THE INTELLECTUAL AWAKENING OF EUROPE
_Social Evolution Is Dependent Upon Variation_.--The process by which
ideas are born and propagated in human society is strangely analogous
to the methods of biological evolution. The laws of survival, of
adaptation, of variation and mutation prevail, and the evidence of
conspicuous waste is ever present. The grinding and shifting of human
nature under social law is similar to the grinding and shifting of
physical nature under organic law. When we consider the length of time
it takes physical nature to accomplish the ultimate of fixed values,
seventy millions of years or more to produce an oak-tree, millions of
years to produce a horse or a man, we should not be impatient with the
slow processes of human society nor the waste of energy in the process.
For human society arises out of the confusion of ideas and progresses
according to the law of survival.
New ideas must be accepted, diffused, used, and adapted to new
conditions. It would seem that Europe had sufficient knowledge of life
contributed by the Orient, by Greek, Roman, and barbarian to go
forward; but first must come a period of readjustment of old truth to
new environment and the discovery of new truth. For several centuries,
in the Dark Ages, the intellectual life of man lay dormant. Then must
come a quickening of the spirit before the world could advance.
However, in considering human progress, the day of small things must
"not be despised." For in the days of confusion and low tide of
regression there are being established new modes of life and thought
which through right adaptation will flow on into the full tide of
progress. Revivals come which gather up and utilize the scattered and
confused ideas of life, adapting and utilizing them by setting new
standards and imparting new impulses of progress.
{348}
_The Revival of Progress Throughout Europe_.--Human society, as a world
of ideas, is a continuous quantity, and therefore it is difficult to
mark off any definite period of time to show social causation. Roughly
speaking, the period from the beginning of the eighth century to the
close of the fifteenth is a period of intellectual ferment, the climax
of which extended from the eleventh to the close of the fifteenth
century. It was in this period that the forces were gathering in
preparation for the achievements of the modern era of progress. There
was one general movement, an awakening along the whole line of human
endeavor in the process of transition from the old world to the new.
It was a revival of art, language, literature, philosophy, theology,
politics, law, trade, commerce, and the additions of invention and
discovery. It was the period of establishing schools and laying the
foundation of universities. In this there was a more or less
continuous progress of the freedom of the mind, which permitted
reflective thought, which subsequently led on to the religious
reformation that permitted freedom of belief, and the French
Revolution, which permitted freedom of political action. It was the
rediscovery of the human mind, a quickening of intellectual liberty, a
desire of alert minds for something new. It was a call for humanity to
move forward.
_The Revival of Learning a Central Idea of Progress_.--As previously
stated, the church had taken to itself by force of circumstances the
power in the Western world relinquished by the fallen Roman Empire. In
fighting the battles against unbelief, ignorance, and political
corruption, it had become a powerful hierarchy. As the conservator of
learning, it eventually began to settle the limits of knowledge and
belief on its own interpretation and to force this upon the world. It
saved the elements of knowledge from the destruction of the barbarians,
but in turn sought to lock up within its own precincts of belief the
thoughts of the ages, presuming to do the thinking for the world. It
became dogmatic, arbitrary, conservative, and conventional. Moreover,
this had become the {349} attitude of all inert Europe. The several
movements that sought to overcome this stifling condition of the mind
are called the "revival of learning."
A more specific use of the term renaissance, or revival of learning,
refers especially to the restoration of the intellectual continuity of
Europe, or the rebirth of the human mind. It is generally applied to
what is known as humanism, or the revival of classical learning.
Important as this phase of general progress is, it can be considered
only as a part of the great revival of progress. Humanism, or the
revival of classical learning, having its origin and first great
impulse in Italy, it has become customary to use humanism and the
Italian renaissance interchangeably, yet without careful consideration;
for although the Italian renaissance is made up largely of humanism, it
had such wide-reaching consequences on the progress of all Europe as
not to be limited by the single influence of the revival of the
classical learning.
_Influence of Charlemagne_.--Clovis founded the Frankish kingdom, which
included the territory now occupied by France and the Netherlands.
Subsequently this kingdom was enlarged under the rule of Charles
Martel, who turned back the Moslem invasion at Poitiers in 732, and
became ruler of Europe north of the Alps. His son Pepin enlarged and
strengthened the kingdom, so that when his successor Charlemagne came
into power in 768 he found himself in control of a vast inland empire.
