The Historians' History of the World 07

Then came the gigantic tragedy of the Hundred Years’ War, retarding for more than a century that growth of industry and commerce upon which even the political structure rests. But while English and French alike are laying waste the fairest provinces of France, the University of Paris is able to dictate the policy of the universal church and for a generation to reduce the greatest absolutism of the age, that of the papacy, to the restrictions of parliamentary government. The Council of Constance was in session in the year of the battle of Agincourt. And, meanwhile, there is another development, far more important than the battles of the Black Prince or the marches of Du Guesclin. Commerce thrives along the shores of Italy, and in spite of their countless feuds and petty wars, the cities of Tuscany and Lombardy grow ready for the great artistic awakening. The story of the Middle Ages, like that of our own times, comes less from the camp fire than from the city square. And even there, how much is omitted! The caravans that line the rude bazaar could never reach it but for the suppression of the robbers by the way, largely the work of royalty. The wealth of the people is the opportunity for culture, but without the security of law and order, neither the one nor the other can be attained. In the last analysis, therefore, the protection of society while it developed is the great political theme of the Middle Ages. And now it is time to confess that we have touched upon but one half of that theme. It was not alone feudalism that saved Europe, nor royalty alone that gave it form. Besides the castle there was another asylum of refuge, the church. However loath men have been in recent years to confess it, the mediæval church was a gigantic factor in the preservation and furthering of our civilisation.

The church was the only potent state in Europe for centuries,—an institution vastly different from our idea of it to-day. It was not only the religious monitor and the guardian of the salvation of mankind, it took up the duty of governing when the Roman Empire was gone. It helped to preserve the best things of antiquity; for when the barbarians were led to destroy what was of no use to them, it was the church, as Rashdall says, that widened the sphere of utility. It, more than the sword of Charlemagne tamed the barbarian Germans, and through its codes of penance with punishments almost as severe as the laws of Draco, it curbed the instincts of savagery, and taught our ancestors the ethics of Moses while promising them the salvation of Christ. It assumed much of the administration of justice in a lawless age, gave an inviolate asylum to the persecuted, and took in hand the education of the people. Its monks were not only the pioneer farmers in the fastnesses of the wilderness, but their entertainment of travellers made commerce possible. Its parish church furnished a nursery for democracy in the gatherings at the church door for counsel and deliberation. It opened to the sons of peasants a career that promised equality with the haughtiest seigneur, or even the dictation over kings. There was hardly a detail of daily life which did not come under the cognisance or control of the church,—questions of marriage and legitimacy, wills, oaths, even warfare, came under its surveillance.