirers  He was a sort of intellectual arbiter of
Europe  such as Petrarch and Erasmus had been  The vast range of his
writings enabled him to bring his bold questionings to the attention of
all sorts and conditions of men   not only to the general reader  but
even to the careless playgoer 

 Sidenote  Voltaire s attack upon the church  

While Voltaire was successfully inculcating free criticism in general 
he led in a relentless attack upon the most venerable  probably the most
powerful  institution in France  the Roman Catholic church  The absolute
power of the king did not greatly trouble him  but the church  with  as
he deemed  its deep seated opposition to a free exercise of reason and
its hostility to reform  seemed to him fatally to block all human
progress  He was wont to close his letters with the exhortation   Crush
the infamous thing   The church  as it fully realized  had never
encountered a more deadly enemy  Not only was Voltaire supremely
skillful in his varied methods of attack  but there were thousands of
both the thoughtful and the thoughtless ready to applaud him  for many
had reached the same conclusions  although they might not be able to
express their thoughts so persuasively as he  Voltaire repudiated the
beliefs of the Protestant churches as well as of the Roman church  He
was  however  no atheist  as his enemies  and they have been many and
bitter  have so often asserted  He believed in God  and at his country
home near Geneva he dedicated a temple to Him  Like many of his
contemporaries he was a deist  and held that God had revealed Himself in
nature and in our hearts  not in Bible or church 

Were there space at command a great many good things and plenty of bad
ones might be told of this extraordinary man  He was often superficial
in his judgments  and sometimes jumped to unwarranted conclusions  He
saw only the evil in the church  and seemed incapable of understanding
all that it had done for mankind during the bygone ages  He maliciously
attributed to evil motives teachings which were accepted by the best and
loftiest of men  He bitterly ridiculed even the holiest and purest
aspirations  along with the alleged deceptions of the Jesuits and the
quarrels of the theologians  He could  however  fight bravely against
wrong and oppression  386  The abuses against which he fought were in
large part abolished by the Revolution  It is extremely unfair to notice
only his mistakes and exaggerations  as many writers  both Catholic and
Protestant  have done  for he certainly did more than any one else to
prepare the way for the great and permanent reform of the church  as a
political and social institution  in 1789 1790 

 Sidenote  Rousseau  1712 1778  

Next to Voltaire the writer who did most to cultivate discontent was
Jean Jacques Rousseau  1712 1778   His famous little treatise   The
Social Contract   takes up the great question  By what right does one
man rule over others  The book opens with the words   Man is born free
and yet is now everywhere in chains  One man believes himself the master
of others and yet is after all more of a slave than they  How did this
change come about  I do not know  What can render it legitimate  I
believe that I can answer that question   It is  Rousseau declares  the
will of the people that renders government legitimate  The real
sovereign is the people  Although they may appoint a single person  a
king  to manage the government for them  they should make the laws 
since it is they who must obey them  We shall find that the first French
constitution accepts Rousseau s doctrine and defines law as  the
expression of the general will    not the will of a king reigning by the
grace of God 

 Sidenote  Montesquieu  

Montesquieu  the most profound of the political writers of the
eighteenth century  did his part in opening the eyes of thoughtful
Frenchmen to the disadvantages of their government by his eulogy of the
limited monarchy of England  He pointed out that the freedom which
Englishmen enjoyed was due to the fact that the three powers of
government  legislative  executive  and judicial  were not as in France
in the same hands  Parliament made the laws  the king executed them  and
the courts  independent of both  saw that they were observed  He
believed that the English would lose their liberties so soon as these
powers fell under the control of one person or body of persons  This
principle of  the separation of powers  is now recognized in many modern
governments  notably in that of the United States 

 Sidenote  The new science of political economy  

215  About the middle of the eighteenth century the science of political
economy was born  Scholars began to investigate far more thoroughly than
ever before the sources and distribution of the wealth of the nation 
The unjust system of taxation  which tended to exempt the richer classes
from their just share of the public burdens  the wasteful and irritating
methods of collecting the taxes  the interior customs lines  preventing
the easy passage of goods from one part of France to another  the
extravagance of the king s household  the pensions granted to
undeserving persons  every evil of the bungling  iniquitous old régime
was brought under the scrutiny of the new thinkers  who tested the
existing system by the light of reason and the welfare of the great mass
of the people 

 Sidenote  Economists argue against government restrictions on trade and
manufacture  

The economists wrote treatises on taxation  scattered pamphlets about 
and conducted a magazine or two  They not only brought the existing
economic evils home to the intelligent reader  but suggested remedies
for them 

The French government had been in the habit of regulating well nigh
everything  In order that the goods that were produced in France might
find a ready sale abroad  the government fixed the quality and width of
the cloth which might be manufactured and the character of the dyes
which should be used  387  The king s ministers kept a constant eye upon
the dealers in grain and breadstuffs  forbidding the storing up of these
products or their sale outside a market  In this way they had hoped to
prevent speculators from accumulating grain in times of scarcity in
order to sell it at a high rate 

It was now pointed out that these government restrictions produced some
very bad results  They failed to prevent famine  and in the case of
industry they discouraged new inventions and the adoption of better
methods  The economists claimed that it would be far better to leave the
manufacturer to carry on his business in his own way  They urged the
king to adopt the motto   laissez faire    Let things alone   if he
would see his realms prosper  388 

 Accession of Louis XVI  

216  In 1774 the old king  Louis XV  died after a long and disgraceful
reign  His unsuccessful wars had brought France to the verge of
bankruptcy  and his ministers had been unable to meet the obligations of
the government  The taxes were already so oppressive as to arouse great
discontent  and yet the government was running behind seventy million
dollars a year  His grandson and successor  Louis XVI  1774 1793   was a
young man of excellent intentions  He was only twenty  and his wife 
the beautiful Marie Antoinette  daughter of Maria Theresa  was still
younger  The new king almost immediately summoned Turgot  the ablest of
the economists  and placed him in the most important of the government
offices  that of controller general 

 Sidenote  Turgot controller general  1774 1776  

Turgot was an experienced government official as well as a scholar  For
thirteen years he had been the king s representative in Limoges  one of
the least prosperous portions of France  There he had had ample
opportunity to see the vices of the prevailing system of taxation  He
had made every effort to induce the government to better its methods 
and had tried to familiarize the people with the principles of political
economy  Consequently  when he was put in charge of the nation s
finances  it seemed as if he and the conscientious young king might find
some remedy for the long standing abuses 

 Sidenote  Turgot advocates economy  

The first and most natural measure was economy  for only in that way
could the government be saved from bankruptcy  and the burden of
taxation be lightened  Turgot felt that the vast amount spent in
maintaining the luxury of the royal court at Versailles should be
reduced  The establishments of the king  the queen  and the princes of
the blood royal cost the state annually toward twelve million dollars 
Then the French king had long been accustomed to grant  pensions  in a
reckless manner to his courtiers  and this required nearly twelve
million dollars more  Any attempt  however  to reduce this amount would
arouse the immediate opposition of the courtiers  and it was the
courtiers who really governed France  They had every opportunity to
influence the king s mind against a man whose economies they disliked 
They were constantly about the monarch from the moment when he awoke in
the morning until he went to bed at night  therefore they had an obvious
advantage over the controller general  who only saw him in business
hours  389 

Although the privileged class so stoutly opposed Turgot s reforms that
he did not succeed in abolishing the abuses himself  390  he did a great
deal to forward their destruction not many years after his retirement 
Immediately after coming into power he removed a great part of the
restrictions on the grain trade  He prefaced the edict with a very frank
denunciation of the government s traditional policy of preventing
persons from buying and selling their grain when and where they wished 
He showed that this did not obviate famines  as the government hoped
that it might  and that it caused great loss and hardship  If the
government would only let matters alone the grain would always go to
those provinces where it was most needed  for there it would bring the
best price  Turgot seized this and every similar opportunity to impress
important economic truths upon the minds of the people  391 

 Sidenote  Turgot s position  

An Italian economist  when he heard of Turgot s appointment  wrote to a
friend in France as follows   So Turgot is controller general  He will
not remain in office long enough to carry out his plans  He will punish
some scoundrels  he will bluster about and lose his temper  he will be
anxious to do good  but will run against obstacles and rogues at every
turn  Public credit will fall  he will be detested  it will be said that
he is not fitted for his task  Enthusiasm will cool  he will retire or
be sent off  and we shall have a new proof of the mistake of filling a
position like his in a monarchy like yours with an upright man and a
philosopher  

 Sidenote  Turgot dismissed  May 1776  

The Italian could not have made a more accurate statement of the case
had he waited until after the dismissal of Turgot  which took place in
May  1776  much to the satisfaction of the court  The king  although
upright and well intentioned  was not fond of the governmental duties
to which Turgot was always calling his attention  It was much the
easiest way to let things go along in the old way  for reforms not only
required much extra work  but they also forced him to refuse the
customary favors to those around him  The discontent of his young queen
or of an intimate companion outweighed the woes of the distant peasant 

 Sidenote  Necker succeeds Turgot  

 Sidenote  Necker s financial report  

217  Necker  who after a brief interval succeeded Turgot  contributed to
the progress of the coming revolution in two ways  He borrowed vast sums
of money in order to carry on the war which France  as the ally of the
United States  had undertaken against England  This greatly embarrassed
the treasury later and helped to produce the financial crisis which was
the immediate cause of the Revolution  Secondly  he gave the nation its
first opportunity of learning what was done with the public funds  by
presenting to the king  February  1781  a  report  on the financial
condition of the kingdom  this was publicly printed and eagerly read 
There the people could see for the first time how much the  taille  and
the salt tax actually took from them  and how much the king spent on
himself and his favorites  392 

 Sidenote  Calonne  controller general  1783 1787  

 Sidenote  Calonne informs the king that France is on the verge of
bankruptcy  August  1786  

Necker was soon followed by Calonne  who may be said to have
precipitated the momentous reform which constitutes the French
Revolution  He was very popular at first with king and courtiers  for he
spent the public funds far more recklessly than his predecessors  But 
naturally  he soon found himself in a position where he could obtain no
more money  The  parlements  would consent to no more loans in a period
of peace  and the taxes were as high as it was deemed possible to make
them  At last Calonne  finding himself desperately put to it  informed
the astonished king that the state was on the verge of bankruptcy and
that in order to save it a radical reformation of the whole public order
was necessary  This report of Calonne s may be taken as the beginning
of the French Revolution  for it was the first of the series of events
that led to the calling of a representative assembly which abolished the
old régime and gave France a written constitution 


     General Reading   For general conditions in France before the
     Revolution  LOWELL   Eve of the French Revolution   Houghton 
     Mifflin   Co    2 00   MACLEHOSE   The Last Days of the French
     Monarchy   The Macmillan Company   2 25   DE TOCQUEVILLE   State of
     Society in France before the Revolution of 1789   John Murray 
      3 00   a very remarkable work  TAINE   The Ancient Régime   Henry
     Holt   Co    2 50  contains excellent chapters on the life at the
     king s court and upon the literature of the period  ARTHUR YOUNG 
      Travels in France in 1787 1789   The Macmillan Company   1 00  
     very interesting and valuable  For Turgot s reforms  STEPHENS 
      Life and Writings of Turgot   Longmans  Green   Co    4 50  
     containing translations from Turgot s writings  MONTESQUIEU   The
     Spirit of Laws   The Macmillan Company  2 vols    2 00   ROUSSEAU 
      The Social Contract   G P  Putnam s Sons   1 25  or Charles
     Scribner s Sons   1 00    Translations and Reprints   Vol  VI  No 
     1  gives short extracts from some of the most noted writers of the
     eighteenth century  In Vol  V  No  2  of the same series  may be
     found a  Protest of the Cour des Aides   one of the higher courts
     of France  issued in 1775  which casts a great deal of light upon
     the evils of the old régime  John Morley has written a number of
     works upon France before the Revolution   Voltaire  Rousseau   2
     vols    Diderot and the Encyclopædists   2 vols   The Macmillan
     Company   1 50 a volume  




CHAPTER XXXV

THE FRENCH REVOLUTION


 Sidenote  Reforms proposed by Calonne  

218  It was necessary  in order to avoid ruin  Calonne claimed   to
reform everything vicious in the state   He proposed  therefore  to
reduce the  taille   reform the salt tax  do away with the interior
customs lines  correct the abuses of the guilds  etc  But the chief
reform  and by far the most difficult one  was to force the privileged
classes to surrender their important exemptions from taxation  He hoped 
however  that if certain concessions were made to them they might be
brought to consent to a land tax to be paid by all alike  So he proposed
to the king that he should summon an assembly of persons prominent in
church and state  called  Notables   to ratify certain changes which
would increase the prosperity of the country and give the treasury money
enough to meet the necessary expenses 

 Sidenote  Summoning of the Notables  1786  

The summoning of the Notables in 1786 was really a revolution in itself 
It was a confession on the part of the king that he found himself in a
predicament from which he could not escape without the aid of his
people  The Notables whom he selected  bishops  archbishops  dukes 
judges  high government officials  were practically all members of the
privileged classes  but they still represented the nation  after a
fashion  as distinguished from the king s immediate circle of courtiers 
At any rate it proved an easy step from calling the Notables to
summoning the ancient Estates General  and that  in its turn  speedily
became a modern representative body 

 Sidenote  Calonne denounces the abuses  

In his opening address Calonne gave the Notables an idea of the sad
financial condition of the country  The government was running behind
some forty million dollars a year  He could not continue to borrow  and
economy  however strict  would not suffice to cover the deficit   What 
then   he asked   remains to fill this frightful void and enable us to
raise the revenue to the desired level   The Abuses   Yes  gentlemen 
the abuses offer a source of wealth which the state should appropriate 
and which should serve to reëstablish order in the finances     The
abuses which must now be destroyed for the welfare of the people are the
most important and the best guarded of all  the very ones which have the
deepest roots and the most spreading branches  For example  those which
weigh on the laboring classes  the pecuniary privileges  exceptions to
the law which should be common to all  and many an unjust exemption
which can only relieve certain taxpayers by embittering the condition of
others  the general want of uniformity in the assessment of the taxes
and the enormous difference which exists between the contributions of
different provinces and of the subjects of the same sovereign  the
severity and arbitrariness in the collection of the  taille   the
apprehensions  embarrassment  almost dishonor  associated with the trade
in breadstuffs  the interior custom houses and barriers which make the
various parts of the kingdom like foreign countries to one another
       all these evils  which public spirited citizens had long
deprecated  Calonne proposed to do away with forthwith 

 Sidenote  Calonne and the Notables dismissed  

The Notables  however  had no confidence in Calonne  and refused to
ratify his programme of reform  The king then dismissed him and soon
sent them home  too  May  1787   Louis XVI then attempted to carry
through some of the more pressing financial reforms in the usual way by
sending them to the  parlements  to be registered 

 Sidenote  The  parlement  of Paris refuses to register new taxes and
calls for the Estates General  

219  The  parlement  of Paris resolved  as usual  to make the king s
ministry trouble and gain popularity for itself  This time it resorted
to a truly extraordinary measure  It not only refused to register two
new taxes which the king desired  but asserted that   Only the nation
assembled in the Estates General can give the consent necessary to the
establishment of a permanent tax     Only the nation   the  parlement 
continued   after it has learned the true state of the finances can
destroy the great abuses and open up important resources   This
declaration was followed in a few days by the humble request that the
king assemble the Estates General of his kingdom 

The refusal of the  parlement  to register the new taxes led to one of
the old struggles between it and the king s ministers  A compromise was
arranged in the autumn of 1787  the  parlement  agreed to register a
great loan  and the king pledged himself to assemble the Estates General
within five years  In the early months of 1788 many pamphlets appeared 
criticising the system of taxation and the unjust privileges and
exemptions enjoyed by a few of the citizens to the detriment of the
great mass of the nation 

 Sidenote  The  parlement  of Paris protests against the  reform  of the
judicial system  

Suddenly the  parlement  of Paris learned that the king s ministers were
planning to put an end to its troublesome habit of opposing their
measures  The ministers proposed to remodel the whole judicial system
and take from the courts the right to register new decrees and
consequently the right to protest  This the  parlement  loudly
proclaimed was in reality a blow at the nation itself  The ministers
were attacking the court simply because it had acknowledged its lack of
power to grant new taxes and had requested the king to assemble the
representatives of the nation  The ministers  it claimed  were bent upon
establishing an out and out despotism in which there should no longer be
any check whatever on the arbitrary power of the king 

 Sidenote  Protests from the provinces  

Some of the provinces became very apprehensive when they learned that
the king proposed to take from the local  parlements  the right to
examine edicts before registering them  Might not the tyrannically
inclined ministers proceed to make new laws for the whole realm and
ignore the special privileges which the king had pledged himself to
maintain when Brittany  Dauphiny  Bearn  and other important provinces
were originally added to France  The cause of the  parlements  became in
this way the cause of the people 

 Sidenote  The Estates General summoned  

Meanwhile the ministers were becoming very hard pressed for funds to
meet the regular expenses of the government  The  parlements  had not
only refused to register taxes but had done everything that they could
to embarrass the ministers and destroy the confidence of those who might
otherwise have lent money to the government  There seemed no other
resort except to call the representatives of the people together  The
Estates General were accordingly summoned to meet on May 1  1789 

 Sidenote  General ignorance in regard to the Estates General  

 Sidenote  The old system of voting by classes in the Estates General  

220  It was now discovered that no one knew much about this body of
which every one was talking  for it had not met since 1614  The king
accordingly issued a general invitation to scholars to find out all they
could about the customs observed in the former meetings of the Estates 
The public naturally became very much interested in a matter which
touched them so closely  and there were plenty of readers for the
pamphlets which now began to appear in greater numbers than ever before 
The old Estates General had been organized in a way appropriate enough
to the feudal conditions under which they originated  393  All three of
the estates of the realm  clergy  nobility  and third estate  each sent
an equal number of representatives  who were expected to consider not
the interests of the nation but the special interests of the particular
social class to which they respectively belonged  Accordingly  the
deputies of the three estates did not sit together  or vote as a single
body  The members of each group first came to an agreement among
themselves and then a single vote was cast for the whole order 

 Sidenote  Objections to this system  

It was natural that this system should seem preposterous to the average
Frenchman in 1788  If the estates should be convoked according to the
ancient forms  the two privileged classes would be entitled to twice the
number of representatives allotted to the other twenty five million
inhabitants of France  What was much worse  it seemed impossible that
any important reforms could be adopted in an assembly where those who
had every selfish reason for opposing the most necessary changes were
given two votes out of three  Necker  whom the king had recalled in the
hope that he might succeed in adjusting the finances  agreed that the
third estate might have as many deputies as both the other orders put
together  namely six hundred  but he would not consent to having the
three orders sit and vote together like a modern representative body 

 Sidenote  The  cahiers   

Besides the great question as to whether the deputies should vote by
head or by order  the pamphlets discussed what reforms the Estates
should undertake  394  We have  however  a still more interesting and
important expression of public opinion in France at this time  in the
 cahiers   395  or lists of grievances and suggestions for reform which 
in pursuance of an old custom  the king asked the nation to prepare 
Each village and town throughout France had an opportunity to tell quite
frankly exactly what it suffered from the existing system  and what
reforms it wished that the Estates General might bring about  These
 cahiers  396  were the  last will and testament  of the old régime  and
they constitute a unique historical document  of unparalleled
completeness and authenticity  No one can read the  cahiers  without
seeing that the whole nation was ready for the great transformation
which within a year was to destroy a great part of the social and
political system under which the French had lived for centuries 

 Sidenote  Desire of the nation for a constitutional  instead of an
absolute  monarchy  

Almost all the  cahiers  agreed that the prevailing disorder and the
vast and ill defined powers of the king and his ministers were perhaps
the fundamental evils  One of the  cahiers  says   Since arbitrary power
has been the source of all the evils which afflict the state  our first
desire is the establishment of a really national constitution  which
shall define the rights of all and provide the laws to maintain them  
No one dreamed at this time of displacing the king or of taking the
government out of his hands  The people only wished to change an
absolute monarchy into a limited  or constitutional  one  All that was
necessary was that the things which the government might  not  do should
be solemnly and irrevocably determined and put upon record  and that the
Estates General should meet periodically to grant the taxes  give the
king advice in national crises  and expostulate  if necessary  against
any violations of the proposed charter of liberties  397 

 Sidenote  The Estates General meet May 5  1789  

 Sidenote  The representatives of the third estate declare themselves a
 National Assembly   

221  With these ideas in mind  the Estates assembled in Versailles and
held their first session on May 5  1789  The king had ordered the
deputies to wear the same costumes that had been worn at the last
meeting of the Estates in 1614  but no royal edict could call back the
spirit of earlier centuries  In spite of the king s commands the
representatives of the third estate refused to organize themselves in
the old way as a separate order  They sent invitation after invitation
to the deputies of the clergy and nobility  requesting them to join the
people s representatives and deliberate in common on the great interests
of the nation  Some of the more liberal of the nobles  Lafayette  for
example  and a large minority of the clergy wished to meet with the
deputies of the third estate  But they were outvoted  and the deputies
of the third estate  losing patience  finally declared themselves  on
June 17  a  National Assembly   They argued that  since they
represented at least ninety six per cent of the nation  the deputies of
the privileged orders might be neglected altogether  This usurpation of
power on the part of the third estate transformed the old feudal
Estates  voting by orders  into the first modern national representative
assembly on the continent of Europe 

 Sidenote  The  Tennis Court  oath  

Under the influence of his courtiers the king tried to restore the old
system by arranging a solemn joint session of the three orders  at which
he presided in person  He presented a long programme of excellent
reforms  and then bade the Estates sit apart  according to the old
custom  But it was like bidding water to run up hill  Three days before 
when the commons had found themselves excluded from their regular place
of meeting on account of the preparations for the royal session  they
had betaken themselves to a neighboring building called the  Tennis
Court   Here  on June 20  they took the famous  Tennis Court  oath   to
come together wherever circumstances may dictate  until the constitution
of the kingdom shall be established   They were emboldened in their
purpose to resist all schemes to frustrate a general reform by the
support of over half of the deputies of the clergy  who joined them the
day before the royal session 

 Sidenote  The nobility and clergy forced to join the third estate  

Consequently  when the king finished his address and commanded the three
orders to disperse immediately in order to resume their separate
sessions  most of the bishops  some of the parish priests  and a great
part of the nobility obeyed  the rest sat still  uncertain what they
should do  When the master of ceremonies ordered them to comply with the
king s commands  Mirabeau  the most distinguished statesman among the
deputies  told him bluntly that they would not leave their places except
at the point of the bayonet  The weak king almost immediately gave in
and a few days later ordered all the deputies of the privileged orders
who had not already done so to join the commons 

 Sidenote  The fall of the Bastille  July 14  1789  

222  The National Assembly now began in earnest the great task of
preparing a constitution and regenerating France  It was soon
interrupted  however  by events at Paris  The king had been advised by
those about him to gather together the Swiss and German troops who
formed the royal guard  so that if he decided to send the insolent
deputies home he would be able to put down any disorder which might
result  He was also induced to dismiss Necker  who enjoyed a popularity
that he had done little to merit  When the people of Paris saw the
troops gathering and when they heard of the dismissal of Necker  there
was general excitement and some disorder 

 Illustration  Mirabeau 

On July 14 crowds of people assembled  determined to procure arms to
protect themselves and mayhap to perform some daring  deed of
patriotism   One of the bands  led by the old Parisian guards  turned to
the ancient fortress of the Bastile  on the parapets of which guns had
been mounted which made the inhabitants of that part of the city very
nervous  The castle had long had a bad reputation as a place of
confinement for prisoners of state and for those imprisoned by  lettres
de cachet   When the mob demanded admission  it was naturally denied
them  and they were fired upon and nearly a hundred were killed  After a
brief  courageous attack the place was surrendered  and the mob rushed
into the gloomy pile  They found only seven prisoners  but one poor
fellow had lost his wits and another had no idea why he had been kept
there for years  The captives were freed amidst great enthusiasm  and
the people soon set to work to demolish the walls 

 Sidenote  Formation of the  national guard   

The actual occurrences of this celebrated day were soon  disfigured and
transfigured by legends   and the anniversary of the fall of the Bastile
is still celebrated as the great national holiday of France  398  The
rising of the people to protect themselves against the machinations of
the king s associates who  it was believed  wished to block reform  and
the successful attack on a monument of ancient tyranny appeared to be
the opening of a new era of freedom  The disorders of these July days
led to the formation of the  national guard   This was made up of
volunteers from among the more prosperous citizens  who organized
themselves to maintain order and so took from the king every excuse for
calling in the regular troops for that purpose  Lafayette was put in
command of this body 

 Sidenote  Establishment of communes in Paris and other cities  

The government of Paris was reorganized  and a mayor  chosen from among
the members of the National Assembly  was put at the head of the new
 commune   as the municipal government was called  The other cities of
France also began with one accord  after the dismissal of Necker and the
fall of the Bastile  to promote the Revolution by displacing or
supplementing their old royal or aristocratic governments by committees
of their citizens  These improvised communes  or city governments 
established national guards  as Paris had done  and thus maintained
order  The news that the king had approved the Paris revolution
confirmed the opinion that the citizens of other cities had done right
in taking the control into their own hands  We shall hear a good deal of
the commune of Paris later  as it played a very important rôle in the
Reign of Terror 

 Sidenote  Disorder in the country districts  

By the end of the month of July the commotion reached the country
districts  A curious panic swept over the land  which the peasants long
remembered as  the great fear   A mysterious rumor arose that the
 brigands  were coming  The terrified people did what they could to
prepare for the danger  neighboring communities combined with one
another for mutual protection  When the panic was over and people saw
that there were no brigands after all  they turned their attention to an
enemy by no means imaginary  i e   the old régime  The peasants
assembled on the village common or in the parish church and voted to pay
the feudal dues no longer  The next step was to burn the castles of the
nobles in order to destroy the records of the peasants  obligations to
their feudal lords  399 

 Sidenote  The decree abolishing the survivals of serfdom and feudalism 
August  1789  

223  About the first of August news began to reach the National Assembly
of the serious disorders in the provinces  This led to the first
important reforms of the Assembly  A momentous decree abolishing the
survivals of serfdom and feudalism was passed in a night session  August
4 5  amid great excitement  the representatives of the privileged orders
vying with each other in surrendering their ancient privileges  The
exclusive right of the nobility to hunt and to maintain pigeon houses
was abolished  and the peasant was permitted to kill game which he found
on his land  The president of the Assembly was  commissioned to ask the
king to recall those persons who had been sent to the galleys or exiled
simply for the violation of the hunting regulations   The tithes of the
church were done away with  Exemptions from the payment of taxes were
abolished forever  It was decreed that  taxes shall be collected from
all citizens and from all property in the same manner and in the same
form   and that  all citizens  without distinction of birth  are
eligible to any office or dignity   Moreover  inasmuch as a national
constitution would be of more advantage to the provinces than the
privileges which some of these enjoyed  and   so the decree
continues    inasmuch as the surrender of such privileges is essential
to the intimate union of all parts of the realm  it is decreed that all
the peculiar privileges  pecuniary or otherwise  of the provinces 
principalities  districts  cantons  cities and communes  are once for
all abolished and are absorbed into the law common to all
Frenchmen   400 

 Illustration  FRANCE IN DEPARTMENTS 

 Sidenote  Unification of France through the abolition of the ancient
provinces and the creation of the present departments  

This decree established the equality and uniformity for which the French
people had sighed so long  The injustice of the former system of
taxation could never be reintroduced  All France was to have the same
laws  and its citizens were henceforth to be treated in the same way by
the state  whether they lived in Brittany or Dauphiny  The Assembly soon
went a step farther in consolidating and unifying France  It wiped out
the old provinces altogether  by dividing the whole country into
districts of convenient size  called  departments   These were much more
numerous than the ancient divisions  and were named after rivers and
mountains  This obliterated from the map all reminiscences of the feudal
disunion 

 Sidenote  The Declaration of the Rights of Man  

224  Many of the  cahiers  had suggested that the Estates should draw up
a clear statement of the rights of the individual citizen  It was urged
that the recurrence of abuses and the insidious encroachments of
despotism might in this way be forever prevented  The National Assembly
consequently determined to prepare such a declaration in order to
gratify and reassure the people and to form a basis for the new
constitution 

This Declaration  completed August 26  is one of the most notable
documents in the history of Europe  It not only aroused general
enthusiasm when it was first published  but it appeared over and over
again  in a modified form  in the succeeding French constitutions down
to 1848  and has been the model for similar declarations in many of the
other continental states  It was a dignified repudiation of the abuses
described in the preceding chapter  Behind each article there was some
crying evil of long standing against which the people wished to be
forever protected 

 Sidenote  Contents of the Declaration  

The Declaration sets forth that  Men are born and remain equal in
rights  Social distinctions can only be founded upon the general good  
 Law is the expression of the general will  Every citizen has a right to
participate  personally or through his representative  in its formation 
It must be the same for all    No person shall be accused  arrested  or
imprisoned except in the cases and according to the forms prescribed by
law    No one shall be disquieted on account of his opinions  including
his religious views  provided that their manifestation does not disturb
the public order established by law    The free communication of ideas
and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man  Every
citizen may  accordingly  speak  write  and print with freedom  being
responsible  however  for such abuses of this freedom as shall be
defined by law    All citizens have a right to decide  either personally
or by their representative  as to the necessity of the public
contribution  to grant this freely  to know to what uses it is put  and
to fix the proportion  the mode of assessment and of collection  and the
duration of the taxes    Society has the right to require of every
public agent an account of his administration   Well might the Assembly
claim  in its address to the people  that  the rights of man had been
misconceived and insulted for centuries   and boast that they were
 reëstablished for all humanity in this declaration  which shall serve
as an everlasting war cry against oppressors  

 Illustration  Louis XVI 

 Sidenote  Suspicion aroused against the court  

225  The king hesitated to ratify the Declaration of the Rights of Man 
and about the first of October rumors became current that  under the
influence of the courtiers  he was calling together troops and preparing
for another attempt to put an end to the Revolution  similar to that
which the attack on the Bastile had frustrated  It was said that the
new national colors  red  white  and blue  had been insulted at a
banquet at Versailles  These things  along with the scarcity of food due
to the poor crops of the year  aroused the excitable Paris populace 

 Sidenote  A Paris mob invades the king s palace and carries him off to
Paris  

On October 5 several thousand women and a number of armed men marched
out to Versailles to ask bread of the king  in whom they had great
confidence personally  however suspicious they might be of his friends
and advisers  Lafayette marched after the mob with the national guard 
but did not prevent some of the rabble from invading the king s palace
the next morning and nearly murdering the queen  who had become very
unpopular  She was believed to be still an Austrian at heart and to be
in league with the counter revolutionary party 

The mob declared that the king must accompany them to Paris  and he was
obliged to consent  Far from being disloyal  they assumed that the
presence of the royal family would insure plenty and prosperity  So they
gayly escorted the  baker and the baker s wife and the baker s boy   as
they jocularly termed the king and queen and the little dauphin  to the
Palace of the Tuilleries  where the king took up his residence 
practically a prisoner  as it proved  The National Assembly soon
followed him and resumed its sittings in a riding school near the
Tuilleries 

This transfer of the king and the Assembly to the capital was the first
great misfortune of the Revolution  At a serious crisis the government
was placed at the mercy of the leaders of the disorderly elements of
Paris  We shall see how the municipal council of Paris finally usurped
the powers of the national government  401 

 Sidenote  Unjust apportionment of the revenue of the church  

226  As we have seen  the church in France was very rich and retained
many of its mediæval prerogatives and privileges  Its higher officials 
the bishops and abbots  received very large revenues and often a single
prelate held a number of rich benefices  the duties of which he utterly
neglected  The parish priests  on the other hand  who really performed
the manifold and important functions of the church  were scarcely able
to live on their incomes  This unjust apportionment of the vast revenue
of the church naturally suggested the idea that  if the state
confiscated the ecclesiastical possessions  it could see that those who
did the work were properly paid for it  and might  at the same time 
secure a handsome sum which would help the government out of its
financial troubles  Those who sympathized with Voltaire s views were
naturally delighted to see their old enemy deprived of its independence
and made subservient to the state  and even many good Catholics could
not but hope that the new system would be an improvement upon the old 

 Sidenote  The property of the church confiscated by the government  

The tithes had been abolished in August along with the feudal dues  That
deprived the church of perhaps thirty million dollars a year  On
November 2 a decree was passed providing that  All the ecclesiastical
possessions are at the disposal of the nation on condition that it
provides properly for the expenses of maintaining religious services 
for the support of those who conduct them and for the succor of the
poor   This decree deprived the bishops and priests of their benefices
and made them dependent on salaries paid by the state  The monks 
monasteries  and convents  too  lost their property 

 Sidenote  The  assignats   or paper currency  

The National Assembly resolved to issue a paper currency for which the
newly acquired lands should serve as security  Of these  assignats   as
this paper money was called  we hear a great deal during the
revolutionary period  They soon began to depreciate  and ultimately a
great part of the forty billions of francs issued during the next seven
years was repudiated 

 Sidenote  The Civil Constitution of the Clergy  

The Assembly set to work completely to reorganize the church  The
anxiety for simplification and complete uniformity shows itself in the
reckless way that it dealt with this most venerable institution of
France  the customs of which were hallowed not only by age  but by
religious veneration  The one hundred and thirty four ancient
bishoprics  some of which dated back to the Roman Empire  were replaced
by the eighty three new departments into which France had already been
divided  402  Each of these became the diocese of a bishop  who was
looked upon as an officer of the state and was to be elected by the
people  The priests  too  were to be chosen by the people  and their
salaries were much increased  so that even in the smallest villages they
received over twice the minimum amount paid under the old régime 

This Civil Constitution of the Clergy 403  was the first serious mistake
on the part of the National Assembly  While the half feudalized church
had sadly needed reform  the worst abuses might have been remedied
without shocking and alienating thousands of those who had hitherto
enthusiastically applauded the great reforms which the Assembly had
effected  The king gave his assent to the changes  but with the feeling
that he might be losing his soul by so doing  From that time on  he
became at heart an enemy of the Revolution 

 Sidenote  Harsh treatment of the  non juring  clergy  

The discontent with the new system on the part of the clergy led to
another serious error on the part of the Assembly  It required the
clergy to take an oath to be faithful to the law and  to maintain with
all their might the constitution decreed by the assembly   Only six of
the bishops consented to this and but a third of the lower clergy 
although they were much better off under the new system  Forty six
thousand parish priests refused to sacrifice their religious scruples 
and before long the pope forbade them to take the required oath to the
Constitution  As time went on  the  non juring  clergy were dealt with
more and more harshly by the government  and the way was prepared for
the horrors of the Reign of Terror  The Revolution ceased to stand for
liberty  order  and the abolition of ancient abuses  and came to mean 
in the minds of many besides those who had lost their former privileges 
irreligion  violence  and a new kind of oppression worse than the old 


     General Reading   There are a great many histories of the French
     Revolution  The best and most modern account is STEPHENS   The
     French Revolution   Charles Scribner s Sons  3 vols    2 50 each  
     SHAILER MATHEWS   The French Revolution   Longmans  Green   Co  
      1 25   is an excellent short account  See also the brief but
     admirable chapters in ROSE   The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era 
      The Macmillan Company   1 25   CARLYLE S famous  French
     Revolution  is hardly a history but rather a series of vivid
     pictures  valuable only to those who already have some knowledge of
     the course of events  For Mirabeau see WILLERT   Mirabeau   The
     Macmillan Company  75 cents  




CHAPTER XXXVI

THE FIRST FRENCH REPUBLIC


 Sidenote  The permanent reforms of 1789  

227  We have now studied the progress and nature of the revolution which
destroyed the old régime and created modern France  Through it the
unjust privileges  the perplexing irregularities  and the local
differences were abolished  and the people admitted to a share in the
government  This vast reform had been accomplished without serious
disturbance and  with the exception of some of the changes in the
church  it had been welcomed with enthusiasm by the French nation 

 Sidenote  The second revolution  

This permanent  peaceful revolution  or reformation  was followed by a
second revolution of unprecedented violence  which for a time destroyed
the French monarchy  It also introduced a series of further changes many
of which were absurd and unnecessary and could not endure since they
were approved by only a few fanatical leaders  France  moreover  became
involved in a war with most of the powers of western Europe  The
weakness of her government which permitted the forces of disorder and
fanaticism to prevail  combined with the imminent danger of an invasion
by the united powers of Europe  produced the Reign of Terror  After a
period of national excitement and disorder  France gladly accepted the
rule of a foreigner  who proved himself far more despotic than its
former kings had been  Napoleon did not  however  undo the great work of
1789  his colossal ambition was  indeed  the means of extending 
directly or indirectly  many of the benefits of the Revolution to other
parts of western Europe  When  after Napoleon s fall  the brother of
Louis XVI came to the throne  the first thing that he did was solemnly
to assure the people that all the great gains of the first revolution
should be maintained 

 Sidenote  The emigration of the nobles  

228  While practically the whole of the nation heartily rejoiced in the
earlier reforms introduced by the National Assembly and celebrated the
general satisfaction and harmony by a great national festival held at
Paris on the first anniversary of the fall of the Bastile  some of the
higher nobility refused to remain in France  The king s youngest
brother  the count of Artois  set the example by leaving the country  He
was followed by others who were terrified or disgusted by the burning of
the châteaux  the loss of their privileges  and the unwise abolition of
hereditary nobility by the National Assembly in June  1790  Before long
these emigrant nobles   émigrés    among whom were many military
officers  organized a little army across the Rhine  and the count of
Artois began to plan an invasion of France  He was ready to ally himself
with Austria  Prussia  or any other foreign government which he could
induce to help undo the Revolution and give back to the French king his
former absolute power and to the nobles their old privileges 

 Sidenote  The conduct of the emigrant nobles discredits the king and
queen  

The threats and insolence of the emigrant nobles and their shameful
negotiations with foreign powers discredited the members of their class
who still remained in France  The people suspected that the plans of the
runaways met with the secret approval of the king  and more especially
of the queen  whose brother was now emperor and ruler of the Austrian
dominions  This  added to the opposition of the non juring clergy 
produced a bitter hostility between the so called  patriots  and those
who  on the other hand  were supposed to be secretly hoping for a
counter revolution which would reëstablish the old régime 

 Sidenote  The flight to Varennes  June 21  1791  

The worst fears of the people appeared to be justified by the secret
flight of the royal family from Paris  in June  1791  Ever since the
king had reluctantly signed the Civil Constitution of the Clergy 
flight had seemed to him his only resource  There was a body of regular
troops on the northeastern boundary  if he could escape from Paris and
join them he hoped that  aided by a demonstration on the part of the
queen s brother  he might march back and check the further progress of
the revolutionary movement with which he could no longer sympathize  He
had  it is true  no liking for the emigrants and heartily disapproved of
their policy  nor did he believe that the old régime could ever be
restored  But  unfortunately  his plans led him to attempt to reach the
boundary just at that point where the emigrants were collected  He and
the queen were  however  arrested on the way  at Varennes  and speedily
brought back to Paris 

 Sidenote  Effect of the king s flight  

The desertion of the king appears to have terrified rather than angered
the nation  The grief of the people at the thought of losing  and their
joy at regaining  a poor weak ruler like Louis XVI clearly shows that
France was still profoundly royalist in its sympathies  The National
Assembly pretended that the king had not fled  but that he had been
carried off  This gratified France at large  still in Paris there were
some who advocated the deposition of the king  and for the first time a
 republican  party appeared  though it was still small 

 Sidenote  The constitution completed  1791  

The National Assembly at last put the finishing touches to the new
constitution upon which it had been working for two years  and the king
readily swore to observe it faithfully  A general amnesty was then
proclaimed  All the discord and suspicion of the past months were to be
forgotten  The National Assembly had completed its appointed task 
perhaps the greatest that a single body of men ever undertook  It had
made France over and had given her an elaborate constitution  It was now
ready to give way to the regular Legislative Assembly provided for in
the constitution  This held its first session October 1  1791  404 

 Sidenote  Sources of danger at the opening of the Legislative
Assembly  October  1791  

229  In spite of the great achievements of the National Assembly it left
France in a critical situation  Besides the emigrant nobles abroad 
there were the non juring clergy at home  and a king who was secretly
corresponding with foreign powers with the hope of securing their aid 
When the news of the arrest of the king and queen at Varennes reached
the ears of Marie Antoinette s brother  the Austrian ruler  Leopold II 
he declared that the violent arrest of the king sealed with unlawfulness
all that had been done in France and  compromised directly the honor of
all the sovereigns and the security of every government   He therefore
proposed to the rulers of Russia  England  Prussia  Spain  Naples  and
Sardinia that they should come to some understanding between themselves
as to how they might  reëstablish the liberty and honor of the most
Christian king and his family  and place a check upon the dangerous
excesses of the French Revolution  the fatal example of which it
behooves every government to repress  

 Sidenote  The Declaration of Pillnitz  August 27  1791  

On August 27 Leopold had issued  in conjunction with the king of
Prussia  the famous Declaration of Pillnitz  In this the two sovereigns
state that  in accordance with the wishes of the king s brothers  the
leaders of the emigrant nobles   they are ready to join the other
European rulers in an attempt to place the king of France in a position
to establish a form of government  that shall be once more in harmony
with the rights of sovereigns and shall promote the welfare of the
French nation   In the meantime they promised to prepare their troops
for active service 

 Sidenote  Effect of the Declaration  

The Declaration was little more than an empty threat  but it seemed to
the French people a sufficient proof that the monarchs were ready to
help the seditious French nobles to reëstablish the old régime against
the wishes of the nation and at the cost of infinite bloodshed  The idea
of foreign rulers intermeddling with their internal affairs would in
itself have been intolerable to a proud people like the French  even if
the permanence of the new reforms had not been endangered  Had it been
the object of the allied monarchs to hasten instead of to prevent the
deposition of Louis XVI  they could hardly have chosen a more efficient
means than the Declaration of Pillnitz 

 Sidenote  The newspapers  

230  The political excitement and the enthusiasm for the Revolution were
kept up by the newspapers which had been established  especially in
Paris  since the meeting of the Estates General  The people did not need
longer to rely upon an occasional pamphlet  as was the case before 1789 
Many journals of the most divergent kinds and representing the most
diverse opinions were published  Some were no more than a periodical
editorial written by one man  for example  the notorious  Friend of the
People   by the insane Marat  Others  like the famous  Moniteur   were
much like our papers of to day and contained news  reports of the
debates in the assembly  announcements of theaters  etc  Some of the
papers were illustrated  and the representations of contemporaneous
events  especially the numerous caricatures  are highly diverting 

 Illustration  Caricature representing Louis XVI as a Constitutional
Monarch 405  

 Sidenote  The Jacobins  

Of the numerous political clubs  by far the most famous was that of the
 Jacobins   When the Assembly moved into Paris  some of the provincial
representatives of the third estate rented a large room in the
monastery of the Jacobin monks  not far from the building where the
National Assembly itself met  A hundred deputies perhaps were present at
the first meeting  The next day the number had doubled  The aim of this
society was to discuss questions which were about to come before the
National Assembly  The club decided beforehand what should be the policy
of its members and how they should vote  and in this way they
successfully combined to counteract the schemes of the aristocratic
party in the assembly  The club rapidly grew and soon admitted some who
were not deputies to its sessions  In October  1791  it decided to
permit the public to attend its discussions 

Gradually similar societies were formed in the provinces  406  These
affiliated themselves with the  mother  society at Paris and kept in
constant communication with it  In this way the Jacobins of Paris
stimulated and controlled public opinion throughout France  and kept the
opponents of the old régime alert  When the Legislative Assembly met 
the Jacobins had not as yet become republicans  but they believed that
the king should have hardly more power than the president of a republic 
They were even ready to promote his deposition if he failed to stand by
the Revolution 

 Sidenote  The emigrant nobles declared traitors  

231  The growing discord in the nation was increased by the severe
edicts that the Legislative Assembly directed against the emigrant
nobles and the non juring clergy   The Frenchmen assembled on the
frontier  were declared under suspicion of conspiring against their
country  If they did not return to France by January 1  1792  they were
to be regarded as convicted traitors  to be punished  if caught  with
death  their property was to be confiscated 