He conquered Rome and all north Italy and assumed the title of Roman
emperor. The movement of Charlemagne was a slight and even a doubtful
beginning of the revival. Possibly his reform was a faint flickering
of the watch-fires of intellectual and civil activity, but they went
out and darkness obscured the horizon until the breaking of the morn of
liberty. Yet in the darkness of the ages that followed new forces were
forming unobserved by the contemporary historian--forces which should
give a new awakening to the mind of all Europe.
Charlemagne re-established the unity of government which {350} had been
lost in the decline of the old Roman government; he enlarged the
boundary of the empire, established an extensive system of
administration, and promoted law and order. He did more than this: he
promoted religion by favoring the church in the advancement of its work
throughout the realm. But unfortunately, in the attempt to break down
feudalism, he increased it by giving large donations to the church, and
so helped to develop ecclesiastical feudalism, and laid the foundation
of subsequent evils. He was a strong warrior, a great king, and a
master of civil government.
Charlemagne believed in education, and insisted that the clergy should
be educated, and he established schools for the education of his
subjects. He promoted learning among his civil officers by
establishing a school all the graduates of which were to receive civil
appointments. It was the beginning of the civil service method in
Europe. Charlemagne was desirous, too, of promoting learning of all
kinds, and gathered together the scattered fragments of the German
language, and tried to advance the educational interests of his
subjects in every direction. But the attempts to make learning
possible, apparently, passed for naught in later days when the iron
rule of Charlemagne had passed away, and the weaker monarchs who came
after him were unable to sustain his system. Darkness again spread
over Europe, to be dispelled finally by other agencies.
_The Attitude of the Church Was Retrogressive_.--The attitude of the
Christian church toward learning in the Middle Ages was entirely
arbitrary. It had become thoroughly institutionalized and was not in
sympathy with the changes that were taking place outside of its own
policy. It assumed an attitude of hostility to everything that tended
toward the development of free and independent thought outside the
dictates of the authorities of the church. It found itself, therefore,
in an attitude of bitter opposition to the revival of learning which
had spread through Europe. It was unfortunate that the church appeared
so diametrically opposed to freedom of {351} thought and independent
activity of mind. Even in England, when the new learning was first
introduced, although Henry VIII favored it, the church in its blind
policy opposed it, and when the renaissance in Germany had passed
continuously into the Reformation, Luther opposed the new learning with
as much vigor as did the papalists themselves.
But from the fact of the church's assuming this attitude toward the new
learning, it must not be inferred that there was no learning within the
church, for there were scholars in theology, logic, and law, astute and
learned. Yet the church assumed that it had a sort of proprietorship
or monopoly of learning, and that only what it might see fit to
designate was to receive attention, and then only in the church's own
way; all other knowledge was to be opposed. The ecclesiastical
discussions gave evidence of intense mental activity within the church,
but, having little knowledge of the outside world to invigorate it or
to give it something tangible upon which to operate, the mind passed
into speculative fields that were productive of little permanent
culture. Dwelling only upon a few fundamental conceptions at first, it
soon tired itself out with its own weary round.
The church recognized in all secular advocates of literature and
learning its own enemies, and consequently began to expunge from the
literary world as far as possible the remains of the declining Roman
and Greek culture. It became hostile to Greek and Latin literature and
art and sought to repress them. In the rise of new languages and
literature in new nationalities every attempt was made by the church to
destroy the effects of the pagan life. The poems and sagas treating of
the religion and mythologies of these young, rising nationalities were
destroyed. The monuments of the first beginnings of literature, the
products of a period so hard to compass by the historian, were served
in the same way as were the Greek and Latin masterpieces.
The church said, if men will persist in study, let them ponder the
precepts of the gospels as interpreted by the church. {352} For those
who inquired about the problems of life, the churchmen pointed to the
creeds and the dogmas of the church, which had settled all things. If
men were too persistent in inquiring about the nature of this world,
they were told that it is of little importance, only a prelude to the
world to come; that they should spend their time in preparation for the
future. Even as great a man as Gregory of Tours said: "Let us shun the
lying fables of the poets and forego the wisdom of the sages at enmity
with God, lest we incur the condemnation of endless death by the
sentence of our Lord." Saint Augustine deplored the waste of time
spent in reading Virgil, while Alcuin regretted that in his boyhood he
had preferred Virgil to the legends of the saints. With the monks such
considerations gave excuse for laziness and disregard of rhetoric.
But in this movement of hostility to the new learning, the church went
too far, and soon found the entire ecclesiastical system face to face
with a gross ignorance, which must be eradicated or the superstructure
would fall. As Latin was the only vehicle of thought in those days, it
became a necessity that the priests should study Virgil and the other
Latin authors, consequently the churches passed from their opposition
to pagan authors to a careful utilization of them, until the whole
papal court fell under the influence of the revival of learning, and
popes and prelates became zealous in the promotion and, indeed, in the
display of learning. When the son of Lorenzo the Magnificent became
Pope Leo X, the splendor of the ducal court of Florence passed to the
papal throne, and no one was more zealous in the patronage of learning
than he. He encouraged learning and art of every kind, and built a
magnificent library. It was merely the transferrence of the pomp of
the secular court to the papacy.
Such was the attitude of the church toward the new learning--first, a
bitter opposition; second, a forced toleration; and third, the
absorption of its best products. Yet in all this the spirit of the
church was not for the freedom of mind nor independence of thought. It
could not recognize this freedom nor {353} the freedom of religious
belief until it had been humiliated by the spirit of the Reformation.
_Scholastic Philosophy Marks a Step in Progress_.--There arose in the
ninth century a speculative philosophy which sought to harmonize the
doctrine of the church with the philosophy of Neo-Platonism and the
logic of Aristotle. The scholastic philosophy may be said to have had
its origin with John Scotus Erigena, who has been called "the morning
star of scholasticism." He was the first bold thinker to assert the
supremacy of reason and openly to rebel against the dogma of the
church. In laying the foundation of his doctrine, he starts with a
philosophical explanation of the universe. His writings and
translations were forerunners of mysticism and set forth a peculiar
pantheistic conception. His doctrine appears to ignore the pretentious
authority of the church of his time and to refer to the earlier church
for authority. In so doing he incorporated the doctrine of emanation
advanced by the Neo-Platonists, which held that out of God, the supreme
unity, evolve the particular forms of goodness, and that eventually all
things will return to God. In like manner, in the creation of the
universe the species comes from the genera by a process of unfolding.
The complete development and extension of scholastic philosophy did not
come until the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. The term
"scholastics" was first applied to those who taught in the cloister
schools founded by Charlemagne. It was at a later period applied to
the teachers of the seven liberal arts--grammar, rhetoric, and
dialectic, in the _Trivium,_ and arithmetic, geometry, music, and
astronomy, in the _Quadrivium_. Finally it was applied to all persons
who occupied themselves with science or philosophy. Scholastic
philosophy in its completed state represents an attempt to harmonize
the doctrines of the church with Aristotelian philosophy.
There were three especial doctrines developed in the scholastic
philosophy, called respectively nominalism, realism, and conceptualism.
The first asserted that there are no generic {354} types, and
consequently no abstract concepts. The formula used to express the
vital point in nominalism is "_Universalia post rem_." Its advocates
asserted that universals are but names. Roscellinus was the most
important advocate of this doctrine. In the fourteenth century William
of Occam revived the subject of nominalism, and this had much to do
with the downfall of scholasticism, for its inductive method suggested
the acquiring of knowledge through observation.
Realism was a revival of the Platonic doctrine that ideas are the only
real things. The formula for it was "_Universalia ante rem_." By it
the general name preceded that of the species. Universal concepts
represent the real; all else is merely illustrative of the real. The
only real sphere is the one held in the mind, mathematically correct in
every way. Balls and globes and other actual things are but the
illustrations of the genus. Perhaps Anselm was the strongest advocate
of this method of reasoning.
It remained for Abelard to unite these two theories of philosophical
reasoning into one, called conceptualism. He held that universals are
not ideals, but that they exist in the things themselves. The formula
given was "_Universalia in re_." This was a step in advance, and laid
something of a foundation for the philosophy of classification in
modern science.