 Sidenote  Harsh measures of the Assembly toward non juring clergy  

The harsh treatment of the emigrant nobles was perhaps justified by
their desertion and treasonable intrigues  but the conduct of the
Assembly toward the clergy was both unstatesmanlike and iniquitous 
Those who had refused to take the oath to support a system which was in
conflict with their religious convictions and which had been condemned
by the pope  were commanded to do so within a week on penalty of losing
their income from the state and being put under surveillance as
suspects  As this failed to bring the clergy to terms  the Assembly
later  May  1792  ordered the deportation from the country of those who
steadily persisted in their refusal to accept the Civil Constitution of
the Clergy  In this way the Assembly aroused the active hostility of a
great part of the most conscientious among the lower clergy  who had
loyally supported the commons in their fight against the privileged
orders  It also lost the confidence of the great mass of faithful
Catholics   merchants  artisans  and peasants   who had gladly accepted
the abolition of the old abuses  but who would not consent to desert
their religious leaders 

 Sidenote  The Legislative Assembly precipitate a war with Europe  

232  By far the most important act of the Legislative Assembly during
the one year of its existence was its precipitation of a war between
France and Austria  It little dreamed that this was the beginning of a
war between revolutionary France and the rest of western Europe  which
was to last  with slight interruptions  for over twenty years 

To many of the leaders in the Assembly it seemed that the existing
conditions were intolerable  The emigrant nobles were forming little
armies on the boundaries of France and had  as we have seen  induced
Austria and Prussia to consider interfering in French affairs  The
Assembly suspected that Louis was negotiating with foreign rulers and
would be glad to have them intervene and reëstablish him in his old
despotic power  The deputies argued  therefore  that a war against the
hated Austria would unite the sympathies of the nation and force the
king to show his true character  for he would be obliged either to
become the nation s leader or show himself the traitor they suspected
him to be 

 Sidenote  France declares war upon Austria  April  1792  

 Sidenote  The king suspected and his life threatened  

It was with a heavy heart that the king  urged on by the clamors of the
Assembly  declared war upon Austria in April  1792  The unpopularity of
the king only increased  however  He refused to ratify certain popular
measures of the Assembly and dismissed the ministers who had been forced
upon him  In June a mob of Parisians invaded the Palace of the
Tuilleries  and the king might have been killed had he not consented to
don the  cap of liberty   the badge of the  citizen patriots  

 Sidenote  Growth of republican feeling  

When France declared war  Prussia immediately allied itself with
Austria  Both powers collected their forces and  to the great joy of the
emigrant nobles  who joined them  prepared to march upon France  The
early attempts of the French to get a footing in the Austrian
Netherlands were not successful  and the troops and people accused the
nobles  who were in command of the French troops  of treason  As the
allies approached the boundaries it became clearer and clearer that the
king was utterly incapable of defending France  and the Assembly began
to consider the question of deposing him  The duke of Brunswick  who was
at the head of the Prussian forces  took the very worst means of helping
the king  by issuing a manifesto in which he threatened utterly to
destroy Paris should the king suffer any harm 

 Sidenote  Insurrection of August 10  1792  

Angered by this declaration and aroused by the danger  the populace of
Paris again invaded the Tuilleries  August 10  1792  and the king was
obliged to take refuge in the building in which the Assembly was in
session  Those who instigated the attack were men who had set their
heart upon doing away with the king altogether and establishing a
republic  A group of them had taken possession of the city hall  pushed
the old members of the municipal council off from their seats  and taken
the government in their own hands  In this way the members of the Paris
commune became the leaders in the revolution which established the first
French republic 

 Sidenote  France proclaimed a republic  September 22  1792  

233  The Assembly agreed with the commune in desiring a republic  If  as
was proposed  France was henceforth to do without a king  it was
obviously necessary that the monarchical constitution so recently
completed should be replaced by a republican one  Consequently  the
Assembly arranged that the people should elect delegates to a
constitutional  Convention   which should draw up a new system of
government  The Convention met on the 21st of September  and its first
act was to abolish the ancient monarchy and proclaim France a republic 
It seemed to the enthusiasts of the time that a new era of liberty had
dawned  now that the long oppression by  despots  was ended forever  The
twenty second day of September  1792  was reckoned as the first day of
the Year One of French liberty  407 

 Sidenote  The September massacres  1792  

Meanwhile the usurping Paris commune had taken matters into its own
hands and had brought discredit upon the cause of liberty by one of the
most atrocious acts in history  On the pretext that Paris was full of
traitors  who sympathized with the Austrians and the emigrant nobles 
they had filled the prisons with three thousand innocent citizens  On
September 2 and 3 hundreds of these were executed with scarcely a
pretense of a trial  The members of the commune who perpetrated this
deed probably hoped to terrify those who might still dream of returning
to the old system of government 

 Sidenote  Progress of the war with Austria and Prussia  

Late in August the Prussians crossed the French boundary and on
September 2 took the fortress of Verdun  It now seemed as if there was
nothing to prevent their marching upon Paris  The French general 
Dumouriez  blocked their advance  however  and without a pitched battle
caused the enemy to retreat  Notwithstanding the fears of the French 
the king of Prussia had but little interest in the war  the Austrian
troops were lagging far behind  and both powers were far more absorbed
in a second partition of Poland  which was approaching  than in the fate
of the French king  The French now invaded Germany and took several
important towns on the Rhine  including Mayence  which gladly opened its
gates to them  They also occupied the Spanish Netherlands and Savoy 

 Sidenote  Trial and execution of the king  January  1793  

Meanwhile the new Convention was puzzled to determine what would best be
done with the king  A considerable party felt that he was guilty of
treason in secretly encouraging the foreign powers to come to his aid 
He was therefore brought to trial  and when it came to a final vote  he
was  by a small majority  condemned to death  He mounted the scaffold on
January 21  1793  with the fortitude of a martyr  Nevertheless  one
cannot but feel that through his earlier weakness and indecision he
brought untold misery upon his own kingdom and upon Europe at large  The
French people had not dreamed of a republic until his absolute
incompetence forced them  in self defense  to abolish the monarchy in
the hope of securing a more efficient government 

 Sidenote  The Convention proposes to aid other countries to rid
themselves of their monarchs  

 Sidenote  France declares war on England  February 1  1793  

234  The exultation of the Convention over the conquests which their
armies were making  encouraged them to offer the assistance of the new
republic to any country that wished to establish its freedom by throwing
off the yoke of monarchy  They even proposed a republic to the English
people  One of the French ministers declared   We will hurl thither
fifty thousand caps of liberty  we will plant there the sacred tree of
liberty   February 1  1793  France greatly added to her embarrassments
by declaring war on England  a country which proved her most inveterate
enemy 

 Sidenote  The allies settle their differences and renew the war against
France  

The war now began to go against the French  The allies had hitherto been
suspicious of one another and fearful lest Russia should take advantage
of their preoccupation with France to seize more than her share of
Poland  They now came to an agreement  It was arranged that Prussia and
Russia should each take another piece of Poland  while Austria agreed to
go without her share if the powers would aid her in inducing the elector
of Bavaria to exchange his possessions for the Spanish Netherlands 

 Illustration  The Partitions of Poland 

 Sidenote  French driven from the Netherlands  desertion of Dumouriez  

This adjustment of the differences between the allies gave a wholly new
aspect to the war with France  When in March  1793  Spain and the Holy
Roman Empire joined the coalition  France was at war with all her
neighbors  The Austrians defeated Dumouriez at Neerwinden and drove the
French out of the Netherlands  Thereupon Dumouriez  disgusted by the
failure of the Convention to support him and by their execution of the
king  deserted to the enemy with a few hundred soldiers who consented to
follow him 

 Sidenote  French government put in the hands of the Committee of
Public Safety  April  1793  

The loss of the Netherlands and the treason of their best general made a
deep impression upon the members of the Convention  If the new French
republic was to defend itself against the  tyrants  without and its many
enemies within  it could not wait for the Convention to draw up an
elaborate  permanent constitution  An efficient government must be
devised immediately to maintain the loyalty of the nation to the
republic  and to raise and equip armies and direct their commanders  The
Convention accordingly put the government into the hands of a small
committee  consisting originally of nine  later of twelve  of its
members  This famous Committee of Public Safety was given practically
unlimited powers   We must   one of the leaders exclaimed   establish
the despotism of liberty in order to crush the despotism of kings  

 Sidenote  The Girondists  

235  Within the Convention itself there were two groups of active men
who came into bitter conflict over the policy to be pursued  There was 
first  the party of the Girondists  so called because their leaders came
from the department of Gironde  in which the great city of Bordeaux lay 
They were moderate republicans and counted among their numbers some
speakers of remarkable eloquence  The Girondists had enjoyed the control
of the Legislative Assembly in 1792 and had been active in bringing on
the war with Austria and Prussia  They hoped in that way to complete the
Revolution by exposing the bad faith of the king and his sympathy with
the emigrant nobles  They were not  however  men of sufficient decision
to direct affairs in the terrible difficulties in which France found
herself after the execution of the king  They consequently lost their
influence  and a new party  called the  Mountain  from the high seats
that they occupied in the Convention  gained the ascendency 

 Sidenote  The extreme republicans  called the  Mountain   

This was composed of the most vigorous and uncompromising republicans 
They believed that the French people had been depraved by the slavery to
which their kings had subjected them  Everything  they argued  which
suggested the former rule of kings must be wiped out  A new France
should be created  in which liberty  equality  and fraternity should
take the place of the tyranny of princes  the insolence of nobles  and
the impostures of the priests  The leaders of the Mountain held that the
mass of the people were by nature good and upright  but that there were
a number of adherents of the old system who would  if they could  undo
the great work of the Revolution and lead the people back to slavery
under king and church  All who were suspected by the Mountain of having
the least sympathy with the nobles or persecuted priests were branded as
counter revolutionary  The Mountain was willing to resort to any
measures  however shocking  to rid the nation of those suspected of
counter revolutionary tendencies  and its leaders relied upon the
populace of Paris to aid them in reaching their ends 

 Sidenote  Girondist leaders expelled from the Convention  June 2 
1793  

The Girondists  on the other hand  abhorred the furious Paris mob and
the cruel fanatics who composed the commune of the capital  They argued
that Paris was not France  and that it had no right to assume a despotic
rule over the nation  They proposed that the commune should be dissolved
and that the Convention should remove to another town where they would
not be subject to the intimidation of the Paris mob  The Mountain
thereupon accused the Girondists of an attempt to break up the republic 
 one and indivisible   by questioning the supremacy of Paris and the
duty of the provinces to follow the lead of the capital  The mob  thus
encouraged  rose against the Girondists  On June 2 it surrounded the
meeting place of the Convention  and deputies of the commune demanded
the expulsion from the Convention of the Girondist leaders  who were
placed under arrest 

 Sidenote  France threatened with civil war  

 Sidenote  The revolt of the peasants of Brittany against the
Convention  

The conduct of the Mountain and its ally  the Paris commune  now began
to arouse opposition in various parts of France  and the country was
threatened with civil war at a time when it was absolutely necessary
that all Frenchmen should combine in the loyal defense of their country
against the invaders who were again approaching its boundaries  The
first and most serious opposition came from the peasants of Brittany 
especially in the department of La Vendée  There the people still loved
the monarchy and their priests and even the nobles  they refused to send
their sons to fight for a republic which had killed their king and was
persecuting the clergymen who declined to take an oath which their
conscience forbade  The Vendean royalists defeated several corps of the
national guard which the Convention sent against them  and it was not
until autumn that the distinguished general  Kléber  was able to put
down the insurrection 

 Sidenote  Revolt of the cities against the Convention  

The great cities of Marseilles and Bordeaux were indignant at the
treatment to which the Girondist deputies were subjected in Paris  and
organized a revolt against the Convention  In the manufacturing city of
Lyons the merchants hated the Jacobins and their republic  since the
demand for silk and other luxuries produced at Lyons had come from the
nobility and clergy  who were now no longer in a position to buy  The
prosperous classes were therefore exasperated when the commissioners of
the Convention demanded money and troops  The citizens gathered an army
of ten thousand men and placed it under a royalist leader  The
Convention  however  called in troops from the armies on the frontier 
bombarded and captured the city  and wreaked a terrible vengeance upon
those who had dared to revolt against the Mountain  Frightened by the
experience of Lyons  Bordeaux and Marseilles decided that resistance was
futile and admitted the troops of the Convention  Some of the Girondist
deputies had escaped from Paris and attempted to gather an army in
Normandy  but they failed  too  The Convention s Committee of Public
Safety showed itself far more efficient than the scattered and disunited
opponents who questioned its right to govern France 

 Sidenote  The French repulse the English and Austrians  

While the Committee of Public Safety had been suppressing the revolts
within the country  it had taken active measures to meet its foreign
enemies  The distinguished military organizer  Carnot  had become a
member of the Committee in August and immediately called for a general
levy of troops  He soon had five hundred and fifty thousand men  these
he divided into thirteen armies and dispatched them against the allies 
The English and Hanoverians  who were besieging Dunkirk  were driven off
and the Austrians were defeated  so that by the close of the year 1793
all danger from invasion was past  for the time being at least 

 Sidenote  The Reign of Terror  

 Sidenote  The Revolutionary Tribunal  

236  In spite of the marvelous success with which the Committee of
Public Safety had crushed its opponents at home and repelled the forces
of the coalition  it continued its policy of stifling all opposition by
terror  Even before the fall of the Girondists a special court had been
established in Paris  known as the Revolutionary Tribunal  Its duty was
to try all those who were suspected of treasonable acts  At first the
cases were very carefully considered and few persons were condemned  In
September  after the revolt of the cities  two new men  who had been
implicated in the September massacres  were added to the Committee of
Public Safety  They were selected with the particular purpose of
intimidating the counter revolutionary party by bringing all the
disaffected to the guillotine  408  A terrible law was passed  declaring
all those to be suspects who by their conduct or remarks had shown
themselves enemies of liberty  The former nobles  including the wives 
fathers  mothers  and children of the  emigrants   unless they had
constantly manifested their attachment to the Revolution  were ordered
to be imprisoned 

 Sidenote  Execution of Marie Antoinette  October  1793  

In October  the queen  Marie Antoinette  after a trial in which the most
false and atrocious charges were brought against her  was executed in
Paris  and a number of high minded and distinguished persons suffered a
like fate  But the most horrible acts of the Reign of Terror were
perpetrated in the provinces  A representative of the Convention had
thousands of the people of Nantes shot down or drowned  The convention
proposed to destroy the great city of Lyons altogether  and though this
decree was only partially carried out  thousands of its citizens were
executed  409 

 Sidenote  Schism in the party of the Mountain  

 Sidenote  Robespierre as dictator  

Soon the radical party which was conducting the government began to
disagree among themselves  Danton  a man of fiery zeal for the republic 
who had hitherto enjoyed great popularity with the Jacobins  became
tired of bloodshed  and believed that the system of terror was no longer
necessary  On the other hand  Hébert the leader of the commune felt that
the revolution was not yet complete  He proposed  for example  that the
worship of Reason should be substituted for the worship of God  and
arranged a service in the great church of Notre Dame  where Reason  in
the person of a handsome actress  took her place on the altar  The most
powerful member of the Committee of Public Safety was Robespierre  who 
although he was insignificant in person and a tiresome speaker  enjoyed
a great reputation for republican virtue  He disapproved alike of
Danton s moderation and of the worship of Reason advocated by the
commune  Through his influence the leaders of both the moderate and the
extreme party were arrested and executed  March and April  1794  

 Sidenote  Fall of Robespierre  July 27  1794  

It was  of course  impossible for Robespierre to maintain his
dictatorship permanently  He had the revolutionary tribunal divided into
sections  and greatly increased the rapidity of the executions with a
view of destroying all his enemies  but his colleagues in the Convention
began to fear that he would demand their heads next  A coalition was
formed against him  and the Convention ordered his arrest  410  He
called upon the commune to defend him  but the Convention roused Paris
against the commune  which was no longer powerful enough to intimidate
the whole city  and he and his supporters were sent to the guillotine 

 Sidenote  Reaction after the overthrow of Robespierre  

237  In successfully overthrowing Robespierre the Convention and
Committee of Public Safety had rid the country of the only man  who 
owing to his popularity and his reputation for uprightness  could have
prolonged the Reign of Terror  There was an immediate reaction after his
death  for the country was weary of executions  The Revolutionary
Tribunal henceforth convicted very few indeed of those who were brought
before it  It made an exception  however  of those who had themselves
been the leaders in the worst atrocities  for example  as the public
prosecutor  who had brought hundreds of victims to the guillotine in
Paris  and the brutes who had ordered the massacres at Nantes and Lyons 
Within a few months the Jacobin Club at Paris was closed by the
Convention  and the commune abolished 

 Sidenote  Constitution of the year III  

The Convention now at last turned its attention to the great work for
which it had originally been summoned  and drew up a constitution for
the republic  This provided that the lawmaking power should be vested in
a legislative assembly consisting of two houses  The lower house was
called the Council of the Five Hundred  and the upper chamber the
Council of the Elders  Members of the latter were required to be at
least forty years of age  The executive powers were put in the hands of
a  Directory  of five persons to be chosen by the two chambers 

 Sidenote  The dissolution of the Convention  October  1795  its
achievements  

In October  1795  the Convention finally dissolved itself  having
governed the country during three years of unprecedented excitement 
danger  and disorder  While it was responsible for the horrors of the
Reign of Terror  its committees had carried France through the terrible
crisis of 1793  The civil war had been brought to a speedy end  and the
coalition of foreign powers had been defeated  Meanwhile other
committees appointed by the Convention had been quietly working upon the
problem of bettering the system of education  which had been taken by
the state out of the hands of the clergy  Progress had also been made
toward establishing a single system of law for the whole country to
replace the old confusion  The new republican calendar was not destined
to survive many years  but the metric system of weights and measures
introduced by the Convention has now been adopted by most European
countries  and is used by men of science in England and America 

On the other hand  the Reign of Terror  the depreciated paper
currency  411  and many hasty and unwise laws passed by the Convention
had produced all sorts of disorder and uncertainty  The Directory did
little to better conditions  and it was not until Napoleon s strong hand
grasped the helm of government in the year 1800 that order was really
restored 


     General Reading   In addition to the references given at the end of
     the preceding chapter  BELLOC   Danton   Charles Scribner s Sons 
      2 50  and  Robespierre  by the same author  same publisher 
      2 00  




CHAPTER XXXVII

NAPOLEON BONAPARTE


 Sidenote  The Napoleonic Period  

238  The aristocratic military leaders of old France had either run away
or been discredited along with the noble class to which they belonged 
Among the commanders who  through exceptional ability  arose in their
stead  one was soon to dominate the history of Europe as no man before
him had ever done  For fifteen years  his biography and the political
history of Europe are so nearly synonymous that the period that we are
now entering upon may properly be called after him  the Napoleonic
Period 

 Sidenote  Napoleon Bonaparte  b  1769   a Corsican by birth  an Italian
by descent  

Napoleon Bonaparte was hardly a Frenchman in origin  It is true that the
island of Corsica  where he was born August 15  1769  had at that time
belonged to France for a year  But Napoleon s native language was
Italian  he was descended from Italian ancestors who had come to the
island in the sixteenth century  and his career revives  on a
magnificent scale  the ambitions and the policy of a  condottiere 
despot of the fifteenth century  412 

 Sidenote  The young Bonaparte in a French military school  

When he was ten years old he was taken to France by his father  After
learning a little of the French language  which he is said never to have
mastered perfectly  he was put into a military school where he remained
for six years  He soon came to hate the young French aristocrats with
whom he was associated  He wrote to his father   I am tired of exposing
my poverty and seeing these shameless boys laughing over it  who are
superior to me only in their wealth  but infinitely beneath me in noble
sentiments   Gradually the ambition to free his little island country
from French control developed in him 

 Sidenote  His political intrigues in Corsica  

 Sidenote  The Bonapartes banished from Corsica  1793  

On completing his course in the military school he was made second
lieutenant  Poor and without influence  he had little hope of any
considerable advance in the French army  and he was drawn to his own
country both by a desire to play a political rôle there and to help his
family  which had been left in straitened circumstances by his father s
death  He therefore absented himself from his command as often and as
long as he could  and engaged in a series of intrigues in Corsica with a
hope of getting control of the forces of the island  He fell out 
however  with the authorities  and he and his family were banished in
1793  and fled to France 

 Sidenote  Napoleon made commander in chief of the army of Italy  1796  

The following three years were for Bonaparte a period of great
uncertainty  He had lost his love for Corsica and as yet he had no
foothold in France  He managed  however  to demonstrate his military
skill and decision on two occasions and gained thereby the friendship of
the Directory  In the spring of 1796 he was made by the Directory
commander in chief of the army of Italy  This important appointment at
the age of twenty seven forms the opening of a military career which in
extent and grandeur hardly finds a parallel in history  except that of
Alexander the Great  And of all Bonaparte s campaigns  none is more
interesting perhaps than his first  that in Italy in 1796 1797 

 Sidenote  Prussia and Spain conclude peace with the French republic 
1795  

 Sidenote  The campaign in Italy  1796 1797  

239  After the armies raised by the Committee of Public Safety had
driven back their enemies in the autumn of 1793  the French occupied the
Austrian Netherlands  Holland  and that portion of Germany which lies on
the left  or west  bank of the Rhine  Austria and Prussia were again
busy with a new  and this time final  partition of Poland  As Prussia
had little real interest in the war with France  she soon concluded
peace with the new republic  April  1795  Spain followed her example and
left Austria  England  and Sardinia to carry on the war  General
Bonaparte had to face the combined armies of Austria and of the king of
Sardinia  By marching north from Savona he skillfully separated his two
enemies  forced the Sardinian troops back toward Turin  and compelled
the king of Sardinia to conclude a truce with France 

 Illustration  Napoleon Bonaparte during the Italian Campaign 

This left him free to advance against the Austrians  These he outflanked
and forced to retreat  On May 15  1796  he entered Milan  The Austrian
commander then shut himself up in the impregnable fortress of Mantua 
where Bonaparte promptly besieged him  There is no more fascinating
chapter in the history of warfare than the story of the audacious
maneuvers by which Bonaparte successfully repulsed four attempts on the
part of the Austrians to relieve Mantua  which was finally forced to
capitulate at the beginning of February of the following year  As soon
as he had removed all danger of an attack in the rear  the young French
general led his army toward Vienna  and by April  1797  the Austrian
court was glad to sign a preliminary peace 

 Sidenote  The treaty of Campo Formio  1797  

 Sidenote  Creation of the Cisalpine republic  

The provisions of the definitive peace which was concluded at
Campo Formio  October 17  1797  illustrate the unscrupulous manner in
which Austria and the French republic disposed of the helpless lesser
states  It inaugurated the bewilderingly rapid territorial
redistribution of Europe  which was so characteristic of the Napoleonic
period  Austria ceded to France the Austrian Netherlands and secretly
agreed to use its good offices to secure for France a great part of the
left bank of the Rhine  Austria also recognized the Cisalpine republic
which Bonaparte had created out of the smaller states of northern Italy 
and which was under the  protection  of France  This new state included
Milan  Modena  some of the papal dominions  and  lastly  a part of the
possessions of the venerable and renowned but defenseless republic of
Venice which Napoleon had iniquitously destroyed  Austria received as a
partial indemnity the rest of the possessions of the Venetian republic 
including Venice itself 

 Sidenote  General Bonaparte holds court  his analysis of the French
character and of his own aims  

240  While the negotiations were going on at Campo Formio  the young
general had established a brilliant court   His salons   an observer
informs us   were filled with a throng of generals  officials  and
purveyors  as well as the highest nobility and the most distinguished
men of Italy  who came to solicit the favor of a glance or a moment s
conversation   He appears already to have conceived the rôle that he was
to play later  We have a report of a most extraordinary conversation
which occurred at this time 

 What I have done so far   he declared   is nothing  I am but at the
opening of the career that I am to run  Do you suppose that I have
gained my victories in Italy in order to advance the lawyers of the
Directory     Do you think either that my object is to establish a
republic  What a notion     What the French want is Glory and the
satisfaction of their vanity  as for Liberty  of that they have no
conception  Look at the army  The victories that we have just gained
have given the French soldier his true character  I am everything to
him  Let the Directory attempt to deprive me of my command and they will
see who is the master  The nation must have a head  a head who is
rendered illustrious by glory and not by theories of government  fine
phrases  or the talk of idealists  of which the French understand not a
whit  

There is no doubt whom General Bonaparte had in mind when he spoke of
the needed head of the French nation who should be  rendered illustrious
by glory   This son of a poor Corsican lawyer  but yesterday a mere
unlucky adventurer  had arranged his programme  two years and a half
later he was the master of the French republic 

 Sidenote  Personal characteristics  

We naturally ask what manner of person this was who could frame such
audacious schemes at twenty eight and realize them at thirty years of
age  He was a little man  less than five feet two inches in height  At
this time he was extremely thin  but his striking features  quick 
searching eye  abrupt  animated gestures and rapid speech  incorrect as
it was  made a deep impression upon those who came in contact with him 
He possessed in a supreme degree two qualities that are ordinarily
incompatible  He was a dreamer  and at the same time a man whose
practical skill and mastery of detail amounted to genius  He once told a
friend that he was wont  when a poor lieutenant  to allow his
imagination full play and fancy things just as he would have them  Then
he would coolly consider the exact steps to be taken if he were to try
to make his dream come true 

 Sidenote  Sources of power in Napoleon s character  

In order to explain Bonaparte s success it must be remembered that he
was not hampered or held back by the fear of doing wrong  He was utterly
unscrupulous  whether dealing with an individual or a nation  and
appears to have been absolutely without any sense of moral
responsibility  Affection for his friends and relatives never stood in
the way of his personal aggrandizement  To these traits must be added
unrivaled military genius and the power of intense and almost
uninterrupted work 

 Sidenote  The political conditions which rendered Napoleon s wonderful
successes possible  

But even Bonaparte  unexampled as were his abilities  could never have
extended his power over all of western Europe  had it not been for the
peculiar political weakness of most of the states with which he had to
deal  There was no strong German empire in his day  no united Italy  no
Belgium whose neutrality was guaranteed  as it now is  by the other
powers of Europe  The French republic was surrounded by petty
independent  or practically independent  principalities which were
defenseless against an unscrupulous invader  Prussia  much smaller than
it now is  offered  as we shall see  no efficient opposition to the
extension of French control  Austria had been forced to capitulate 
after a short campaign  by an enemy far from its source of supplies and
led by a young and inexperienced general 

 Sidenote  Napoleon conceives the idea of an expedition to Egypt  

241  After arranging the Peace of Campo Formio  General Bonaparte
returned to Paris  He at once perceived that France  in spite of her
enthusiasm for him  was not yet ready to accept him as her ruler  He
saw  too  that he would soon sacrifice his prestige if he lived quietly
in Paris like an ordinary person  His active mind soon conceived a plan
which would forward his interests  France was still at war with England 
its most persevering enemy during this period  Bonaparte convinced the
Directory that England could best be ruined in the long run by seizing
Egypt and threatening her commerce through the Mediterranean  and
perhaps ultimately her dominion in the East  Bonaparte  fascinated by
the career of Alexander the Great  pictured himself riding to India on
the back of an elephant and dispossessing England of her most precious
colonial dependencies  He had  however  still another and a
characteristic reason for undertaking the expedition  France was on the
eve of a new war with the European powers  Bonaparte foresaw that  if he
could withdraw with him some of France s best officers  the Directory
might soon find itself so embarrassed that he could return as a national
savior  And even so it fell out 

 Sidenote  The campaign in Egypt  1798 1799  

 Sidenote  Nelson destroys the French fleet  

The French fleet left Toulon  May 19  1798  It was so fortunate as to
escape the English squadron under Nelson  which sailed by it in the
night  Bonaparte arrived at Alexandria  July 1  and easily defeated the
Turkish troops in the famous battle of the Pyramids  Meanwhile Nelson 
who did not know the destination of the enemy s fleet  had returned from
the Syrian coast where he had looked for the French in vain  He
discovered Bonaparte s ships in the harbor of Alexandria and completely
annihilated them in the first battle of the Nile  August 1  1798   The
French troops were now completely cut off from Europe  413 

 Sidenote  Syrian campaign  

 Sidenote  Bonaparte deserts the army in Egypt and returns to Paris  

The Porte  i e   the Turkish government  declared war against France 
and Bonaparte resolved to attack Turkey by land  He accordingly marched
into Syria in the spring of 1799  but was repulsed at Acre  where the
Turkish forces were aided by the English fleet  Pursued by pestilence 
the army regained Cairo in June after terrible suffering and loss  It
was still strong enough to annihilate a Turkish army that landed at
Alexandria  but news now reached Bonaparte from Europe which convinced
him that the time had come for him to hasten back  Northern Italy  which
he had won  was lost  the allies were about to invade France  and the
Directory was completely demoralized  Bonaparte accordingly secretly
deserted his army and managed  by a series of happy accidents  to reach
France by October 9  1799 

 Sidenote  The  coup d état  of the 18th Brumaire  November 9  1799  

 Sidenote  Bonaparte made First Consul  

242  The Directory  one of the most corrupt and inefficient governmental
bodies that the world has ever seen  had completely disgraced
itself  414  Bonaparte readily found others to join with him in a
conspiracy to overthrow it  A plan was formed for abruptly destroying
the old government and replacing it by a new one without observing any
constitutional forms  This is a procedure so familiar in France during
the past century that it is known even in English as a  coup d état 
 literally translated  a  stroke of state    The conspirators had a good
many friends in the two assemblies  especially among the  Elders  
Nevertheless Bonaparte had to order his soldiers to invade the hall in
which the Assembly of the Five Hundred was in session and scatter his
opponents before he could accomplish his purpose  A chosen few were then
reassembled under the presidency of Lucien Bonaparte  one of Napoleon s
brothers  who was a member of the assembly  They voted to put the
government in the hands of General Bonaparte and two others  to be
called  Consuls   These were to proceed  with the aid of a commission
and of the  Elders   to draw up a new constitution  415 

 Sidenote  The constitution of the year VIII  

 Sidenote  The Council of State  

The new constitution 416  was a very cumbrous and elaborate one  It
provided for no less than four assemblies  one to propose the laws  one
to consider them  one to vote upon them  and one to decide on their
constitutionality  But Bonaparte saw to it that as First Consul he
himself had practically all the power in his own hands  The Council of
State  to which he called talented men from all parties and over which
he presided  was the most important of the governmental bodies  This
body and the administrative system which he soon established have
endured  with a few changes  down to the present day  There is no surer
proof of Napoleon s genius than that  with no previous experience  he
could conceive a plan of government that should serve a great state like
France  through all its vicissitudes  for a century 

 Sidenote  The administrative system instituted by Napoleon  

In each department he put an officer called a  prefect   in each
subdivision of the department a  subprefect   These  together with the
mayors and police commissioners of the towns  were all appointed by the
First Consul  The prefects   little First Consuls   as Bonaparte called
them  resembled the intendants  the king s officers under the old
régime  Indeed  the new government suggested in several important
respects that of Louis XIV 

 Sidenote  The new government accepted by a plebiscite  

The new ruler objected as decidedly as Louis XIV had done to the idea of
being controlled by the people  who  he believed  knew nothing of public
affairs  It was enough  he thought  if they were allowed to say whether
they wished a certain form of government or not  He therefore introduced
what he called a  plebiscite   The new constitution when completed was
submitted to the nation at large  and all were allowed to vote  yes  or
 no  on the expediency of its adoption  Over three million voted in
favor of it and only fifteen hundred and sixty two against it  This did
not necessarily mean  however  that practically the whole nation wished
to have General Bonaparte as its ruler  A great many may have preferred
what seemed to them an objectionable form of government to the risk of
rejecting it  Herein lies the injustice of the plebiscite  There are
many questions that cannot be answered by a simple  yes  or  no  

 Sidenote  Bonaparte generally acceptable to France as First Consul  

Yet the accession of the popular young general to power was undoubtedly
grateful to the majority of citizens  who longed above all for a stable
government  The Swedish envoy wrote just after the  coup d état    A
legitimate monarch has perhaps never found a people more ready to do his
bidding than Bonaparte  and it would be inexcusable if this talented
general did not take advantage of this to introduce a better form of
government upon a firmer basis  It is literally true that France will
perform impossibilities in order to aid him in this  The people  with
the exception of a despicable horde of anarchists  are so sick and weary
of revolutionary horrors and folly that they believe that any change
cannot fail to be for the better     Even the royalists  whatever their
views may be  are sincerely devoted to Bonaparte  for they attribute to
him the intention of gradually restoring the old order of things  The
indifferent element cling to him as the one most likely to give France
peace  The enlightened republicans  although they tremble for their form
of government  prefer to see a single man of talent possess himself of
the power than a club of intriguers  

 Sidenote  Necessity of renewing the war  

243  Upon becoming First Consul  General Bonaparte found France at war
with England  Russia  Austria  Turkey  and Naples  These powers had
formed a coalition in December  1798  had defeated the armies that the
Directory sent against them  and undone Bonaparte s work in Italy  It
now devolved upon him to reëstablish the prestige of France abroad  as
well as to restore order and prosperity at home  A successful campaign
would  moreover  fill the empty treasury of the state  for Bonaparte
always exacted large contributions from the defeated enemy and from
those of his allies  like the ephemeral Cisalpine republic  who were
under the  protection  of France  Besides  he must keep himself before
the people as a military hero if he wished to maintain his supremacy 

 Sidenote  Napoleon crosses the Alps and surprises the Austrians  

Early in the year 1800 Bonaparte began secretly to collect an army near
Dijon  This he proposed to direct against an Austrian army which was
besieging the French general  Masséna  in Genoa  Instead of marching
straight into Italy  as would have been most natural  the First Consul
resolved to take the Austrian forces in the rear  Emulating Hannibal  he
led his troops over the famous Alpine pass of the Great St  Bernard 
dragging his cannon over in the trunks of trees which had been hollowed
out for the purpose  He arrived safely in Milan on the 2d of June to the
utter astonishment of the Austrians  who were taken completely by
surprise 

 Sidenote  The battle of Marengo  June 14  1800  

Bonaparte now moved westward  but in his uncertainty as to the exact
whereabouts of the Austrians  he divided his force when near the village
of Marengo  June 14  and sent a contingent under Desaix southward to
head off the enemy in that direction  In the meantime the whole Austrian
army approached from Alessandria and the engagement began  The Austrians
at first repulsed the French  and Bonaparte saw all his great plans in
jeopardy as he vainly besought his soldiers to make another stand  The
defeat was soon turned  however  into one of the most brilliant
victories  for Desaix had heard the firing and returned with his
division  Meanwhile the aged and infirm Austrian commander had returned
to Alessandria  supposing that the battle was won  The result was that
the French troops  reënforced  returned to the attack and carried all
before them  The brave Desaix  who had really saved the day  was killed 
Bonaparte simply said nothing of his own temporary defeat  and added one
more to the list of his great military successes  A truce was signed
next day  and the Austrians retreated behind the Mincio River  leaving
Bonaparte to restore French influence in Lombardy  The districts that he
had  freed  had to support his army  and the reëstablished Cisalpine
republic was forced to pay a monthly tax of two million francs 

 Sidenote  A general pacification  1801  

A victory gained by the French at Hohenlinden in December of the same
year brought Austria to terms  and she agreed to conclude a separate
peace with the French republic  This was the beginning of a general
pacification  During the year 1801 treaties were signed with all the
powers with which France had been at war  even with England  who had not
laid down her arms since war was first declared in 1793 

 Sidenote  Two most important provisions of the treaties of 1801  

 Sidenote  Bonaparte sells Louisiana to the United States  1803  

Among many merely transitory results of these treaties there were two
provisions of momentous import  The first of these  Spain s cession of
Louisiana to France in exchange for certain advantages in Italy  does
not concern us here directly  When war again broke out  Bonaparte sold
the district to the United States  and among the many transfers of
territory that he made during his reign  none was more important than
this  We must  however  treat with some detail the second of the great
changes  which led to the complete reorganization of Germany and
ultimately rendered possible the establishment of the present powerful
German empire 

 Sidenote  Cession of the left bank of the Rhine to France and the
results for Germany  

244  In the treaty signed by Austria at Lunéville in February  1801  the
emperor agreed  on his own part and on the part of the Holy Roman
Empire  that the French republic should thereafter possess in full
sovereignty the territories lying on the left bank of the Rhine which
belonged to the empire  and that thereafter the Rhine should form the
boundary of France from the point where it left Switzerland to where it
flowed into Dutch territory  As a natural consequence of this cession 
various princes and states of the empire found themselves dispossessed 
either wholly or in part  of their lands  The empire bound itself to
furnish the hereditary princes who had lost possessions on the left bank
of the Rhine with  an indemnity within the empire  

 Sidenote  Secularization of church lands  

This provision implied a veritable territorial metamorphosis of the old
Holy Roman Empire  which  except for the development of Prussia  was
still in pretty much the same condition as in Luther s time  417  There
was no unoccupied land to give the dispossessed princes  but there were
two classes of states in the empire that did not belong to  hereditary 
princes  namely  the ecclesiastical states and the free towns  As the
churchmen   archbishops  bishops  and abbots   who ruled over the
ecclesiastical states  were forbidden by the rules of the church to
marry  they could of course have no lawful heirs  Should an
ecclesiastical ruler be deprived of his realms  he might  therefore  be
indemnified by a pension for life  with no fear of any injustice to
heirs  since there could be none  The transfer of the lands of an
ecclesiastical prince to a lay  i e   hereditary  prince was called
 secularization   The towns  once so powerful and important  had lost
their former influence  and seemed as much of an anomaly in the German
Confederation as the ecclesiastical states 

 Sidenote  Decree of the German diet redistributing German territory 
1803  

 Sidenote  Disappearance of the imperial cities  

 Sidenote  Fate of the knights  

 Reichsdeputationshauptschluss  was the high sounding German name of the
great decree issued by the imperial diet in 1803  redistributing the
territory so as to indemnify the hereditary princes dispossessed by the
cession of the left bank of the Rhine to France  All the ecclesiastical
states  except the electorate of Mayence  were turned over to lay
rulers  Of the forty eight imperial cities  only six were left  Three of
these still exist as republican members of the present German
federation  namely  the Hanseatic towns   Hamburg  Bremen  and Lübeck 
Bavaria received the bishoprics of Würzburg  Bamberg  Augsburg 
Freising  and a number of the imperial cities  Baden received the
bishoprics of Constance  Basel  Speyer  etc  The knights who had lost
their possessions on the left bank were not indemnified  and those on
the right bank were deprived of their political rights within the next
two or three years  by the several states within whose boundaries they
lay  418 

 Sidenote  Importance of the extinction of the smaller German states  

The final distribution was preceded by a bitter and undignified scramble
among the princes for additional bits of territory  All turned to Paris
for favors  since the First Consul  and not the German diet  was really
the arbiter in the matter  Germany never sank to a lower degree of
national degradation than at this period  But this amalgamation was 
nevertheless  the beginning of her political regeneration  for without
the consolidation of the hundreds of practically independent little
states into a few well organized monarchies  such a union as the present
German empire would have been impossible  and the country must have
remained indefinitely in its traditional impotency 

 Sidenote  Extension of French territory  

 Sidenote  French dependencies  

The treaties of 1801 left France in possession of the Austrian
Netherlands and the left bank of the Rhine  to which increase of
territory Piedmont was soon added  Bonaparte found a further resource in
the dependencies  which it was his consistent policy to create  Holland
became the Batavian republic  and  with the Italian  originally the
Cisalpine  republic  came under French control and contributed money
and troops for the forwarding of French interests  The constitution of
Switzerland was improved in the interests of the First Consul and 
incidentally  to the great advantage of the country itself 




CHAPTER XXXVIII

EUROPE AND NAPOLEON


 Sidenote  The demoralized condition of France  and Bonaparte s
reforms  

245  The activity of the extraordinary man who had placed himself at the
head of the French republic was by no means confined to the important
alterations of the map of Europe described in the previous chapter  He
was indefatigable in carrying out a series of internal reforms  second
only in importance to those of the great Revolution of 1789  The Reign
of Terror and the incompetence of the Directory s government had left
France in a very bad plight  419  Bonaparte s reorganization of the
government has already been noticed  The finances  too  were in a
terrible condition  These the First Consul adjusted with great skill and
quickly restored the national credit 

 Sidenote  The adjustment of relations with the pope and the church  

 Sidenote  The Concordat of 1801  

He then set about settling the great problem of the non juring clergy 
who were still suffering for refusing to sanction the Civil Constitution
of the Clergy  420  All imprisoned priests were now freed  on promising
not to oppose the constitution  Their churches were given back to them 
and the distinction between  non juring  and  constitutional  clergymen
was obliterated  Sunday  which had been abolished by the republican
calendar  was once more observed  and all the revolutionary holidays
except July 14   the anniversary of the fall of the Bastile   and the
first day of the republican year  were done away with  A formal treaty
with the pope  the Concordat of 1801  was concluded  which revoked some
of the provisions of the Civil Constitution  especially the election of
the priests and bishops by the people  and recognized the pope as the
head of the church  It is noteworthy  however  that Bonaparte did not
restore to the church its ancient possessions  and that he reserved to
himself the right to appoint the bishops  as the former kings had done 

 Sidenote  The emigrant nobles permitted to return  

As for the emigrant nobles  Bonaparte decreed that no more names should
be added to the lists  The striking of names from the list and the
return of confiscated lands that had not already been sold  he made
favors to be granted by himself  Parents and relatives of emigrants were
no longer to be regarded as incapable of holding public offices  In
April  1802  a general amnesty was issued  and no less than forty
thousand families returned to France 

 Sidenote  Old habits resumed  

 Sidenote  The grateful reliance of the nation on Bonaparte  

There was a gradual reaction from the fantastic innovations of the Reign
of Terror  The old titles of address  Monsieur and Madame  were again
used instead of the revolutionary  Citizen   Streets which had been
rebaptized with republican names resumed their former ones  Old titles
of nobility were revived  and something very like a royal court began to
develop at the Palace of the Tuilleries  for  except in name  Bonaparte
was already a king  and his wife  Josephine  a queen  It had been clear
for some years that the nation was weary of political agitation  How
great a blessing after the anarchy of the past to put all responsibility
upon one who showed himself capable of concluding a long war with
unprecedented glory for France and of reëstablishing order and the
security of person and property  the necessary conditions for renewed
prosperity  How natural that the French should welcome a despotism to
which they had been accustomed for centuries  after suffering as they
had under nominally republican institutions 

 Sidenote  The  Code Napoléon   

One of the greatest and most permanent of Bonaparte s achievements still
remains to be noted  The heterogeneous laws of the old régime had been
much modified by the legislation of the successive assemblies  All this
needed a final revision  and Bonaparte appointed a commission to
undertake this great task  Their draft of the new code was discussed in
the Council of State  and the First Consul had many suggestions to make 
The resulting codification of the civil law  the  Code Napoléon   is
still used to day  not only in France  but also  with some
modifications  in Rhenish Prussia  Bavaria  Baden  Holland  Belgium 
Italy  and even in the state of Louisiana  The criminal and commercial
law was also codified  These codes carried with them into foreign lands
the principles of equality upon which they were based  and thus diffused
the benefits of the Revolution beyond the borders of France  421 

 Sidenote  Napoleon made Consul for life  1802  and Emperor  1804  

Bonaparte was able gradually to modify the constitution so that his
power became more and more absolute  In 1802 he was appointed Consul for
life and given the right to name his successor  Even this did not
satisfy his insatiable ambition  which demanded that his actual power
should be clothed with all the attributes and surroundings appropriate
to an hereditary ruler  In May  1804  he was accordingly given the title
of Emperor  and  in December  crowned  as the successor of Charlemagne 
with great pomp in the cathedral of Notre Dame  He at once proceeded to
establish a new nobility to take the place of that abolished by the
first National Assembly in 1790 

 Sidenote  Napoleon s censorship of the press  

From this time on he became increasingly tyrannical and hostile to
criticism  At the very beginning of his administration he had suppressed
a great part of the numerous political newspapers and forbidden the
establishment of new ones  As emperor he showed himself still more
exacting  His police furnished the news to the papers and carefully
omitted all that might offend their suspicious master  He ordered the
journals to  put in quarantine all news that might be disadvantageous or
disagreeable to France   His ideal was to suppress all newspapers but
one  which should be used for official purposes 

 Illustration  Napoleon 

 Sidenote  Napoleon on the necessity of war for France  

246  A great majority of the French undoubtedly longed for peace  but
Napoleon s position made war a personal necessity for him  No one saw
this more clearly than he   If   he said to his Council of State in the
summer of 1802   the European states intend ever to renew the war  the
sooner it comes the better  Every day the remembrance of their defeats
grows dimmer and at the same time the prestige of our victories
pales     France needs glorious deeds  and hence war  She must be the
first among the states  or she is lost  I shall put up with peace as
long as our neighbors can maintain it  but I shall regard it as an
advantage if they force me to take up my arms again before they are
rusted     In our position I shall look on each conclusion of peace as
simply a short armistice  and I regard myself as destined during my term
of office to fight almost without intermission  

 Sidenote  Napoleon dreams of becoming emperor of Europe  

On another occasion  in 1804  Napoleon said   There will be no rest in
Europe until it is under a single chief  an emperor who shall have kings
for officers  who shall distribute kingdoms to his lieutenants  and
shall make this one king of Italy  that one of Bavaria  this one ruler
of Switzerland  that one governor of Holland  each having an office of
honor in the imperial household   This was the ideal that he now found
himself in a situation to carry out with marvelous exactness 

 Sidenote  Reasons for England s persistent opposition to Napoleon  

There were many reasons why the peace with England  concluded at Amiens
in March  1802  should be speedily broken  especially as the First
Consul was not averse to a renewal of the war  The obvious intention of
Napoleon to bring as much of Europe under his control as he could  and
the imposition of high duties on English goods in those territories that
he already controlled  filled commercial and industrial England with
apprehension  The English people longed for peace  but peace appeared
only to offer an opportunity to the Corsican usurper to ruin England by
a continuous war upon her commerce  This was the secret of England s
pertinacity  All the other European powers concluded peace with Napoleon
at some time during his reign  England alone did not lay down her arms a
second time until the emperor of the French was a prisoner 

 Sidenote  War between France and England renewed in 1803  

 Sidenote  Napoleon institutes a coast blockade  

247  War was renewed between England and France in 1803  Bonaparte
promptly occupied Hanover  of which it will be remembered that the
English king was elector  and declared the coast blockaded from Hanover
to Otranto  Holland  Spain  Portugal  and the Ligurian
republic  formerly the republic of Genoa  were  by hook or by crook 
induced to agree to furnish each their contingent of men or money to the
French army and to exclude English ships from their ports 

 Sidenote  Napoleon threatens to invade England  

To cap the climax  England was alarmed by the appearance of a French
army at Boulogne  just across the Channel  A great number of flatboats
were collected  and troops trained to embark and disembark  Apparently
Napoleon harbored the firm purpose of invading the British Isles  Yet
the transportation of a large body of troops across the English Channel 
trifling as is the distance  would have been very hazardous  and by many
it was deemed downright impossible  No one knows whether Napoleon really
expected to make the trial  It is quite possible that his main purpose
in collecting an army at Boulogne was to have it in readiness for the
continental war which he saw immediately ahead of him  He succeeded  at
any rate  in terrifying England  who prepared to defend herself 

 Sidenote  Coalition of Russia  Austria  England  and Sweden  

 Sidenote  Napoleon king of Italy  

The Tsar  Alexander I  had submitted a plan for the reconciliation of
France and England in August  1803  The rejection of this and the
evident intention of Napoleon to include the eastern coast of the
Adriatic in his sphere of influence  led Russia to join a new coalition
which  by July  1805  included Austria  Sweden  and  of course  England 
Austria was especially affected by the increase of Napoleon s power in
Italy  He had been crowned king of Italy in May  1805  had created a
little duchy in northern Italy for his sister  and had annexed the
Ligurian republic to France  There were rumors  too  that he was
planning to seize the Venetian territories of Austria 

 Sidenote  The war of 1805  

 Sidenote  Occupation of Vienna  

 Sidenote  Battle of Austerlitz  December 2  1805  

War was declared against Austria  August 23  and four days later the
army at Boulogne was ordered eastward  One of the Austrian commanders
exhibited the most startling incapacity in allowing himself to be shut
up in Ulm  where he was forced to capitulate with all his troops
 October 20   Napoleon then marched down the Danube with little
opposition  and before the middle of November Vienna was in the
possession of French troops  Napoleon thereupon led his forces north to
meet the allied armies of Austria and Russia  these he defeated on
December 2  in the terrible winter battle of Austerlitz  Russia then
withdrew for a time and signed an armistice  and Austria was obliged to
submit to a humiliating peace  the Treaty of Pressburg 

 Sidenote  The Treaty of Pressburg  

By this treaty Austria recognized all Napoleon s changes in Italy  and
ceded to his kingdom of Italy that portion of the Venetian territory
that she had received at Campo Formio  Moreover  she ceded Tyrol to
Bavaria  which was friendly to Napoleon  and other of her possessions to
Würtemberg and Baden  also friends of the French emperor  She further
agreed to ratify the assumption  on the part of the rulers of Bavaria
and Würtemberg  of the titles of King  Napoleon was now in a position
still further to reorganize western Europe  with a view to establishing
a great international federation of which he should be the head  422 

 Sidenote  The dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire  1806  

248  Napoleon had no desire to unify Germany  he merely wished to
maintain a certain number of independent states  or groups of states 
which he could conveniently control  He had provided  in the Treaty of
Pressburg  that the newly created sovereigns should enjoy the  plenitude
of sovereignty  and all the rights derived therefrom  precisely as did
the rulers of Austria and Prussia 

This  by explicitly declaring several of the most important of the
German states altogether independent of the emperor  rendered the
further existence of the Holy Roman Empire impossible  The emperor 
Francis II  accordingly abdicated  August 6  1806  Thus the most
imposing and enduring political office known to history was formally
abolished 

 Sidenote  Francis II assumes the title of  Emperor of Austria   

Francis II did not  however  lose his title of Emperor  Shortly after
the First Consul had received that title  Francis adopted the formula
 Emperor of Austria   to designate him as the ruler of all the
possessions of his house  Hitherto he had been officially known as King
of Hungary  Bohemia  Dalmatia  Croatia  Galicia  and Laodomeria  Duke of
Lorraine  Venice  Salzburg  etc   Grand Duke of Transylvania  Margrave
of Moravia  etc 

 Sidenote  The Confederation of the Rhine  

Meanwhile Napoleon had organized a union of the southern German states 
called the Confederation of the Rhine  and had assumed its headship as
 Protector   This he had done  he assured Europe   in the dearest
interests of his people and of his neighbors   adding the pious hope
that the French armies had crossed the Rhine for the last time  and that
the people of Germany would witness no longer   except in the annals of
the past  the horrible pictures of disorder  devastation  and slaughter
that war invariably brings with it   423 

Immediately after the battle of Austerlitz  Napoleon proclaimed that the
king of Naples  who had allied himself with the English  had ceased to
reign  and French generals were ordered to occupy Naples  In March 
1806  he made his brother Joseph king of Naples and Sicily  his brother
Louis king of Holland  and his brother in law  Murat  duke of Cleves and
Berg  These states and those of his German allies constituted what he
called  the real French Empire  

 Sidenote  Prussia forced into war with France  

249  One of the most important of the continental states  it will have
been noticed  had taken no part as yet in the opposition to the
extension of Napoleon s power  Prussia  the first power to conclude
peace with the new French republic in 1795  had since that time
maintained a strict neutrality  Had it yielded to Tsar Alexander s
persuasions and joined the coalition in 1805  it might have turned the
tide at Austerlitz  or at any rate have encouraged further resistance to
the conqueror  The hesitation of Frederick William III cost him dear 
for Napoleon now forced him into war at a time when he could look for no
efficient assistance from Russia or the other powers  The immediate
cause of the declaration of war was the disposal of Hanover  This
electorate Frederick William had consented to hold provisionally 
pending its possible transfer to him should the English king give his
assent  Prussia was anxious to get possession of Hanover because it lay
just between her older possessions and the territory which she had
gained in the redistribution of 1803  424 

 Sidenote  Napoleon s insolent behavior toward Prussia  

Napoleon  as usual  did not fail either to see or to use his advantage 
His conduct toward Prussia was most insolent  After setting her at
enmity with England and promising that she should have Hanover  he
unblushingly offered to restore the electorate to George III  His
insults now began to arouse the national spirit in Prussia  and the
reluctant Frederick William was forced by the party in favor of war 
which included his beautiful queen Louise  and the great statesman
Stein  to break with Napoleon 

 Illustration  EUROPE AT THE HEIGHT OF NAPOLEON S POWER 

 Sidenote  Decisive defeat of the Prussian army at Jena  1806  

Her army was  however  as has been well said   only that of Frederick
the Great grown twenty years older   one of Frederick s generals  the
aged duke of Brunswick  who had issued the famous manifesto in
1792  425  was its leader  A single defeat  near Jena  October 14 
1806   put Prussia completely in the hands of her enemy  This one
disaster produced complete demoralization throughout the country 
Fortresses were surrendered without resistance  and the king fled to the
uttermost parts of his realm on the Russian boundary 

 Sidenote  The campaign in Poland  

 Sidenote  Territorial changes of the treaties of Tilsit  July  1807  

 Sidenote  Creation of the grand duchy of Warsaw and the kingdom of
Westphalia  

Napoleon now led his army into Poland  where he spent the winter in
operations against Russia and her feeble Prussian ally  He closed an
arduous campaign by a signal victory at Friedland  June 14  1807   which
was followed by the treaties of Tilsit with Russia and Prussia  July 7
and 9   Napoleon had no mercy on Prussia  Frederick William III lost all
his possessions to the west of the Elbe and all that Prussia had gained
in the second and third partitions of Poland  The Polish territory
Napoleon made into a new subject kingdom called the grand duchy of
Warsaw  and chose his friend  the king of Saxony  as its ruler  Out of
the western lands of Prussia  which he later united with Hanover  he
created the kingdom of Westphalia for his brother Jerome  Russia  on the
other hand  was treated with marked consideration  The Tsar finally
consented to recognize all the sweeping territorial changes that
Napoleon had made  and secretly agreed to enforce the blockade against
England should that country refuse to make peace 

 Sidenote  The continental blockade  

250  Napoleon s most persevering enemy still remained unconquered and
inaccessible  Just as Napoleon was undertaking his successful campaign
against Austria in 1805  Nelson had annihilated the French fleet for the
second time in the renowned naval engagement of Trafalgar  off the coast
of Spain  It seemed more than ever necessary  therefore  to ruin England
commercially and industrially  since there was obviously no likelihood
of subduing it by arms 

 Sidenote  The Berlin Decree and Napoleon s  paper  blockade  

In May  1806  England had declared the coast from the Elbe to Brest to
be blockaded  Napoleon replied to this with the Berlin Decree  November
21  1806   in which he proclaimed it a monstrous abuse of the right for
England to declare great stretches of coast in a state of blockade which
her whole fleet would be unable to enforce  He retaliated with a
 paper  426  blockade of the British Isles  which forbade all commerce
with them  Letters or packages directed to England or to an Englishman
or written in the English language were not to be permitted to pass
through the mails in the countries he controlled  Every English subject
in countries occupied by French troops or in the territory of Napoleon s
allies was to be regarded as a prisoner of war and his property as a
lawful prize  All trade in English goods was forbidden 

 Sidenote  Disastrous effects of the blockades on the commerce of the
United States  

A year later England established a similar paper blockade of the ports
of the French empire and its allies  but permitted the ships of neutral
powers to proceed  provided that they touched at an English port 
secured a license from the English government  and paid a heavy export
duty  Napoleon promptly declared all ships that submitted to these
humiliating regulations to be lawful prizes of French privateers  The
ships of the United States were at this time the most numerous and
important of the neutral carriers  The disastrous results of these
restrictions led to the various embargo acts  the first of which was
passed by Congress in December  1807   and ultimately to the destruction
of the flourishing carrying trade of the United States 

 Sidenote  Napoleon s attempt to make the continent independent of
English colonial products  

Napoleon tried to render Europe permanently independent of the colonial
productions brought from English colonies and by English ships  He
encouraged the substitution of chicory for coffee  the cultivation of
the sugar beet  and the discovery of new dyes to replace those coming
from the tropics  But the distress caused by the disturbance in trade
produced great discontent  especially in Russia  it rendered the
domination of Napoleon more and more distasteful  and finally
contributed to his downfall  427 

 Sidenote  Napoleon s policy in France  

251  France owed much to Napoleon  for he had restored order and
guaranteed many of the beneficent achievements of the Revolution of
1789  His boundless ambition was  it is true  sapping her strength by
forcing younger and younger men into his armies in order to build up the
vast international federation of which he dreamed  But his victories and
the commanding position to which he had raised France could not but fill
the nation with pride 

 Sidenote  Public works  

He sought to gain popular approval by great public improvements  He
built marvelous roads across the Alps and along the Rhine  which still
fill the traveler with admiration  He beautified Paris by opening up
wide streets and quays  and building magnificent bridges and triumphal
arches that kept fresh in the people s mind the recollection of his
victories  By these means he gradually converted a mediæval town into
the most beautiful of modern capitals 

 Sidenote  Reorganization of education  

The whole educational system was reorganized and made as highly
centralized and as subservient to the aims of the emperor as any
department of government  Napoleon argued that one of the chief aims of
education should be the formation of loyal subjects who would be
faithful to the emperor and his successors  An imperial catechism was
prepared  which not only inculcated loyalty to Napoleon  but actually
threatened with eternal perdition those who should fail in their
obligations to him  including military service  428 

 Sidenote  The new nobility and the Legion of Honor  

Napoleon created a new nobility  and he endeavored to assure the support
of distinguished individuals by making them members of the Legion of
Honor which he founded  The  Princes  whom he nominated received an
annual income of two hundred thousand francs  The ministers of state 
senators  members of his Council of State  and the archbishops received
the title of Count and a revenue of thirty thousand francs  and so on 
The army was not forgotten  for Napoleon felt that to be his chief
support  The incomes of his marshals were enormous  and brave actions
among the soldiers were rewarded with the decoration of the Legion of
Honor 

 Sidenote  Napoleon s despotism in France  

As time went on Napoleon s despotism grew more and more oppressive  No
less than thirty five hundred prisoners of state were arrested at his
command  one because he hated Napoleon  another because in his letters
he expressed sentiments adverse to the government  and so on  No
grievance was too petty to attract the attention of the emperor s
jealous eye  He ordered the title of a  History of Bonaparte  to be
changed to the  History of the Campaigns of Napoleon the Great   429  He
forbade the performance of certain of Schiller s and Goethe s plays in
German towns  as tending to arouse the patriotic discontent of the
people with his rule 

 Sidenote  Napoleon s European power threatened by the growth of
national opposition to him  

252  Up to this time Napoleon had had only the opposition of the several
European courts to overcome in the extension of his power  The people of
the various states which he had conquered showed an extraordinary
indifference toward the political changes  It was clear  however  that
as soon as the national spirit was once awakened  the highly artificial
system created by the French emperor would collapse  His first serious
reverse came from the people and from an unexpected quarter 

 Sidenote  Napoleon makes his brother Joseph king of Spain  

Napoleon decided  after Tilsit  that the Spanish peninsula must be
brought more completely under his control  Portugal was too friendly to
the English  and Spain  owing to serious dissensions in the royal
family  seemed an easy prey  In the spring of 1808 Napoleon induced both
the king and the crown prince of Spain to meet him at Bayonne  Here he
was able to persuade or force both of them to surrender their rights to
the throne  on June 6 he appointed his brother Joseph king of Spain 
making Murat king of Naples in his stead 

 Sidenote  Revolt in Spain against the foreign ruler  

Joseph entered Madrid in July  armed with excellent intentions and a new
constitution  The general rebellion in favor of the crown prince which
immediately broke out had an element of religious enthusiasm in it  for
the monks stirred up the people against Napoleon  on the ground that he
was oppressing the pope and depriving him of his dominions  One French
army was captured at Baylen  and another capitulated to the English
forces which had landed in Portugal  Before the end of July Joseph and
the French troops had been compelled to retreat behind the Ebro River 

 Sidenote  Spain subdued by arms  

In November the French emperor himself led a magnificent army into
Spain  two hundred thousand strong  in the best of condition and
commanded by his ablest marshals  The Spanish troops  perhaps one
hundred thousand in number  were ill clad and inadequately equipped 
what was worse  they were over confident in view of their late victory 
They were  of course  defeated  and Madrid surrendered December 4 
Napoleon immediately abolished the Inquisition  the feudal dues  the
internal customs lines  and two thirds of the cloisters  This is typical
of the way in which the French Revolution went forth in arms to spread
its principles throughout western Europe 

The next month Napoleon was back in Paris  as he saw that he had another
war with Austria on his hands  He left Joseph on his insecure throne 
after assuring the Spanish that God had given the French emperor the
power and the will to overcome all obstacles  430  He was soon to
discover  however  that these very Spaniards could maintain a guerilla
warfare against which his best troops and most distinguished generals
were powerless  His ultimate downfall was in no small measure due to the
persistent hostility of the Spanish people 

 Sidenote  War with Austria  1809  

 Sidenote  Battle of Wagram  

 Sidenote  Extension of the boundaries of France  

In April  1809  Austria ventured to declare war once more on the  enemy
of Europe   but this time she found no one to aid her  The great battle
of Wagram  near Vienna  July 5 6   was not perhaps so unconditional a
victory for the French as that of Austerlitz  but it forced Austria into
just as humiliating a peace as that of Pressburg  Austria s object had
been to destroy Napoleon s system of dependencies and  to restore to
their rightful possessors all those lands belonging to them respectively
before the Napoleonic usurpations   Instead of accomplishing this end 
Austria was obliged to cede more territory to Napoleon and his allies 
and he went on adding to his dependencies  After incorporating into
France the kingdom of Etruria and the papal dominions  1808 1809  
Napoleon was encouraged by his victory over Austria to annex
Holland 431  and the German districts to the north  including the
Hanseatic towns  Consequently  in 1810 France stretched from the
confines of Naples to the Baltic  One might travel from Lübeck to Rome
without leaving Napoleon s realms 

Napoleon was anxious to have an heir to whom he could transmit his vast
dominions  As Josephine bore him no children  he decided to divorce her 
and after considering a Russian princess  he married the Archduchess
Maria Louisa  the daughter of the Austrian emperor and a grandniece of
Marie Antoinette  In this way the former Corsican adventurer gained
admission to one of the oldest and proudest of reigning families  the
Hapsburgs  His new wife soon bore him a son  who was styled King of
Rome 

 Sidenote  Relations between Napoleon and Alexander I of Russia  

253  Among the continental states Russia alone was entirely out of
Napoleon s control  There were plenty of causes for misunderstanding
between the ardent young Tsar Alexander I and Napoleon  Up to this time
the agreement of Tilsit had been maintained  Napoleon was  however 
secretly opposing Alexander s plans for adding the Danubian provinces
and Finland to his possessions  Then the possibility of Napoleon s
reëstablishing Poland as a national kingdom which might threaten
Russia s interests  was a constant source of apprehension to Alexander 
By 1812 Napoleon believed himself to be in a condition to subdue this
doubtful friend  who might at any moment become a dangerous enemy 
Against the advice of his more far sighted counselors  the emperor
collected on the Russian frontier a vast army of four hundred thousand
men  composed to a great extent of young conscripts and the contingents
furnished by his allies 

 Sidenote  Napoleon s campaign in Russia  1812  

The story of the fearful Russian campaign which followed cannot be told
here in detail  Napoleon had planned to take three years to conquer
Russia  but he was forced on by the necessity of gaining at least one
signal victory before he closed the season s campaign  The Russians
simply retreated and led him far within a hostile and devastated country
before they offered battle at Borodino  September 7   Napoleon won the
battle  but his army was reduced to something over one hundred thousand
men when he entered Moscow a week later  The town had been set on fire
by the Russians before his arrival  he found his position untenable  and
had to retreat as winter came on  The cold  the want of food  and the
harassing attacks of the people along the route made that retreat the
most signal military tragedy on record  Napoleon regained Poland early
in December with scarcely twenty thousand of the four hundred thousand
with which he had started less than six months before  432 

 Sidenote  Napoleon collects a new army  

Napoleon hastened back to Paris  where he freely misrepresented the true
state of affairs  even declaring that the army was in a good condition
up to the time that he turned it over to Murat in December  While the
loss of men in the Russian campaign was enormous  just those few had
naturally survived who would be most essential in the formation of a new
army  namely  the officers  With their help  Napoleon soon had a force
of no less than six hundred thousand men with which to return to the
attack  This contained one hundred and fifty thousand conscripts who
should not have been called into service until 1814  besides older men
who had been hitherto exempted 

 Sidenote  Social conditions in Prussia before 1806  


254  By the end of February  1813  the timid Frederick William had been
induced by public sentiment in Prussia to break with his oppressor and
join Russia  On March 17  he issued a famous address  To my People   in
which he called upon them to assist him in the recovery of Prussian
independence  Up to the defeat of Jena  Prussia was far more backward in
its social organization than France had been before 1789  The
agricultural classes were serfs  who were bound to the land and
compelled to work a certain part of each week for the lord without
remuneration  433  The population was divided into strict social castes 
Moreover  no noble could buy citizen or peasant land  no citizen  noble
or peasant land  no peasant  noble or citizen land 

 Sidenote  Reform of the social system in Prussia  

The disaster of Jena and the losses at Tilsit convinced the
clearer sighted statesmen of Prussia  especially Stein  that the
country s only hope of recovery was a complete social and political
revolution  not unlike that which had taken place in France  They saw
that the feudal system must be abolished  the peasants freed  and the
restrictions which hedged about the different classes done away with 
before it would be possible to arouse public spirit to a point where a
great popular uprising might expel the intruder forever 

The first great step toward this general reform was the royal decree of
October 9  1807  434  intended to  remove every obstacle that has
hitherto prevented the individual from attaining such a degree of
prosperity as he was capable of reaching   Serfdom was abolished and the
restrictions on landholding removed  so that any one  regardless of
class  was at liberty to purchase and hold landed property of every
kind  In some cases the principles of the French Revolution had been
introduced by Napoleon or the rulers that he set up  In this case it was
the necessity of preparing the country to throw off his yoke and regain
its independence that led to the same result 

 Sidenote  Napoleon defeated by the allied Russians  Prussians  and
Austrians  October  1813  

 Sidenote  Battle of Leipsic  October 16 19  1813  

255  Napoleon had therefore to face now  not only the cabinets of Europe
and the regular armies that they directed  but a people who were being
organized to defend their country  His soldiers were  however  still
triumphant for a time  He met with no successful opposition  and on May
14  1813  he occupied Dresden in the territory of his faithful ally  the
king of Saxony  This he held during the summer  and inflicted several
defeats upon the allies  who had been joined by Austria in August  He
gained his last great victory  the battle of Dresden  August 26 27 
Finding that the allied armies of the Russians  Prussians  and
Austrians  which had at last learned the necessity of coöperating
against their powerful common enemy  were preparing to cut him off from
France  he retreated early in October and was totally defeated in the
tremendous  Battle of the Nations   as the Germans love to call it  in
the environs of Leipsic  October 16 19  

 Sidenote  Germany  Holland  and Spain throw off the Napoleonic yoke  

As the defeated emperor crossed the Rhine with the remnants of his army 
the whole fabric of his political edifice in Germany and Holland
collapsed  The members of the Confederation of the Rhine joined the
allies  Jerome Bonaparte fled from his kingdom of Westphalia  and the
Dutch drove the French officials from Holland  During the year 1813 the
Spanish  with the aid of the English under Wellington  had practically
cleared their country of the French intruders 

 Sidenote  Occupation of Paris by the allies  March 31  1814  

 Sidenote  Napoleon abdicates and is banished to the island of Elba  

In spite of these disasters  Napoleon refused the propositions of peace
made on condition that he would content himself henceforth with his
dominion over France  The allies consequently marched into France  and
the almost superhuman activity of the hard pressed emperor could not
prevent their occupation of Paris  March 31  1814   Napoleon was forced
to abdicate  and the allies  in seeming derision  granted him full
sovereignty over the tiny island of Elba and permitted him to retain his
imperial title  In reality he was a prisoner on his island kingdom  and
the Bourbons reigned again in France 

 Sidenote  Return of Napoleon  

Within a year  encouraged by the dissensions of the allies and the
unpopularity of the Bourbons  he made his escape  landed in France
 March 1  1815   and was received with enthusiasm by a portion of the
army  Yet France as a whole was indifferent  if not hostile  to his
attempt to reëstablish his power  Certainly no one could place
confidence in his talk of peace and liberty  Moreover  whatever
disagreement there might be among the allies on other matters  there was
perfect unanimity in their attitude toward  the enemy and destroyer of
the world s peace   They solemnly proclaimed him an outlaw  and devoted
him to public vengeance 

 Sidenote  Battle of Waterloo  June  1815  

 Sidenote  Exile to Saint Helena  

Upon learning that English troops under Wellington and a Prussian army
under Blücher had arrived in the Netherlands  Napoleon decided to attack
them with such troops as he could collect  In the first engagements he
defeated and drove back the Prussians  Wellington then took his station
south of Brussels  at Waterloo  Napoleon advanced against him  June 18 
1815  and might have defeated the English had they not been opportunely
reënforced by Blücher s Prussians  who had recovered themselves  As it
was  Napoleon lost the most memorable of modern battles  Yet  even if he
had not been defeated at Waterloo  he could not long have opposed the
vast armies which were being concentrated to overthrow him  This time he
was banished to the remote island of Saint Helena  where he could only
brood over the past and prepare his  Memoirs   in which he carefully
strove to justify his career of ambition  435 


     General Reading   Of the many lives of Napoleon the best and most
     recent are the following  FOURNIER   Life of Napoleon   a
     translation of this work from the original German  edited by E G 
     Bourne  is announced by Holt   Co    ROSE   Life of Napoleon the
     First   The Macmillan Company  2 vols    4 00   The fullest
     biography of Napoleon is that of SLOANE   Life of Napoleon
     Bonaparte   The Century Co   4 vols    18   An excellent sketch of
     the military history may be found in ROPES   The First Napoleon 
      Houghton  Mifflin   Co    2 00  




CHAPTER XXXIX

EUROPE AFTER THE CONGRESS OF VIENNA


 Sidenote  Problem of the reconstruction of Europe after Napoleon s
fall  

256  There is no more important chapter in the political history of
Europe than the reconstruction of the map after Napoleon s abdication 
The allies immediately reinstated the Bourbon dynasty on the throne of
France in the person of Louis XVI s younger brother  the count of
Provence  who became Louis XVIII  436  They first restricted France to
the boundaries that she had had at the beginning of 1792  but later
deprived her of Savoy as a punishment for yielding to the domination of
Napoleon after his return from Elbe  A great congress of the European
powers was summoned to meet at Vienna  where the allies proposed to
settle all those difficult problems that faced them  They had no idea of
reëstablishing things just as they were before the Napoleonic cataclysm 
for the simple reason that Austria  Russia  and Prussia all had schemes
for their own advantage that precluded so simple an arrangement 

 Sidenote  Provisions of the Congress of Vienna in regard to the
Netherlands  Switzerland  Italy  and Germany  

The Congress of Vienna began its sessions November 1  1814  The allies
quickly agreed that Holland should become an hereditary kingdom under
the house of Orange  which had long played so conspicuous a rôle in the
nominal republic  In order that Holland might be the better able to
check any new encroachments on the part of France  the former Austrian
Netherlands were given to her  Switzerland was declared independent  as
were all the small Italian states which had existed prior to the
innovations of Napoleon  except the ancient republics of Venice and
Genoa  neither of which was restored  Genoa was given to the king of
Sardinia  Venetia to Austria  as an indemnity for her losses in the
Netherlands  Austria also received back her former territory of Milan 
and became  by reason of her control of northern Italy  a powerful
factor in determining the policy of the whole Italian peninsula  As to
Germany  no one desired to undo the great work of 1803 and restore the
old anarchy  The former members of the Rhine Confederation were bent
upon maintaining the  sovereignty  which Napoleon had secured for them 
consequently the allies determined that the several states of Germany
should be independent  but  united in a federal union  

 Illustration  EUROPE IN 1815 

 Sidenote  Dispute over disposal of the Polish territory and the fate of
the kingdom of Saxony  

So far all was tolerably harmonious  Nevertheless  serious differences
of opinion developed at the congress  which nearly brought on war among
the allies themselves  and encouraged Napoleon s return from Elba  These
concerned the disposition of the Polish territory that Napoleon had
converted into the grand duchy of Warsaw  Prussia and Russia were agreed
that the best way would be to let the Tsar make a separate state of this
territory  and unite it in a personal union with his Russian realms 
Prussia was then to be indemnified for her losses in the East by
annexing the lands of the king of Saxony  who  it was argued  merited
this retribution for remaining faithful to Napoleon after the other
members of the Confederation of the Rhine had repudiated him 

Austria and England  on the other hand  were bitterly opposed to this
arrangement  They approved neither of dispossessing the king of Saxony
nor of extending the Tsar s influence westward by giving him Poland  The
great diplomatist  Talleyrand  who represented Louis XVIII at the
congress  now saw his chance  The allies had resolved to treat France as
a black sheep  and permit the other four great powers to arrange
matters to suit themselves  But they were now hopelessly at odds  and
Austria and England found France a welcome ally in their opposition to
the northern powers  So in this way the disturber of the peace of Europe
for the last quarter of a century was received back into the family of
nations 

 Sidenote  The compromise  

A compromise was at last reached  The Tsar was allowed to create a
kingdom of Poland out of the grand duchy of Warsaw  but only half of the
possessions of the king of Saxony were ceded to Prussia  As a further
indemnity  Frederick William III was given certain districts on the left
bank of the Rhine which had belonged to ecclesiastical and petty lay
princes before the Treaty of Lunéville  The great importance of this
arrangement we shall see later when we come to trace the development of
the present German empire 

 Sidenote  Changes in the map of Europe since 1815  

If one compares the map of Europe in 1815 with that of the present
day  437  he will be struck with the following differences  In 1815
there was no German empire  and Prussia was a much smaller and less
compact state than now  It has evidently grown at the expense of its
neighbors  as several of the lesser German states of 1815   Hanover 
Nassau  and Hesse Cassel   no longer appear on the map  and Schleswig
Holstein  which then belonged to Denmark  is now Prussian  It will be
noted that the present German empire does not include any part of the
Austrian countries  as did the Confederation of 1815  and that  on the
other hand  it does include all of Prussia  The kingdom of Poland has
become an integral part of the Russian dominions  Austria  excluded from
the German union  has entered into a dual union with Hungary  in which
the two countries are placed upon the same footing 

There was no kingdom of Italy in 1815  Now Austria has lost all hold on
Lombardy and Venetia  and all the little states reëstablished by the
Congress of Vienna  including the Papal States  have disappeared  A new
kingdom  Belgium  has been created out of the old Austrian Netherlands
which the congress gave to the king of Holland  France  now a republic
again  has recovered Savoy  but has lost all her possessions on the
Rhine by the cession of Alsace and Lorraine to the German empire 
Lastly  Turkey in Europe has nearly disappeared  and several new states 
Greece  Servia  Roumania  and Bulgaria  have appeared in southeastern
Europe  It is the purpose of the following chapters to show how the
great changes indicated on the map took place and explain the
accompanying internal changes  in so far as they represent the general
trend of modern development or have an importance for Europe at large 

 Sidenote  Influence of Napoleon in spreading the reforms achieved by
the Revolution  

 Sidenote  Reactionary policy in the smaller states of Europe  

257  Napoleon had been as thoroughly despotic in his government as any
of the monarchs who regained their thrones after his downfall  but he
was a son of the Revolution and had no sympathy with the ancient abuses
that it had done away with  In spite of his despotism the people of the
countries that had come under his influence had learned the great
lessons of the French Revolution  Nevertheless  the restored monarchs in
many of the smaller European states proceeded to reëstablish the ancient
feudal abuses and to treat their subjects as if there had been no French
Revolution and no such man as Napoleon  In Spain  for example  the
Inquisition and the monasteries were restored and the clergy exempted
anew from taxation  In Hesse Cassel  which had formed a part of the
kingdom of Westphalia  all the reforms introduced by Napoleon and his
brother were abolished  The privileges of the nobility  and also the
feudal burdens of the peasantry  were restored  The soldiers were even
required to assume the discarded pigtails and powdered wigs of the
eighteenth century  In Sardinia and Naples the returning monarchs
pursued the same policy of reaction  The reaction was not so sudden and
obvious in the greater European states   France  Prussia  Austria  and
Russia 

 Sidenote  The restoration of the Bourbons in France  

 Sidenote  Policy of Louis XVIII  1814 1824  

258  The French had aroused themselves in 1793 1794 to repel the foreign
powers  Austria and Prussia  who threatened to intervene in the domestic
concerns of the country  and to reëstablish the old régime  Twenty years
later  in 1814  when the allies entered Paris  there was no danger
either of a popular uprising  or of the reëstablishment of the old
abuses  It is true that the Bourbon line of kings was restored  but
France had always been monarchical at heart  It was only the ill advised
conduct of Louis XVI in the peculiar circumstances of 1791 1792 that had
led to his deposition and the establishment of a republic  which
Napoleon had easily converted into a monarchy  The new king  Louis
XVIII  left the wonderful administrative system of Napoleon intact and
made no effort to destroy the great achievements of the Revolution  He
granted the nation a constitution called the  Charter   which is a most
interesting document from two standpoints 

 Sidenote  The Charter of 1814  

In the first place  the provisions of the Charter of 1814 furnish us
with a statement of the permanent results of the Revolution  The
concessions that Louis XVIII found it expedient to make   in view of the
expectations of enlightened Europe   help us to measure the distance
that separates his time from that of his elder brother  In the second
place  no other constitution has yet lasted the French so long as did
the Charter  438  Although somewhat modified in 1830  it was maintained
down to 1848 

All Frenchmen are declared by the Charter to be equal before the law 
and equally eligible to civil and military positions  Personal and
religious liberty is insured  and all citizens  without distinction of
rank  are required to contribute to the taxes in proportion to their
means  In short  almost all the great reforms proclaimed by the first
Declaration of the Rights of Man are guaranteed  The laws are to be made
by the king in coöperation with a House of Peers and a popular body 
the Chamber of Deputies  the latter may impeach the king s ministers 

 Sidenote  Policy of the reactionary party in France  

In spite of these enlightened provisions attempts were made by the old
emigrant nobles  still led by their original leader  the king s brother 
the count of Artois  and by the clergy  to further a reaction in France 
This party induced the French  parlement  to pass certain oppressive
measures  and  as we shall see  persuaded Louis XVIII to coöperate with
the other reactionary rulers in interfering to quell the revolutionary
movements in Italy and Spain 

THE LAST BOURBON KINGS

                   Louis XIII  d  1643 
                            
                                                              
                                                              
 Louis XIV  d  1715                               Philip  Duke of Orleans
                                                              
  Louis XV  d  1774                                           
great grandson of Louis XIV                                   
                                                              
 Louis the Dauphin  d  1765                                   
                                                              
                                                              
                                                              
     Louis XVI       Louis XVIII        Charles X             
      d  1793         d  1824         deposed 1830            
                  Count of Provence   Count of Artois         
                                                              
    Louis XVII  d  1795                              Louis Philippe I 
                                                 great great grandson of
                                                  Philip  deposed 1848 

 Sidenote  Charles X deposed in 1830 and replaced by Louis Philippe  

In 1824 Louis XVIII died and was succeeded by the count of Artois  who
took the title of Charles X  Under his rule the reactionary policy of
the government naturally became more pronounced  A bill was passed
indemnifying the nobility for the property they had lost during the
Revolution  Other less just measures led to the dethronement of the
unpopular king in 1830  by a revolution  Louis Philippe  the descendant
of Henry IV through the younger  or Orleans  branch of the Bourbon
family  was put upon the throne  439 

 Sidenote  Three chief results of Napoleon s influence in Germany  

 Sidenote  Disappearance of most of the little states  

259  The chief effects of the Napoleonic occupation of Germany were
three in number  First  the consolidation of territory that followed the
cession of the left bank of the Rhine to France had  as has been
explained  done away with the anomalous ecclesiastical states  the
territories of knights  and most of the free towns  Only thirty eight
German states  including four towns  were left when the Congress of
Vienna took up the question of forming a confederation to replace the
defunct Holy Roman Empire 

 Sidenote  Advantageous position of Prussia  

Second  the external and internal conditions of Prussia had been so
changed as to open the way for it to replace Austria as the controlling
power in Germany  A great part of the Slavic possessions gained in the
last two partitions of Poland had been lost  but as an indemnity Prussia
had received half of the kingdom of Saxony  in the very center of
Germany  and also the Rhine provinces  where the people were thoroughly
imbued with the revolutionary doctrines that had prevailed in France 
Prussia now embraced all the various types of people included in the
German nation and was comparatively free from the presence of non German
races  In this respect it offered a marked contrast to the heterogeneous
and mongrel population of its great rival Austria 

The internal changes were no less remarkable  The reforms carried out
after Jena by the distinguished minister Stein and his successor 
Hardenberg  had done for Prussia somewhat the same that the first
National Assembly had done for France  The abolition of the feudal
social castes  and the liberation of the serfs made the economic
development of the country possible  The reorganization of the whole
military system prepared the way for Prussia s great victories in 1866
and 1870  which led to the formation of a new German empire under her
headship 

 Sidenote  Demand for constitutional government  

Third  the agitations of the Napoleonic period had aroused the national
spirit  The appeal to the people to aid in the freeing of their country
from foreign oppression  and the idea of their participation in a
government based upon a written constitution  had produced widespread
discontent with the old absolute monarchy 

 Sidenote  The German Confederation of 1815  

When the form of union for the German states came up for discussion at
the Congress of Vienna  two different plans were advocated  Prussia s
representatives submitted a scheme for a firm union like that of the
United States  in which the central government should control the
individual states in all matters of general interest  This idea was
successfully opposed by Austria  supported by the other German rulers 
Austria realized that her possessions  as a whole  could never be
included in any real German union  for even in the western portion of
her territory there were many Slavs  while in Hungary and the southern
provinces there were practically no Germans at all  On the other hand 
she felt that she might be the leader in a very loose union in which all
the members should be left practically independent  Her ideal of an
international union of sovereign princes under her own headship was
almost completely realized in the constitution adopted 

 Sidenote  Character of the German constitution  

The confederation was not a union of the various  countries  involved 
but of  The Sovereign Princes and Free Towns of Germany   including the
emperor of Austria and the king of Prussia for such of their possessions
as were formerly included in the German empire  the king of Denmark for
Holstein  and the king of the Netherlands for the grand duchy of
Luxembourg  The union thus included two sovereigns who were out and out
foreigners  and did not include all the possessions of its two most
important members  440 

The diet which met at Frankfort was composed  as was perfectly logical  
not of representatives of the people  but of plenipotentiaries of the
rulers who were members of the confederation  The members reserved to
themselves the right of forming alliances of all kinds  but pledged
themselves to make no agreement prejudicial to the safety of the union
or of any of its members  or to make war upon any member of the
confederation on any pretense whatsoever  The constitution could not be
amended without the approval of  all  the governments concerned  In
spite of its obvious weaknesses  the confederation of 1815 lasted for a
half a century  until Prussia finally expelled Austria from the union by
arms  and began the formation of the present German federation 

 Sidenote  Political associations of German students  

260  The liberal and progressive party in Germany was sadly disappointed
by the failure of the Congress of Vienna to weld Germany into a really
national state  They were troubled  too  by the delay of the king of
Prussia in granting the constitution that he had promised to his
subjects  Other indications were not wanting that the German princes
might not yet be ready to give up their former despotic power and adopt
the principles of the French Revolution advocated by the liberals  A
 League of Virtue  had been formed after the disastrous battle of Jena
to arouse and keep alive the zeal of the nation for expelling the
invader  This began to be reënforced  about 1815  by student
associations organized by those who had returned to their studies from
the war of independence  The students anathematized the reactionary
party in their meetings  and drank to the freedom of Germany  October
18  1817  they held a celebration in the Wartburg to commemorate both
Luther s revolt and the anniversary of the battle of Leipsic  Speeches
were made in honor of the brave who had fallen in the war of
independence  and of the grand duke of Weimar  who was the first of the
North German princes to give his people a constitution  The day closed
with the burning of certain reactionary pamphlets 

This innocent burst of enthusiasm excited great apprehension in the
minds of the conservative statesmen of Europe  the leader among whom was
the Austrian minister  Metternich  The murder by a fanatical student of
a journalist  who was supposed to have influenced the Tsar to desert his
former liberal policy  cast discredit upon the liberal party  It also
gave Metternich an opportunity to emphasize the terrible results which
he anticipated would come from the students  associations  liberal
governments  and the freedom of the press 

 Illustration  Metternich 

 Sidenote  The  Carlsbad Resolutions   1819  

The extreme phase in the progress of reaction in Germany was reached
when  with this murder as an excuse  Metternich called together the
representatives of the larger states of the confederation at Carlsbad in
August  1819  Here a series of resolutions were drawn up with the aim of
checking the free expression of opinions hostile to existing
institutions  and of discovering and bringing to justice the
revolutionists who were supposed to exist in dangerous numbers  These
 Carlsbad Resolutions  were laid before the diet by Austria and adopted 
though not without protest 

They provided that there should be a special official in each university
to watch the professors  Should any of them be found  abusing their
legitimate influence over the youthful mind and propagating harmful
doctrines hostile to the public order or subversive of the existing
governmental institutions   the offenders were to lose their positions 
The general students  union  which was suspected of being too
revolutionary  was to be suppressed  Moreover  no newspaper  magazine 
or pamphlet was to go to press without the previous approval of
government officials  who were to determine whether it contained
anything tending to foster discontent with the government  Lastly  a
special commission was appointed to investigate the revolutionary
conspiracies which Metternich and his sympathizers supposed to exist
throughout Germany  441 

The attack upon the freedom of the press  and especially the
interference with the liberty of teaching in the great institutions of
learning  which were already becoming the home of the highest
scholarship in the world  scandalized all the progressive spirits in
Germany  Yet no successful protest was raised  and Germany as a whole 
acquiesced for a generation in Metternich s system of discouraging
reform of all kinds 

 Sidenote  The southern German states receive constitutions  1818 1820  

 Sidenote  Formation of a customs union   zollverein   with Prussia at
its head  

Nevertheless  important progress was made in southern Germany  As early
as 1818 the king of Bavaria granted his people a constitution in which
he stated their rights and admitted them to a share in the government by
establishing a parliament  His example was followed within two years by
the rulers of Baden  Würtemberg  and Hesse  Another change for the
better was the gradual formation of a customs union  which permitted
goods to be sent freely from one German state to another without the
payment of duties at each boundary line  This yielded some of the
advantages of a political union  This economic union  of which Prussia
was the head  and from which Austria was excluded  was a harbinger of
the future German empire  442 

 Sidenote  Metternich opposes revolutionary movements in Spain and
Italy  

261  Metternich had met with signal success in his efforts to keep
Germany at a standstill  When  in 1820  the kings of Spain and Naples
were compelled by popular uprisings to accept constitutions  and so
surrender their ancient right to rule their subjects despotically  it
was but natural that Metternich should urge the European powers to
unite for the purpose of suppressing such manifestations  He urged that
revolts of this kind set a dangerous example and threatened the
tranquillity and security of all the other absolute monarchs 

 Sidenote  Italy only  a geographical expression  in 1820  

Italy was at this time what Metternich called only  a geographical
expression   it had no political unity whatever  Lombardy and Venetia 
in the northern part  were in the hands of Austria  and Parma  Modena 
and Tuscany belonged to members of the Austrian family  In the south 
the considerable kingdom of the Two Sicilies was ruled over by a branch
of the Spanish Bourbons  In the center  cutting the peninsula in twain 
were the Papal States  which extended north to the Po  The presence of
Austria  and the apparent impossibility of inducing the pope to submit
to any government but his own  seemed to preclude all hope of making
Italy into a true nation  Yet fifty years later the kingdom of Italy  as
it now appears on the map of Europe  came into existence through the
final exclusion of Austria from the peninsula and the extinction of the
political power of the pope 

 Sidenote  Reforms introduced in Italy during the Napoleonic
occupation  

Although Napoleon had governed Italy despotically he had introduced a
great many important reforms  He had established political equality and
an orderly administration  and had forwarded public improvements  the
vestiges of the feudal régime had vanished at his approach  Moreover  he
had held out the hope of a united Italy  from which the foreign powers
who had plagued and distracted her for centuries should be banished  But
his unscrupulous use of Italy to advance his personal ambitions
disappointed those who at first had placed their hopes in him  and they
came to look for his downfall as eagerly as did the nobility and the
dispossessed clergy  whose hopes were centered in Austria  It became
clear to the more thoughtful Italians that Italy must look to herself
and her own resources if she were ever to become an independent European
state 

 Sidenote  Reaction in Italy after Napoleon s downfall  

 Sidenote  The  Carbonari   

The downfall of Napoleon left Italy seemingly in a worse state than that
in which he had found it  The hold of Austria was strengthened by her
acquisition of Venice  The petty despots of Parma  Modena  and Tuscany 
reseated on their thrones by the Congress of Vienna  hastened to sweep
away the reforms of the Corsican and to reëstablish all the abuses of
the old régime  now doubly conspicuous and obnoxious by reason of their
temporary abolition  The lesser Italian princes  moreover  showed
themselves to be heartily in sympathy with the hated Austria  Popular
discontent spread throughout the peninsula and led to the formation of
numerous secret societies  which assumed strange names  practiced
mysterious rites  and plotted darkly in the name of Italian liberty and
independence  By far the most noted of these associations was that of
the  Carbonari   i e   charcoal burners  Its objects were individual
liberty  constitutional government  and national independence and unity 
these it undertook to promote by agitation  conspiracy  and  if
necessary  by revolution 

 Sidenote  Temporary constitutions in Spain and Naples  1820  

The Italian agitators had a superstitious respect for a constitution 
they appear to have regarded it not so much as a form of government to
be carefully adapted to the needs of a particular country and time  as a
species of talisman which would insure liberty and prosperity to its
happy possessor  So when the Neapolitans heard that the king of Spain
had been forced by an insurrection to grant a constitution  they made
the first attempt on the part of the Italian people to gain
constitutional liberty by compelling their king to agree to accept the
Spanish constitution  July  1820   However  at the same time that he was
invoking the vengeance of God upon his own head should he violate his
oath of fidelity to the constitution  he was casting about for foreign
assistance to suppress the revolution and enable him to return to his
old ways 

 Sidenote  Austria intervenes in Italy  1821   in support of
absolutism  

262  He had not long to wait  The alert Metternich invited Russia 
Prussia  France  and England to unite in order to check the development
of  revolt and crime   He declared that the liberal movements  if
unrestrained  would prove  not less tyrannical and fearful  in their
results than that against which the allies had combined in the person of
Napoleon   Revolution  appeared to him and his conservative sympathizers
as heresy appeared to Philip II   it was a fearful disease that not only
destroyed those whom it attacked directly  but spread contagion wherever
it appeared and justified prompt and sharp measures of quarantine and
even violent intervention with a view of stamping out the devastating
plague 

To the great joy of the king of Naples  Austria marched its troops into
his territory  March  1821  and  meeting but an ill organized
opposition  freed him from the limitations which his subjects had for
the moment imposed upon him  An attempt on the part of the subjects of
the king of Sardinia to win a constitution was also repressed by
Austrian troops 

 Sidenote  Hopeful signs in Italy  

The weakness of the liberal movement in both southern and northern Italy
appeared to be conclusively demonstrated  A new attempt ten years later 
in Piedmont  443  Modena  and the Papal States  to get rid of the
existing despotism was quite as futile as the revolution of 1820 1821 
Yet there were two hopeful signs  England protested as early as 1820
against Metternich s theory of interfering in the domestic affairs of
other independent states in order to prevent reforms of which he
disapproved  and France emphatically repudiated the doctrine of
intervention on the accession of Louis Philippe in 1830  A second and
far more important indication of progress was the increasing conviction
on the part of the Italians that their country ought to be a single
nation and not  as hitherto  a group of small independent states under
foreign influence 

 Sidenote  Mazzini  1805 1872  

A great leader arose in the person of the delicately organized and
highly endowed Mazzini  He quickly became disgusted with the
inefficiency and the silly mystery of the Carbonari  and founded a new
association  called  Young Italy   This aimed to bring about the
regeneration of Italy through the education of the young men in lofty
republican principles  Mazzini had no confidence in princes and treaties
and foreign aid   We are of the people and will treat with the people 
They will understand us   he said  He was not the man to organize a
successful revolution  but he inspired the young Italians with an almost
religious enthusiasm for the cause of Italy s liberation  His writings 
which were widely read throughout the peninsula  created a feeling of
loyalty to a common country among the patriots who were scattered
through the different states of Italy  444 

 Sidenote  Plan of uniting Italy under the headship of the pope  

 Sidenote  Early reforms of Pius IX  pope  1846 1878   

There was a great diversity of opinion among the reformers as to the
best way to make Italy into a nation  Mazzini s party saw no hope except
in republican institutions  but others were confident that an
enlightened pope could form an Italian federation  of which he should be
the head  And when Pius IX  upon his accession in 1846  immediately
began to consult the interests and wishes of his people by subjecting
priests to taxation  admitting laymen to his councils and tribunals 
granting greater liberty of the press  and even protesting against
Austrian encroachments  there seemed to be some ground for the belief
that the pope might take the lead in the regeneration of Italy  But he
soon grew suspicious of the liberals  and the outcome furnished one more
proof of the sagacity of Machiavelli  who had pointed out over three
centuries earlier that the temporal possessions of the pope constituted
the chief obstacle to Italian unity 

The future belonged neither to the republicans nor to the papal party 
but to those who looked for salvation in the gradual reformation of the
existing monarchies  especially of the kingdom of Sardinia  Only in this
way was there any prospect of ousting Austria  and without that no
union  whether federal or otherwise  could possibly be formed 

 Sidenote  Reason of Austria s influence after the Congress of Vienna  

From 1815 to 1848 those who believed in keeping things as they were at
any cost were able  under the leadership of Metternich  to oppose pretty
successfully those who from time to time attempted to secure for the
people a greater control of the government and to satisfy the craving
for national life  This did not mean  of course  that no progress was
made during this long period in realizing the ideals of the liberal
party in the various European states  or that one man can block the
advance of nations for a generation  The very fact that Austria had 
after the Congress of Vienna  assumed the leading rôle in Europe that
France had played during the period following the Revolution of 1789  is
a sufficient indication that Metternich s aversion to change
corresponded to a general conviction that it was best  for the time
being  to let well enough alone 

 Sidenote  Creation of the kingdom of Greece  1829  

Two events  at least  during the period of Metternich s influence served
to encourage the liberals of Europe  In 1821 the inhabitants of Greece
had revolted against the oppressive government of the Turks  The Turkish
government set to work to suppress the revolt by atrocious massacres  It
is said that twenty thousand of the inhabitants of the island of Chios
were slaughtered  The Greeks  however  succeeded in arousing the
sympathy of western Europe  and they held out until England  Russia  and
France intervened and forced the Sultan to recognize the independence of
Greece in 1829  445 

 Sidenote  Belgium becomes an independent kingdom in 1831  

Another little kingdom was added to the European states by the revolt of
the former Austrian Netherlands from the king of Holland  to whom they
had been assigned by the Congress of Vienna  The southern Netherlands
were still as different from the northern as they had been in the time
of William the Silent  446  Holland was Protestant and German  while the
southern provinces  to whom the union had always been distasteful  were
Catholic and akin to the French in their sympathies  Encouraged by the
revolution at Paris in 1830  the people of Brussels rose in revolt
against their Dutch king  and forced his troops to leave the city 
Through the influence of England and France the European powers agreed
to recognize the independence of the Belgians  who established a kingdom
and introduced an excellent constitution providing for a limited
monarchy modeled upon that of England 




CHAPTER XL

THE UNIFICATION OF ITALY AND GERMANY


 Sidenote  The general revolutionary movement in western Europe in
1848  

263  In 1848 the gathering discontent and the demand for reform suddenly
showed their full strength and extent  it seemed for a time as if all
western Europe was about to undergo as complete a revolution as France
had experienced in 1789  With one accord  and as if obeying a
preconcerted signal  the liberal parties in France  Italy  Germany  and
Austria  during the early months of 1848  overthrew or gained control of
the government  and proceeded to carry out their programme of reform in
the same thoroughgoing way in which the National Assembly in France had
done its work in 1789  The general movement affected almost every state
in Europe  but the course of events in France  and in that part of
central Europe which had so long been dominated by Austria  merits
especial attention 

 Sidenote  The revolution of 1848 in France  

 Sidenote  Unpopularity of Louis Philippe among the republicans  

The revolutionary movements of 1848 did not begin in France  but in
Italy  yet it was the dethronement of Louis Philippe and the
establishment of a second French republic that gave the signal for the
general European revolt  The Charter of 1814 had been only slightly
modified after the revolution of 1830  in spite of the wishes of the
republicans who had been active in bringing about the deposition of
Charles X  They maintained that the king had too much power and could
influence the  parlement  to make laws contrary to the wishes of the
people at large  They also protested against the laws which excluded the
poorer classes from voting  only two hundred thousand among a population
of thirty million enjoyed that right   and demanded that every
Frenchman should have the right to vote so soon as he reached maturity 
As Louis Philippe grew older he became more and more suspicious of the
liberal parties which had helped him to his throne  He not only opposed
reforms himself  but also did all he could to keep the  parlement  and
the newspapers from advocating any changes which the progressive parties
demanded  Nevertheless the strength of the republicans gradually
increased  They found allies in a new group of socialistic writers who
desired a fundamental reorganization of the state 

 Sidenote  The second French republic proclaimed February 27  1848  

On February 24  1848  a mob attacked the Tuilleries  The king abdicated
in favor of his grandson  but it was too late  he and his whole family
were forced to leave the country  The mob invaded the assembly  as in
the time of the Reign of Terror  crying   Down with the Bourbons  old
and new  Long live the Republic   A provisional government was
established which included the writer  Lamartine  Louis Blanc  a
prominent socialist  two or three editors  and several other
politicians  The first decree of this body  ratifying the establishment
of the republic  was solemnly proclaimed on the former site of the
Bastile  February 27 

 Sidenote  The social democrats and the  red republic   

 Sidenote  National workshops established  

The provisional government was scarcely in session before it was
threatened by the  red republic   Its representatives  the social
democrats  desired to put the laboring classes in control of the
government and let them conduct it in their own interests  Some
advocated community of property  and wished to substitute the red flag
for the national colors  The government went so far as to concede the
so called  right to labor   and established national workshops  in which
all the unemployed were given an opportunity to work 

 Sidenote  The insurrection in Paris  June  1848  

A National Assembly had been convoked whose members were elected by a
popular vote of all Frenchmen above the age of twenty one  The result of
the election was an overwhelming defeat for the social democrats  Their
leaders then attempted to overthrow the new assembly on the pretext
that it did not represent the people  but the national guard frustrated
the attempt  The number of men now enrolled in the national workshops
had reached one hundred and seventeen thousand  each of whom received
two francs a day in return for either useless labor or mere idleness 
The abolition of this nuisance led to a serious revolt  Battle raged in
the streets of Paris for three days  and over ten thousand persons were
killed 

 Sidenote  Louis Napoleon elected president  

 Sidenote  Establishment of the second empire  1852  

This wild outbreak of the forces of revolution resulted in a general
conviction that a strong hand was essential to the maintenance of peace 
The new constitution decreed that the president of the republic should
be chosen by the people at large  Their choice fell upon the nephew of
Napoleon Bonaparte  Louis Napoleon  who had already made two futile
attempts to make himself the ruler of France  Before the expiration of
his four years  term he succeeded  by a  coup d état  on the anniversary
of the coronation of his uncle  December 2  1851   in setting up a new
government  He next obtained  by means of a plebiscite  447  the consent
of the people to his remaining president for ten years  A year later
 1852  the second empire was established  and Napoleon III became
 Emperor of the French by the grace of God and the will of the people  

 Sidenote  Austria s commanding position in central Europe  

264  When Metternich heard of the February revolution of 1848 in France 
he declared that  Europe finds herself to day in the presence of a
second 1793   This was not true  however  It was no longer necessary for
France to promote liberal ideas by force of arms  as in 1793  For sixty
years ideas of reform had been spreading in Europe  and by the year 1848
they were accepted by a great majority of the people  from Berlin to
Palermo  The Europe of 1848 was no longer the Europe of 1793 

The overthrow of Louis Philippe encouraged the opponents of Metternich
in Germany  Austria  and Italy to attempt to make an end of his system
at once and forever  In view of the important part that Austria had
played in central Europe since the fall of Napoleon I  it was inevitable
that she should appear the chief barrier to the attainment of national
unity and liberal government in Italy and Germany  As ruler of Lombardy
and Venetia she practically controlled Italy  and as presiding member of
the German Confederation she had been able to keep even Prussia in line 
It is not strange that Austria felt that she could make no concessions
to the spirit of nationality  for the territories belonging to the house
of Hapsburg  some twenty in number  were inhabited by four different
races   Germans  Slavs  Hungarians  and Italians  448  The Slavs
 especially the Bohemians  and the Hungarians longed for national
independence  as well as the Italians 

 Sidenote  Overthrow of Metternich  March  1848  

On March 13 the populace of Vienna rose in revolt against their
old fashioned government  Metternich fled  and all his schemes for
opposing reform appeared to have come to naught  Before the end of the
month the helpless Austrian emperor had given his permission to the
kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia to draw up constitutions for themselves
incorporating the longed for reforms  equality of all classes in the
matter of taxation  religious freedom  liberty of the press  and the
rest   and providing that each country should have a parliament of its
own  which should meet annually  The Austrian provinces were promised
similar advantages  None of these regions  however  showed any desire to
throw off their allegiance to the Austrian ruler 

 Sidenote  Beginning of Italian war of independence  

The rising in northern Italy  on the contrary  was directed to that
particular end  Immediately on the news of Metternich s fall the
Milanese expelled the Austrian troops from their city  and soon Austria
had evacuated a great part of Lombardy  The Venetians followed the lead
of Milan and set up a republic once more  The Milanese  anticipating a
struggle  appealed to Charles Albert  King of Sardinia  for aid  By
this time a great part of Italy was in revolt  Constitutions were
granted to Naples  Rome  Tuscany  and Piedmont by their rulers  The king
of Sardinia was forced by public opinion to assume the leadership in the
attempt to expel the interloping Austria and ultimately  perhaps  to
found some sort of an Italian union which should satisfy the longings
for national unity  The pope and even the Bourbon king of Naples were
induced to consent to the arming and dispatch of troops in the cause of
Italian freedom  and Italy began its first war for independence 

 Sidenote  The liberal movement in Germany in 1848  

The crisis at home and the Italian war made it impossible for Austria to
prevent the progress of revolution in Germany  So spontaneous was the
movement  that before the fall of Metternich reform movements had begun
in Baden  Würtemberg  Bavaria  and Saxony  The opportunity seemed to
have come  now that Austria was hopelessly embarrassed  to reorganize
the German Confederation 

 Sidenote  Frederick William IV  1840 1861  of Prussia takes the lead in
the reform movement in Germany  

The king of Prussia  seeing his opportunity  suddenly reversed his
policy of obedience to the dictates of Austria  and determined to take
the lead in Germany  He agreed to summon an assembly to draw up a
constitution for Prussia  Moreover  a great national assembly was
convoked at Frankfurt to draft a constitution for Germany at large 

265  By the end of March  1848  the prospects of reform were bright
indeed  Hungary and Bohemia had been guaranteed constitutional
independence  the Austrian provinces awaited their promised
constitution  Lombardy and Venetia had declared their independence of
Austria  four Italian states had obtained their longed for
constitutions  and all were ready for a war with Austria  Prussia was
promised a constitution  and lastly  the National Assembly at Frankfurt
was about to prepare a constitution for a united Germany 

 Sidenote  Conservatives and radicals both help to frustrate the
realization of the proposed reforms  

The moderate reformers who had gained these seeming victories had 
however  only just reached the most difficult part of their task  They
had two kinds of enemies  who abhorred each other but who effectually
combined to undo the work of the moderates  These were  first  the
conservative party  represented by Austria and the Italian rulers who
had been forced most reluctantly to grant constitutions to their
subjects  and  secondly  the radicals  who were not satisfied with the
prospect of a liberal monarchy and desired a republican or socialistic
form of government  While the princes were recovering from the
astonishing humiliations of March  the radicals began to discredit the
revolutionary movement and alienate public opinion by fantastic
programmes and the murder of hostile ministers 

 Sidenote  Defeat of the Italians under Charles Albert of Sardinia 
July  1848  

For the moment Austria s chief danger lay in Italy  which was the only
one of her dependencies that had actually taken up arms against her  The
Italians had been unable to drive out the Austrian army  which  under
the indomitable general  Radetzky  had taken refuge in the so called
Quadrilateral  in the neighborhood of Mantua  where it was protected by
four great fortresses  Charles Albert of Sardinia found himself  with
the exception of a few volunteers  almost unsupported by the other
Italian states  The best ally of Austria was the absence of united
action upon the part of the Italians  and the jealousy and indifference
that they showed as soon as war had actually begun  The pope decided
that his mission was one of peace and that he could not afford to join
in a war against Austria  the stoutest ally of the Roman church  The
king of Naples easily found a pretext for recalling the troops that
public opinion had compelled him to send to the aid of the king of
Sardinia  Charles Albert was defeated at Custozza  July 25  and
compelled to sign a truce with Austria and withdraw his forces from
Lombardy 

 Sidenote  Policy of the Italian republicans  

The Italian republicans  who had imputed to Charles Albert merely
personal motives in his efforts to free Italy  now attempted to carry
out their own programme  Florence  as well as Venice  proclaimed itself
a republic  At Rome the liberal and enlightened Rossi  whom the pope had
put at the head of affairs  was assassinated in November just as he was
ready to promulgate his reforms  The pope fled from the city and put
himself under the protection of the king of Naples  A constitutional
assembly was then convoked by the revolutionists  and under the
influence of Mazzini  in February  1849  it declared the temporal power
of the pope abolished and proclaimed the Roman republic 

 Sidenote  Hostility between the Germans and Czechs in Bohemia  

266  Meanwhile the conditions in Austria began to be favorable to a
reëstablishment of the emperor s former influence  Race rivalry proved
his friend in his Austrian domains just as republicanism tended to his
ultimate advantage in Italy  The Czechs 449  in Bohemia hated the
Germans in 1848  much as they had hated them in the time of Huss  The
German part of the population naturally opposed the plan of making
Bohemia practically independent of the government at Vienna  for it was
to German Vienna that they were wont to look for protection against the
enterprises of their Czechish fellow countrymen  The Germans wanted to
send delegates to the Frankfurt convention  and to maintain the union
between Bohemia and the German states 

 Sidenote  The Pan Slavic Congress of 1848  

 Sidenote  Beginnings of revolt in Bohemia suppressed  

The Czechs determined to offset the movement toward German consolidation
by a Pan Slavic Congress  which should bring together the various Slavic
peoples comprised in the Austrian empire  To this assembly  which met in
Prague in June  1848  came delegates from the Czechs  Moravians 
Ruthenians  and Poles in the north  and the Servians and Croatians in
the south  Its deliberations were interrupted by an insurrection that
broke out among the people of Prague and gave the commander of the
Austrian forces a sufficient excuse for intervening  He established a
military government  and the prospect of independence for Bohemia
vanished  This was Austria s first real victory 

 Sidenote  The Slavic peoples revolt against Hungary  

The eastern and southern portion of the Hapsburg domains were not more
homogeneous than the west and north  When a constitution was granted to
Hungary it was inevitable that the races which the Hungarians  Magyars 
had long dominated should begin to consider how they might gain the
right to govern themselves  The Slavs inhabiting Carniola  Carinthia 
Istria  Croatia  Slavonia  Bosnia  and Servia had long meditated upon
the possibility of a united Slavic kingdom in the south  Both the
Servians and Croatians now revolted against Hungary  Like the Germans in
Bohemia  the Servians and Croatians were on the whole friendly to the
Vienna government  from which they had less to fear than from the
establishment of Hungarian independence  which would put them at the
mercy of the Magyars  It was  therefore  with the support of the
Austrian ministry that an army of Servians and Croatians crossed into
Hungary in September 

 Illustration  The Various Races of Austro Hungary 

 Sidenote  Insurrection of the radicals in Vienna suppressed  

 Sidenote  Accession of Francis Joseph I  1848   

In October  1848  the radical party rose in Vienna as it had in Paris
after the deposition of Louis Philippe  The minister of war was brutally
murdered and the emperor fled  The city was  however  besieged by the
same commander who had put down the insurrection in Prague  and was
forced to surrender  The imperial government was now in a position still
further to strengthen itself  The emperor  a notoriously inefficient
person  was forced to abdicate  December 2  1848  in favor of his
youthful nephew  Francis Joseph I  who still sits upon the Austrian
throne  Moreover  a new Metternich appeared in the person of
Schwarzenberg 

 Sidenote  Suppression of Hungarian republic  

 Sidenote  Final peaceful union between Austria and Hungary  1867  

A vigorous campaign was begun against Hungary  which  under the
influence of the patriotic Kossuth  had deposed its Hapsburg king and
declared itself an independent republic under the presidency of Kossuth 
The Tsar placed his forces at the disposal of Francis Joseph  and with
the aid of an army of one hundred and fifty thousand Russians  who
marched in from the east  the Hungarians were compelled  by the middle
of August  to surrender  Austria took terrible vengeance upon the
rebels  Thousands were hung  shot  and imprisoned  and many  including
Kossuth  fled to the United States or elsewhere  But within a few years
Hungary won its independence by peaceful measures  and it is now on
exactly the same footing as the western dominions of Francis Joseph in
the dual federation of Austria Hungary 

 Sidenote  Austria defeats the king of Sardinia at Novara  March  1849  

 Sidenote  Accession of Victor Emmanuel as king of Sardinia  

It remained for Austria to reëstablish her prestige in Italy and in the
German Confederation  In March  1849  Charles Albert renewed the war
which had been discontinued after the defeat at Custozza  The campaign
lasted but five days and closed with his crushing and definitive defeat
at Novara  March 23   which put an end to the hopes of Italian liberty
for the time being  Charles Albert abdicated in favor of his son  Victor
Emmanuel  who was destined before many years to become king of Italy 

 Sidenote  Austria reëstablishes the former conditions in Italy  except
in Piedmont  

After bringing the king of Sardinia to terms  Austria pushed southward 
reëstablishing the old order as she went  The ephemeral Italian
republics were unable to offer any effectual resistance  The former
rulers were restored in Rome  Tuscany  and Venice  and the constitutions
were swept away from one end of the peninsula to the other  except in
Piedmont  the most important part of the king of Sardinia s realms 
There Victor Emmanuel not only maintained the representative government
introduced by his father  but  by summoning to his councils d Azeglio
and others known throughout Italy for their liberal sentiments  he
prepared to lead Italy once more against her foreign oppressors 

 Sidenote  Question of the extent of the proposed union  

 Sidenote  Impossibility of a German state which should include both
Austria and Prussia  

267  In Germany  as elsewhere  Austria profited by the dissensions among
her opponents  On May 18  1848  the National Assembly  consisting of
nearly six hundred representatives of the German people  had met at
Frankfurt  It immediately began the consideration of a new constitution
that should satisfy the popular longings for a great free German state 
to be governed by and for the people  But what were to be the confines
of this new German state  The confederation of 1815 did not include all
the German inhabitants of Prussia  and did include the heterogeneous
western possessions of Austria   Bohemia and Moravia  for example  where
a great part of the people were Slavs  There was no hesitation in
deciding that all the Prussian territories should be admitted to the new
union  As it appeared impossible to exclude Austria altogether  the
Assembly agreed to include those parts of her territory which had
belonged to the confederation formed in 1815  This decision rendered the
task of founding a real German state practically impossible  for the new
union was to include two great European powers who might at any moment
become rivals  since Prussia would hardly consent to be led forever by
Austria  So heterogeneous a union could only continue to be  as it had
been  a loose confederation of practically independent princes 

 Sidenote  The Assembly at Frankfurt gives Austria time to recover  

The improbability that the Assembly at Frankfurt would succeed in its
undertaking was greatly increased by its unwise conduct  Instead of
proceeding immediately to frame a new form of government  it devoted
several months to the formulation of the general rights of the German
citizen  This gave a fine opportunity to the theorists  of which there
were many in the Assembly  to ventilate their views  and by the time
that the constitution itself came up for discussion  Austria had begun
to regain her influence and was ready to lead the conservative forces
once more  She could rely upon the support of the rulers of South
Germany  for they were well satisfied with the old confederation and the
independence that it gave them 

 Sidenote  The Assembly asks the king of Prussia to become emperor of
Germany  

 Sidenote  Frederick William IV refuses the imperial crown  

In spite of her partiality for the old union  Austria could not prevent
the Assembly from completing its new constitution  This provided that
there should be an hereditary emperor at the head of the government  and
that exalted office was tendered to the king of Prussia  Frederick
William IV had been alienated from the liberal cause  which he had at
first espoused  by an insurrection in Berlin  He was  moreover  timid
and conservative at heart  he hated revolution and doubted if the
National Assembly had any right to confer the imperial title  He also
greatly respected Austria  and felt that a war with her  which was
likely to ensue if he accepted the crown  would not only be dangerous to
Prussia  since Francis Joseph could rely upon the assistance of the
Tsar  but dishonorable as well  in Austria s present embarrassment  So
he refused the honor of the imperial title and announced his rejection
of the new constitution  April  1849  

 Sidenote  The National Assembly disperses and the old diet is
restored  

This decision rendered the year s work of the National Assembly
fruitless  and its members gradually dispersed  with the exception of
the radicals  who made a last desperate effort to found a republic 
Austria now insisted upon the reëstablishment of the old diet  and
nearly came to war with Prussia over the policy to be pursued 
Hostilities were only averted by the ignominious submission of Prussia
to the demands of Schwarzenberg in 1851 

 Sidenote  Results of the revolutions of 1848  

While the revolutions of 1848 seem futile enough when viewed from the
standpoint of the hopes of March  they left some important indications
of progress  The king of Prussia had granted his country a constitution 
which  with some modifications  has served Prussia down to the present
day  Piedmont also had obtained a constitution  The internal reforms 
moreover  which these countries speedily introduced  prepared them to
head once more  and this time with success  a movement for national
unity 

It will be noted that the revolution of 1848 aimed to do more than the
French Revolution of 1789  Not only was the national question everywhere
an important one  but there were plans for the economic reorganization
of society  It was no longer simply a matter of abolishing the remnants
of feudalism and insuring equal rights to all and the participation of
the more prosperous classes in the government  Those who lived by the
labor of their hands and were employed in the vast industries that had
developed with the application of steam machinery to manufacture also
had their spokesmen  The relation of the state to the industrial
classes  and of capital to labor  had become  as they still are  the
great problems of modern times 

 Sidenote  Decline of Austrian influence after 1851  

In 1851 Austria had once more  in spite of the greatest obstacles 
established the system of Metternich  But this victory was of short
duration  and it was her last  Five years later the encroachments of
Russia in Turkey brought on the Crimean War  of which something will be
said later  In this war Austria observed an inglorious neutrality  she
thereby sacrificed much of her prestige with both Russia and the western
powers  and encouraged renewed attempts to free both Italy and Germany
from her control 

 Sidenote  Development of Piedmont under Cavour  

268  Under Victor Emmanuel and his great minister  Cavour  Piedmont had
rapidly developed into a modern state  It sent a contingent to the aid
of the western powers in the Crimean War waged by France and England
against Russia  1853 1856   it developed its resources  military and
economic  and at last found an ally to help it in a new attempt to expel
Austria from Italy 

 Sidenote  Position and policy of Napoleon III  

Napoleon III  like his far more distinguished uncle  was a usurper  He
knew that he could not rely upon mere tradition  but must maintain his
popularity by deeds that should redound to the glory of France  A war
with Austria for the liberation of the Italians  who like the French
were a Latin race  would be popular  especially if France could thereby
add a bit of territory to her realms  and perhaps become the protector
of the proposed Italian confederation  A conference was arranged between
Napoleon and Cavour  Just what agreement was reached we do not know  but
Napoleon no doubt engaged to come to the aid of the king of Sardinia 
should the latter find a pretense for going to war with Austria  Should
they together succeed in expelling Austria from northern Italy  the king
of Sardinia was to reward France by ceding to her Savoy and Nice  which
both geographically and racially belonged to her 

 Illustration  Cavour 

 Sidenote  Victories of Victor Emmanuel and Napoleon III over Austria  

By April  1859  Victor Emmanuel had managed to involve himself in a war
with Austria  The French army promptly joined forces with the
Piedmontese  defeated the Austrians at Magenta  and on June 8  Napoleon
III and Victor Emmanuel entered Milan amid the rejoicings of the
people  The Austrians managed the campaign very badly  and were again
defeated at Solferino  June 24  

 Sidenote  Napoleon III alarmed by the Italian successes  

Suddenly Europe was astonished to hear that a truce had been concluded 
and that the preliminaries of a peace had been arranged which left
Venetia in Austria s hands  in spite of Napoleon III s boast that he
would free Italy to the Adriatic  The French emperor had begun to fear
that  with the growing enthusiasm which was showing itself throughout
the peninsula for Piedmont  there was danger that it might succeed in
forming a national kingdom so strong as to need no French protector  By
leaving Venetia in possession of Austria  and agreeing that Piedmont
should only be increased by the incorporation of Lombardy and the little
duchies of Parma and Modena  Napoleon III hoped to prevent the
consolidation of Italy from proceeding too far 

 Sidenote  The formation of a kingdom of Italy  1860  

He had  however  precipitated changes which he was powerless to check 
Italy was now ready to fuse into a single state  Tuscany  as well as
Modena and Parma  voted  March  1860  to unite with Piedmont  Garibaldi 
a famous republican leader  sailed for Sicily  where he assumed the
dictatorship of the island in the name of Victor Emmanuel   King of
Italy   After expelling the troops of the king of Naples from Sicily  he
crossed to the mainland  and early in September he entered Naples
itself  just as the king fled from his capital 

 Sidenote  Napoleon III intervenes to prevent the annexation of Rome to
the kingdom of Italy  

Garibaldi now proposed to march on Rome and proclaim the kingdom of
Italy from the Quirinal  This would have imperiled all the previous
gains  for Napoleon III could not  in view of the strong Catholic
sentiment in France  possibly permit the occupation of Rome and the
destruction of the political independence of the pope  He agreed that
Victor Emmanuel might annex the outlying papal possessions to the north
and reëstablish a stable government in Naples instead of Garibaldi s
dictatorship  But Rome  the imperial city  with the territory
immediately surrounding it  must be left to its old master  Victor
Emmanuel accordingly marched southward and occupied Naples  October  
Its king capitulated and all southern Italy became a part of the kingdom
of Italy 

In February  1861  the first Italian parliament was opened at Turin  and
the process of really amalgamating the heterogeneous portions of the new
kingdom began  Yet the joy of the Italians over the realization of their
hopes of unity and national independence was tempered by the fact that
Austria still held one of the most famous of the Italian provinces  and
that Rome  which typified Italy s former grandeur  was not included in
the new kingdom  Within a decade  however  both these districts became a
part of the kingdom of Italy through the action of Prussia  William I
and his extraordinary minister and adviser  Bismarck  were about to do
for Germany what Victor Emmanuel and Cavour had accomplished for
Italy  450 

 Sidenote  William I of Prussia  1861 1888  

269  With the accession of William I in 1858  451  a new era dawned for
Prussia  A practical and vigorous man had come into power  whose great
aim was to expel Austria from the German Confederation  and out of the
remaining states to construct a firm union  under the leadership of
Prussia  which should take its place among the most powerful of the
states of Europe  He saw that war would come sooner or later  and his
first business was to develop the military resources of his realms 

 Sidenote  William I s plan for strengthening the army  

The German army  which was the outgrowth of the early reforms of William
I  is so extraordinary a feature of the Europe of to day  that its
organization merits attention  The war of independence against Napoleon
in 1813 had led to the summoning of the nation to arms  and a law was
passed in Prussia making military service a universal obligation of
every healthy male citizen  The first thing that William I did was to
increase the annual levy from forty to sixty thousand men  and to see
that all the soldiers remained in active service three years  They then
passed into the reserve  according to the existing law  where for two
years more they remained ready at any time to take up arms should it be
necessary  William wished to increase the term of service in the reserve
to four years  In this way the state would claim seven of the years of
early manhood and have an effective army of four hundred thousand  which
would permit it to dispense with the service of those who were
approaching middle life  The lower house of the Prussian parliament
refused  however  to make the necessary appropriations for increasing
the strength of the army 

 Sidenote  Bismarck and his struggle with the Prussian parliament  

The king proceeded  nevertheless  with his plan  and in 1862 called to
his side one of the most extraordinary statesmen of modern times 
Bismarck  The new minister conceived a scheme for laying Austria low and
exalting Prussia  which he succeeded in carrying out with startling
precision  He could not  however  reveal it to the lower chamber  he
would  indeed  scarcely hint its nature to the king himself  In defiance
of the lower house and of the newspapers  he carried on the
strengthening of the army without formal appropriations  on the theory
that the constitution had not provided for a dead lock between the upper
and lower house  and that consequently the king might exercise  in such
a case  his former absolute power  For a time it seemed as if Prussia
was returning to a pure despotism  for there was assuredly no more
fundamental provision of the constitution than the right of the people
to control the granting of the taxes  Yet Bismarck was eventually fully
exonerated by public opinion  and it was generally agreed that the end
had amply justified the means 

 Sidenote  The Schleswig Holstein affair  

270  Prussia now had a military force that appeared to justify the hope
of victory should she undertake a war with her old rival  In order to
bring about the expulsion of Austria from the confederation  Bismarck
took advantage of a knotty problem that had been troubling Germany  and
which was known as the Schleswig Holstein affair  The provinces of
Schleswig and Holstein  although inhabited largely by Germans  had for
centuries belonged to the king of Denmark  They were allowed  however 
to retain their provincial assemblies  and were not considered a part of
Denmark any more than Hanover was a part of Great Britain in the last
century 

In 1847  just when the growing idea of nationality was about to express
itself in the Revolution of 1848  the king of Denmark proclaimed that he
was going to make these German provinces an integral part of the Danish
kingdom  This aroused great indignation throughout Germany  especially
as Holstein was a member of the confederation  Frederick William IV
consented to go to war with Denmark  but only succeeded in delaying for
a few years the proposed absorption of the provinces by Denmark  The
constant encroachments of the government at Copenhagen upon the
privileges claimed by Schleswig Holstein aroused new apprehension and
much discontent  In 1863 Schleswig was finally incorporated into the
Danish kingdom 

 Sidenote  Bismarck s audacious plan for the expulsion of Austria from
Germany  

 From this time the history of Germany is the history of the profound
and audacious statecraft and of the overmastering will of Bismarck  the
nation  except through its valour on the battlefield  ceases to
influence the shaping of its own fortunes  What the German people
desired in 1864 was that Schleswig Holstein should be attached  under a
ruler of its own  to the German Federation as it then existed  what
Bismarck intended was that Schleswig Holstein  itself incorporated more
or less directly with Prussia  should be made the means of the
destruction of the existing Federal system and of the expulsion of
Austria from Germany     The German people desired one course of action 
Bismarck had determined on something totally different  with matchless
resolution and skill he bore down all the opposition of people and of
the  European  courts  and forced a reluctant nation to the goal which
he himself had chosen for it   Fyffe  

 Illustration  Bismarck 

 Sidenote  The working out of the plan  

Bismarck s first step was to invite Austria to coöperate with Prussia in
settling the Schleswig Holstein difficulty  As Denmark refused to make
any concessions  the two powers declared war  defeated the Danish army 
and forced the king of Denmark to cede Schleswig Holstein to the rulers
of Prussia and Austria jointly  October  1864   They were to make such
disposition of the provinces as they saw fit  There was now no trouble
in picking a quarrel with Austria  Bismarck suggested the nominal
independence of the duchies  but that they should become practically a
part of Prussia  This plan was of course indignantly rejected by
Austria  and it was arranged that  pending an adjustment  Austria should
govern Holstein  and Prussia  Schleswig 

 Sidenote  Prussia declares the German Confederation dissolved  

Bismarck now obtained the secret assurance of Napoleon III that he would
not interfere if Prussia and Italy should go to war with Austria  In
April  1866  Italy agreed that  should the king of Prussia take up arms
during the following three months with the aim of reforming the German
union  it too would immediately declare war on Austria  with the hope 
of course  of obtaining Venice  The relations between Austria and
Prussia grew more and more strained  until finally in June  1866 
Austria induced the diet to call out the forces of the confederation
with a view of making war on Prussia  This act the representative of
Prussia declared put an end to the existing union  He accordingly
submitted to the diet Prussia s scheme for the reformation of Germany
and withdrew from the diet 

 Sidenote  War declared between Prussia and Austria  

271  On June 12 war was declared between Austria and Prussia  With the
exception of Mecklenburg and the small states of the north  all Germany
sided with Austria against Prussia  Bismarck immediately demanded of the
rulers of the larger North German states  Hanover  Saxony  and
Hesse Cassel  that they stop their warlike preparations and agree to
accept Prussia s plan of reform  On their refusal  Prussian troops
immediately occupied these territories  and war actually began 

 Sidenote  Prussia victorious  

So admirable was the organization of the Prussian army that  in spite of
the suspicion and even hatred which the liberal party in Prussia
entertained for the despotic Bismarck  all resistance on the part of the
states of the north was promptly prevented  Austria was miserably
defeated on July 3 in the decisive battle of Königgrätz  or Sadowa  452 
and within three weeks after the breaking off of diplomatic relations
the war was practically over  Austria s influence was at an end  and
Prussia had won her right to do with Germany as she pleased 

 Sidenote  The North German Federation  

Prussia was aware that the larger states south of the Main River were
not ripe for the union that she desired  She therefore organized a
so called North German Federation  which included all the states north
of the Main  Prussia had seized the opportunity considerably to increase
her own boundaries and round out her territory by annexing the North
German states  with the exception of Saxony  that had gone to war with
her  Hanover  Hesse Cassel  Nassau  and the free city of Frankfurt 
along with the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein  all became Prussian 

 Sidenote  Requirements of the proposed constitution  

Prussia  thus enlarged  summoned the lesser states about her to confer
upon a constitution that should accomplish four ends  First  it must
give all the people of the territory included in the new union 
regardless of the particular state in which they lived  a voice in the
government  A popular assembly satisfied this demand  Secondly  the
predominating position of Prussia must be secured  but at the same time
 thirdly  the self respect of the other monarchs whose lands were
included must not be sacrificed  In order to accomplish this double
purpose the king of Prussia was made president of the federation but not
its sovereign  The chief governing body was the Federal Council
 Bundesrath   In this each ruler  however small his state  and each of
the three free towns  Hamburg  Bremen  and Lübeck  had at least one
vote  in this way it was arranged that the other rulers did not become
 subjects  of the king of Prussia  The real sovereign of the North
German Federation and of the present German empire is not the king of
Prussia  but  all of the united governments   The votes were distributed
as in the old diet  so that Prussia  with the votes of the states that
she annexed in 1860  enjoyed seventeen votes out of forty three  Lastly 
the constitution must be so arranged that when the time came for the
southern states  Bavaria  Würtemberg  Baden  and south Hesse  to join
the union  it would be adapted to the needs of the widened empire 

The union was a true federation like that of the United States  although
its organization violated many of the rules which were observed in the
organization of the American union  It was inevitable that a union
spontaneously developed from a group of sovereign  monarchies   with
their traditions of absolutism  would be very different from one in
which the members  like the states of the American union  had previously
been governed by republican institutions 

 Sidenote  Disappointment of the hopes of Napoleon III  

272  No one was more chagrined by the abrupt termination of the war of
1866 and the victory of Prussia than Napoleon III  He had hoped that
both the combatants might be weakened by a long struggle  and that at
last he might have an opportunity to arbitrate and incidentally to gain
something for France  as had happened after the Italian war  But Prussia
came out of the conflict with greatly increased power and territory 
while France had gained nothing  An effort of Napoleon s to get a
foothold in Mexico had failed  owing to the recovery of the United
States from the Civil War and their warning that they should regard his
continued intervention there as an hostile act  453  His hopes of
annexing Luxembourg as an offset for the gains that Prussia had made 
were also frustrated 

 Sidenote  France declares war upon Prussia  July 19  1870  

One course remained for the French usurper  namely  to permit himself to
be forced into a war against the power which had especially roused the
jealousy of France  Never was an excuse offered for war more trivial
than that advanced by the French  454  never did retribution come more
speedily  The hostility which the South German states had hitherto shown
toward Prussia encouraged Napoleon III to believe that so soon as the
French troops should gain their first victory  Bavaria  Würtemberg  and
Baden would join him  That first victory was never won  War had no
sooner been declared than the Germans laid all jealousy aside and ranged
themselves as a nation against a national assailant  The French army 
moreover  was neither well equipped nor well commanded  The Germans
hastened across the Rhine  and within a few days were driving the French
before them  In a series of bloody encounters about Metz  one of the
French armies was defeated and finally shut up within the fortifications
about the town  Seven weeks had not elapsed after the beginning of the
war  before the Germans had captured a second French army and made a
prisoner of the emperor himself in the great battle of Sedan  September
1  1870  455 

 Sidenote  Siege of Paris and close of Franco Prussian War  

 Sidenote  Cession of Alsace and Lorraine to Germany  

The Germans then surrounded and laid siege to Paris  Napoleon III had
been completely discredited by the disasters about Metz and at Sedan 
and consequently the empire was abolished and France for the third time
was declared a republic  In spite of the energy which the new government
showed in arousing the French against the invaders  prolonged resistance
was impossible  The capital surrendered January 28  1871  and an
armistice was arranged  Bismarck  who had been by no means reluctant to
go to war  deeply humiliated France  in arranging the treaty of peace 
by requiring the cession of two French provinces which had formerly
belonged to Germany   Alsace and northeastern Lorraine  456  In this way
France was cut off from the Rhine  and the crest of the Vosges Mountains
was established as its boundary  The Germans exacted  further  an
enormous indemnity for the unjustifiable attack which the French had
made upon them  This was fixed at five billion francs  and German troops
were to occupy France till it was paid  The French people made pathetic
sacrifices to hasten the payment of this indemnity  in order that the
country might be freed from the presence of the hated Germans  The
bitter feeling of the French for the Germans dates from this war  and
the longing for revenge still shows itself  For many years after the war
a statue in Paris  representing the lost city of Strasburg  was draped
in mourning 

 Sidenote  The insurrection of the Paris commune of 1871  

Immediately after the surrender of Paris the new republican government
had been called upon to subdue a terrible insurrection of the Parisian
populace  The insurgents reëstablished the commune of the Reign of
Terror  and rather than let Paris come again into the hands of the
national government  they proposed to burn the city  When  after two
months of disorder  their forces were completely routed in a series of
bloody street fights  the city was actually set on fire  but only two
important public buildings were destroyed   the Palace of the Tuilleries
and the city hall 

 Sidenote  The French constitutional laws of 1875  

A National Assembly had been elected by the people in February  1871  to
make peace with Germany and to draw up a new constitution  Under this
temporary government France gradually recovered from the terrible loss
and demoralization caused by the war  There was much uncertainty for
several years as to just what form the constitution would permanently
take  for the largest party in the National Assembly was composed of
those who favored the reëstablishment of a monarchy  457  Those who
advocated maintaining the republic prevailed  however  and in 1875 the
assembly passed a series of three laws organizing the government  These
have since served France as a constitution 

 Sidenote  Character of the present French republic  

While France is nominally a republic with a president at its head  its
government closely resembles that of a limited monarchy like Belgium 
This is not strange  since the monarchists were in the majority when its
constitutional laws were passed  The French government of to day is
therefore a compromise  and since all attempts to overthrow it have
proved vain  we may assume that it is suited to the wants of the nation 

 Sidenote  Permanent character of the French government in spite of
changes in the constitution  

As one reviews the history of France since the establishment of the
first republic in 1792  it appears as if revolutionary changes of
government had been very frequent  As a matter of fact  the various
revolutions produced far less change in the system of government than is
usually supposed  They neither called in question the main provisions of
the Declaration of the Rights of Man drawn up in 1789  nor did they
materially alter the system of administration which was established by
Napoleon immediately after his accession in 1800  So long as the latter
was retained  the civil rights and equality of all citizens secured  and
the representatives of the nation permitted to control the ruler  it
really made little difference whether France was called an empire  a
constitutional monarchy  or a republic 

 Sidenote  Final unification of Germany  

 Sidenote  Proclamation of the German empire  January 18  1871  

273  The attack of France upon Prussia in 1870  instead of hindering the
development of Germany as Napoleon III had hoped it would  only served
to consummate the work of 1866  The South German states   Bavaria 
Würtemberg  Baden  and south Hesse  having sent their troops to fight
side by side with the Prussian forces  consented after their common
victory over France to join the North German Federation  Surrounded by
the German princes  William  King of Prussia and President of the North
German Federation  was proclaimed German Emperor in the palace of
Versailles  January  1871  In this way the present German empire came
into existence  With its wonderfully organized army and its mighty
chancellor  Bismarck  it immediately took a leading place among the
western powers of Europe 

 Illustration  EUROPE OF TO DAY 

 Sidenote  Predominance of Prussia in the present German empire  

The constitution of the North German Federation had been drawn up with
the hope that the southern states would later become a part of the
union  consequently  little change was necessary when the empire was
established  The king of Prussia enjoys the title of German Emperor  and
is the real head of the federation  He is not  however   emperor of
Germany   for the sovereignty is vested  theoretically  not in him  but
in the body of German rulers who are members of the union  all of whom
send their representatives to the Federal Council  Bundesrath  
Prussia s influence in the Federal Council is  however  secured by
assigning her king a sufficient number of votes to enable him to block
any measure he wishes 

 Illustration  Proclamation of the German Empire at Versailles 

 Sidenote  Rome added to the kingdom of Italy  1870  

The unification of Italy was completed  like that of Germany  by the
Franco Prussian War of 1870  After the war of 1866 Austria had ceded
Venetia to Italy  Napoleon III had  however  sent French troops in 1867
to prevent Garibaldi from seizing Rome and the neighboring districts 
which had been held by the head of the Catholic church for more than a
thousand years  In August  1870  the reverses of the war compelled
Napoleon to recall the French garrison from Rome  and the pope made
little effort to defend his capital against the Italian army  which
occupied it in September  The people of Rome voted by an overwhelming
majority to join the kingdom of Italy  and the work of Victor Emmanuel
and Cavour was consummated by transferring the capital to the Eternal
City 

 Sidenote  Position of the pope  

Although the papal possessions were declared a part of the kingdom of
Italy  a law was passed which guaranteed to the pope the rank and
privileges of a sovereign prince  He was to have his own ambassadors and
court like the other European powers  No officer of the Italian
government was to enter the Lateran or Vatican palaces upon any official
mission  As head of the church  the pope was to be entirely independent
of the king of Italy  and the bishops were not required to take the oath
of allegiance to the government  A sum of over six hundred thousand
dollars annually was also appropriated to aid the pope in defraying his
expenses  The pope  however  refused to recognize the arrangement  He
still regards himself as a prisoner  and the Italian government as a
usurper who has robbed him of his possessions  He has never accepted the
income assigned to him  and still maintains that the independence which
he formerly enjoyed as ruler of the Papal States is essential to the
best interests of the head of a great international church  458 

 Sidenote  Southeastern Europe  

274  To complete the survey of the great political changes of the
nineteenth century  we must turn for a moment to southeastern Europe 
The disposal of the European lands occupied by the Turks has proved a
very knotty international question  We have seen how the Turks were
expelled from Hungary by the end of the seventeenth century  and how
Peter the Great and his successors began to dream of acquiring
Constantinople as a Russian outpost which would enable the Tsar to
command the eastern Mediterranean  459  Catherine II  1762 1796  had
extended the Russian boundary to the Black Sea  On the whole  however 
the Turks held their own pretty well during the eighteenth century  but
the nineteenth witnessed the disruption of European Turkey into a number
of new and independent Christian states 

 Sidenote  Servia and Greece revolt from the Sultan  

The Servians first revolted successfully against their oppressors  and
forced the Sultan  1817  to permit them to manage their own affairs 
although he did not grant them absolute independence  Of the war of
independence which the Greeks waged against the Turks  1821 1829 
something has already been said  460  The intervention of Russia 
England  and France saved the insurgents from defeat  and in 1829 the
Porte recognized the independence of Greece  which became a
constitutional monarchy  The Turkish government also pledged itself to
allow vessels of all nations to pass freely through the Dardanelles and
the Bosporus 

 Sidenote  The Crimean War  1853 1856  

 Sidenote  Origin of the principality of Roumania  1859  

Inasmuch as a great part of the peoples still under Turkish rule in
Europe were  like the Russians  Slavs and adherents of the Greek church 
Russia believed that it had the best right to protect the Christians
within the Sultan s dominions from the atrocious misgovernment of the
Mohammedans  When in 1853 news reached the Tsar that the Turks were
troubling Christian pilgrims  he demanded that he be permitted to assume
a protectorate over all the Christians in Turkey  This the Porte refused
to grant  Russia declared war and destroyed the Turkish fleet in the
Black Sea  The English government looked with apprehension upon the
advance of the Russians  It felt that it would be disastrous to western
Europe if Russia were permitted to occupy the well nigh impregnable
Constantinople and send its men of war freely about the Mediterranean 
England therefore induced Napoleon III to combine with her to protect
the Sultan s possessions  The English and French troops easily defeated
the Russians  landed in the Crimea  and then laid siege to Sevastopol 
an important Russian fortress on the Black Sea  Sevastopol fell after a
long and terrible siege  and the so called Crimean War came to a close 
The intervention of the western powers had prevented the capture of
Constantinople by the Russians  but very soon the powers recognized the
practical independence of two important Turkish provinces on the lower
Danube  which were united in 1859 into the principality of Roumania 

 Sidenote  Revolt of Bosnia  1875  

The Turkish subjects in Bosnia and Herzegovina naturally envied the
happier lot of the neighboring Servians  who had escaped from the
bondage of the Turks  These provinces were stirred to revolt in 1875 
when the Turks  after collecting the usual heavy taxes  immediately
demanded the same amount over again  The oppressed Christians proposed
to escape Turkish tyranny by becoming a part of Servia  They naturally
relied upon the aid of Russia to carry out their plans  The insurrection
spread among the other Christian subjects of the Sultan  especially
those in Bulgaria 

 Sidenote  The Bulgarian atrocities  

Here the Turks wreaked vengeance upon the insurgents by atrocities which
filled Europe with horror and disgust  In a single town six thousand of
the seven thousand inhabitants were massacred with incredible cruelty 
and scores of villages were burned  Russia  joined by Roumania 
thereupon declared war upon the Porte  1877   The Turks were defeated 
but western Europe would not permit the questions at issue to be settled
without its approval  Consequently  a congress was called at Berlin
under the presidency of Bismarck  which included representatives from
Germany  Austria  Russia  England  France  Italy  and Turkey 

 Sidenote  The Congress of Berlin  1878  and the eastern question  

The Congress of Berlin determined that Montenegro  Servia  and Roumania
should thereafter be altogether independent  The latter two became
kingdoms within a few years  Roumania in 1881 and Servia in 1882  Bosnia
and Herzegovina  461  instead of becoming a part of Servia  as they
wished  were to be occupied and administered by Austria  although the
Sultan remained their nominal sovereign  Bulgaria received a Christian
government  but was forced to continue to recognize the Sultan as its
sovereign and pay him tribute  462 

To day the once wide dominions of the Sultan in Europe are reduced to
the city of Constantinople and a strip of mountainous country stretching
westward to the Adriatic 


     General Reading   In addition to the works of Andrews and Fyffe
     referred to in the footnotes  the following are excellent short
     accounts of the political history of Europe since 1815  W A 
     PHILLIPS   Modern Europe   The Macmillan Company   1 50  
     SEIGNOBOS   Political History of Europe since 1814   carefully
     edited by MacVane  Henry Holt   Co    3 00   and the readable but
     partisan German work of Müller   Political History of Recent Times 
      American Book Company   2 00   For Germany  MUNROE SMITH 
      Bismarck and German Unity   The Macmillan Company   1 00  and KUNO
     FRANCKE   History of German Literature as determined by Social
     Forces   Henry Holt   Co    2 50   For Italy  THAYER   Dawn of
     Italian Independence   Houghton  Mifflin   Co   2 vols    4 00  
     STILLMAN   Union of Italy   The Macmillan Company   1 60   COUNTESS
     CESARESCO   Liberation of Italy   Charles Scribner s Sons   1 75 
     and her  Cavour   The Macmillan Company  75 cents   For England 
     MCCARTHY   History of our Own Times   issued by various publishers 
     e g   Coates   Co   2 vols    1 50  




CHAPTER XLI

EUROPE OF TO DAY


275  The scholars and learned men of the Middle Ages were but little
interested in the world about them  They devoted far more attention to
philosophy and theology than to what we should call the natural
sciences  They were satisfied in the main to get their knowledge of
nature from reading the works of the ancients  above all of Aristotle 
Roger Bacon  as we have seen  protested against the exaggerated
veneration for books  He foresaw that a careful examination of the
things about us   like water  air  light  animals and plants   would
lead to important and useful discoveries which would greatly benefit
mankind 

 Sidenote  Modern scientific methods of discovering truth  

 Sidenote  Experimentation  

He advocated three methods of reaching truth which are now followed by
all scientific men  In the first place  he proposed that natural objects
and changes should be examined with great care  in order that the
observer might determine exactly what happened in any given case  This
has led in modern times to incredibly refined measurements and analysis 
The chemist  for example  can now determine the exact nature and amount
of every substance in a cup of impure water  which may appear perfectly
limpid to the casual observer  Then  secondly  Roger Bacon advocated
experimentation  He was not contented with mere observation of what
actually happened  but tried new and artificial combinations and
processes  Nowadays experimentation is constantly used by scientific
investigators  and by means of it they discover many things which the
most careful observation would never reveal  Thirdly  in order to carry
on investigation and make careful measurements and the desired
experiments  apparatus designed for the special purpose of discovering
truth was necessary  As early as the thirteenth century it was found 
for example  that a convex crystal or bit of glass would magnify
objects  although several centuries elapsed before the microscope and
telescope were devised 

 Sidenote  Astrology grows into astronomy  

The progress of scientific discovery was hastened  strangely enough  by
two grave misapprehensions  In the Middle Ages even the most intelligent
believed that the heavenly bodies influenced the fate of mankind 
consequently  that a careful observation of the position of the planets
at the time of a child s birth would make it possible to forecast his
life  In the same way important enterprises were only to be undertaken
when the influence of the stars was auspicious  Physicians believed that
the efficacy of their medicines depended upon the position of the
planets  This whole subject of the influence of the stars upon human
affairs was called astrology  and was in some cases taught in the
mediæval universities  Those who examined the stars gradually came 
however  to the conclusion that the movements of the planets had no
effect upon humanity  but the facts which the astrologers had discovered
through careful observation became the basis of modern astronomy 

 Sidenote  Alchemy grows into chemistry  

In the same way chemistry developed out of the mediæval study of
alchemy  The first experimentation with chemicals was carried on with
the hope of producing gold by some happy combination of less valuable
metals  But finally  after learning more about the nature of chemical
compounds  it was discovered that gold was an element  or simple
substance  and consequently could not be formed by combinations of other
substances 

 Sidenote  Discovery that the universe follows natural laws  

In short  observation and experimentation were leading to the most
fundamental of all scientific discoveries  namely  the conviction that
all the things about us follow certain natural  immutable laws  The
modern scientific investigator devotes a great part of his attention to
the discovery of these laws and their application  He has given up any
hope of reading man s fate in the stars or of producing any results by
magical combinations  Unlike the mediæval writers  he hesitates to
accept as true the reports which reach him of miracles  that is  of
exceptions to the general laws  because he is convinced that the natural
laws have been found to work regularly in every instance where they have
been carefully observed  His study of the natural laws has  however 
enabled him to produce far more marvelous results than those reported of
the mediæval magician 

 Sidenote  Galileo s telescope  

276  In a previous chapter the progress of science for three hundred
years after Roger Bacon has been briefly noted  463  With the exception
of Copernicus the investigators of this period are scarcely known to us 
In the seventeenth century  however  progress became very rapid and has
been steadily accelerating since  In astronomy  for example  the truths
which had been only suspected by earlier astronomers were demonstrated
to the eye by Galileo  1564 1642   By means of a little telescope  which
was hardly so powerful as the best modern opera glasses  he discovered
 in 1610  the spots on the sun  These made it plain that the sun was
revolving on its axis as astronomers were already convinced that the
earth revolved  He saw  too  that the moons of Jupiter were revolving
about their planet in the same way that the planets revolve about the
sun 

 Sidenote  Sir Isaac Newton and his discovery of the law of universal
gravitation  

The year that Galileo died  the famous English mathematician  Sir Isaac
Newton  was born  1642 1727   He carried on the work of earlier
astronomers by the application of higher mathematics  and proved that
the force of attraction which we call gravitation was a universal one 
and that the sun and the moon and the earth  and all the heavenly
bodies  are attracted to one another inversely as the square of the
distance 

 Sidenote  Development of the microscope  

While the telescope aided the astronomer  the microscope contributed far
more to the extension of practical knowledge  Rude and simple
microscopes were used with advantage as early as the seventeenth
century  Leeuwenhoek  a Dutch linen merchant  so far improved his lenses
that he discovered the blood corpuscles and  1665  the  animalculæ  or
minute organisms of various kinds found in pond water and elsewhere  The
microscope has been rapidly perfected since the introduction of better
kinds of lenses early in the nineteenth century  so that it is now
possible to magnify minute objects to more than two thousand times their
diameters 

 Sidenote  Advance in medical science  

This has produced the most extraordinary advance in medicine and
biology  It has made it possible to determine the difference between
healthy and diseased tissue  and not many years ago the microscope
revealed the fact that the bodies of animals and men are the home of
excessively small organisms called bacteria  some of which  through the
poisonous substances they give out  cause disease  The modern treatment
of many maladies  such as consumption  diphtheria  scarlet fever  and
typhoid  is based upon this momentous discovery  The success of surgical
operations has also been rendered far more secure than formerly by the
so called antiseptic measures which are now taken to prevent the
development of bacteria  464 

 Sidenote  Scientific discovery and invention did not affect daily life
before the end of the eighteenth century  

277  The discoveries of the scientist and of the mathematician did not
begin to be applied to the affairs of daily life until about a hundred
and fifty years ago  No new ways had previously been discovered for
traveling from place to place  Spinning and weaving were still carried
on as they had been before the barbarians overran the Roman Empire 
Iron  of which we now make our machines  could only be prepared for use
expensively and in small quantities by means of charcoal and bellows 

 Sidenote  The  domestic system  of manufacture  

Manufacture still meant  as it did in the original Latin   manu
facere    to make by hand  Artisans carried on their trade with their
own tools in their own homes  or in small shops  like the cobbler of
to day  Instead of working with hundreds of others in a great factory
and being entirely dependent upon his wages  the artisan  in England at
least  was often able to give some attention to a small garden plot from
which he derived a part of his support  This  domestic system  was
displaced by factories  as the result of a series of mechanical
inventions made in England during the latter half of the eighteenth
century  Through them machinery was substituted for hand and foot power
and for the simple implements which had served the world for centuries 

 Sidenote  Cheap iron and adequate power essential to the development of
machinery  

 Sidenote  Watt invents the steam engine  

In order that machinery should develop and become widely useful  two
things were necessary  In the first place  there must be some strong
material available of which to make the machines  for that purpose iron
and steel have  with few exceptions  proved to be the best  In the
second place  some adequate power must be found to propel the machinery 
which is ordinarily too heavy to be run by hand or foot power  This
necessary motive power was discovered in steam  The steam engine was
devised by James Watt  an English inventor of great ingenuity  He
invented a cylinder containing a piston  which could be forced back and
forth by the introduction of steam  His progress was much retarded by
the inability of the mechanics of his time to make an accurate cylinder
of sufficient size  but in the year 1777 the new machine was
successfully used for pumping  A few years later  1785  he arranged his
engine so that it would turn a wheel  In this way  for the first time 
steam could be used to run machinery  the spindles  for example  in a
cotton mill 

 Sidenote  Steam used for spinning and weaving  

A few years before Watt completed his improved steam engine  the old
spinning wheel had been supplanted by the modern system  in which the
thread is drawn out by means of spindles revolving at different rates
of speed  The spindles  which had at first been run by water power 
could now be propelled by steam  The old loom had also been improved 
and weaving by steam began to become general after the year 1800 

 Sidenote  Use of steam cheapens iron  

 Sidenote  New method of producing steel  

Machinery  however  could not become common so long as iron and steel
were expensive  The first use  therefore  to which the crude steam
engines were put was to furnish a blast which enabled the iron smelter
to employ coal instead of charcoal to fuse the iron ore  1777  
Moreover  the steam pumps made it possible for the miners to pump out
the water which impeded their work in the mines  and in this way
cheapened both the iron and the coal  Soon the so called  puddling
furnace  was invented  by means of which steel was produced much more
economically than it could be earlier  Rolling mills run by steam then
took the place of the hammers with which the steel had formerly been
beaten into shape  These discoveries of the use of steam and coal and
iron revolutionized the life of the people at large in western Europe
more quickly than any of the events which have been previously recorded
in this volume  It is the aim of the remainder of this chapter to
indicate very briefly the variety and importance of the effects produced
by modern inventions  465 

 Sidenote  Domestic industry supplanted by the factory system  

278  Machinery although very efficient was expensive  and had
necessarily to be near the boilers which produced the steam 
Consequently machines for particular purposes were grouped in factories 
and the workmen left their homes and gathered in large establishments 
The hand worker with his old tools was more and more at a disadvantage
compared with the workman who produced commodities by machinery  The
result was inevitable  namely  that domestic industry was supplanted by
the factory 

 Sidenote  Advantages of machinery  

 Sidenote  Division of labor  

One of the principal advantages of the factory system is that it makes
possible a minute division of labor  Instead of giving his time and
thought to the whole process  each worker concentrates his attention
upon one single step of the process  and by repeating a simple set of
motions over and over again acquires wonderful dexterity  At the same
time the period of necessary apprenticeship is shortened under the
factory system  because each separate task is comparatively simple 
Moreover  the invention of new machinery is increased  because the very
subdivision of the process into simple steps often suggests some way of
substituting mechanical motion for the motion of the human hand 

 Sidenote  Examples of the increased production of goods by machinery  

An example of the greatly increased output rendered possible by the use
of machinery and division of labor is given by the distinguished Scotch
economist  Adam Smith  whose great work   The Wealth of Nations  
appeared in 1776  Speaking of the manufacture of a pin in his own time 
Adam Smith says   To make the head requires two or three distinct
operations  to put it on is a peculiar business  to whiten the pin is
another  It is even a trade by itself to put them into the paper  and
the important business of making a pin is  in this manner  divided into
about eighteen distinct operations   By this division  he adds  ten
persons can make among them upwards of forty eight thousand pins in a
day  A recent writer reports that now an English machine makes one
hundred and eighty pins a minute  cutting the wire  flattening the
heads  sharpening the points  and dropping the pin into its proper
place  In a single factory which he visited seven million pins were made
in a day  and three men were all that were required to manage the
mechanism 

Another example of modern mechanical work is found in printing  For
several centuries after the development of that art the type was set up
by hand  inked by hand  each sheet of paper was laid by hand upon the
type and then printed by means of a press operated by a lever  Nowadays
our newspapers are  in the great cities at least  printed almost
altogether by machinery  from the setting up of the type until they are
dropped complete and counted out by hundreds at the bottom of a rotary
press  The paper is fed into the press from a great roll and is printed
on both sides and folded at the rate of two hundred or more newspapers a
minute 

 Sidenote  New means of communication  

 Sidenote  Steamboats  

279  The factory system would never have developed upon a vast scale had
the manufacturers been able to sell their goods only in the
neighborhood  The discovery that steam could be used to carry the goods
cheaply and speedily to all parts of the world made it possible for a
manufacturer to widen his market indefinitely  Fulton  an American
inventor  devised the first steamboat that was really successful  in
1807  yet over half a century elapsed before steamships began to
supplant the old and uncertain sailing ship  It is now possible to make
the journey from New York to Southampton  three thousand miles  in less
than six days  and with almost the regularity of an express train  Japan
may be reached from Vancouver in thirteen days  and from San Francisco
via Honolulu  a distance of five thousand five hundred miles  in
eighteen days  A commercial map of the world shows that the globe is now
crossed in every direction by definite routes  which are followed by
innumerable freight and passenger steamers passing regularly from one
port to another  These are able to carry goods for incredibly small
sums  For example  wheat has frequently been shipped from New York to
Liverpool for two cents a bushel 

 Sidenote  Development of the railroad  

Just as the gigantic modern steamship has taken the place of the
schooner and clipper  so  on land  the merchandise which used to be
slowly dragged in carts by means of horses and oxen is now transported
in long trains of capacious cars  each of which holds as much as many
ordinary carts  A ton of freight can now be carried for less than a cent
a mile  In 1825 Stephenson s locomotive was put into operation in
England  Other countries soon began to follow England s lead in
building railroads  France opened its first railroad in 1828  Germany in
1835  By 1840 Europe had over eighteen hundred miles of railroad  fifty
years later this had increased to one hundred and forty thousand 

 Sidenote  Startling improvements in the means of communication  

Besides the marvelous cheapening of transportation  other new means of
communication have resulted from modern inventions  The telegraph  the
submarine cable  and the telephone  all have served to render
communication prompt and certain  Steamships and railroads carry letters
half round the globe for a price too trivial to be paid for delivering a
message round the corner  The old  awkward methods of making payments
have given way to a tolerably uniform system of coinage  Instead of each
petty principality and each town having its own coins  as was common 
especially in Germany and Italy  before the nineteenth century  all
coins are now issued by the national central governments  Yet the most
convenient coins are difficult to transfer in large quantities  and
nowadays all considerable sums are paid by means of checks and drafts 
The banks settle their accounts by means of a clearing house  and in
this way almost no large amount of money need pass from hand to hand 

England took the lead in utilizing all these remarkable new inventions 
and with their aid became  by the middle of the nineteenth century  the
manufacturing center of the world  Gradually the new machinery was
introduced on the continent  and since 1850 countries having the
necessary coal  such as Germany and Belgium  have developed
manufacturing industries which now rival those of Great Britain 

 Sidenote  Some results of the industrial revolution of the nineteenth
century  

 Sidenote  Rapid growth of the towns  

280  The  industrial revolution   as the changes above referred to are
usually called  could not but have a profound influence upon the life
and government of Europe  For example  the population of Europe appears
to have nearly doubled during the nineteenth century  One of the most
startling tendencies of recent times has been the growth of the towns 
In 1800 London had a population of less than one million  it now
contains over four million five hundred thousand inhabitants  Paris  at
the opening of the French Revolution  contained less than seven hundred
thousand inhabitants  it now has over two and a half millions  Berlin
has grown in a hundred years from one hundred and seventy two thousand
to nearly two millions  In England a quarter of the whole population
live in towns having over two hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants 
and less than a quarter still remain in the country  Our modern life is
dominated by the great cities  which not only are the center of commerce
and manufacturing  but are the homes of the artist and man of letters 

 Sidenote  Reasons for the growth of the towns  

There are two obvious reasons for the growth of the towns since the
industrial revolution  In the first place  factories are established in
places where there is an abundant supply of coal  or where conditions
are otherwise favorable  and this brings a large number of people
together  In the second place  there is no limit set to the growth of
cities  as was formerly the case  by the difficulty of procuring food
from a distance  Paris  in the time of Louis XVI  was not a large city
in the modern sense of the word  still the government found it very
difficult to secure a regular supply of food in the markets  Now grain
and even meat and fruit are easily carried any distance  England imports
a large amount of her meat from Australia  on the other side of the
globe  and even her butter and eggs she gets largely from the continent 

 Sidenote  Abolition of most of the restrictions on trade and industry  

281  Before the nineteenth century the European governments had been
accustomed to regulate trade  industry  and commerce by a great variety
of laws  which were supposed to be necessary for the protection of the
public  Of this we find examples in the English Navigation Acts  466  in
the guilds  which under the protection of the government enjoyed a
monopoly of their industries in their particular districts  in the
regulations issued by Colbert 467  and in the grain laws in both France
and England  which limited the free importation and even the exportation
of grain 

The French and English economists in the eighteenth century  like Turgot
and Adam Smith  advocated the abolition of all restrictions  which they
believed did far more harm than good  The expediency of this  laissez
faire   468  or free trade policy  has now been recognized by most
European powers  England abolished her grain laws  the so called Corn
Laws  in 1846  and since then has adopted the policy of free trade 
except so far as she raises a revenue from customs duties imposed upon a
very few commodities  like liquor and tobacco  Low import duties are
collected by most of the European powers on goods entering their
territories  but all export duties have been abolished as well as all
customs barriers within the countries 

 Sidenote  Government regulations protecting the laborer  

A short experience with the factory system showed the need of
regulations designed to protect the laborer  469  There was a temptation
for the new factories to force the employees to work an excessive number
of hours under unhealthful conditions  Women and children were set to
run the machines  and their strength was often cruelly overtaxed  Women
and children were also employed in the coal mines  under terribly
degrading conditions  One of the great functions of our modern
governments has been to pass laws to protect the working men and women
and to improve their condition  Germany has been particularly active in
this sort of regulation  and has gone so far as to compel workingmen to
insure themselves for the benefit of their families  470 

 Sidenote  Labor unions  

Another development of the factory system has been the rise of labor
unions  These are voluntary associations intended to promote the
interests of their members  They have grown as the factory system has
been extended  and they now enjoy an influence in certain industries
comparable to that exercised by the craft guilds of the Middle Ages  The
governments do not undertake  however  to enforce the regulations of the
labor unions as they formerly did of the guilds  471 

 Sidenote  The people admitted to a share in the government  

 Sidenote  Character of modern constitutions  

282  The extension of manufacturing industries has had much to do with
the gradual admission of the people to a share in the government  The
life in towns and cities has quickened the intelligence of the working
classes  so that they are no longer willing to intrust the affairs of
government entirely to a king or to the representatives of the upper
classes  The result of this was  as we have seen  that constitutions
were  during the nineteenth century  introduced into all the western
European states  While these differ from one another in detail  they all
agree in establishing a house of representatives  whose members are
chosen by the people at large  Gradually the franchise has been extended
so that the poorest laborer  so soon as he comes of age  is permitted to
have a voice in the selection of the deputies  472  Without the sanction
of the representatives of the people  the king and the upper  more
aristocratic house are not allowed to pass any law or establish any new
tax  Each year a carefully prepared list of expenses must be presented
to the lower house and receive its ratification before money collected
by taxation can be spent 

 Sidenote  Equality before the law  

The French prefaced their first constitution by the memorable words 
 All citizens being equal before the law  are alike eligible to all
public offices and positions of honor and trust  according to their
capacity  and without any distinction  except that of their character
and ability   This principle  so different from that which had hitherto
prevailed  has been recognized in most of the modern European
constitutions  The privileges and exceptions which everywhere existed
before the French Revolution have been abolished  Modern European
governments are supposed to treat all alike  regardless of social rank
or religious belief 

 Sidenote  Religious equality in England  

 Sidenote  Repeal of the Test Act  1828  

At the opening of the nineteenth century England still kept on the
statute book the laws debarring Roman Catholics and dissenters from
sitting in Parliament or holding any public office  Exceptions  however 
were made in the case of the dissenters  Finally  after violent
opposition on the part of the conservative party  the Test Act  passed
in the reign of Charles II  473  was repealed in 1828  Next year the
Roman Catholics were also given the right to sit in Parliament and to
hold office  like the other subjects of the king 

 Sidenote  Free and compulsory education under the control of the
state  

Education  which was formerly left to the church  has during the
nineteenth century become one of the most important functions of
government  Boys and girls of all classes  between the ages of four and
fourteen or fifteen  are now generally forced to take advantage of the
schools which the government supports for their benefit  Tuition is free
in France  Italy  Norway  and Sweden  and only trifling fees are
required in Germany and elsewhere in western Europe  In 1902 the English
Parliament and the French Legislative Assembly each appropriated about
forty million dollars for educational purposes  As an example of the
rapid advance in education in recent times  it may be noted that in
1843  among those who married in England and Wales  one third of the men
and half of the women were unable to sign their names in the marriage
registers  In 1899 all but three men in a hundred could write  and
almost as many of the women 

 Sidenote  Warfare in recent times  

283  The general advance in education has not yet taught nations to
settle all their disputes without recourse to war  It is true that since
Napoleon s downfall there have been but three or four serious wars in
western Europe  and these very brief ones compared with the earlier
conflicts  But the European powers spend vast amounts annually in
maintaining standing armies and building battle ships  France and
Germany have each a force of over half a million carefully trained
soldiers ready to fight at any moment  and two million more who can be
called out with the utmost speed should war be declared  474  The
invention of repeating rifles and of new and deadly explosives have 
however  rendered war so terrible a thing to contemplate that statesmen
are more and more reluctant to suggest a resort to arms 

 Sidenote  European colonies in the nineteenth century  

Recent wars and the frequent rumors of war have had their origin mainly
in disagreements over colonial matters  The anxiety of the European
powers to extend their control over distant parts of the world is now no
less marked than it was in the eighteenth century  Modern means of
communication have naturally served to make the world smaller and more
compact  An event in London is known as promptly in Sydney as in Oxford 
A government can send orders to its commanders on the opposite side of
the globe as easily as if they were but five miles away  Supplies 
ammunition  and arms are  moreover  readily and speedily transferred to
remote points 

 Sidenote  The Spanish colonies in North and South America establish
their independence  1810 1826  

At the opening of the nineteenth century Spain still held Mexico 
Florida  Central America  and most of South America except Brazil 
which belonged to Portugal  During the Napoleonic period the Spanish
colonies revolted and declared their independence of the mother
country   Mexico  New Granada  Chile  and the region about Buenos Ayres
in 1810  Venezuela in 1811  etc  By 1826 Spain had been forced to give
up the struggle and withdraw her troops from the American continent  In
1822 Brazil declared itself independent of Portugal  After the recent
war with the United States Spain lost Cuba  Porto Rico  and the
Philippines  the last remnants of her once imposing colonial domains 

 Sidenote  Expansion of England during the nineteenth century  

England  on the other hand  has steadily increased her colonial realms
and her dependencies during the nineteenth century  and has met with no
serious losses since the successful revolt of the thirteen American
colonies  In 1814 she acquired the Cape of Good Hope from the Dutch  and
since then the territory has been enlarged by adding the adjacent
districts  During the last years of the nineteenth century England
busied herself extending her power over large tracts of western 
central  and eastern Africa 

England has secured her interests in the eastern Mediterranean by
gaining control of the Suez Canal  which was completed in 1869  mainly
with French capital  In 1875 she purchased the shares owned by the
khedive of Egypt  Then  since the khedive s finances were in a very bad
way  she arranged to furnish him  in the interest of his creditors and
in agreement with France  with financial advisers without whose approval
he can make no financial decision  Moreover  English troops are
stationed in Egypt with a view of maintaining order 

In the southern hemisphere England has colonized the continent of
Australia  the large islands of New Zealand  Tasmania  etc  The mother
country wisely grants these colonies and Canada almost complete freedom
in managing their own affairs  The Canadian provinces formed a
federation among themselves in 1867  and in 1901 the Commonwealth of
Australia was proclaimed  a federation of the five Australian colonies
and the island of Tasmania 

 Sidenote  Expansion of Russia since the Crimean War  

France exercises a wide influence in Africa and even Germany has made
some effort to gain a foothold there  but the most momentous extension
of a European power is that of Russia  Since the Crimean War Russia has
pressed steadily into central Asia  so that now her boundaries and those
of the English possessions in India practically touch one another  She
has also been actively engaged in the Far East  In 1898 she leased Port
Arthur from China  and now the Trans Siberian Railroad connects this as
well as Vladivostok on the Pacific coast with Moscow 

 Sidenote  The Far Eastern Question  

Recent events have shown that the European powers are likely to come
into hostile relations with one another in dealing with China  The
problem of satisfying the commercial and military demands of the various
nations constitutes what is known as the Far Eastern Question 

 Sidenote  General disturbance caused by war in modern conditions  

While all these conquests of the European powers increase the
probability of friction and misunderstandings  there is a growing
abhorrence of war  It appears more inhuman to men of to day than it did
to their ancestors  Moreover  all parts of the world are now so
dependent each on the other that even the rumor of war may produce
disastrous results far and wide  The prospect of war frightens the
merchants  checks commerce and industry  and causes loss both to the
laborer and the capitalist 

 Sidenote  The peace conference at The Hague  1899  

Many difficulties between nations can now be adjusted by the rules of
international law  Arbitration is more and more frequently preferred to
war  In 1899 an international peace conference was held at The Hague at
the suggestion of the Tsar  Its object was to consider how the European
powers might free themselves from the burden of supporting tremendous
armies and purchasing the terrible engines of destruction which modern
ingenuity has conceived  The resolutions of the conference embody rules
for adjusting international disputes and prohibiting the use of
particularly cruel and murderous projectiles  and for the treatment of
prisoners of war  etc 

It has been possible to mention only a few of the startling achievements
and changes which the nineteenth century has witnessed  Enough has 
however  been said to show that Europe to day differs perhaps more
fundamentally from the Europe Napoleon knew than did Napoleon s world
from Charlemagne s  Although civil and religious liberty and equality
have been established  and incredible progress has been made in
scientific thought  in general enlightenment  and in domestic comfort 
yet the growth of democracy  the magnitude of the modern city  and the
unprecedented development of industry and commerce have brought with
them new and urgent problems which the future must face 


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INDEX


  Abbeys   see  Monasteries 

  Abbot  meaning of  58 

  Abbots chosen by feudal lords  155 

  Abelard  268 f 

  Absolute monarchy  475 ff   496 ff 

  Acolyte  20 

  Acre taken in First Crusade  194 

  Act of Appeals  430 

  Act of Supremacy  430 

  Act of Uniformity  491 

  Adda  valley of  471 

   Address to the German Nobility   by Luther  396 f 

  Adrian VI  Pope  attempts reformation of Church  310 

  Adrianople  battle of  25 

   Æneid   copies of  in Middle Ages  333  note 

  Agincourt  battle of  1415   292 

  Agricola  Rudolph  379 

  Aids  feudal  111  145 and note 

  Aistulf  Lombard king  74 f 

  Aix la Chapelle  Charlemagne s palace at  78 

  Alaric takes Rome  26 

  Albertus Magnus  231  260 
    writes commentary on Aristotle  272 

  Albigenses  221 f  
    crusade against  223 f   256 

  Alchemy  672 

  Aleander s views of Protestant revolt  399  403 

  Alemanni  35 
    attempted conversion of  by St  Columban  65 

  Alessandria built  178 

  Alexander III  Pope  178 f 

  Alexander VI  Pope  Borgia   362  364 

  Alexander I  Tsar  611  620 

  Alexius  Emperor  and First Crusade  188  191 

  Alfred the Great  133 f 

  Alsace ceded to Germany  472 f   663 and note 

  Alva  448 ff 

  Amalfi  commerce of  243 

  Ambrose  51 

  America  North  explored by English  351 

  American colonies of England  revolt of  532 ff 

  American Revolution  533 ff 

  Amiens  rupture of Treaty of  610 

  Anabaptists  416 

  Anagni  attack on Boniface VIII at  306 

   Ancien Régime   537 ff 

  Andrea del Sarto  346 

  Angelico  Fra  343 

  Angevins   see  Plantagenets 

  Angles  27 
    settle in Britain  60 

  Anglo Saxon  253 

   Anglo Saxon Chronicle   134  253 

  Anjou  126  301 

  Anne  Queen  524 

  Antioch  Latin principality of  193 

  Antwerp  450 

   Appanages   creation of  in France  128 

  Aquinas  231  272 

  Aquitaine  67  82  93  124  126   See also  Guienne 

  Arabia  243 

  Arabs  condition of  before Mohammed  69 
    conquests of  70 f  
    conquer Syria  188 
    civilization of  in Spain  356 

  Aragon united with Castile  357 

  Archbishops  origin of  21 
    powers of  203 ff 

  Arches defined and illustrated  264 

  Architecture  mediæval  262 f  
    Romanesque  263 
    Gothic  264 f  
    domestic  266 f  
    Renaissance  339 f 

  Aristotle  mediæval veneration for  271 f  
    Dante s estimate of  331 

  Arius  30 

  Arles   see  Burgundy 

  Armada  463 

  Arnold of Brescia  177 

  Arnulf of Carinthia  97 

  Art  mediæval  261 f  
    fostered by Italian despots  326 
    Renaissance  339 
    Arabic  356 

  Arthur  nephew of John of England  127 

  Artois  count of  575  630   See  Charles X of France 

   Assignats   571  591 and note 

  Astrology  260  672 

  Astronomy  mediæval knowledge of  331 
    discoveries of Copernicus  351 
    modern  672 f 

  Athanasius  50 

  Athens  school at  closed  33 

  Attila  27 

  Augsburg  Hungarians defeated near  150 
    confession of  417 f  
    diet of  417 f  
    religious Peace of  419 f   465 

  Augustine  Bishop of England  61 

  Augustine  Bishop of Hippo  26  note  51  390  393 

  Augustinian order  385  note  387 

  Austerlitz  battle of  611 

  Australia  685 f 

  Austrasia  37  38 

  Austria  150  354 f  
    hold of  on Italy  507 
    conflicts with Turks  517 f  
    war of 1809 with Napoleon  619 
    mixed population of  632 
    influence of  after 1815  640 
    revolution of 1848 in  644 f  
    opposition of  to German unity  651 f  
    decline of influence of  after 1851  653 f  
    war with Prussia  1866   660 

  Austrian Mark  150 

  Austrian Netherlands  given to France  604 
    to Holland  625 

  Austrian Succession  War of  518 ff 

  Avignon  seat of papacy  1305 1377   307 f  
    Clement VII  anti pope  reëstablishes papal court at  310 

  Azores Islands discovered by Portuguese  347 


  Baber  529 and note 

  Babylonian Captivity of the Church  1305 1377   307 f 

   Babylonian Captivity of the Church   by Luther  397 

  Bacon  Francis  478 

  Bacon  Roger  273  478  671 

  Bacteria  674 

  Baden granted a constitution  635 

  Bæda   see  Venerable Bede 

  Bagdad  83  note 

   Baillis   established by Philip Augustus  130 

  Balance of power  427 f   625 f 

  Baldwin  in First Crusade  191 f  
    ruler of Jerusalem  194 

  Balliol  279 

  Banking  origin of  246 

  Bannockburn  battle of  1314   280 

   Banquet   Dante s  331 

  Baptism essential to salvation  46 
    sacrament of  210 

  Baptists  491 

  Barbarians   see  Germans 

   Barbarians  Laws of the   40 

  Barbarossa  Frederick   see  Frederick I  Emperor 

  Barebone s Parliament  489 

  Barons  War of the  146 f 

  Basel  Council of  1431 1449   318 f 

  Basil  51 

  Bastile  fall of the  565 

  Bavaria  conquered by the Franks  37  65  67  82  93  98  112 
    made an electorate  467 
    in War of Austrian Succession  518 f  
    elector of  assumes title of king  612 
    granted a constitution  635 

  Baylen  battle of  618 

  Bede   see  Venerable Bede 

  Bedford  duke of  293 

   Beggars  of the Netherlands  447 

  Belgium  627 f  
    becomes an independent kingdom  640 f 

  Belisarius overthrows the Vandal kingdom  33 

  Benedict  St   57 f  
    Rule of  57 f 

  Benedict IX  Pope  160 

  Benedict XIII  Pope  deposed by Council of Pisa  313 
    by Council of Constance  315 

  Benedictine order  57  note 

   Beneficium   105 f 

  Berbers  71 

  Berlin  Congress of  670 

  Bible  translated into Gothic  252 
    Wycliffe s translation of  309 
    first printed  338 
    German  before Luther  378  405 
    Luther s translation of  405 f  
    German  for Catholics  413 
    English translation of  431 
    King James version of  478 and note 

  Bishop of Rome  not yet pope in Constantine s time  21 
    obscurity of the early  50 
    Valentinian s decree concerning  51 
     See  Pope 

  Bishops  origin of  20  67 
    method of choosing  155 
    complicated position of  156  174 
    duties  position  and importance of  204  206 f 

  Bismarck  657 ff   663 

  Black Death  1348 1349   288 

  Black Friars   see  Dominicans 

   Black Hole  of Calcutta  531 

  Black Prince of England  at Crécy  285 
    and Poitiers  287 

  Blockade  615 f 

  Boethius  last distinguished Roman writer  19  31 f   134 

  Bohemia  Huss spreads Wycliffe s doctrines in  309 
    relation with Council of Basel  318 f  
    revolts from the Hapsburgs  466 f  
    in 1848  646  648 

  Bohemians  Charlemagne forces  to pay tribute  82 

  Bohemond  in First Crusade  191 f 

  Boleyn  Anne  429 f 

  Bologna  study of Roman law at  177 

  Bonaparte  analysis of character of  595 ff 
     See  Napoleon 

  Bonaventura  head of Franciscan order  quoted  232 

  Boniface  St   apostle to the Germans  65 f  
    anoints Pippin  73 

  Boniface VIII  Pope  struggle with Philip the Fair  304 f 

  Book of Prayer  English  435  458  482  491 

  Books copied by monks  58 

  Borgia  Cæsar  hero of Machiavelli s  Prince   362 

  Borgia  Pope Alexander VI  362 

  Borodino  battle of  621 

  Bosnia  669  670 and note 

  Boso  count of Vienne  97 

  Bosworth Field  battle of  297 

  Bothwell  459 f 

  Boulogne  Napoleon s army at  610 f 

  Bourbon kings  453  630 

  Brandenburg  electorate of  372  474  515 f 
     See  Prussia 

  Brazil  685 

  Breitenfeld  battle of  470 

  Bremen  foundation of  81 
    commerce of  244 
    member of the German empire  604 

  Bretigny  Treaty of  1360   286 f 

  Britain conquered by the Angles and Saxons  60 
    church of  yields to Roman Church  62 

  Brittany  123 

  Bruce  Robert  279 f 

  Bruges  123  245 

  Brumaire  eighteenth  598 

  Bruni  Leonardo  estimate of importance of Greek studies  336 

  Bruno  Archbishop  149 

  Buckingham  478 

  Bulgaria  669 f 

  Bulgaria  South  670  note 

  Bulls  papal  origin of name  204  note 

   Bundesrath   661  666 

  Burgher class  rise of  249 

  Burgundians  30  36 
    number of  entering the empire  39 

  Burgundy  county of  366  471 
     See also  Franche Comté 

  Burgundy  duchy of  124  292 
    alliance with England  292 f  
    importance of  under Philip the Good and Charles the Bold  300  354 
      417 

  Burgundy  kingdom of  38  97  124 and note  153 

   Burnt Njal  The Story of   99  note 

  Buttress  flying  defined and illustrated  264 f 

  Byzantium  22  note 


  Cabinet  English  524 f 

  Cadiz  479 

  Cædmon  253 

  Cæsar  drives back the Germans  5 
    conquers Britain  60 

   Cahiers   562 f 

  Calais taken by English  285  295 

  Calcutta  529 
     Black Hole  of  531 

  Calendar  French republican  582 and note 

  Caliph  title of  70 

  Calmar  Union of  469 

  Calonne  556 f  
    reforms proposed by  558 ff 

  Calvin  425 f   452 

  Calvinists  420  473 

  Cambray  League of  1508   365 

  Campo Formio  Treaty of  594 f 

  Canada won by the English  530  532  685 f 

  Canary Islands discovered by Portuguese  347 

  Canon law  202  note 
    burned by Luther  399 

  Canonical election  155 

  Canons  207  note 

   Canons and decrees of the Council of Trent  The   440 

  Canossa  169 

  Canterbury  the religious capital of England  61 
    St  Martin s at  61 
    dispute concerning Archbishop of  under John  183 

  Capet  Hugh  121 

  Capetian kings  position of early  121 f   124 f 

  Capitularies  87 

   Carbonari   637 

  Cardinals  162 and note  204 

  Carloman  brother of Pippin  72 

  Carlsbad Resolutions  634 f 

  Carlstadt  407 f 

  Carnot  588 

  Carolingian line in France  120 f 

  Cassiodorus  his treatises on the liberal arts and sciences  32 

  Castile  united with Aragon  357 

  Castle  mediæval  100  267 

  Catechism  Napoleon s  617 

  Cathari  221 

  Cathedral  the mediæval  262 f  
    of Wells  265 f 

  Catherine de  Medici  454 f 

  Catherine of Aragon  367  428 ff 

  Catherine II of Russia  514 

  Catholic Church  early conception of  20 
     See  Church  Clergy 

  Catholic League of Dessau  415 

  Catholic League in Germany  466 f 

  Catholic party  formation of a  at Regensburg  412 

  Catholic reaction  438  note 

  Catholic reformation  412 f   437 ff 

  Cavaliers  485 

  Cavour  654 

  Celibacy of the clergy   see  Marriage 

  Celts in Britain  60 

  Chalcedon  Act of the Council of  51 

  Châlons  battle of  27 

  Champagne  counts of  growth of possessions of  113 f 
    position of  114 f 

  Chapter  cathedral  207 

  Charlemagne  77 ff  
    ideal of  of a great German empire  79 
    coronation of  as emperor  83 f  
    reëstablishes the Western Empire  84 f  
    system of government of  86 
    his farms  86 and note 
    interest of  in schools  87 ff   268 
    disruption of empire of  92 ff  
    collects German poems  253 
    hero of romances  254 

  Charles Martel  38 
    aids Boniface  66  67 ff  
    defeats the Mohammedans at Tours  72 

  Charles the Bald  92 f   95 

  Charles the Fat  96 f 

  Charles the Simple  96  note  113  121 f 

  Charles V of France  1364 1380  reconquers most of English possessions
    in France  287 f 

  Charles VI of France  292 f 

  Charles VII of France  293 f 

  Charles VIII of France invades Italy  360 f 

  Charles IX of France  454 ff 

  Charles X of France  630   See also  Artois  count of 

  Charles the Bold of Burgundy  300  422 

  Charles V  Emperor  301 
    possessions of  354  359 f  
    coronation of  367 
    wars with Francis I  366  415  417 
    at diet of Worms  400 
    at Augsburg  417 f  
    attitude toward the Protestants  438 
    abdicates  444 

  Charles VI  Emperor  518 

  Charles VII  Emperor  518 f 

  Charles I of England  478 ff  
    financial exactions of  479  481 
    execution of  486 f 

  Charles II of England  488  490 ff 

  Charles II of Spain  502 
    will of  506 

  Charles XII of Sweden  513 f 

  Charles Albert of Sardinia  646  647  650 

  Charter  French  of 1814  629 f 

  Charter  the Great  of England  144  146 

  Charters granted to mediæval towns  239 f 

  Chemistry  672 

  Chivalry  256 f 

  Christian IV of Denmark  467 f 

  Christian missions  map of  63 

  Christianity  preparation for  in Roman Empire  18 
    promises of  18 
    pagan rites and conceptions adopted by  19 

  Christians  persecution of  10 

  Chrysoloras called to teach Greek in Florence  336 

  Church  apostolic  19 
    organization of  before Constantine  20 
    in the Theodosian Code  21 
    survives the Roman Empire  22 
    greatness of  44 
    sources of power of  45 ff  
    attitude of  toward the civil government  47 
    begins to perform the functions of the civil government  48 
    coöperation of  with the civil government  80  note  81 
    maintains knowledge of Latin  87 
    policy of William the Conqueror in regard to English  138 
    wealth of  154 
    lands of  feudalized  154 
    offices bought and sold  158 
    and state  165  303 
    character and organization of mediæval  201 ff  
    services of  to civilization  216 
    evil effects of wealth upon  217 f  
    loses power as modern states develop  303 f  
    reasons for influence of  in Middle Ages  303  370 
    corruption of  217 ff  
    during Babylonian Captivity of  307 
    in Germany  383 
    attempted reformation of  223 
    at Constance  317 
    taxation of  307 
    attempted union of  with Eastern Church  319 
    attitude of humanists toward  335 
    enthusiasm for  in Germany before Luther  377 
    discontent with  in Germany  385 
    in France before the Revolution  541 ff  
    attacked by Voltaire  550 
    property of  confiscated by the National Assembly  570 f  
    lands  secularization of  603 

  Church fathers  50 f 

  Cicero  humanists  estimate of  332  334 

  Cisalpine republic  595  601  602 

  Cistercian order  219 

   City of God  The   Augustine s  26  note  78 

  Civil Constitution of the Clergy  571 f   580  606 f 

  Civil war in England  485 f 

  Classics  Greek and Roman  neglect of  in the Middle Ages  259  330 
    333  note 
    Dante s respect for  331 
    revival of  332 ff  
    Petrarch s enthusiasm and search for  332 ff 

  Clement V  Pope  removes seat of papacy to France  306 

  Clement VII  anti pope  returns to Avignon  310 

  Clement VII  Pope  412  430 

  Clergy  minor orders of  20 
    privileges of  in Theodosian Code  21 
    attitude toward civil government  81 
    lower  demoralized by simony  159 
    importance of  to civilization  214 f  
    benefit of  214  note 
    corruption of  217 f  
    secular  opposition of  to mendicant orders  231 
    reform of  at Regensburg  412 
    policy of Henry VIII toward  429 ff  
    in France before the Revolution  542 
    representatives of  join third estate  564 
    Civil Constitution of  571 f   580  606 f  
    non juring  in France  572  579  606 
     See also  Marriage 

   Clericis laicos   papal bull  304 

  Clive  531 f 

  Clovis  conquests of  35 f  
    conversion of  35 
    number of soldiers of  baptized  39 

  Cnut  king of England  134 

  Coal  use of  676 

   Code Napoléon   607 f 

  Coinage  French king s control of  131 

  Colbert  reforms of  499 f 

  Colet  426 f 

  Coligny  455 f 

  Cologne  12  248 
    elector of  372 

   Coloni   condition of  15 f 

  Colonies  European  527 ff   684 
    Roman  12 
    French  in North America  527 f  
    Spanish  684 f 

  Columban  St   65 

   Columban St   Life of   65  note 

  Columbus  350 

   Comitatus   105 f 

   Comites   67 

  Commendation  105 and note 

  Commerce  development of  199 f   243 f  
    restrictions on  245 f  
    in Italy  243  322 f  
    in France and England  302 

  Commercial war between Holland and England  488 

  Committee of Public Safety  585  587 f 

  Common law  English  142 

  Commons  House of  147   See  Parliament 

  Commons  summoned to the French Estates General  131 
    the English  147 

  Commonwealth  England a  487 

  Commune  Paris  586 
    insurrection of  1871  664 

  Communes  establishment of  in France in 1789  566 

  Communes  origin of  239 f 

  Communication  modern means of  678 f   684 

  Communion under both kinds  432 and note 

  Compass  invention of  352 

  Compendiums  reliance upon  in later Roman Empire  17 
    inherited by Middle Ages  18 

  Compurgation  41 

  Concordat  between Francis I and Pope Leo X  366  note 
    of 1801  607 

  Condé  472 

   Condottieri   Italian mercenary troops  326 f 

  Confederation of the Rhine  612 f 

  Confession  212  note 

  Confession of Augsburg  417 f 

  Confirmation  sacrament of  211 

  Congregational church  483 

  Congress of Berlin  670 

  Congress of Vienna  625 ff 

  Conrad II  Emperor  153 

  Conrad III  Emperor  173  note  197 

   Consolation of Philosophy  The   of Boethius  19  134 

  Constance  heiress of Naples and Sicily  marries Emperor Henry VI  180 

  Constance  Peace of  1183   179 
    Council of  1414   314 

  Constantine  21 f 

  Constantine VI  84 

  Constantinople  22 f  
    threatened by Turks  188 
    taken by the Turks  23  517 
    Bishop of  put on an equal footing with the Bishop of Rome  51 
    during First Crusade  191 
    culture of  affects the West  336 f  
    desire of Russia for  668 

  Constitution  first French  576 
    of the year VIII  599 
    veneration for a  in Italy  637 

  Constitutional government  desire for  in France  563 
    demand for  in Prussia  632 
    granted in southern Germany  635 
    in Piedmont  651 

  Consul  title of Bonaparte  600  608 

  Continental blockade  615 f 

  Continental system  the  616 

  Continuity of history  4 

  Conventicle Act  492 

  Convention  French  582 ff  
    close of  590 f 

  Conversion of the Germans  56 ff  
    of the Saxons  80 

  Copernicus  Kopernik   astronomical discoveries of  351 f 

  Copyists  carelessness of  89 and note  90 

  Corbie  school at  90 

  Cordova  emir of  83 
    brilliant civilization of caliphate of  356 

  Corn Laws  681 

  Corneille  500 

  Corsica added to France  536  592 f 

  Cortez conquers Mexico  351 

  Council  general  311 f  
    of Clermont  188 
    fourth Lateran  184 
    of Pisa  313 
    of Constance  314 ff  
    of Basel  318 f  
    of Ferrara Florence  319 f  
    Luther recognizes fallibility of  393 

  Council of Blood  448 

  Council of State  French  599 

  Counter reformation  438  note 

  Counties  sheriffs in the English  137 

  Counts  origin of  67 
    position of  102 

  Counts of the march  82  86 

   Coup d état   598 

  Court  lord s  110 and note 

  Court of High Commission  482 

  Covenant  National  483 f 

  Crécy  battle of  284 

  Crema destroyed by Frederick I  178 

  Crimean War  668 f 

  Cromwell  Oliver  485 ff  
    death of  489 f 

  Cromwell  Richard  490 

  Crusade  Albigensian  223 f   256 

  Crusades  23  187 ff  
    effects of  199 f   243  347 

  Culloden Moor  527 

  Culture  mediæval  250 f  
    general use of Latin  250 
    Germanic languages  251 f  
    Romance languages  251 f  
    literature  romance  254 f  
    chivalry  256 f  
    ignorance of the past  259 
    popular science  260 
    art  261 f  
    education  the universities  267 f  
    Roman and canon law  269 
    Aristotle  271 
    scholasticism  272 

  Curia  papal  204 

  Customs duties  246  681 

  Customs lines  interior  539 f 

  Customs union  German  635 

  Cyprian  20 

  Czar   see  Tsar 


  Dagobert  38 

  Damascus  seat of the caliphate  70  83  note 

  Danegeld  134 

  Danes  99  note 
    invade England  133 f  
    defeated by Alfred  133 

  Danish language  derivation of  251 

  Dante  330 f 

  Danton  589 

  Dantzig  196  248 

  Dark age before Charlemagne  87 

   Dark ages   meaning of  6  91 

  Darnley  459 

  Dauphin  origin of title  292  note 

  Deacons  19 f 

  Declaration of Independence  American  533 

  Declaration of Rights  English  494 

  Declaration of the Rights of Man  568 ff   629 

   Decretum  of Gratian  269 

  Degrees  university  explained  270  note 

  Deist  550 

  Departments in France  538  567 f 

  Desaix  601 f 

  Dessau  League of  415 

   Dialogues  of Gregory the Great  54 

  Diaz rounds Cape of Good Hope  348 

   Dictatus  of Gregory VII   164 

  Diet  German  attempts to reform government  375 

  Directory  French  591  593  597 f   601 

  Discoveries in fourteenth and fifteenth centuries  347 f  
    modern scientific  671 ff 

  Dispensations  papal  203 

  Dissenters  491 

   Divine Comedy  of Dante  330 

  Divine right of kings  476 f   496 ff 

  Doge of Venice  324 

  Domain  121 

   Domesday Book   138 

  Dominican order organized  230 

  Donauwörth  466 

  Drake  Sir Francis  461 

  Dresden  battle of  623 

  Dukes  origin of  67 

  Dumouriez  582  584 

  Dunkirk  489  588 

  Dupleix  531 

  Dürer  Albrecht  346 

  Dutch  commerce of  448 
     See also  Holland 

  Dutch language  derivation of  251 


  East Frankish kingdom  94  98 

  East Goths  28 f   30  33 

  East India Company  English  530 
    French  530 

  Eastern Church   see  Greek Church 

  Eastern Empire  22 
    civilization of  in Middle Ages  23 

  Eastern question  origin of  535  667 ff 

  Ecclesiastical states  origin of  156  note 
    in Germany  disappearance of  603 f 

  Eck  392 f   398  418 

  Economists  French  552 f 

  Edessa  Latin principality of  established  193 
    fall of  196 

  Edict of Nantes  542 

  Edict of Restitution  468  473 

  Edict of Worms  403 f   415 

  Education  clerical monopoly of  213 f  
    mediæval  267 
    humanistic  335 
    compulsory  683 

  Edward the Confessor  134  136 f 

  Edward I of England  147  278 f 

  Edward II  280 
    forced to abdicate  281 

  Edward III  claims French crown  283 f   286 f 

  Edward IV  296 

  Edward V  297 

  Edward VI  434 f 

  Egbert  king of Wessex  133 

  Egypt  Bonaparte s expedition to  597 f  
    English occupation of  685 

  Eisenach  Luther at  405 

  Elba  624 

  Elders  19  426  note 

  Elders  Council of  590  599 

  Electors in empire  372  524  note 

  Elizabeth  queen of England  430  451  458 ff   476 

  Embargo acts of the United States  615 f 

  Emigrant nobles  575  577  579 
    permitted to return  607 

   Émigrés    see  Emigrant nobles 

  Emirate of Cordova  83  note 

   Emperor Elect   152  note 

  Emperor  Roman  his will law  10 
    worship of  10 

  Emperor  title of  held by Italian kings  151 
    assumed by Otto the Great  151 
    assumed by Napoleon  608 
    assumed by Austrian ruler  612 

  Empire  reëstablishment of  in the West  84 
    divisions of  92 f   96 
    relations with papacy  151 f  
    under Hohenstaufens  173  185 
    under Hapsburgs  355 
     See  Holy Roman Empire 

  Empire  Roman  character and organization of  8 ff 

  Engine  steam  675 f 

  England  early culture in  64 
    becomes a part of the Catholic Church  64 
    claims of kings of  to France  130 
    importance of  in history of Europe  133 
    on the accession of William the Conqueror  135 
    feudalism in  135 
    Norman conquest of  136 ff  
    made tributary to pope by John  183 
    commerce of  244 f   351  460 f  
    conquers Wales  278 
    relations of  with Scotland  279 f  
    union of  with Scotland  280 
    during the Hundred Years  War  281 ff   291 ff   301 f  
    labor problem of  and Peasants  War  288 ff  
    Wars of the Roses  296 f  
    humanism in  335  363 
    Protestant revolt in  426 ff  
    struggle for constitutional government  475 ff  
    establishment of commonwealth  487 ff  
    restoration of the Stuarts  490 
    revolution of 1688  493 
    in the War of the Austrian Succession  526 
    in the Seven Years  War  520 f  
    expansion of  523 ff  
    colonies of  in North America  527 ff  
    settlements of  in India  529 
    colonial possessions of  at end of eighteenth century  535 
    involved in war with France  1793   583 
    renews war with Napoleon  610 
    expansion of  in the nineteenth century  685 
     See also  Britain 

  English language  134  147  251  253 f 

  Epictetus  18 

  Equality before the law  683 

  Erasmus  381 f  
    attitude of  toward Luther  394  427 

  Estates General  131 f  and note  285  298 f   305  475  496 f  
    demanded by the  parlement  of Paris  560 
    summoning of  561 
    meeting of  1789   562 f 

  Esthonia  514 

  Etruria  kingdom of  620 

  Eucharist   see  Mass 

  Eugene IV  Pope  319 

  Eugene of Savoy  507 

  Euric  king of West Goths  26 

  Europe after 1814  625  627 f  
    contemporaneous  671 

  Excommunication  213 

  Exorcist  20 


  Fabliaux  mediæval  256 

  Far Eastern Question  686 

  Ferdinand I  Emperor  brother of Charles V  412  444  465  517 

  Ferdinand II  Emperor  467 

  Ferdinand of Aragon  357  363  364 

  Ferrara Florence  Council of  319 f 

  Feudal dues  110 f  
    in France  543 
    abolition of  567 

  Feudal hierarchy  no regular  116 

  Feudal registers  112 

  Feudalism  104 ff  
    origins of  99 ff   102 f   104 f  
    anarchy of  116 f  
    in England  135 
    connection of  with chivalry  257 

  Fief  hereditary character of  106 ff  
    conditions upon which granted  110 and note 
    classes of  110  111 f   115 

  Five Hundred  Council of  590  599 

  Flanders  94  123 f   244 
    weavers from  in England  139 
    relations of  with England  283 f  
    under dukes of Burgundy  300 
    art of  346 

   Flayers   298 

  Florence  321  325  327 ff   342 
    under Savonarola  361 f 

  Fontenay  battle of  93 

  Foot soldiers  English  defeat French knights at Crécy  284 
    at Poitiers  285 
    at Agincourt  292 

  Forest cantons  421 

  France  origin of  94  95 f   121 
    position of early kings of  121 f   125 
    under Philip Augustus  130 
    genealogical table of the kings of  282  note 
    during the Hundred Years  War  281 ff   288  291 ff  
    standing army of  established  298 
    condition under Louis XI  299 ff  
    influence of Italian culture  335  363 
    Protestantism in  451 ff  
    wars of religion  451 ff  
    limits of  in 1659  501 f  
    ascendency of  under Louis XIV  495 ff  
    absolute monarchy in  545 
    reforms of Colbert  499 f  
    condition of  at end of the reign of Louis XIV  508 
    joins in War of Austrian Succession  518 
    alliance with the Hapsburgs  520 
    possessions in North America  527 f  
    in India  529 ff  
    losses of  at close of Seven Years  War  532 
    aids the United States  534 
    in the eighteenth century  535 f   537 ff  
    first Revolution  cause of  545  563 
    course of  558 ff  
    First Republic  581 ff  
    Reign of Terror  585 ff  
    constitution of the year III  590 f  
    reforms of Bonaparte  599  606  616 
    restoration of the Bourbons  629 f  
    revolution of 1848  642 ff  
    Third Republic  664 f 

  Franche Comté  300  366  471 
    ceded to France  502 f   See  Burgundy  county of 

  Francis I  Emperor  519 

  Francis II  Emperor  assumes the title of Emperor of Austria  612 

  Francis I of France  365  415  417  425 
    wars with Emperor Charles V  366 
    persecutes the Protestants  452 

  Francis II of France  452 f 

  Francis Joseph I  accession of  650 

  Francis of Assisi  226 ff 

  Franciscan order founded  228 

  Franconian line of emperors  153 

  Franco Prussian War  662 f 

  Frankfurt  National Assembly at  646  651 f 

  Franks  conquests of  30  34 
    conversion of  35 
    history of  36 f  
    alliance of  with popes  73  75 f   See also  Charlemagne 

  Frederick  Elector of the Palatinate  466 f   477 

  Frederick I  Barbarossa   Emperor  173  197 

  Frederick II  Emperor  181 f   198 

  Frederick I of Prussia  516 

  Frederick II of Prussia   see  Frederick the Great 

  Frederick the Great  516  518 ff 

  Frederick the Wise  of Saxony  collects relics  377 
    patron of Luther  389 

  Frederick William III of Prussia  613 f   621 f 

  Frederick William IV of Prussia  652 f   656  note 

  Freedmen  condition of  15 

   Freedom of the Christian   by Luther  397  note 

  Freemen in competition with slaves in Roman Empire  15 

  Free towns  German   See  Towns 

  French Academy  501 

  French and Indian War  530 

  French language  94  251  254  260 

  French Revolution  4  537 f  
    opening of  557  558 ff  
    second  574  ff 

   Frequens   decree  of Council of Constance  318  note 

  Friends  Society of  491 

  Frisia  79 

  Fritzlar  sacred oak of Odin at  66 

  Fust  John  printer of Psalter of 1459  338  note 

  Future life  pagan view of  18 
    Christian view of  19 


  Galileo  673 

  Gall  St   Irish missionary  65 
    monk of  78 and note 

  Garibaldi  655  667 

  Gascony  124 

  Gaul  West Goths establish a kingdom in  26 
    occupied by the Franks  30  35 
    church in  reformed and brought under the papal supremacy  66 

  Gelasius  Pope  his opinion of the relation of the Church and the civil
    government  47 

  Geneva  Calvin at  425 f 

  Genghiz Khan  510 

  Genoa  174  194  198 
    commerce of  243  347 
    given to Sardinia  626 

  Geoffrey  son of Henry II  126 f  and note 

  George I of England  524 

  George II of England  526 

  George III  533 

  German Confederation of 1815  632 f  
    dissolution of  660 

  German empire  Proclamation of the  665 

  German kings  difficulties of  caused by the imperial title  85 
    vain attempt of  to control Italy  85 

  German kingship  148  152 f 

  German language  94 f  and note  251 
    reduced to writing  252 f   258 f  
    books published in the  250  note 
    in Luther s time  405 f 

  Germans  infiltration of  into Roman Empire  8  12  16 f  
    objects of  in invading the Empire  25 
    number of invading  39 
    fusion of  with the Romans  39 
    character of early  42 
    conversion of  56 ff 

  Germany  79  95 f  
    foundation of towns in northern  81 
    assigned to Louis the German  92 f   94 
    history of  contrasted with that of France  148 
    under the same ruler as Italy  151 f  
    confusion in  under Henry VI  182 
    want of unity in  185  355 
    culture in  335  363 
    before Protestant revolt  complexity  organization  the electors  the
      knights  the cities  neighborhood war  the diet  reorganization in
      fifteenth century  social and intellectual conditions  371 f  
    during the Protestant revolt  405 ff  
    progress of Protestantism in  418 ff  
    religious division of  412  415 ff  
    after the Thirty Years  War  473 f  
    territorial reorganization of  in 1803  604 
    condition of  in 1814  626 
    effects of Napoleonic era in  631 f  
    in 1848  646 
    unification of  656 ff   665 

  Ghent  123 
    commerce of  245  248 

  Ghibelline party  179  note 

  Ghiberti  342 

  Gian Galeazzo Visconti of Milan  325 

  Gibbon  73  76 

  Gibraltar  507  532 
    siege of  534 

  Giotto  341 f 

  Girondists  585 f   587 

  Glass  stained  264 

  Godfrey of Bouillon  191 f   193 

  Golden Bull sanctions neighborhood war  117 

  Good Hope  Cape of  rounded by Diaz  1486   348 
    ceded to England  685 

  Gothic language  Bible translated into  252 

  Gothic type  339 

  Government  difficulty of  in the Middle Ages  67  85  98 
    effect of feudalism on  108 f  
    natural  120 
    modern character of  682 f 

  Grail  legend of Holy  258 

  Granada  fall of  83  357 

  Grand Alliance  506 

  Grand Remonstrance  484 

  Granson  422 

  Gratian   Decretum  of  269 

  Gravitation  discovery of universal  673 

  Gray Friars   see  Franciscans 

  Great Charter of England  144 146 

  Great Elector of Prussia  516 

  Great Khan  510 

  Great Mogul  529 

  Great St  Bernard crossed by Bonaparte  601 

  Greece  creation of the kingdom of  640  668 

  Greek books brought to Venice in 1423  337 

  Greek Church  tends to separate from the Latin  51 
    union of  with Western Church  319 

  Greek culture in the Roman Empire  12 

  Greek language  knowledge of  in Middle Ages  64  336 
    revived study of  in Italy  320  336 f 

  Greek New Testament  423 

  Gregory of Tours  33  36 

  Gregory the Great  52 ff  
    writings of  54 
    missionary work of  55  61 

  Gregory VI  Pope  160 

  Gregory VII  52  note  138  162  164 ff  
    reform of  161  162 f  
    conflict of  with Henry IV  167 ff  
    death of  170 

  Gregory XI  Pope  310 

  Gregory XII  Pope  313  315 

  Grotius  508 

  Guelf party  origin of  179  182 

  Guienne  130  140  283 
     See also  Aquitaine 

  Guilds  craft  241 f   500 
    abolition of  in France  555 

  Guillotine  588 f  and notes 

  Guise  Henry of  456 

  Guises  454 

  Gunpowder  invention of  352 

  Gustavus Adolphus  468 ff 

  Gustavus Vasa  469 


  Hades  18 

  Hadrian  tomb of  54 

  Hadrian IV  Pope  and Frederick I  176 f 

  Hadrian VI  Pope  410 412 

  Hague  peace conference at The  686 

  Hampden  John  481 

  Hanover  electorate of  524  note 

  Hanover  house of  524 
    occupied by Napoleon  610 
    relations of  with Prussia  613 f 

  Hanseatic League  247 f 

  Hanseatic towns annexed to France  602 

  Hapsburg  Rudolf of  king of Germany  185 

  Hapsburgs  rise of  354 f   421  444 f   471  517 ff 

  Harold  Earl of Wessex  136 f 

  Hastings  battle of  136  note 

  Hébert  589 

  Heilbronn  articles of  414 

  Hejira  the  69 

  Henrietta Maria  478 

  Henry II of England  possession of  126  140 ff 

  Henry III of England  146 f 

  Henry IV of England  291 

  Henry V of England continues Hundred Years  War  291 ff 

  Henry VII of England  296 f 

  Henry VIII of England  365  367  426 ff   476 

  Henry II of France  452 

  Henry III of France  456 

  Henry IV of France  457 f 

  Henry I of Germany  149 and note 

  Henry III  Emperor  153 f  
    intervenes in papal matters  160  166 

  Henry IV of Germany  165 ff  
    conflict of  with Gregory VII  167 ff   174 

  Henry V  Emperor  171 

  Henry VI  Emperor  180 f 

  Henry of Navarre   see  Henry IV of France 

  Henry the Lion  180 

  Henry the Proud  179 

  Heresy  in twelfth and thirteenth centuries  220 f  
    punishment of  225 
    of Huss  314 f   403 and note 

  Herzegovina  669  670 and note 

  Hesse  Philip of  409 f   415  419 

  Hesse Cassel  628 

  Hildebrand   see  Gregory VII 

  Hindustan  348  529 ff 

  History  scope of  1 
    continuity or unity of  4 
    notions of  in the Middle Ages  259 f 

  Hohenstaufens  173 f 
     See also  Frederick I  Henry VI  Frederick II 

  Hohenzollern family  515 
     See also  Brandenburg and Prussia 

  Holbein  Hans  346 

  Holidays  number of  reduced in Germany  412 

  Holland  449 
    war with England  492 
    war with France  492 f   502 f  
    colonies of  527 
    becomes the Batavian republic  604 
    Louis Bonaparte  king of  613 
    annexed to France  620 
    made a kingdom  625  632 
     See also  United Netherlands 

  Holy Land  commercial interests of Italian cities in  198 f 

  Holy League formed by Pope Julius II against France  365 

  Holy League  French  456 

  Holy Roman Empire  85  152 f   473 
    consolidation of  in 1803  603 f  
    dissolution of  612 
     See also  Germany 

  Homage  109 and note 
    refusal of  116 f 

  Horace  idea of life entertained by  45 
     Satires  of  333  note 

  Hospitalers  194 f 

  House of Lords  abolition of  487 
     See also  Parliament 

  Hrolf  122 f 

  Huguenots  454 ff   467 
    Charles I attempts to aid  478 f  
    position of  under Louis XIV  504 f 

  Humanists  Italian  334 f  
    German  379 f 

  Humanities  334 

  Hundred Years  War  281 ff   291 ff 

  Hungarians  149 
    defeated by Otto the Great  150 

  Hungary  freed from the Turks  518 
    during revolution of 1848  646  648 f  
    dual union of  with Austria  650 

  Huns  25  27 

  Huss  309  315 ff   393 

  Hussite wars  317 

  Hussites  432  465 

  Hutten  Ulrich von  385 f   395 f   399  404  410 


  Iconoclastic controversy  74 
     See  Images 

  Illuminations  261 f 

  Images  demolition of  in England  433 f  
    in the Netherlands  447 f 

  Immunities  101 

  Imperial title  151 f 
     See also  Emperor 

  Indemnity  the French  664 

  Independents  482 f  and note 

  India  Portuguese seek a sea route to  348 
    Europeans in  528 ff  
    during Seven Years  War  530 

  Indulgences attacked by Wycliffe  308 
    explained  390 f  
    attitude of Luther toward  390 ff   412  423 

  Industrial revolution  679 f 

  Industry stimulated by commerce in Middle Ages  244 f 

  Infeudation  106 f  
    of other things than land  115 

  Innocent III  Pope  struggle of  with the Hohenstaufens  181 f  
    attempts to reform the Church  223 

  Inquisition established  224  231 
    in Spain  358  619 
    in the Netherlands  445  447 

   Institutes of Christianity   Calvin s  425 f 

  Interdict  183  213 

  International law  507 f 

  Invasions of the ninth and tenth centuries  98 f 

  Invention  progress of  in fourteenth and fifteenth centuries  352 f  
    modern  674 ff 

  Investiture  lay  155 ff   161 
    prohibition of  163  167 
    question of  settled at Worms  171 f 

  Invincible Armada  463 

  Ireland  461 f   487 f 

  Irene  Empress  84 

  Irish monks in Britain  62 

  Iron industry  352  675 f 

  Isabella  queen of Castile  357 

  Islam  69 

  Italian language  derivation of  251 
    used by Dante in the  Divine Comedy   330 
    by Petrarch  334 

  Italy  during the barbarian invasions  33 
    united to Charlemagne s empire  85  93  96 
    German kings make vain attempt to control  151 f  
    towns of  under Frederick I  174 f  
    Hohenstaufens in  180  186 
    commerce of  198 f   243 f  
    divisions of  in fourteenth century  321 f  
    culture of  during the Renaissance  321  339 ff  
    invasion of  by Charles VIII  360 f  
    hold of Austria on  507 
    Bonaparte s campaign in  594 
    Napoleon  king of  611 
    after 1815  636 f   638 f  
    war of independence of  645 f  
    constitutions granted to various states of  646 
    unification of  654 ff  
    formation of the present kingdom of  655 f 

  Ivan the Terrible  511 


  Jacobins  578 f   590 

  Jacobites  526 and note 

  James I of England  467 
    theory of kingship of  475 ff 

  James II  493 

  James VI of Scotland  462 
     See also  James I of England 

  Jamestown  528 

  Jefferson  Thomas  opinion of the condition of France  544 

  Jena  battle of  614 

  Jerome  St   51 
    advocate of the monastic life  57 

  Jerome Bonaparte  614 

  Jerusalem  185  188 
    Kingdom of  192 ff   197 f 

  Jesuits  order of  462  465 f   494 

  Jewry  246 

  Jews  economic importance of  246 
    persecution of  246  358 

  Joan of Arc  293 f 

  John of England  126 f   144 ff  
    vassal of pope  183 

  John  king of France  285 

  John Frederick of Saxony  415  418 f 

  John XXIII  Pope  313 

  Jongleurs  256 

  Joseph Bonaparte  king of Spain  618 

  Josephine  607  620 

   Journal des Savants   501 

  Jousts  118 

  Jubilee at Rome  1300   305 

  Julius II  Pope  344  365 

  Jury  origin of  142 

  Just price  doctrine of  245 

  Justification by faith  388  439 

  Justinian 33 
    closes government schools  267 


  Kadijah  wife of Mohammed  69 

  Kappel  battle of  425 

  Kent  king of  converted  61 

  King  position of  in Middle Ages  73  102  108  120 

  King of Rome  620 

  King of the Romans  152  note 

  Kneeling Parliament  436 

  Knighthood  257 f 

  Knights  summoned to the English Parliament  147 
    in Germany  407 
    revolt of  409 f  
    disappearance of  604 

  Knox  John  459 

  Koran  the  69 f 

  Kossuth  650 


  Labor  division of  677 

  Labor unions  681 f 

  Laborers  protection of  681 

  Lafayette  534  563  570 

   Laissez faire   553  681 

  Lancaster  house of  in England  291  296 
    genealogical table of  297  note 

  Lancelot  description of  quoted  258 

  Landholding  in the Roman Empire  104 
     See also  Feudalism 

  Lanfranc  138 

  Langton  Stephen  183 

   Langue d oc   254  note 

   Langue d oïl   254  note 

  La Rochelle  455  457  478 

  La Salle  528 

  Latin Church tends to separate from the Greek  51 
     See also  Church 

  Latin language  contrast of the written  with the spoken  39  252  note 
    knowledge of  preserved by the Church  87 f  
    general use of  in the Middle Ages  95  202  250 

  Latin literature  extinction of  31 
     See also  Humanists 

  Laud  William  481 f   484 

  La Vendée  revolt of  587 

  Law   see  Canon and Civil law 

   Law of Free Monarchies  The   of James I  477 

   Law of Nature and Nations   by Pufendorf  508 

   Laws of the Barbarians   40 

  Lay investiture   see  Investiture 

  Lea  Henry C   description of Church  214 
    account of mendicants  230 

  Lefèvre  452 f 

  Legates  162 

  Legion of Honor  617 

  Legislative Assembly  576  579 f 

  Legitimists  664  note 

  Legnano  battle of  179 

  Leipsic  disputation at  392 f  
    battle of  623 

  Leo the Great  21  51  52 

  Leo III  Emperor  forbids the veneration of images  74 

  Leo IX  Pope  reform begun by  161 f 

  Leo X  Medici   Pope  patron of art  344  365  391  410 

  Leonardo da Vinci  344 f 

  Leopold II  577 

  Leopold of Hohenzollern  662  note 

   Letters of Obscure Men   380 f   and note 

   Lettres de cachet   546 

  Leyden  siege of  451  note 

  Libraries  destruction of  32 
    established in Italy  337 

  Ligurian republic  610 

  Lisbon  trade in spices  348 

   Lit de justice   547 

  Livonia  514 

  Llewelyn  Prince of Wales  278 

  Logic  esteem for  in the Middle Ages  268  271 
    decline of  334 f 

  Lombard cities  170 f   174 ff 

  Lombard League  178 

  Lombard  Peter   Sentences  of  210  396 f 

  Lombards as bankers  246 

   Lombards  History of the   by Paulus Diaconus  90 

  Lombards in Italy  33  34  65  74 f  
    conquered by Charlemagne  81 

  London  248  290 

  Long Parliament  484 ff  
    dissolved by Cromwell  488 f  
    recalled  490 

  Lord  mediæval  position of  99 f  
    meaning of term  106 

  Lord Protector  Cromwell  489 

  Lord s Supper  Zwingli s conception of  425 
     See also  Mass 

  Lorraine  94  300  472 
    added to France  536 
    portion of  ceded to Germany  663 and note 

   Lorsch  Chronicles of   passage from  84 

  Lothaire  son of Louis the Pious  93 

   Lotharii regnum   94 

  Louis the Fat of France  125 

  Louis the German  92  93  95 

  Louis the Pious  92 

  Louis IX  Saint   130 f   198 

  Louis XI of France  299 f 

  Louis XII of France  364 f 

  Louis XIII of France  458 

  Louis XIV  472  489  492  495 ff  
    idea of position of  496 f  
    court of  498 
    wars of  501 ff  
    condition of France at end of reign of  508 

  Louis XV  508  553 

  Louis XVI  position of  545  553 f  
    removes to Paris  570 
    flight of  to Varennes  575 f  
    imprisonment of  581 
    trial and execution of  583 

  Louis XVII  625  note 

  Louis XVIII  625 
    policy of  629 f 

  Louis Philippe  630  642 f 

  Louisiana  534  602 

  Low Church party  482 

  Loyola  Ignatius  440 ff 

  Lübeck  244  248 

  Lucien Bonaparte  599 

  Luther  Martin  387 ff  
    burns the canon law  368  399 
    early life and education of  387 
    enters monastery  387 
    justification by faith  388 
    called to Wittenberg  visits Rome  389 
    teaches biblical theology  389 
    the theses of  390 
    warfare against indulgences  390 
    debate with Eck at Leipsic  392 
    relations with humanists  393 
    with Ulrich von Hutten  395 
     Address to the German Nobility  of  396 
     Babylonian Captivity of the Church  of  397 
    excommunicated  398 
    at diet of Worms  401 
    outlawed by the emperor  403 and note 
    translates the Bible  405 
    view of reform of  407 ff  
    rash talk of  about princes  413 
    attacks the peasants  414  416 

  Lützen  battle of  470 

  Luxembourg  300  662 

  Lyons revolts against the Convention  587  589 


  Machiavelli   The Prince  of  327  362 

  Machinery  introduction of  675 ff 

  Madras  529 

  Magdeburg  469 

  Magellan circumnavigates the globe  351 

  Magyars   see  Hungarians 

  Major Domus   see  Mayors of the Palace 

  Malory  the  Mort d Arthur  of  255  note 

  Malta  195 

  Mandeville  Sir John  referred to  261  note 

  Manor  100  234 f  
    court of the  236 

  Mantua  471 

  Manufacture  increase of  in thirteenth century  200 
    modern  675 

  Manuscripts  337 f 

  Marches  establishment of  82 

  Marco Polo  347 

  Marcus Aurelius   Meditations of   18 

  Marengo  battle of  601 

  Margaret  queen of Navarre  452 

  Margraves  origin of  82  86  102 

  Maria Louisa  620 

  Maria Theresa  518 ff 

  Marie Antoinette  554  570  589 

  Marlborough  506 

  Marquette  528 

  Marquises  86 

  Marriage  of the clergy  154  157 and note  161  163  418 
    sacrament of  211 

  Marseilles  revolt of  587 

  Marston Moor  battle of  486 

  Mary of Burgundy  301 

  Mary of Modena  493 

  Mary  queen of England  435 f 

  Mary Queen of Scots   see  Mary Stuart 

  Mary Stuart  454  459 ff 

  Mass  the  211 f   407  409  432 

  Matilda  126  140 

  Maurice of Saxony  418 f 

  Maximilian I  Emperor  356  358 f   363  365 

  Maximilian of Bavaria  466  467 

  Mayence  66  78 
    elector of  372  378 
    printing at  338 

  Mayflower  483 

  Mayors of the Palace  38 

  Mazarin  495 

  Mazzini  639  648 

  Mecca  68  69  70 

  Medici  328 f   361  366 
    Lorenzo de   328  344 
    library of the  337 

  Medicine  modern advance in  674 

  Medina  69 

  Melanchthon  417 

  Mendicant orders  225 f 

  Merovingian documents  carelessness of  87 

  Merovingian kings  38  72 

  Mersen  Treaty of  95 f 

  Metric system  591 

  Metternich  634 
    overthrow of  644 f 

  Metz  452  473  663 

  Mexican expedition  662 

  Mexico  351  358 

  Michael Angelo  342  344 f 

  Microscope  development of  674 

  Middle Ages  meaning of term  5 f  
    character of  42 f 

  Middle kingdom of Lothaire  94 f 

  Milan  Edict of  21 
    married clergy in  163 
    destruction of  by Frederick I  176 f  
    despots of  324 f  
    claimed by France  364 f  
    claimed by Charles V  366  417 

  Miles Coverdale  431 

  Military service  feudal  110 

  Miniature  derivation of word  262 

  Minnesingers  258 

  Minor orders of the clergy  20 

  Minorca  507 

  Mirabeau  564 

  Miracles  frequency of  in Middle Ages  46 f 

   Missi dominici   86  102 

  Missions  greatly increase the power of the pope  66 
    of the Jesuits  442 

  Model Parliament  147 

  Modern languages  origin of  40  250 ff 

  Mohammed  68 f 

  Mohammedan conquests   see  Arabic conquests 

  Mohammedan invasion of Italy  150 

  Mohammedanism  69 f 

  Mohammedans  68 ff   88 
    gradual expulsion of  from Spain  83  356 f  
    commerce of  199  243 

  Molière  500 

  Moluccas  347  348 

  Monasteries  breaking up of  in Germany  407 f  
    in England  432 f 

  Monasticism  attraction of  for many different classes  56 f 

  Money  scarcity of  in the Middle Ages  98 
    use of  236  247 

  Mongol emperors of India  529 and note 

  Mongols  510 

   Moniteur   578 

  Monk  George  490 

  Monk of St  Gall  78 and note 

  Monks  46 
    origin and distinguished services of  56 f   219 

  Monte Cassino  founding of  57 

  Montesquieu  552 

  Moors  in Spain  357 f  
    expulsion of  464 

  Moravians  149 

  More  Sir Thomas  427  432 

  Morgarten  battle of  421 

   Mort d  Arthur   Malory s  255  note 

  Moscow  512  514 
    princes of  510 f  
    Napoleon at  621 

  Mosque  70 

  Mountain party  585 f 

  Münster  472 

  Murat  king of Naples  618 

  Murten  battle of  422 


  Nantes  Edict of  granting of  457 
    revocation of  504 f 

  Nantes  massacre at  589 

  Naples  kingdom of  180  360  note  363 f   613 
    revolution in  635  637 f 

  Napoleon Bonaparte  536  574  592 ff  
    idea of  of a European empire  609 
     Memoirs  of  624 

  Napoleon II  620 

  Napoleon III  644 
    intervenes in Italy  654 f  
    position of  after 1866  662 

  Naseby  battle of  486 

  National Assembly  first French  564  570 
    close of  576 f 

  National guard  566 

  National workshops  643 f 

   Natural boundaries  of France  501 f 

  Natural laws  discovery of  672 f 

  Navigation Act  488 

  Necker  556 

  Nelson  597 f   615 

  Netherlands  295 
    come into Austrian hands  301 
    revolt of  445 ff  
    Louis XIV claims  502 
    Spanish  ceded to Austria  507 

  Neustria  37 f 

  New Testament  edition of  by Erasmus  382 

  New York  492 

  Newspapers  origin of French  578 
    Napoleon s attitude toward  608 f 

  Newton  Sir Isaac  673 

  Nicæa  Council of  21 
    during First Crusades  188  192 

  Niccola of Pisa  340 

  Nicholas II  Pope  decree of  162 

  Nicholas V  320  337 

   Niebelungs  Song of the   253 

  Nimwegen  Peace of  503 

  Nobility  origin of Frankish  38 
    titles of  86 
    character of feudal  112  234 f  
    in France under Louis XI  299 f  
    established by Napoleon  608  617 

  Nobles  privileges of  in France  542 f  
    emigration of French  575 

  Nogaret  306 

  Non juring clergy  572 f   579 

  Nördlingen  battle of  470 

  Norman conquest of England  136 ff  
    results of  138 f 

  Normandy  122 f   127  284  292 

  Normans  amalgamate with the English  139  146 
    in Sicily  180  note   See also  Northmen 

  Norse literature  99  note 

  North German Federation  660 f 

  Northmen  treaty of Charles the Fat with  96 f   99 and note 
    in Russia  510 

  Northumbria  king of  62 

  Notables  meeting of  558 f 

  Novara  battle of  650 

  Novgorod  248  510 

  Nuremberg  373 
    diet of  1522   410 f 


  Odo  96  120 f 

  Odoacer  28 

  Ordeal  41  142 

  Ordination  sacrament of  211 

  Orient  European relations with  199 f   244 

  Orleanists  664  note 

  Orleans  duke of  292 
    Maid of  294 

  Ormond  487 

  Osnabrück  472 

  Ostrogoths   see  East Goths 

  Other worldliness of mediæval Christianity  45 

  Othman  517 

  Otto I  the Great  of Germany  149 ff 

  Otto of Brunswick  182 

  Otto of Freising  173  197 

  Overlord  106  note 


  Pagan idea of the life after death  18  45 

  Paganism  merges into Christianity  19 
    of Italian humanists  335 

  Painting  Italian  340 f   346 
    in northern Europe  346 

  Palace  school of the  90 

  Palatinate  electorate of  372  467 
    Louis XIV s operations in  505 

  Pallium  203  307 

  Pan Slavic Congress of 1848  648 

  Papacy  origin of  49 ff  
    seat of  transferred to Avignon  306 f   308  317   See also  Pope 

  Papal legates  162 

  Papal states  75 f   170  320  620  639  655  667   See also  Pope 

  Papyrus  supply of  cut off  87 

  Paris  37  96 
    Treaty of  1763   532 
    Peace of  1783   534 
    importance in the Revolution  570 
    commune of  581  589 
    insurrection of  June  1848   643 
    of 1871  664 

  Parish  administration of  208 f 

   Parlements   French  origin of  130 f   547 f   559 f 

  Parliament  English  147  281  286  289 
    after Wars of the Roses  298  308  475 
    struggle of  with Charles I  478 ff   496 

  Parma  duchess of  447 f 

   Parsifal   by Wolfram von Eschenbach  258 

  Patrick  St   62 

  Paulus Diaconus  90 

  Peasants  War  in England  309 
    in Germany  407  413 ff 

  Peasants in France  condition of  before the French Revolution  544 f 

  Penance  sacrament of  211 f 

  Pepys   Diary  of  492 

  Persecution  religious  432  436 
    of English Catholics  462 

  Peter Lombard   Sentences  of  268  334  425 

  Peter  St   49 f 

  Peter the Great  511 ff  
    reforms of  512 

  Peter the Hermit  190 

  Petition of Right  479 

  Petrarch  288  332 ff 

  Philip Augustus of France  125 ff   130  183  197  246 

  Philip the Fair  of France  131  196  280 
    struggle of  with Boniface VIII  304 f 

  Philip VI of France  283 

  Philip the Good  of Burgundy  293  295  300 

  Philip II of Spain  436  444 ff  
    reign of  463 f 

  Philip V  first Bourbon king of Spain  506 

  Picts  279 

  Piedmont  reforms in  654 

   Piers Ploughman   290 

  Pilgrim Fathers  483 

  Pillnitz  Declaration of  577 f 

  Pins  illustration of the manufacture of  677 

  Pippin of Heristal  38 

  Pippin the Short  72 f   75 f 

  Pisa  Council of  313 

  Pitt  the elder  530 

  Pius IX  639  648 

  Plantagenets  125 ff   140 ff 

  Plassey  battle of  531 f 

  Plebiscite  600  644 

  Poitiers  battle of  285 

  Poland  153  514 
    first partition of  521  583 f  
    Napoleon s campaign in  614 
    dispute over  at the Congress of Vienna  626 f 

  Pomerania  473 

  Pondicherry  530 

  Pope  52 
    origin of name of  52  note  54 f   66 
    alliance of  with Franks  72 f   75 f  
    opposition to iconoclasm  74  85 
    relations of  with Otto the Great  151 f  
    position of  in tenth and early eleventh centuries  161 
    election of  162 
    powers of  claimed for by Gregory VII  164 f  
    position of  in the Church  202 ff  
    during the Great Schism  310 ff  
    attitude of  toward councils  438 
    attitude of  toward Italian unity  639  647 
    position of  since 1870  667 

  Popular sovereignty defended by Rousseau  552 

  Port Mahon  532 

  Portuguese  explorations by  347 f  
    colonies of  348  527  685 

   Praise of Folly   by Erasmus  383  427 

  Prayer book  English  435  458  482  491 

  Preaching Friars  231 

  Prefects  French  599 

  Presbyterian Church  425 f   459  482 f 

  Presbyters  19 f   426  note 

  Press  censorship of  in the eighteenth century  549 

  Pressburg  Treaty of  611 

  Pride s Purge  486 

  Priest  20 
    duties of  208 f 

  Prime minister  526 

  Prince Charlie  527 

  Prince of Wales  origin of title of  278 

  Printing  invention of  337 f  
    modern methods of  678 

  Privileges in France  540 
    abolition of  567 

  Protestant  origin of term  416 f 

  Protestant revolt  conditions explaining  377 
    course of  in Germany  405 ff 

  Protestant union of German princes  415  466 

  Protestantism  in Germany  418 ff  
    in Switzerland  423 ff  
    in England  430 435 
    in the Netherlands  447 ff  
    in France  451 ff 

   Protests  of the French  parlements   547 

  Provençal language  254 
    troubadours  songs in  256 

  Provisors  statute of  in England  308 

  Prussia  474  515 ff   544 
    war of  with France  581  583 f   593  613 f  
    reforms of Stein and Hardenberg  622 f  
    after 1815  626 f   631 
    in 1848  646 
    strengthening of army of  656 f  
    war with Austria  1866   660 
    war with France  1870   662 f  
    predominating influence of  in the German empire  666 

  Prussians conquered by the Teutonic knights  196 

  Ptolemy s estimate of size of the world  350 

  Pufendorf  508 

  Purgatory  212 

  Puritans  482  483 and note  491 


  Quakers  491 

  Quebec  528  530 


  Racine  500 

  Railroads  development of  678 f 

  Rajah  529 

  Raphael  344 f 

  Ravenna  interior of a church at  29 

  Reaction  after Napoleon s downfall  628 
    in Germany  634 f 

  Reason  worship of  589 

  Reform Act  English  682  note 

   Regalia   177 

  Regensburg  formation of Catholic party at  412 

  Regular clergy defined  59 

   Reichsdeputationshauptschluss   603 

  Reign of Terror  537  573  588 ff  
    customs of  abolished  607 

  Relics  German collections of  377 f 

  Relief  108  note 

  Religious equality  683 

  Rembrandt  346 

  Renaissance  321  329 f 

  Republic  the  red   in France  643 

  Republican calendar  591 

  Republican party in France  origin of  576 

  Restoration in England  490 

  Reuchlin  380 

  Revolution of 1848  642 ff  
    results of  653 

  Revolutionary Tribunal  588 

   Reynard the Fox   256 

  Rhine  left bank of  ceded to France  603 

  Rhine  the Confederation of the  612 f 

  Richard I  the Lion Hearted  126 f   144  197 f 

  Richard II of England  291  315 

  Richard III of England  297 

  Richelieu  458  467  495 
    intervenes in the Thirty Years  War  471 f 

  Rights of Man  Declaration of  568 ff 

  Rising in the north of England  460 

  Roads  12 
    poor  in the Middle Ages  98  242 

  Robbia  Luca della  343 

  Robert Guiscard in Naples and Sicily  180  note 

  Robespierre  589  f 

   Rois fainéants   38 

   Roland  Song of   83  note  255 

  Rollo  122 f 

  Roman Church  the mother church  49 f 

  Roman Empire  8 ff  
    reasons for decline of  12 ff  
    religious revival in  18 
     fall  of  in the West  27 
    relations of  with Church  47 
    continuity of  84 f 

  Roman law  11 
    retained by Theodoric  29 
    supplanted by German customs  40 
    study of  revived  177  269 

   Romana lingua    see  French language 

  Romance languages  derivation of  251 f 

  Romances  mediæval  254 f 

  Rome  city of  26  53  305  310 
    ascendency of  in art  344 
    sack of  417  note 
    made a republic  648 
    added to the kingdom of Italy  667 

  Romulus Augustulus  28 

  Roncaglia  Frederick I holds two assemblies at  176 f 

  Roncesvalles  Pass of  83  note 

  Rossbach  battle of  520 

   Rotten boroughs   682  note 

  Roumania  669 f 

  Roumelia  Eastern  670  note 

  Roundheads  485 

  Round Table  Knights of the  255 

   Rous   510 

  Rousillon  471 f 

  Rousseau  551 

  Royal library of France  501 

  Rubens  346 

  Rudolf of Hapsburg  355 

  Rule of St  Benedict  57 f 

  Rump Parliament  487 f 

  Rurik  510 

  Russia  509 ff  
    relations of  with Napoleon  614  620 f  
    Crimean War of  668 f  
    recent expansion of  686 

  Sacraments  210 f  
    attacked by Luther  397 f  
    confirmed by the Council of Trent  439 

   Sacrosancta   decree  317 

   Sagas   99  note 

  St  Bartholomew s Day  massacre of  455 f 

  St  Bernard  197  219  268 

  St  Dominic  229 f 

  St  Francis of Assisi  225 ff   342 

  St  Mark s church at Venice  323 

  St  Meinrad  423 

  St  Omer  terms of charter of  240 

  St  Peter s Church at Rome  344 

  St  Petersburg  founding of  512 f 

  Saint Simon  500 

  Saladin takes Jerusalem  197 

  Salamander  mediæval account of  quoted  260 

  Salisbury  oath of  137 f 

  Salt tax  French  540 

  Saracens   see  Mohammedans 

  Saratoga  battle of  534 

  Sardinia  kingdom of  628 

  Satires of the sixteenth century  406 

  Savonarola  361 f 

  Savoy  France deprived of  625 

  Saxons  27  79 ff   98 
    settle in England  60 
    rebel against Henry IV  166 

  Saxony  179 f  
    electorate of  372 
    question of  at the Congress of Vienna  626 f 

  Scandinavian kingdoms  468 f 

  Schism  the Great  310 f   314 f 

  Schleswig Holstein affair  657 f 

  Schoifher  Peter  338  note 

  Scholasticism  272 f 

  School of the palace  90 

  Schools established by Charlemagne  88 f 

  Science  mediæval  260  356 
    modern methods of  678 ff 

  Scotch people  280 f 

  Scotland  135  278 ff   459 
    under the same ruler as England  476 
    Charles I at war with  483 
    union with England  524 
    welcomes the Young Pretender  526 f 

  Sculpture  mediæval  262  265 f  
    Renaissance  340 

  Secular clergy defined  59 

  Sedan  battle of  663 

   Seigneur   derivation of  106  note 

  Seneca  opinion on origin of practical arts  14 

   Senior   late Latin  106  note 

  Senlac  battle of  136 

   Sentences  of Peter Lombard  210  425 

  Sepoys  531 

  September massacres  582 

  Serfdom  16  234 
    disappearance of  in England  290 f  
    abolished in France  567 
    in Prussia  622 

  Serfs   coloni  resemble the  16  100 
    condition of  234 ff   414   See also  Serfdom 

  Servia  668 ff 

  Sevastopol  669 

  Seven Years  War  519 f  
    in India  530 ff 

  Sévigné  Madame de  500  505 

  Sforza family  327 

  Shakespeare  477 f 

  Sheriffs appointed by William the Conqueror  137 

  Ship money  481  484 

  Shires  135 and note 

  Sicily  180  182  185  360  note 

  Sickingen  Franz von  406 f   409 f 

  Sigismund  Emperor  314 f 

  Silesia  518 f 

  Simon de Montfort leads Albigensian crusade  223 

  Simon de Montfort  Parliament of  146 f 

  Simony  158 f   161  218 

   Simple priests  of Wycliffe  309 

   Six Articles   the  431 f 

  Slavery in Roman Empire  13 ff 

  Slavs  82 
    on the borders of Germany  150  153 
    settlement of  in Europe  509  648 f 

  Smith  Adam  677 

   Social Contract  of Rousseau  551 

  Social Democrats  643 

  Sophia of Hanover  524 

  Sorbonne  452 

  South Bulgaria  670  note 

  Southampton granted a charter  240 

  Spain  26  70 f   83  346 
    maritime power of  351 
    under Charles V  354  356 f   445  451  455 
    decline of  464 
    colonies of  527 
    Napoleon attempts to control  618 f   623  637 
    loses American colonies  684 f 

   Spanish fury   450 

  Spanish language  derivation of  251 

  Spanish March  83  94 

  Spanish Netherlands   see  Netherlands 

  Spanish Succession  War of the  506 ff 

  Spectacles  invention of  352 

  Speyer  Edict of  1526   415 f  
    protest of  316 f  and note 

  Spice trade  importance of  348 f 

  Stamp Act  532 

  Star Chamber  Court of  484 

  State  character of  in Middle Ages  48  165 

  States of the Church   see  Papal states 

  Statutes of Laborers  289 

  Steam  application of  675 f 

  Steamboats  678 

  Steel  676 

  Steelyard  248 

  Stein  reforms of  622  631 

  Stem duchies in Germany  148 f 

  Stephen  king of England  140 

  Stone of Scone  280 

  Strafford  484 

  Strand laws  247 

  Strasburg  473 
    seized by Louis XIV  504  663 f 

  Strasburg oaths  94 

  Stuart  house of  475 

  Students  associations in Germany  633 

  Subdeacon  20 

  Subinfeudation  106 f 

  Subtenant  107 

  Subvassals  107 ff 

  Suffrage  extension of  682 

  Sully  457 f 

  Sutri  the council of  160 

  Suzerain  106 and note 

  Sweden  468 f   473 
    under Charles XII  513 f 

  Swiss mercenaries  423 and note 

  Switzerland  origin of  421 ff  
    Protestant revolt in  423 ff   473  605  626 

  Symbolism  mediæval  261 

  Syria  Bonaparte s campaign in  598 


  Taille  299  540  545 f   556  559 

  Talleyrand  626 

  Tamerlane  529  note 

  Tancred  180 f 

  Tartars  510 

  Taxation  in Roman Empire  13 
    papal  204  384 
    of church property  304 
    without representation  533 
    reform of  in France  567 

  Teachers  government  in Roman Empire  12  32 

  Telescope  67 

  Templars  195 f   306 

  Temporalities  156 

   Tennis Court  oath  564 

  Test Act 492 
    repeal of  683 

  Tetzel  390 

  Teutonic order  195 f  
    in Prussia  515 f 

  Theodoric  28 ff 

  Theodosian Code  provisions of  relating to the Church  21 

  Theodosius the Great  22 f   27 

  Theology in University of Paris  269 

  Thermidor  9th  590  note 

  Theses  Luther s ninety five  390 f 

  Third estate  543 ff 

  Thirty Nine Articles  the  435 

  Thirty Years  War  465 ff 

  Thomas à Becket  142 f 

  Thomas Aquinas  231  272 

  Three Henrys  War of the  456 

  Tilly  469 f 

  Tilsit  treaties of  614 

  Timur  529  note 

  Tithe  81  202 

  Titian  346 

  Toleration  religious  in Germany  415 ff   419 f  
    in France  454 ff  
    modern  683 

  Tolls in Middle Ages  246 f 

  Toul  452  473 

  Toulouse  counts of  124  256 

  Tourneys  118 

  Tours  battle of  71 f 

  Towns  representatives of  summoned to Parliament  147 
    in Middle Ages  174  200  232  237 f   248 
    German  373  375  604 
    growth of the modern  680 

  Trade  mediæval  238  242 f  
    restrictions on  abolished  680 

  Trafalgar  battle of  615 

  Transubstantiation  213  309  425  431 

  Treasury of  good works   378 

  Trent  Council of  437 ff 

  Treves  12 
    electorate of  372 

  Trial by jury  142 

  Trials  mediæval  41  140 ff 

  Triple Alliance  502 f 

  Troubadours  256 

  Troyes  Treaty of  1420   293 

  Truce of God  118 

  Tsar  title of  511  note 

  Tudor  house of  296 f 

  Tuilleries  581  664 

  Turenne  472 

  Turgot  553  note  554 f 

  Turkey in Europe  535 
    disruption of  628  667 ff 

  Turks  188  190 f   376  514  517 

  Twelve Articles of the peasants  413 f 


  Ulfilas translates Bible into Gothic  252 

  Ulm  374  611 

  Unction  sacrament of extreme  211 

  United Provinces  450  473 

   Unity of the Church   by Cyprian  20 

  Unity of history  4 

  Universities  mediæval  269 f   333  356 
    German  380  398 

  Urban II  188 

  Usufruct  105 

  Usury  doctrine of  245 

   Utopia   by Sir Thomas More  427 

  Utrecht  Union of  450 
    Treaty of  507 


  Valentinian III  decree of  51 

  Valois  house of  455 

  Van Dyck  346 

  Van Eyck brothers  346 

  Vandals  26  33 

  Varennes  flight to  575 f 

  Vassals  origin of  102 f   106 
    obligations of  110 f 

  Vasco da Gama  348 

  Vassy  massacre of  455 

  Vatican library  337 

  Velasquez  346 

  Vendée  La  revolt of  587 

  Venerable Bede  the  56  64 

  Venetia given to Austria  626  655 
    ceded to Italy  667 

  Venice  founding of  27 
    commerce of  194  198 f   243 f   347 
    government of  321 f  
    painting at  346 
    war of  with League of Cambray  364 f  
    destruction of republic of  595 
    in 1848  648   See  Venetia 

  Verdun  452  473 
    Treaty of  93 
    fall of  582 

  Versailles  498 

  Vespasiano  Italian bookseller  337  note 

  Veto  royal  in England  524 and note 

  Victor Emmanuel  650  654 f 

  Vienna  siege of  by Turks  517 f  
    Congress of  625 ff  
    revolution of 1848 in  645  650 

  Vikings  99  note 

  Villa  Roman  14  100 

  Villehardouin  260 

  Visconti  324 f   364 

  Visigoths   see  West Goths 

  Voltaire  519  549 ff 

  Vulgate  51  439 


  Wager of battle  41 

  Wagram  battle of  619 

  Waibling  castle of  179  note 

  Waldensians  221 f   452 

  Waldo  Peter  221 

  Wales  135  277 f 

  Wallenstein  468 and note  469 f 

  Wallingford  charter of  240 

  Walpole  526 

  Walther von der Vogelweide  258  384 

   War and Peace  of Grotius  508 

  War  neighborhood  117 ff 

  War of the Barons  146 f 

  Warfare  modern  684  686 

  Wars of the Roses  296 ff 

  Warsaw  grand duchy of  614  626 

  Wartburg  405 
    festival at the  633 

  Washington  George  533 f 

  Waterloo  battle of  624 

  Watt  James  675 

  Welf  179 

  Wellington  623 f 

  Wessex  133 

  West Frankish kingdom  94   See also  Franks 

  West Goths  25 f   36  39  71 

  Westphalia  kingdom of  614  623 

  Westphalia  Peace of  472 f 

  Whitby  Council of  62 

  White Hill  battle on the  467 

  William the Conqueror  claim of  to English crown  136 
    policy of  in England  136 ff   165 

  William III of England  492 ff   505  506  523 f   525 

  William of Orange  king of England   see  William III 

  William of Orange  the Silent   448 ff 

  William I of Prussia  656 f  
    chosen emperor  665 

   Winter king   467 

  Witenagemot  135  137  147 

  Wittenberg  University of  389 
    reform at  407 f 

  Wolfram von Eschenbach  258 

  Wolsey  Cardinal  367  427 ff 

  Worms  council of  167 
    Concordat of  171 
    diet of  400 f  
    Edict of  403 f   415 

  Writing  style of  used in Charlemagne s time  89 

  Würtemberg  372 
    duke of  assumes the title of King  612 
    granted a constitution  635 

  Wycliffe  John  308 f  
    influence of  on Huss  315  393 


  Xavier  442 


   Yea and Nay   by Abelard  268 

  York  house of  296  297  note 

  Young  Arthur  544 

  Young Italy  639 

  Young Pretender  526 f 


  Zealand  449 

  Zipangu  Japan   347 

   Zollverein   635 

  Zurich  421 f   424 

  Zwingli  416  420  423 ff 


FOOTNOTES 

 1  There is a short description of Roman society in Hodgkin   Dynasty
of Theodosius   Chapter II 

 2  Reference  Adams   Civilization during the Middle Ages   Chapter II 
 What the Middle Ages started with  

 3  There are a number of editions of this work in English  and
selections from Epictetus are issued by several publishers  See
 Readings   Chapter II 

 4  There is an English translation of this published by Stock   1 20  

 5  Whoever separates himself from the Church  writes Cyprian  is
separated from the promises of the Church   He is an alien  he is
profane  he is an enemy  he can no longer have God for his father who
has not the Church for his mother  If anyone could escape who was
outside the Ark of Noah  so also may he escape who shall be outside the
bounds of the Church   See  Readings in European History   Chapter II 

 6  Reference  Adams   Civilization   Chapter III   The Addition of
Christianity  

 7  See  Readings in European History   Chapter II  for extracts from
the Theodosian Code 

 8  An older town called Byzantium was utilized by Constantine as the
basis of his new imperial city 

 9  St  Augustine  who was then living  gives us an idea of the
impression that the capture of Rome made upon the minds of
contemporaries  in an extraordinary work of his called  The City of
God   He undertakes to refute the argument of the pagans that the fall
of the city was due to the anger of their old gods  who were believed to
have withdrawn their protection on account of the insults heaped upon
them by the Christians  who regarded them as demons  He points out that
the gods whom Æneas had brought  according to tradition  from Troy had
been unable to protect the city from its enemies and asks why any
reliance should be placed upon them when transferred to Italian soil 
His elaborate refutation of pagan objections shows us that heathen
beliefs still had a strong hold upon an important part of the population
and that the question of the truth or falsity of the pagan religion was
still a living one in Italy 

 10  Reference  Emerton   Introduction to the Middle Ages   Chapter III 

 11  Reference  Emerton   Introduction   Chapter V 

 12  Reference  Oman   Dark Ages   Chapter I 

 13  Reference  Oman   Dark Ages   Chapter II 

 14  See above  p  19 

 15  See  Readings   Chapter III  end   for historical writings of this
period 

 16  For Justinian  who scarcely comes into our story  see Oman   Dark
Ages   Chapters V VI 

 17  Reference  Oman   Dark Ages   Chapter IV 

 18  See  Readings   Chapter III  for passages from Gregory of Tours 

 19  Reference  Emerton   Introduction   68 72 

 20  Reference  Oman   Dark Ages   Chapter XV 

 21  The northern Franks  who did not penetrate far into the Empire  and
the Germans who remained in Germany proper and in Scandinavia  had of
course no reason for giving up their native tongues  the Angles and
Saxons in Britain also adhered to theirs  These Germanic languages in
time became Dutch  English  German  Danish  Swedish  etc  Of this matter
something will be said later  See below  § 97 

 22  Extracts from the laws of the Salian Franks may be found in
Henderson s  Historical Documents   pp  176 189 

 23  Professor Emerton gives an excellent account of the Germanic ideas
of law in his  Introduction   pp  73 91  see also Henderson   Short
History of Germany   pp  19 21  For examples of the trials  see
 Translations and Reprints   Vol  IV  No  4  A philosophical account of
the character of the Germans and of the effects of the invasions is
given by Adams   Mediæval Civilization   Chapters IV V 

 24  Tacitus   Germania   which is our chief source for the German
customs  is to be found in  Translations and Reprints   Vol  VI  No  3 
For the habits of the invading Germans  see Henderson   Short History of
Germany   pp  1 11  Hodgkin   Dynasty of Theodosius   last half of
Chapter II 

 25  See above  § 7 

 26  For reports of miracles  see  Readings   especially Chapters V and
XVI 

 27  Matt  xvi  18 19  Two other passages in the New Testament were held
to substantiate the divinely ordained headship of Peter and his
successors  Luke xxii  32  where Christ says to Peter   Stablish thy
brethren   and John xxi  15 17  where Jesus said to him   Feed my
sheep   See  Readings   Chapter IV 

 28  The name  pope   Latin   papa    father  was originally and quite
naturally applied to all bishops  and even to priests  It began to be
especially applied to the bishops of Rome perhaps as early as the sixth
century  but was not apparently confined to them until two or three
hundred years later  Gregory VII  d  1085  was the first to declare
explicitly that the title should be used only for the Bishop of Rome  We
shall  however  hereafter refer to the Roman bishop as pope  although it
must not be forgotten that his headship of the Western Church did not
for some centuries imply the absolute power that he came later to
exercise over all the other bishops of western Europe 

 29  The great circular tomb was later converted into the chief fortress
of the popes and called  from the event just mentioned  the Castle of
the Angel  San Angelo  

 30  For extracts from Gregory s writings  see  Readings   Chapter IV 

 31  Benedict did not introduce monasticism in the West  as is sometimes
supposed  nor did he even found an  order  in the proper sense of the
word  under a single head  like the later Franciscans and Dominicans 
Nevertheless  the monks who lived under his rule are ordinarily spoken
of as belonging to the Benedictine order  A translation of the
Benedictine rule may be found in Henderson   Historical Documents   pp 
274 314 

 32  Cunningham   Western Civilization   Vol  II  pp  37 40  gives a
brief account of the work of the monks 

 33  See  Readings   Chapter V  for Gregory s instructions to his
missionaries 

 34  See  Readings   Chapter V 

 35  There is a  Life of St  Columban   written by one of his
companions  which  although short and simple in the extreme  furnishes a
better idea of the Christian spirit of the sixth century than the
longest treatise by a modern writer  This life may be found in
 Translations and Reprints   Vol  II  No  7  translated by Professor
Munro 

 36  For extracts from the Koran  see  Readings   Chapter VI 

 37  An admirable brief description of the culture of the Arabs and
their contributions to European civilization will be found in Munro 
 Mediæval History   Chapter IX 

 38  One of the most conspicuous features of early Protestantism  eight
hundred years later  was the revival of Leo s attack upon the statues
and frescoes which continued to adorn the churches in Germany  England 
and the Netherlands 

 39  Charlemagne is the French form for the Latin  Carolus Magnus  i e  
Charles the Great  It has been regarded as good English for so long that
it seems best to retain it  although some writers  fearful lest one may
think of Charles as a Frenchman instead of a German  use the German
form  Karl 

 40  Professor Emerton   Introduction   pp  183 185  gives an example of
the style and spirit of the monk of St  Gall  who was formerly much
relied upon for knowledge of Charlemagne 

 41  These decrees lose something of their harshness by the provision 
 If after secretly committing any one of these mortal crimes any one
shall flee of his own accord to the priest and  after confessing  shall
wish to do penance  let him be freed  on the testimony of the priest 
from death   This is but another illustration of the theory that the
Church was in the Middle Ages a governmental institution  It would be
quite out of harmony with modern ideas should the courts of law  in
dealing with one who had committed a crime  consider in any way the
relations of the suspected criminal to his priest or minister  or modify
his sentence on account of any religious duties that the criminal might
consent to perform 

 42  The king of Prussia still has  among other titles  that of Margrave
of Brandenburg  The German word  Mark  is often used for  march  on maps
of Germany 

 43  The Mohammedan state had broken up in the eighth century  and the
ruler of Spain first assumed the title of emir  about 756  and later
 929  that of caliph  The latter title had originally been enjoyed only
by the head of the whole Arab empire  who had his capital at Damascus 
and later at Bagdad 

 44  As Charlemagne was crossing the Pyrenees  on his way back from
Spain  his rear guard was attacked in the Pass of Roncesvalles  The
chronicle simply states that Roland  Count of Brittany  was slain  This
episode  however  became the subject of one of the most famous of the
epics of the Middle Ages  the  Song of Roland   See below  § 99 

 45  Reference  for Charlemagne s conquests  Emerton   Introduction  
Chapter XIII  Oman   Dark Ages   Chapters XX XXI 

 46  See  Readings   Chapter VII  and Bryce   Holy Roman Empire  
Chapter V 

 47  See extracts from these regulations  and an account of one of
Charlemagne s farms  in  Readings   Chapter VII 

 48  For the capitulary relating to the duties of the  missi   see
 Readings   Chapter VII 

 49  See above  p  32 

 50  These lines are taken from a manuscript written in 825  They form a
part of a copy of Charlemagne s admonition to the clergy  789  mentioned
below  The part here given is addressed to the bishops and warns them of
the terrible results of disobeying the rules of the Church  Perhaps the
scribe did not fully understand what he was doing  for he has made some
of those mistakes which Charlemagne was so anxious to avoid  Then there
are some abbreviations which make the lines difficult to read  They
ought probably to have run as follows       mereamini  Scit namque
prudentia vestra  quam terribili anathematis censura feriuntur qui
praesumptiose contra statuta universalium conciliorum venire audeant 
Quapropter et vos diligentius ammonemus  ut omni intentione illud
horribile execrationis judicium     

 51  See  Readings   Chapter VII 

 52  References for the reign of Louis the Pious  Henderson   Germany in
the Middle Ages   Chapter VI  Oman   Dark Ages   Chapter XXIII 

 53  Named for Lothaire II 

 54  For the text and translation of the Strasburg oaths  see Emerton 
 Mediæval Europe   pp  26 27  or Munro   Mediæval History   p  20  A
person familiar with Latin and French could puzzle out a part of the
oath in the  lingua romana   that in the  lingua teudisca  would be
almost equally intelligible to one familiar with German 

 55  The following table will show the relationship of the descendants
of Charlemagne 

                         Charlemagne  d  814
                                 
                       Louis the Pious  d  840
                                 
                                                            
                                                            
Lothaire  d  855     Louis the German  d  876    Charles the Bald  d  877
                                                            
                                                            
                                                            
                                                            
Carloman  d  880        Charles the Fat  deposed 887        
                                                            
                                              Louis the Stammerer  d  879
                                                            
                                                            
                                                            
                                                            
Arnulf  d  899  Louis  d  882  Carloman  d  884  Charles the Simple  d  929 56 
        
Louis the Child  d  911 



 56  Who was too young to be considered in 884  but afterwards became
king of France and progenitor of the later Carolingian rulers 

 57  Reference  Henderson   Germany in the Middle Ages   Chapter VII 
Oman   Dark Ages   Chapter XXV 

 58  Reference  Munro   Mediæval History   pp  34 39  The Northmen
extended their expeditions to Spain  Italy  and even into Russia  In
England  under the name of Danes  we find them forcing Alfred the Great
to recognize them as the masters of northern England  878   The Norse
pirates were often called  vikings   from their habit of leaving their
long boats in the  vik   i e   bay or inlet  A goodly number of the
Northmen settled in Iceland  and our knowledge of their civilization and
customs comes chiefly from the Icelandic  sagas   or tales  Some of
these are of great interest and beauty  perhaps none is finer than  The
Story of Burnt Njal   This and others may be read in English  See
 Readings   Chapter VIII 

 59  An account of the manor will be given later  Chapter XVIII 

 60  See an example of an immunity granted by Charlemagne to a
monastery  in Emerton   Introduction   pp  246 249  also Munro 
 Mediæval History   p  44  Other examples are given in the  Readings  
Chapter IX 

 61  Extracts from the chronicles of the ninth century illustrating the
disorder of the period will be found in the  Readings   Chapter VIII 

 62  See above  p  16 

 63  See an example of this form of grant in the seventh century in
 Readings   Chapter IX  The reader will also find there a considerable
number of illustrations of feudal contracts  etc 

 64  See formula of  commendation   as this arrangement was called  in
 Readings   Chapter IX  The fact that the Roman imperial government
forbade this practice under heavy penalties suggests that the local
magnates used their retainers to establish their independence of the
imperial taxgatherers and other government officials 

 65  See Adams   Civilization   pp  207  sqq  

 66  Lord is  dominus   or  senior   in mediæval Latin  From the latter
word the French  seigneur  is derived   Suzerain  is used to mean the
direct lord and also an  overlord  separated by one or more degrees from
a subvassal 

 67  A relic of the time when fiefs were just becoming hereditary was
preserved in the exaction by the lord of a certain due  called the
 relief   This payment was demanded from the vassal when one lord died
and a new one succeeded him  and from a new vassal upon the death of his
predecessor  It was originally the payment for a new grant of the land
at a time when fiefs were not generally held hereditarily  The right did
not exist in the case of all fiefs and it varied greatly in amount  It
was customarily much heavier when the one succeeding to the fief was not
the son of the former holder but a nephew or more distant relative 

 68  Homage is derived from the Latin word for man   homo  

 69  The conditions upon which fiefs were granted might be dictated
either by interest or by mere fancy  Sometimes the most fantastic and
seemingly absurd obligations were imposed  We hear of vassals holding on
condition of attending the lord at supper with a tall candle  or
furnishing him with a great yule log at Christmas  Perhaps the most
extraordinary instance upon record is that of a lord in Guienne who
solemnly declared upon oath  when questioned by the commissioners of
Edward I  that he held his fief of the king upon the following terms 
When the lord king came through his estate he was to accompany him to a
certain oak  There he must have waiting a cart loaded with wood and
drawn by two cows without any tails  When the oak was reached  fire was
to be applied to the cart and the whole burned up  unless mayhap the
cows make their escape  

 70  The feudal courts  especially those of the great lords and of the
king himself  were destined to develop later into the centers of real
government  with regular judicial  financial  and administrative bodies
for the performance of political functions 

 71  In the following description of the anarchy of feudalism  I merely
condense Luchaire s admirable chapter on the subject in his  Manuel des
Institutions Françaises   The  Readings   Chapters X  XII  XIII  XIV 
furnish many examples of disorder 

 72  The gorgeous affairs of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were
but weak and effeminate counterparts of the rude and hazardous
encounters of the thirteenth 

 73  References  for the mediæval castle  the jousts  and the life of
the nobles  Munro   Mediæval History   Chapter XIII  and Henderson 
 Short History of Germany   pp  111 121 

 74  See the famous  Truce of God  issued by the Archbishop of Cologne
in 1083  in  Readings   Chapter IX 

 75  See genealogical table  above  p  96 

 76  Reference  Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp  405 420   Readings  
Chapter X 

 77  Not to be confounded with the  duchy  of Burgundy just referred to 
See p  97  above 

 78  See genealogical table and map of the Plantagenet possessions  pp 
140 141  below 

 79  Henry s family owes its name  Plantagenet  to the habit that his
father  Geoffrey of Anjou  had of wearing a bit of broom   planta
genista   in his helmet on his crusading expeditions 

 80  Geoffrey  the eldest of the three sons of Henry II mentioned above 
died before his father 

 81  The Estates General were so called to distinguish a general meeting
of the representatives of the three estates of the realm from a merely
local assembly of the provincial estates of Champagne  Provence 
Brittany  Languedoc  etc  There are some vague indications that Philip
had called in a few townspeople even earlier than 1302 

 82  For the French monarchy as organized in the thirteenth century  see
Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp  432 433  Adams   Civilization   pp 
311 328 

 83  In spite of the final supremacy of the West Saxons of Wessex  the
whole land took its name from the more numerous Angles 

 84  References  Green   Short History of the English People   revised
edition  Harper   Brothers   pp  48 52  extracts from the  Anglo Saxon
Chronicle  may be found in  Readings   Chapter XI 

 85  The shires go back at least as far as Alfred the Great  and many of
their names indicate that they had some relation to the earlier little
kingdoms  e g   Sussex  Essex  Kent  Northumberland 

 86  See above  p  62 

 87  Often called the battle of Hastings from the neighboring town of
that name 

 88  For contemporaneous accounts of William s character and the
relations of Normans and English  see Colby   Sources   pp  33 36 
39 41   Readings   Ch  XI 

 89  Reference  for the Conqueror and his reign  Green   Short History  
pp  74 87  and Gardiner   Students  History   pp  86 114 

 90 

William I  1066 1087   m  Matilda  daughter of Baldwin V of Flanders
            
                                                             
                                                             
William II  Rufus        Henry I  1100 1135         Adela  m  Stephen 
 1087 1100             m  Matilda  daughter of        Count of Blois
                      Malcolm  King of Scotland              
                                                             
                          Matilda  d  1167          Stephen  1135 1154 
                       m  Geoffrey Plantagenet 
                           Count of Anjou
                                   
                         Henry II  1154 1189  
                      the first Plantagenet king



 91  See above  p  126 

 92  References  Green  pp  104 112  Gardiner  pp  138 158  A
contemporaneous account of the murder is given by Colby   Sources   pp 
56 59 

 93  See above  p  126 

 94  For John s reign  see Green  pp  122 127 

 95  The text of the Great Charter is given in  Translations and
Reprints   Vol  I  No  6  extracts  in the  Readings   Chapter XI 

 96  These were payments made when the lord knighted his eldest son 
gave his eldest daughter in marriage  or had been captured and was
waiting to be ransomed 

 97  See map following p  152 for the names and position of the several
duchies 

 98  Arnulf  the grandson of Louis the German  who supplanted Charles
the Fat  died in 899 and left a six year old son  Louis the Child  d 
911   who was the last of the house of Charlemagne to enjoy the German
kingship  The aristocracy then chose Conrad I  d  918   and  in 919 
Henry I of Saxony  as king of the East Franks 

 99  See  Readings   Chapter XII 

 100  See Emerton   Mediæval Europe   Chapter IV  for a clear account of
the condition of the papacy  the struggles between the rival Italian
dynasties  and the interference and coronation of Otto the Great 

 101  Henry II  1002 1024  and his successors  not venturing to assume
the title of emperor till crowned at Rome  but anxious to claim the
sovereignty of Rome as indissolubly attached to the German crown  began
to call themselves before their coronation  rex Romanorum   i e   King
of the Romans  This habit lasted until Luther s time  when Maximilian I
got permission from the pope to call himself  Emperor Elect  before his
coronation  and this title was thereafter taken by his successors
immediately upon their election 

 102  For Otto II  Otto III  and Henry II  see Emerton   Mediæval
Europe   Chapter V  and Henderson   Germany in the Middle Ages   pp 
145 166 

 103  These grants of the powers of a count to prelates serve to explain
the  ecclesiastical  states   for example  the archbishoprics of Mayence
and Salzburg  the bishopric of Bamberg  and so forth   which continue to
appear upon the map of Germany until the opening of the nineteenth
century 

 104  From the beginning  single life had appealed to some Christians as
more worthy than the married state  Gradually  under the influence of
monasticism  the more devout and enthusiastic clergy voluntarily shunned
marriage  or  if already married  gave up association with their wives
after ordination  Finally the Western Church condemned marriage
altogether for the deacon and the ranks above him  and later the
sub deacons were included in the prohibition  The records are too
incomplete for the historian to form an accurate idea of how far the
prohibition of the Church was really observed throughout the countries
of the West  There were certainly great numbers of married clergymen in
northern Italy  Germany  and elsewhere  in the tenth and eleventh
centuries  Of course the Church refused to sanction the marriage of its
officials and called the wife of a clergyman  however virtuous and
faithful she might be  by the opprobrious name of  concubine  

 105  Pronounced  sĭm o ny  

 106  Reference  Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp  201 209 

 107  The word  cardinal   Latin   cardinalis   principal  was applied
to the priests of the various parishes in Rome  to the several deacons
connected with the Lateran   which was the cathedral church of the Roman
bishopric   and  lastly  to six or seven suburban bishops who officiated
in turn in the Lateran  The title became a very distinguished one and
was sought by ambitious prelates and ecclesiastical statesmen  like
Wolsey  Richelieu  and Mazarin  If their official titles were examined 
it would be found that each was nominally a cardinal bishop  priest  or
deacon of some Roman church  The number of cardinals varied until fixed 
in 1586  at six bishops  fifty priests  and fourteen deacons 

 108  The decree of 1059 is to be found in Henderson   Historical
Documents   p  361 

 109  For text of the  Dictatus   see  Readings   Chapter XIII  The most
complete statement of Gregory s view of the responsibility of the papacy
for the civil government is to be found in his famous letter to the
Bishop of Metz  1081    Readings   Chapter XIII 

 110  For this letter  see Colby   Sources   p  37 

 111  Reissues of this decree in 1078 and 1080 are given in the
 Readings   Chapter XIII 

 112  To be found in the  Readings   Chapter XIII 

 113  Henry s letter and one from the German bishops to the pope are
both in Henderson   Historical Documents   pp  372 376 

 114  Gregory s deposition and excommunication of Henry may be found in
the  Readings   Chapter XIII 

 115  For Gregory s own account of the affair at Canossa  see
 Readings   Chapter XIII 

 116  For a fuller account of the troubles between Gregory and Henry 
see Henderson   Germany in the Middle Ages   pp  183 210  Emerton 
 Mediæval Europe   pp  240 259 

 117  See  Readings   Chapter XIII 

 118  For the emperors Lothaire  1125 1137  and Conrad III  1138 1152  
the first of the Hohenstaufens  see Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp 
271 282 

 119  Something will be said of the mediæval towns in Chapter XVIII 

 120  Reference  Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp  271 291 

 121  Reference  Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp  293 297 

 122  The origin of the name  Ghibelline   applied to the adherents of
the emperor in Italy  is not known  it may be derived from Waibling  a
castle of the Hohenstaufens 

 123  The attention of the adventurous Normans had been called to
southern Italy early in the eleventh century by some of their people
who  in their wanderings  had been stranded there and had found plenty
of opportunities to fight under agreeable conditions for one or another
of the local rival princes  From marauding mercenaries  they soon became
the ruling race  They extended their conquests from the mainland to
Sicily  and by 1140 they had united all southern Italy into a single
kingdom  The popes had naturally taken a lively interest in the new and
strong power upon the confines of their realms  They skillfully arranged
to secure a certain hold upon the growing kingdom by inducing Robert
Guiscard  the most famous of the Norman leaders  to recognize the pope
as his feudal lord  in 1059 he became the vassal of Nicholas II 

 124  For John s cession of England and oath of vassalage  see
Henderson   Historical Documents   pp  430 432  For the interdict  see
Colby   Sources   pp  72 73 

 125  For the career and policy of Innocent III  see Emerton   Mediæval
Europe   pp  314 343 

 126  An excellent account of Frederick s life is given by Henderson 
 Germany in the Middle Ages   pp  349 397 

 127  For the speech of Urban  see  Readings   Chapter XV 

 128  The privileges of the crusaders may be found in  Translations and
Reprints   Vol  I  No  2 

 129  For Peter the Hermit  see  Translations and Reprints   Vol  I  No 
2 

 130  For the routes taken by the different crusading armies  see the
accompanying map 

 131  For an account of the prowess of Richard the Lion Hearted  see
Colby   Sources   pp  68 70 

 132  Heraldry may be definitely ascribed to the Crusades  for it grew
up from the necessity of distinguishing the various groups of knights 
Some of its terms  for example   gules   red  and  azur   are of Arabic
origin 

 133  References  For the highly developed civilization which the
crusaders found in Constantinople  Munro   Mediæval History   Chapter X 
For the culture of the Saracens  see the same work  Chapter IX 

 134  The law of the Church was known as the  canon law   It was taught
in most of the universities and practiced by a great number of lawyers 
It was based upon the acts of the various church councils  from that of
Nicæa down  and  above all  upon the decrees and decisions of the popes 
See Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp  582 592 

One may get some idea of the business of the ecclesiastical courts from
the fact that the Church claimed the right to try all cases in which a
clergyman was involved  or any one connected with the Church or under
its special protection  such as monks  students  crusaders  widows 
orphans  and the helpless  Then all cases where the rites of the Church 
or its prohibitions  were involved came ordinarily before the church
courts  as  for example  those concerning marriage  wills  sworn
contracts  usury  blasphemy  sorcery  heresy  and so forth 

 135  Many of the edicts  decisions  and orders of the popes were called
 bulls  from the seal  Latin   bulla   attached to them 

 136  For an illustration of provinces and bishoprics  see accompanying
map of France showing the ecclesiastical divisions  The seats of the
archbishops are indicated by  Symbol   those of the bishops by  Symbol  

 137  See below  § 81 

 138  Except those monasteries and orders whose members were especially
exempted by the pope from the jurisdiction of the bishops 

 139  Those clergymen who enjoyed the revenue from the endowed offices
connected with a cathedral church were called  canons   The office of
canon was an honorable one and much sought after  partly because the
duties were light and could often be avoided altogether  A scholar like
Petrarch might look to such an office as a means of support without
dreaming of performing any of the religious services which the position
implied  For an account of the relations between the chapter and the
bishop  see Emerton   Mediæval Europe   pp  549 550 

 140  It should be remembered that only a part of the priests were
intrusted with the care of souls in a parish  There were many priests
among the wandering monks  of whom something will be said presently  See
below  § 91  There were also many chantry priests whose main function
was saying masses for the dead in chapels and churches endowed with
revenue or lands by those who in this way provided for the repose of
their souls or those of their descendants  See below  p  213 

 141  For several centuries the  Sentences  were used as the text book
in all the divinity schools  Theologians established their reputations
by writing commentaries upon them  One of Luther s first acts of revolt
was to protest against giving the study of the  Sentences  preference
over that of the Bible in the universities 

 142  All the sacraments   e g  orders and matrimony   are not necessary
to every one  Moreover  the sincere  wish  suffices if one is so
situated that he cannot possibly actually receive the sacraments 

 143  Confession was a very early practice in the Church  Innocent III
and the fourth Lateran Council made it obligatory by requiring the
faithful to confess at least once a year  at Easter time  For
sacraments  see  Readings   Chapter XVI 

 144  See above  p  183  and  Translations and Reprints   Vol  IV  No 
4  for examples of the interdict and excommunication 

 145  The privilege of being tried by churchmen  which all connected
with the Church claimed  was called  benefit of clergy   See  Readings  
Chapter XVI 

 146  The bishops still constitute an important element in the upper
houses of parliament in several European countries 

 147  For a satire of the thirteenth century on the papal court  see
Emerton   Mediæval Europe   p  475 

 148  It must not be forgotten that the monks were regarded as belonging
to the clergy  For the various new orders of monks and the conditions in
the monasteries  see Munro   Mediæval History   Chapter XII  and
Jessopp   Coming of the Friars   Chapter III   Daily Life in a Mediæval
Monastery  

 149  See  Readings   Chapter XVII 

 150  See  Readings   Chapter XVII  for the beliefs of the Albigenses 

 151  Examples of these decrees are given in  Translations and
Reprints   Vol  III  No  6 

 152  His son married an English lady  became a leader of the English
barons  and was the first to summon the commons to Parliament  See
above  pp  146 147 

 153  For the form of relaxation and other documents relating to the
Inquisition  see  Translations and Reprints   Vol  III  No  6 

 154  The whole rule is translated by Henderson   Historical Documents  
p  344 

 155  In Italy and southern France town life was doubtless more general 

 156  The peasants were the tillers of the soil  They were often called
 villains   a word derived from vill 

 157  The manner in which serfs disappeared in England will be described
later 

 158  Reference  Munro   Mediæval History   Chapter XIV  where the
subject of this chapter is treated in a somewhat different way 

 159  In Germany the books published annually in the German language did
not exceed those in Latin until after 1680 

 160  Even the monks and others who wrote Latin in the Middle Ages were
unable to follow strictly the rules of the language  Moreover  they
introduced many new words to meet the new conditions and the needs of
the time  such as  imprisonare   imprison   utlagare   to outlaw 
 baptizare   to baptize   foresta   forest   feudum   fief  etc 

 161  See above  pp  94 95 

 162 

   Bytuene Mershe and Avoril
    When spray beginneth to springe 
  The little foul  bird  hath hire wyl
    On hyre lud  voice  to synge  



 163  Of course there was no sharp line of demarcation between the
people who used the one language and the other  nor was Provençal
confined to southern France  The language of Catalonia  beyond the
Pyrenees  was essentially the same as that of Provence  French was
called  langue d oïl   and the southern language  langue d oc   each
after the word used for  yes  

 164  The  Song of Roland  is translated into spirited English verse by
O Hagan  London  1880 

 165  The reader will find a beautiful example of a French romance of
the twelfth century in an English translation of  Aucassin and
Nicolette   Mosher  Portland  Me    Mr  Steele gives charming stories of
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries in  Huon of Bordeaux    Renaud of
Montauban   and  The Story of Alexander   Allen  London   Malory s  Mort
d Arthur   a collection of the stories of the Round Table made in the
fifteenth century for English readers  is the best place to turn for
these famous stories 

 166  An excellent idea of the spirit and character of the troubadours
and of their songs may be got from Justin H  Smith   Troubadours at
Home   G P  Putnam s Sons  New York   See  Readings   Chapter XIX 

 167  Reference  Henderson   Short History of Germany   Vol  I  pp 
111 121 

 168  See Steele s  Mediæval Lore  for examples of the science of the
Middle Ages  For the curious notions of the world and its inhabitants 
see the  Travels   attributed to Sir John Mandeville  The best edition
is published by The Macmillan Company  1900  See  Readings   Chapter
XIX 

 169  The word  miniature   which is often applied to them  is derived
from  minium   i e   vermilion  which was one of the favorite colors 
Later the word came to be applied to anything small  See the
frontispiece for an example of an illuminated page from a book of hours 

 170  So called because it was derived from the old Roman basilicas  or
buildings in which the courts were held 

 171  In France as early as the twelfth century 

 172  Notice flying buttresses shown in the picture of Canterbury
cathedral  p  208 

 173  See  Readings   Chapter XIX 

 174  The origin of the bachelor s degree  which comes at the end of our
college course nowadays  may be explained as follows  The bachelor in
the thirteenth century was a student who had passed part of his
examinations in the course in  arts   as the college course was then
called  and was permitted to teach certain elementary subjects before he
became a full fledged master  So the A B  was inferior to the A M  then
as now  After finishing his college course and obtaining his A M   the
young teacher often became a student in one of the professional schools
of law  theology  or medicine  and in time became a master in one of
these sciences  The words  master    doctor   and  professor  meant
pretty much the same thing in the thirteenth century 

 175  An example of the scholastic method of reasoning of Thomas Aquinas
may be found in  Translations and Reprints   Vol  III  No  6 

 176  Reference  Green   Short History of the English People   pp 
161 169 

 177  See above  p  147 

 178  See above  pp  127 128 and 130 

 179  See above  pp  131 132 

 180  Formerly it was supposed that gunpowder helped to decide the
battle in favor of the English  but if siege guns  which were already
beginning to be used  were employed at all they were too crude and the
charges too light to do much damage  For some generations to come the
bow and arrow held its own  it was not until the sixteenth century that
gunpowder came to be commonly and effectively used in battles 

 181  For the account of Crécy by Froissart  the celebrated historian of
the fourteenth century  see  Readings   Chapter XX 

 182  See above  pp  131 132 

 183  Reference  Adams   Growth of the French Nation   pp  116 123 

 184  For an example of the Statutes of Laborers  see  Translations and
Reprints   Vol  II  No  5  and Lee   Source book of English History  
pp  206 208 

 185  For extracts  see  Readings   Chapter XX 

 186  For description of manor  see above  pp  234 235 

 187  For this younger line of the descendants of Edward I  see
genealogical table below  p  297 

 188  See above  p  287 

 189  The title of Dauphin  originally belonging to the ruler of
Dauphiny  was enjoyed by the eldest son of the French king after
Dauphiny became a part of France in 1349  in the same way that the
eldest son of the English king was called Prince of Wales 

 190  Reference  Green   Short History   pp  274 281  For official
account of the trial of Joan  see Colby   Sources   pp  113 117 

 191  DESCENT OF THE RIVAL HOUSES OF LANCASTER AND YORK

                   Edward III  1327 1377 
                              
                                                          
                                                          
  Edward               John of Gaunt                  Edmund 
the Black Prince     Duke of Lancaster              Duke of York
  d  1376                                                 
                                                          
                                                          
RICHARD II                                                
 1377 1399                                                
                 HENRY IV        John Beaufort        Richard
               1399 1413                                  
                                                          
                HENRY V         John Beaufort        Richard
               1413 1422                                  
                                                          
               HENRY VI                                                  
               1422 1461                                                 
                                          EDWARD IV              RICHARD III
                                           1461 1483              1483 1485 
                                                  
                                                             
                   Edmund Tudor m  Margaret                  
                                                             
                          HENRY VII m  Elizabeth of York   EDWARD V
                           1485 1509                       Murdered in
                          First of the                     the Tower 
                          Tudor kings                         1483





 192  References  Green   Short History   pp  281 293  299 303 

 193  See  Readings   Chapter XX 

 194  Reference  Adams   Growth of the French Nation   pp  121 123 
134 135 

 195  See above  p  128 

 196  See geneological table above  p  282 

 197  See below  Chapter XXIII 

 198  Reference  Adams   French Nation   pp  136 142 

 199  See  Readings   Chapter XXI 

 200  The name recalled of course the long exile of the Jews from their
land 

 201  See  Readings   Chapter XXI 

 202  For statutes  see  Translations and Reprints   Vol  II  No  5  and
Lee   Source book   pp  198 202 

 203  See above  p  183 

 204  Reference  Green   Short History   pp  235 244  For extracts  see
 Readings   Chapter XXI   Translations and Reprints   Vol  II  No  5 
Lee   Source book   for the treatment of the Lollards  as the followers
of Wycliffe were called  pp  209 223 

 205  The eighth and last of these eastern councils  which were regarded
by the Roman Church as having represented all Christendom  occurred in
Constantinople in 869  In 1123 the first Council of the Lateran
assembled  and since that five or six Christian congresses had been
convoked in the West  But these  unlike the earlier ones  were regarded
as merely ratifying the wishes of the pope  who completely dominated the
assembly and published its decrees in his own name 

 206  See above  pp  202 203 

 207  THE POPES DURING THE GREAT SCHISM

                            Gregory XI  1373 1378 
                           Returns to Rome in 1377

     Roman Line                                      Avignon Line 

Urban VI  1378 1389                                Clement VII  1378 1394 
                                                                   
Boniface IX  1389 1404                           Benedict XIII  1394 1417 
                                                                   
Innocent VII  1404 1406     Council of Pisa s Line                 
                                                                   
Gregory XII  1406 1415     Alexander V  1409 1410                  
                                                                   
                           John XXIII  1410 1415                   
                                                                   
                                                                   
                                                                   
                            Martin V  1417 1431                    



 208  See above  pp  222 223 

 209  For examples of the general criticism of the abuses in the Church 
see  Translations and Reprints   Vol  III  No  6 

 210  This decree   Frequens   may be found in  Translations and
Reprints   Vol  III  No  6 

 211  On account of an outbreak of sickness the council was transferred
to Florence 

 212  See above  p  186 

 213  This word  although originally French  has come into such common
use that it is quite permissible to pronounce it as if it were
English    rẹ nā sens  

 214  See above  p  27 

 215  See above  pp  198 199 and 243 

 216  See above  pp  174  sqq  

 217  In the year 1300 Milan occupied a territory scarcely larger than
that of the neighboring states  but under the Visconti it conquered a
number of towns  Pavia  Cremona  etc   and became  next to Venice  the
most considerable state of northern Italy 

 218  A single example will suffice  Through intrigue and
misrepresentation on the part of Gian Galeazzo Visconti  the Marquis of
Ferrara became so wildly jealous of his nephew that he beheaded the
young man and his mother  then burned his own wife and hung a fourth
member of the family 

 219  See above  pp  31 32 

 220  The translation of  The Banquet  in Morley s  Universal Library 
is very poor  but that of Miss Hillard  London  1889  is good and is
supplied with helpful notes 

 221  See the close of the fourth canto of the  Inferno  

 222  See above  pp  271 272 

 223  Copies of the  Æneid   of Horace s  Satires   of certain of
Cicero s  Orations   of Ovid  Seneca  and a few other authors  were
apparently by no means uncommon during the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries  It seemed  however  to Petrarch  who had learned through the
references of Cicero  St  Augustine  and others  something of the
original extent of Latin literature  that treasures of inestimable value
had been lost by the shameful indifference of the Middle Ages   Each
famous author of antiquity whom I recall   he indignantly exclaims 
 places a new offense and another cause of dishonor to the charge of
later generations  who  not satisfied with their own disgraceful
barrenness  permitted the fruit of other minds and the writings that
their ancestors had produced by toil and application  to perish through
shameful neglect  Although they had nothing of their own to hand down to
those who were to come after  they robbed posterity of its ancestral
heritage  

 224  Petrarch s own remarkable account of his life and studies  which
he gives in his famous  Letter to Posterity   may be found in Robinson
and Rolfe   Petrarch   pp  59 76 

 225  See above  pp  45 46 

 226  Historians formerly supposed that it was only after Constantinople
was captured by the Turks in 1453 that Greek scholars fled west and took
with them the knowledge of their language and literature  The facts
given above serve as a sufficient refutation of this oft repeated error 

 227  In Whitcomb   Source Book of the Italian Renaissance   pp  70
 sqq    interesting accounts of these libraries may be found  written by
Vespasiano  the most important book dealer of the time 

 228  Manuscript   manu scriptum   means simply written by hand 

 229  The closing lines  i e   the so called  colophon   of the second
edition of the Psalter which are here reproduced  are substantially the
same as those of the first edition  They may be translated as follows 
 The present volume of the Psalms  which is adorned with handsome
capitals and is clearly divided by means of rubrics  was produced not by
writing with a pen but by an ingenious invention of printed characters 
and was completed to the glory of God and the honor of St  James by John
Fust  a citizen of Mayence  and Peter Schoifher of Gernsheim  in the
year of our Lord 1459  on the 29th of August  

 230  Note the similarity in form of the letters in the accompanying
illustration and those in the illuminated page which serves as the
frontispiece of this volume  It is not easy at first sight to tell some
early printed books from the best manuscripts  It may be observed that
the Germans still adhere to a type something like that used by the first
printers 

 231  See above  pp  261 262 

 232  See above  p  263 

 233  With the appearance of the mendicant orders  preaching again
became an important part of the church service  and pulpits were erected
in the body of the church  where the people could gather around them 
These pulpits offered a fine opportunity to the sculptor and were often
very elaborate and beautiful 

 234  The frescoes in Pompeii and other slight remnants of ancient
painting were not discovered till much later 

 235  In the church of Santa Croce in Florence and in that of St 
Francis at Assisi 

 236  Fra is an abbreviation of  frate   brother 

 237  See below  pp  361  363  364 

 238  One of the most celebrated among the other Florentine painters of
the period was Botticelli  He differs from most of his contemporaries in
being at his best in easel pictures  His poetic conceptions  the
graceful lines of his draperies  and the pensive charm of his faces have
especially inspired a famous school of English painters in our own
day  the Preraphaelites 

 239  See below  pp  364  365 

 240  Leonardo was an engineer and inventor as well 

 241  Compare his Holy Family with the reproduction of one of Giotto s
paintings  in order to realize the great change in art between the
fourteenth and sixteenth centuries 

 242  See his portrait of Erasmus below  p  382 

 243  For an example of the magnificent bronze work produced in Germany
in the early sixteenth century  see the statues of Philip the Good and
Charles the Bold  pp  300  301  above 

 244  See his portrait of Charles I below  p  480 

 245  Marco Polo s travels can easily be had in English  for example  in
 The Story of Marco Polo   by Noah Brooks  Century Company  1898  A
certain Franciscan monk  William of Rubruk  visited the far East
somewhat earlier than the Polo brothers  The account of his journey  as
well as the experiences of other mediæval travelers  may be found in
 The Travels of Sir John Mandeville   published by The Macmillan
Company  1900 

 246  See map above  pp  242 243 

 247  Reference   Cambridge Modern History   Chapter I 

 248  Reference   Cambridge Modern History   Chapter II  Kingsley has
described these mariners in his  Westward Ho   He derives his notions of
them from the collection of voyages made by an English geographer 
Hakluyt  died 1616   Some of these are published by Payne   Voyages of
Elizabethan Seamen   Clarendon Press  2 vols    1 25 each  

 249  See above  pp  85  151  sq    and Chapters XIII XIV 

 250  Rudolf  like many of his successors  was strictly speaking only
king of the Romans  since he was never crowned emperor at Rome  See
above  pp  152 n   185 

 251  From 1438 to 1806 only two emperors belonged to another family
than the Hapsburgs 

 252  See above  p  301 

 253  See above  p  71 

 254  See map above  following p  152 

 255  No one can gaze upon the great castle and palace of the Alhambra 
which was built for the Moorish kings  without realizing what a high
degree of culture the Moors had attained  Its beautiful and impressive
arcades  its magnificent courts  and the delicate tracery of its arches
represent the highest achievement of Arabic architecture 

 256  See above  pp  224 225 

 257 

Austria       Burgundy         Castile    Aragon Naples  etc 
                               America 

Maximilian I   Mary  d  1482        Isabella   Ferdinand  d  1516 
   d  1519     dau  of Charles      d  1504   
               the Bold  d  1477              
                                              
       Philip  d  1506          Joanna the Insane  d  1555 
                            
                                  
                                  
Charles V  d  1558    Ferdinand  d  1564    Anna  heiress to kingdoms
Emperor  1519 1556    Emperor  1556 1564    of Bohemia and Hungary



 258  It will be remembered that the popes  in their long struggle with
Frederick II and the Hohenstaufens  finally called in Charles of Anjou 
the brother of St  Louis  and gave to him both Naples and Sicily  See
above  p  185  Sicily revolted in 1282 and was united with the kingdom
of Aragon  which still held it when Charles V came to the Spanish
throne  The older branch of the house of Anjou died out in 1435 and
Naples was conquered by the king of Aragon  and was still in his family
when Charles VIII undertook his Italian expedition  The younger branch
of the house of Anjou had never reigned in Naples  but its members were
careful to retain their asserted title to it  and  upon the death of
their last representative  this title was transferred to Louis XI  He 
however  prudently refused to attempt to oust the Aragonese usurpers  as
he had quite enough to do at home 

 259  See above  p  327 

 260  More important for France than the arrangements mentioned above
was the so called  Concordat   or agreement  between Francis and the
pope in regard to the selection of the French prelates  Francis was
given the privilege of appointing the archbishops  bishops  and abbots 
and in this way it came about that he and his successors had many rich
offices to grant to their courtiers and favorites  He agreed in return
that the pope should receive a part of the first year s revenue from the
more important offices in the Church of France  The pope was  moreover 
thereafter to be regarded as superior to a council  a doctrine which had
been denied by the French monarchs since the Council of Basel  The
arrangements of the Concordat of 1516 were maintained down to the French
Revolution 

 261  See below  p  428 429 

 262  The Catholic Church  on the other hand  held that certain
important teachings  institutions  and ceremonies  although not
expressly mentioned in the Bible  were nevertheless sanctioned by
 tradition   That is  they had been handed down orally from Christ and
his apostles as a sacred heritage to the Church  and like the Bible were
to be received as from God  See  Readings   Chapter XXIV 

 263  For the origin of these and of the other ecclesiastical states of
Germany  see above  p  156 

 264  The manner in which the numerous and often important
ecclesiastical states all disappeared in Napoleon s time will become
clear later  See below  § 244 

 265  See above  pp  117  sqq   For the German law permitting feuds  see
Henderson   Historical Documents   p  246  In 1467  the German diet
ventured to forbid neighborhood war for five years  It was not  however 
permanently prohibited until a generation later 

 266  For example  in one of the books of instruction for the priest we
find that he is warned  when he quotes the Bible  to say to the people
that he is not translating it word for word from the Latin  for
otherwise they are likely to go home and find a different wording from
his in their particular version and then declare that the priest had
made a mistake 

 267  Some seventeen universities had been established by German rulers
and towns in a little over one hundred years  The oldest of them was
founded in 1348 at Prague  Several of these institutions  for example 
Leipsic  Vienna  and Heidelberg  are still ranked among the leading
universities of the world 

 268  See above  § 104 

 269  For examples of these  Letters of Obscure Men   see Whitcomb 
 Source Book of the German Renaissance   pp  67  sq    and  Translations
and Reprints   Vol  II  No  6  The peculiar name of the satire is due to
the fact that Reuchlin s sympathizers wrote him many letters of
encouragement  which he published under the title   Letters of
Celebrated Men to John Reuchlin   The humanists then pitched upon the
modest title   Letters of Obscure Men   for the supposed correspondence
of the admirers of the monks  The following is an example of the
 obscure men s  poetry  One of them goes to Hagenau and meets a certain
humanist  Wolfgang Angst  who  the writer complains  struck him in the
eye with his staff 

  Et ivi hinc ad Hagenau
  Da wurden mir die Augen blau
  Per te  Wolfgang Angst 
  Gott gib das du hangst 
  Quia me cum baculo
  Percusseras in oculo 



 270  See below  pp  426 7 

 271  This may be had in English  published by Scribner s Sons   1 25 
or Brentano   1 25  

 272  See above  pp  317 318 

 273  See above  p  203 

 274  The Augustinian order  to which Luther belonged  was organized in
the thirteenth century  a little later than the Dominican and the
Franciscan 

 275  He writes exultingly to a friend   Our kind of theology reigns
supreme in the university  only one who lectures on the Bible 
Augustine  or some real Church father  can reckon on any listeners  and
Aristotle sinks lower and lower every day   In this way he sought to
discredit Peter Lombard  Aquinas  and all the writers who were then most
popular in the theological schools  Walker   The Reformation   pp 
77 91 

 276  See above  p  211 212 

 277  It is a common mistake of Protestants to suppose that the
indulgence was forgiveness granted beforehand for sins to be committed
in the future  There is absolutely no foundation for this idea  A person
proposing to sin could not possibly be contrite in the eyes of the
Church  and even if he secured an indulgence it would  according to the
theologians  have been quite worthless 

 278  See above  p  344 

 279  The complete text of the theses may be found in  Translations and
Reprints   Vol  II  No  6 

 280  See above  p  209  for the Church s doctrine of the  indelible
character  which the priest received at ordination 

 281  See above  §§ 81 82  The two great works of Luther  here
mentioned  as well as his  Freedom of the Christian   in which he
explains his own doctrine very simply  may be found translated in Wace
and Buchheim   Luther s Primary Works  

 282  It must be remembered that it was the emperor s business to
execute the law  not to discuss its propriety with the accused  In the
same way nowadays  should a man convicted  for example  of bigamy urge
that he believed it Scriptural to have two wives  the court would refuse
to listen to his arguments and would sentence him to the penalty imposed
by law  in spite of the fact that the prisoner believed that he had
committed no wrong 

 283  The text of the Edict of Worms is published in English in the
 Historical Leaflets  issued by the Crozer Theological Seminary 
Chester  Pa 

 284  See  Readings   Chapter XXVI 

 285  See below  § 167 

 286  The  Twelve Articles  may be found in  Translations and Reprints  
Vol  II  No  6 

 287  The Protest of Speyer is to be had in English in the  Historical
Leaflets  published by the Crozer Theological Seminary  Chester  Pa 

 288  For the successive wars between Charles and Francis and the
terrible sack of Rome in 1527  see Johnson   Europe in the Sixteenth
Century   pp  172 175 and 181 195 

 289  It is still accepted as the creed of the Lutheran Church  Copies
of it in English may be procured from the Lutheran Publication Society 
Philadelphia  for ten cents each 

 290  Reference  Johnson   Europe in the Sixteenth Century   Chapter V 
Walker   The Reformation   pp  188 216 

 291  See above  p  300 

 292  This condition has not changed  all Swiss laws are still
proclaimed in three languages 

 293  Switzerland had made a business  ever since the time when Charles
VIII of France invaded Italy  of supplying troops of mercenaries to
fight for others  especially for France and the pope  It was the Swiss
who gained the battle of Marignano for Francis I  and Swiss guards may
still be seen in the pope s palace 

 294  So eloquent was the new preacher that one of his auditors reports
that after a sermon he felt as if  he had been taken by the hair and
turned inside out  

 295  See above  pp  212 213 

 296  For Zwingli s life and work see the scholarly biography by Samuel
Macauley Jackson   Huldreich Zwingli   G P  Putnam s Sons  1901  

 297  See below  p  452 

 298  Calvin intrusted the management of church affairs to the ministers
and the elders  or  presbyters   hence the name Presbyterian  For
Calvin s work  see Johnson   Europe in the Sixteenth Century   pp 
272 276 

 299  See above  p  382 

 300  An English translation of the  Utopia  is published by the
Macmillan Company at 50 cents 

 301  See above  § 139 

 302  The clergy only recognized the king as  Head of the Church and
Clergy so far as the law of Christ will allow   They did not abjure the
headship of the pope over the whole Church 

 303  These were the sufficiency of the bread without the wine for the
laity in partaking of the communion  A  the celibacy of the clergy  the
perpetual obligation of vows to remain unmarried  the propriety of
private masses  and  lastly  of confession  The act was popularly known
as  the whip with six strings  

 A  The custom of the Church had long been that the priest alone should
partake of the wine at communion  The Hussites  and later the
Protestants  demanded that the laity should receive both the bread and
the wine 

 304 

Henry VIII  m   1  Catherine  m   2  Anne Boleyn    m   3  Jane Seymour
                                                                
Mary  1553 1558               Elizabeth  1558 1603   Edward VI  1547 1553 

It was arranged that the son was to succeed to the throne  In case he
died without heirs  Mary and then Elizabeth were to follow 

 305  These may be found in any Book of Common Prayer of the English
Church or of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States 

 306  For an extract from the Bishop of Worcester s diary  recording
these changes  see  Readings   Chapter XXVII 

 307  The Catholics in their turn  it should be noted  suffered serious
persecution under Elizabeth and James I  the Protestant successors of
Mary  Death was the penalty fixed in many cases for those who
obstinately refused to recognize the monarch as the rightful head of the
English Church  and heavy fines were imposed for the failure to attend
Protestant worship  Two hundred Catholic priests are said to have been
executed under Elizabeth  others were tortured or perished miserably in
prison  See below  p  462  and Green   Short History   pp  407 410 

 308  There is an admirable account of the spirit of the conservative
reformers in the  Cambridge Modern History   Vol  I  Chapter XVIII 

 309  Protestant writers commonly call the reformation of the mediæval
Catholic Church the  counter reformation  or  Catholic reaction   as if
Protestantism were entirely responsible for it  It is clear  however 
that the conservative reform began some time before the Protestants
revolted  Their secession from the Church only stimulated a movement
already well under way  See Maurenbrecher   Geschichte der Katholischen
Reformation  

 310  They may be had in English   Decrees and Canons of the Council of
Trent   translated by Rev  J  Waterworth  London and New York  See
extracts from the acts of the council in  Translations and Reprints  
Vol  II  No  6 

 311  See  Readings   Chapter XXVIII 

 312  Reference  Parkman s   Jesuits in North America   Vol  I  Chapters
II and X 

 313  DIVISION OF THE HAPSBURG POSSESSIONS BETWEEN THE SPANISH AND THE
GERMAN BRANCHES

Maximilian I  d  1519   m  Mary of Burgundy  d  1482 
                         
              Philip  d  1506   m  Joanna the Insane  d  1555 
                               
                                      
                                      
Charles V  d  1558             Ferdinand  d  1564   m  Anna  heiress to kingdoms
Emperor  1519 1556             Emperor  1556 1564         of Bohemia and Hungary
                                                     
Philip II  d  1598                            Maximilian II  d  1576 
inherits Spain  the Netherlands               Emperor  and inherits Bohemia 
and the Italian possessions of                Hungary  and the Austrian possessions
the Hapsburgs                                 of the Hapsburgs

The map of Europe in the sixteenth century  see above  p  372  indicates
the vast extent of the combined possessions of the Spanish and German
Hapsburgs 

 314  Reference  Johnson   Europe in the Sixteenth Century   Chapter
VIII 

 315  It is impossible in so brief an account to relate the heroic deeds
of the Dutch  such  for example  as the famous defence of Leyden  The
American historian Motley gives a vivid description of this in his
well known  Rise of the Dutch Republic   Part IV  Chapter II  The most
recent and authoritative account of the manner in which the Dutch won
their independence is to be found in the third volume of  A History of
the People of the Netherlands   by the Dutch scholar Blok  translated by
Ruth Putnam  G P  Putnam s Sons  3 vols    7 50   Miss Putnam s own
charming  William the Silent   G P  Putnam s Sons  2 vols   with many
fine illustrations   3 75  gives an impressive picture of the tremendous
odds which he faced and of his marvellous patience and perseverance 

 316  Reference  Johnson   Europe in the Sixteenth Century   pp 
386 389 

 317  See  Readings   Chapter XXVIII 

 318  See above  p  221 

 319  The origin of this name is uncertain 

 320  Reference for Henry IV  Wakeman   Europe from 1598 1715   Chapter
I 

 321  Reference  Schwill   History of Modern Europe   Chapter VI  or a
somewhat fuller account in Johnson   Europe in the Sixteenth Century  
Chapter IX 

 322  Reference  Green   Short History   pp  370 376  392 405 

 323  For English mariners and their voyages and conflicts with Spain 
see Froude s  English Seamen in the Fifteenth Century   The account of
Drake s voyage is on pp  75 103  See also  The Famous Voyage of Sir
Francis Drake   by one of Drake s gentlemen at arms  in E J  Payne s
 Voyages of Elizabethan Seamen to America   Vol  I  pp  196 229  Oxford 
1893 

 324  See above  p  62 

 325  Reference for life and death of Mary Stuart  Green   Short
History   pp  379 392  416 417 

 326  References  Green   Short History of the English People   pp 
418 420  Froude   English Seamen   pp  176 228 

 327  Reference  Johnson   Europe in the Sixteenth Century   Chapter
VII  §§ 1 and 3 

 328  See above  pp  419 420 

 329  Reference  Wakeman   Europe from 1598 1715   Chapter III 

 330  Wallenstein  b  1583  had been educated in the Catholic faith 
although he came of a family with Hussite sympathies 

 331  Reference  Wakeman   Europe from 1598 1715   Chapter IV 

 332  Reference  Wakeman   Europe from 1598 1715   Chapter V 

 333  See above  p  452 

 334  Reference  Wakeman   Europe from 1598 1715   Chapter VI  For a
brief and excellent review of the whole war  see Schwill   Modern
Europe   pp  141 160 

 335  See above  p  467 

 336  See above  p  273 

 337  See the translators  dedication to James I in the authorized
version of the Bible  Only recently has it been deemed necessary to
revise the remarkable work of the translators of the early seventeenth
century  Modern scholars discovered very few serious mistakes in this
authorized version  but found it expedient for the sake of clearness to
modernize a number of words and expressions 

 338  See Lee   Source book of English History   pp  348 352 

 339  See Lee   Source book of English History   pp  352 355  for the
first writ of ship money 

 340  See above  p  426  n  1 

 341  The name Puritan  it should be noted  was applied loosely to the
English Protestants  whether Low Churchmen  Presbyterians  or
Independents  who aroused the antagonism of their neighbors by
advocating a godly life and opposing popular pastimes  especially on
Sunday 

 342  Reference  Green   Short History   pp  595 614  For a contemporary
account of Puritans  see  Readings   Chapter XXX 

 343  Reference  Lee   Source book of English History   pp  355 357 

 344  Reference for Cromwell s early career and his generalship  Green 
 Short History   pp  554 559 

 345  For charge against the king  etc   see Lee   Source book of
English History   pp  364 372 

 346  Reference  Green   Short History   pp  580 588  594 600 

 347  See below  p  502 

 348  Reference  Wakeman   Europe from 1598 1715   Chapter VII 

 349  Louis does not appear to have himself used the famous expression 
  I  am the  state    usually attributed to him  but it exactly
corresponds to his idea of the relation of the king and the state 

 350  Reference  Perkins   France under the Regency   pp  129 141 

 351  Reference  Perkins   France under the Regency   Chapter IV 

 352  Reference  Perkins   France under the Regency   pp  141 147 

 353  See above  pp  488 and 492  493 

 354  See below  pp  517 518 

 355  Reference  Perkins   France under the Regency   Chapter VI 

 356  The title Tsar  or Czar  was formerly supposed to be connected
with Cæsar  German   Kaiser    i e   emperor  but this appears to have
been a mistake 

 357  References  Schwill   Modern Europe   pp  215 230  Wakeman 
 European History from 1598 1715   pp  300 308 

 358  See above  p  196 

 359  The title King of Prussia appeared preferable to the more natural
King of Brandenburg  because Prussia lay wholly without the empire  and
consequently its king was not in any sense subject to the emperor but
was wholly independent  Since western Prussia still belonged to Poland
in 1701 the new king satisfied himself at first with the title  King
 in  Prussia 

 360  Reference  Schwill   Modern Europe   pp  230 238 

 361  Reference  Schwill   Modern Europe   pp  238 247 

 362  Reference  Hassall   The Balance of Power   pp  18  19  303 317 
See map below  p  584 

 363  The last instance in which an English ruler vetoed a measure
passed by Parliament was in 1707 

 364  See above  pp  278 280 

 365  Originally there had been but seven electors  see above  p  372  
but the duke of Bavaria had been made an elector during the Thirty
Years  War  and in 1692 the father of George I had been permitted to
assume the title of Elector of Hanover 

 366  Wolsey  it will be remembered  had advanced the same reason in
Henry VIII s time for England s intervention in continental wars  See
above  p  428 

 367  Except in 1718 1720  when she joined an alliance against Spain 
and her admiral  Byng  destroyed the Spanish fleet 

 368  Derived from  Jacobus   the Latin for James  The name was applied
to the adherents of James II and of his son and grandson  the elder and
younger pretenders to the throne 

 369  It will be remembered that the children of James II by his second
and Catholic wife  Mary of Modena  were excluded from the throne at the
accession of William and Mary  See genealogical table on preceding page 

 370  The Dutch occupation of a portion of the coast of North America
was brought to an end  as has been mentioned  by the English  See above 
p  492 

 371  For the settlement of the English and French in North America  see
Morris   The History of Colonization   Vol  I  Chapter X  and Vol  II 
Chapter XVII  also Parkman   Montcalm and Wolfe   Vol  I  pp  20 35 

 372  See above  p  348 

 373  Baber claimed to be descended from an earlier invader  the famous
Timur  or Tamerlane   who died in 1405  The so called Mongol  or Mogul 
emperors were really Turkish rather than Mongolian in origin  A very
interesting account of them and their enlightenment may be found in
Holden   The Mogul Emperors of Hindustan   Charles Scribner s Sons 
 2 00  

 374  Reference  Perkins   France under Louis XV   Vol  I  Chapter XI 

 375  Reference  Green   Short History of the English People   pp 
776 786 

 376  See below  p  568 

 377  The interior customs lines roughly coincided with the boundaries
of the region of the great salt tax  See accompanying map 

 378  The figures indicate the various prices of a given amount of salt 

 379  See above  p  366 

 380  Reference  Lowell   Eve of the French Revolution   Chapter III 

 381  See above  Chapter XVIII 

 382  Only a very small portion of the nobility were descendants of the
ancient and illustrious families of France  The king could grant
nobility to whom he would  moreover  many of the government offices 
especially those of the higher judges  carried the privileges of
nobility with them 

 383  Reference  Lowell   Eve of the French Revolution   Chapter XIII 

 384  See above  § 192 

 385  See Lowell   Eve of the French Revolution   pp  116 118 

 386  See the account of Voltaire s defense of Calas in Perkins   Louis
XV   Vol  II  pp  198  sqq  

 387  See above  p  500 

 388  Turgot  the leading economist of the time  argues that it would be
quite sufficient if  the government should always protect the natural
liberty of the buyer to buy  and of the seller to sell  For the buyer
being always the master to buy or not to buy  it is certain that he will
select among the sellers the man who will give him at the best bargain
the goods that suit him best  It is not less certain that every seller 
it being his chief interest to merit preference over his competitors 
will sell in general the best goods and at the lowest price at which he
can make a profit in order to attract customers  The merchant or
manufacturer who cheats will be quickly discredited and lose his custom
without the interference of government  

 389  Reference  Lowell   Eve of the French Revolution   Chapter II 

 390  Turgot succeeded in inducing the king to abolish the guilds and
the forced labor on the roads  but the decrees were revoked after
Turgot s dismissal  For an admirable short account of Turgot s life 
ideas  and reforms  see Say   Turgot   McClurg  75 cents  

 391  See  Readings   Chapter XXIV 

 392  Reference  Lowell   Eve of the French Revolution   pp  238 242 

 393  See above  pp  131 132 

 394  Reference  H  Morse Stephens   The French Revolution   Vol  I  pp 
13 15  20 24 

 395  Pronounced kă yā  

 396  Examples of the  cahiers  may be found in  Translations and
Reprints   Vol  IV  No  5 

 397  Reference  Lowell   Eve of the French Revolution   Chapter XXI 

 398  Reference  Stephens   The French Revolution   Vol  I  pp  128 145 

 399  Reference  Stephens   The French Revolution   Vol  I  Chapter VI 

 400  This decree may be found in  Translations and Reprints   Vol  I 
No  5 

 401  Reference  Stephens   French Revolution   Vol  I  Chapter VII 

 402  See above  p  568 

 403  The text of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy may be found in
 Translations and Reprints   Vol  I  No  5 

 404  Reference  Mathews   The French Revolution   Chapter XII 

 405  The formerly despotic king is represented as safely caged by the
National Assembly  When asked by Marie Antoinette s brother what he is
about  Louis XVI replies   I am signing my name    that is  he had
nothing to do except meekly to ratify the measures which the Assembly
chose to pass 

 406  By June  1791  there were four hundred and six of these affiliated
clubs 

 407  A committee of the Convention was appointed to draw up a new
republican calendar  The year was divided into twelve months of thirty
days each  The five days preceding September 22  at the end of the year 
were holidays  Each month was divided into three  decades   and each
 tenth day    décadi   was a holiday  The days were no longer dedicated
to saints  but to agricultural implements  vegetables  domestic animals 
etc 

 408  In former times it had been customary to inflict capital
punishment by decapitating the victim with the sword  At the opening of
the Revolution a certain Dr  Guillotin recommended a new device  which
consisted of a heavy knife sliding downward between two uprights  This
instrument  called after him  the guillotine  which is still used in
France  was more speedy and certain in its action than the sword in the
hands of the executioner 

 409  Reference  for the conduct of the terrorists and the executions at
Paris  Nantes  and Lyons  Mathews   The French Revolution   Chapter
XVII 

It should not be forgotten that very few of the people at Paris stood in
any fear of the guillotine  The city during the Reign of Terror was not
the gloomy place that we might imagine  Never did the inhabitants appear
happier  never were the theaters and restaurants more crowded  The
guillotine was making away with the enemies of liberty  so the women
wore tiny guillotines as ornaments  and the children were given toy
guillotines and amused themselves decapitating the figures of
 aristocrats   See Stephens   French Revolution   Vol  II  pp  343 361 

 410  The date of Robespierre s fall is generally known as the 9th
Thermidor  the day and month of the republican calendar 

 411  There were about forty billions of francs in assignats in
circulation at the opening of 1796  At that time it required nearly
three hundred francs in paper money to procure one in specie 

 412  See above  pp  326 327 

 413  Reference  Rose   Life of Napoleon   Vol  I  Chapter VIII 

 414  Reference  Rose   Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era   pp  95  96 
104 108  114  115 

 415  Reference  Rose   Life of Napoleon   Vol  I  pp  144 148 

 416  Reference   Ibid    Chapter X 

 417  See above  § 134 

 418  Reference  Rose   Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era   pp  132 133 

 419  The roads were dilapidated and the harbors filled with sand  taxes
were unpaid  robbery prevailed  and there was a general decay in
industry  A manufacturer in Paris who had employed sixty to eighty
workmen now had but ten  The lace  paper  and linen industries were as
good as destroyed 

 420  See above  pp  572 573  579 580 

 421  Reference  Rose   Life of Napoleon   Vol  I  Chapter XII 

 422  Reference  Rose   Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era   pp  148 163 

 423  See  Translations and Reprints   Vol  II  No  2 

 424  See above  p  604 

 425  See above  p  581 

 426  That is  a blockade too extensive to be really carried out by the
ships at the disposal of the power proclaiming it 

 427  Reference  Rose   Life of Napoleon   Vol  II  pp  197 207  For
documents relating to the blockade and  the Continental system   see
 Translations and Reprints   Vol  II  No  2 

 428  See  Readings   Chapter XXXVIII 

 429  Napoleon was never content with his achievements or his glory  On
the day of his coronation  December  1806  he complained to his minister
Decrès that he had been born too late  that there was nothing great to
be done any more  On his minister s remonstrating he added   I admit
that my career has been brilliant and that I have made a good record 
But what a difference is there if we compare ours with ancient times 
Take Alexander the Great  for example  After announcing himself the son
of Jupiter  the whole East  except his mother  Aristotle  and a few
Athenian pedants  believed this to be true  But now  should I nowadays
declare myself the son of the Eternal Father  there isn t a fishwife who
would not hiss me  No  the nations are too sophisticated  there is
nothing great any longer possible  

 430   It depends upon you alone   he said to the Spanish in his
proclamation of December 7   whether this moderate constitution that I
offer you shall henceforth be your law  Should all my efforts prove
vain  and should you refuse to justify my confidence  then nothing
remains for me but to treat you as a conquered province and find a new
throne for my brother  In that case I shall myself assume the crown of
Spain and teach the ill disposed to respect that crown  for God has
given me power and will to overcome all obstacles  

 431  Reference  Rose   Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era   pp  193 201 
Louis Bonaparte  the father of Napoleon III  and the most conscientious
of the Bonaparte family  had been so harassed by his imperial brother
that he had abdicated as king of Holland 

 432  Reference  Rose   Life of Napoleon   Vol  II  Chapter XXXII 

 433  See above  p  544 

 434  This decree may be found in  Translations and Reprints   Vol  II 
No  2 

 435  Reference  Rose   Revolutionary and Napoleonic Era   pp  335 361 

 436  The son of Louis XVI had been imprisoned and maltreated by the
terrorists  He died while still a boy in 1795  but nevertheless takes
his place in the line of French kings as Louis XVII 

 437  Compare the accompanying map with that below  pp  666 667 

 438  This document may be found in  Translations and Reprints   Vol  I 
No  3 

 439  Reference  Andrews   Modern Europe   Vol  I  Chapter IV 

 440  Observe the boundary of the German Confederation as indicated on
the map  pp  626 627  above  Important portions of the German
constitution of 1815 are given in  Translations and Reprints   Vol  I 
No  3 

 441  For the Carlsbad Resolutions  see  Translations and Reprints  
Vol  I  No  3 

 442  Reference  Andrews   Modern Europe   Vol  I  pp  229 257 

 443  The island of Sardinia had  in 1720  been given to the duke of
Savoy  who was also ruler of Piedmont  The duke thereupon assumed the
title of king of Sardinia  but Piedmont  with Turin as its capital 
remained  nevertheless  the most important part of the kingdom of
Sardinia 

 444  Reference  Andrews   Modern Europe   Vol  I  pp  205 212 

 445  Reference  Fyffe   History of Modern Europe   Popular Edition 
1896   Chapter XV 

 446  See above  p  449 

 447  See above  p  600 

 448  See map  p  649  below 

 449  The Slavic inhabitants of Bohemia 

 450  Reference  Andrews   Modern Europe   Vol  II  Chapter III 

 451  He ruled until 1861 as regent for his brother  Frederick William
IV  who was incapacitated by disease 

 452  Reference  Fyffe   Modern Europe   pp  954 957 

 453  Andrews   Modern Europe   Vol  2  pp  173 180 

 454  In 1869 Spain was without a king  and the crown was tendered to
Leopold of Hohenzollern  a very distant relative of William I of
Prussia  This greatly excited the people of Paris  for it seemed to them
only an indirect way of bringing Spain under the influence of Prussia 
The French minister of foreign affairs declared that the candidacy was
an attempt to  reëstablish the empire of Charles V   In view of this
opposition  Leopold withdrew his acceptance of the Spanish crown early
in July  1870  and Europe believed the incident to be at an end  The
French ministry  however  was not satisfied with this  and demanded that
the king of Prussia should pledge himself that the candidacy should
never be renewed  This William refused to do  The account of the demand
and refusal was given in such a way in the German newspapers that it
appeared as if the French ambassador had insulted King William  The
Parisians  on the other hand  thought that their ambassador had received
an affront  and demanded an immediate declaration of war 

 455  Reference  Fyffe   Modern Europe   pp  988 1002 

 456  Alsace had  with certain reservations   especially as regarded
Strasburg and the other free towns   been ceded to the French king by
the treaty of Westphalia  see above  p  473   Louis XIV disregarded the
reservations and seized Strasburg and the other towns  1681  and so
annexed the whole region to France  The duchy of Lorraine had upon the
death of its last duke fallen to France in 1766  It had previously been
regarded as a part of the Holy Roman Empire  In 1871 less than a third
of the original duchy of Lorraine  together with the fortified city of
Metz  was ceded back to Germany 

 457  The monarchical party naturally fell into two groups  One  the
so called  legitimists   believed that the elder Bourbon line  to which
Louis XVI and Charles X had belonged  should be restored in the person
of the count of Chambord  a grandson of Charles X  The  Orleanists   on
the other hand  wished the grandson of Louis Philippe  the count of
Paris  to be king  In 1873 the Orleanists agreed to help the count of
Chambord to the throne as Henry V  but that prince frustrated the plan
by refusing to accept the national colors   red  white  and blue   which
had become so endeared to the nation that it appeared dangerous to
exchange them for the white of the Bourbons 

 458  See above  p  75 

 459  See above  pp  514  517 518  535 

 460  See above  p  640 

 461  Herzegovina is a small province lying between Bosnia and the
Adriatic  Both Bosnia and Herzegovina appear on the map as a part of
Austria  to which they now belong  to all intents and purposes  See map 
p  649  above 

 462  In 1885 South Bulgaria  formerly known as Eastern Roumelia 
proclaimed itself annexed to Bulgaria  The Sultan  under the influence
of the western powers  permitted the prince of Bulgaria to extend his
power over South Bulgaria 

 463  See above  pp  351 352 

 464  See  The Progress of the Century   Harper Bros   pp  181 188 
232 242 

 465  Reference  for the development of the inventions  Cheyney 
 Industrial History of England   pp  199 216 

 466  See above  p  488 

 467  See above  p  500 

 468  See above  p  553 

 469  Reference  Cheyney   Industrial History of England   pp  224 239 

 470  For factory legislation in England  see Cheyney   Industrial
History   pp  244 262 

 471  Reference  Cheyney   Industrial History   pp  277 293 

 472  England  like the continental countries  has gradually  during the
nineteenth century  conceded the right to vote to almost all adult
males  Before 1832 a great part of the members of the House of Commons
were chosen  not by the voters at large but by a few individuals  who
controlled the so called  rotten boroughs   These boroughs had once been
important enough to be asked by the king to send representatives to
Parliament  but had sunk into insignificance  or even disappeared
altogether  Meanwhile great manufacturing cities like Birmingham 
Manchester  and Sheffield had grown up  and as there had been no
redistribution of representatives after the time of Charles II  these
large cities were unrepresented in Parliament  This evil was partially
remedied by the famous  Reform Act  of 1832  At the same time the amount
of property which one must hold in order to be permitted to vote was
reduced  In 1867 almost all of the workingmen of the cities were granted
the franchise by permitting those to vote who rented a lodging costing
at least fifty dollars a year  This doubled the number of voters  In
1885 the same privilege was granted to the country people 

 473  See above  p  492 

 474  See Sir Charles Dilke on  War   in  The Progress of the Century  
333  sqq  

 475  The works here enumerated are those referred to in the notes
throughout the volume  They would form a valuable and inexpensive
collection for use in a high school  The prices given are in most
instances subject to a discount  often as high as twenty five per cent 




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