The scholastic philosophers did much to sharpen reason and to develop
the mind, but they failed for want of data. Indeed, this has been the
common failure of man, for in the height of civilization men speculate
without sufficient knowledge. Even in the beginning of scientific
thought, for lack of facts, men spent much of their time in
speculation. The scholastic philosophers were led to consider many
unimportant questions which could not be well settled. They asked the
church authorities why the sacramental wine and bread turned into blood
and flesh, and what was the necessity of the atonement? And in
considering the nature of pure being they asked: "How many angels can
dance at once on the point of a needle?" and "In moving from point to
point, do angels pass through {355} intervening space?" They asked
seriously whether "angels had stomachs," and "if a starving ass were
placed exactly midway between two stacks of hay would he ever move?"
But it must not be inferred that these people were as ridiculous as
they appear, for each question had its serious side. Having no
assistance from science, they fell single-handed upon dogmatism; yet
many times they busied themselves with unprofitable discussions, and
some of them became the advocates of numerous doctrines and dogmas
which had a tendency to confuse knowledge, although in defense of which
wits were sharpened.
Lord Bacon, in a remarkable passage, has characterized the scholastic
philosophers as follows:
"This kind of degenerate learning did chiefly reign among the
schoolmen, who--having sharp and strong wits and abundance of leisure
and small variety of reading, but their wits being shut up in the cells
of a few authors (chiefly Aristotle, their dictator) as their persons
were shut up in the cells of monasteries and colleges, and having
little history, either of nature or of time--did, out of no great
quantity of matter and infinite agitation of wit, spin out unto us
those laborious webs of learning which are extant in their books. For
the wit and mind of man, if it work upon matter which is the
contemplation of the creatures of God, worketh according to the stuff
and is limited thereby; but if it work upon itself, as the spider
worketh its web, then it is endless, and brings forth indeed cobwebs of
learning, admirable for the fineness of thread and work, but of no
substance or profit."[1]
Scholasticism, as the first phase of the revival of learning, though
overshadowed by tradition and mediaeval dogmatism, showed great
earnestness of purpose in ascertaining the truth by working "the wit
and mind of man"; but it worked not "according to the stuff," and,
having little to feed upon, it produced only speculations of truth and
indications of future possibilities. There were many bright men among
the scholastic {356} philosophers, especially in the thirteenth
century, who left their impress upon the age; yet scholasticism itself
was affected by dogmatism and short-sightedness, and failed to utilize
the means at its hand for the improvement of learning. It exercised a
tyranny over all mental endeavor, for the reason that it was obliged in
all of its efforts to carry through all of its reasoning the heavy
weight of dogmatic theology. Whatever else it attempted, it could not
shake itself free from this incubus of learning, through a great system
of organized knowledge, which hung upon the thoughts and lives of men
and attempted to explain all things in every conceivable way.
But to show that independent thinking was a crime one has only to refer
to the results of the knowledge of Roger Bacon, who advanced his own
methods of observation and criticism. Had the scholastics been able to
accept what he clearly pointed out to them, namely, that reason can
advance only by finding, through observation, new material upon which
to work, science might have been active a full century in advance of
what it was. He laid the foundation of experimental science, and
pointed out the only way in which the revival of learning could be made
permanent, but his voice was unheeded by those around him, and it
remained for the philosophers of succeeding generations to estimate his
real worth.
_Cathedral and Monastic Schools_.--There were two groups of schools
under the management of the church, known as the cathedral and monastic
schools. The first represented the schools that had developed in the
cathedrals for the sons of lay members of the church; the second, those
in the monasteries that were devoted largely to the education of the
ministry. To understand fully the position of these schools it is
necessary to go back a little and refer to the educational forces of
Europe. For a long period after Alexandria had become established as a
great centre of learning, Athens was really the centre of education in
the East, and this city held her sway in educational affairs down to
the second century. The influence of the traditions of great teachers
and the encouragement and {357} endowments given by emperors kept up a
school at Athens, to which flocked the youth of the land who desired a
superior education.
Finally, when the great Roman Empire joined to itself the Greek
culture, there sprang up what was known as the Greek and Roman schools,
or Graeco-Roman schools, although Rome was not without its centre of
education at the famous Athenaeum. In these Graeco-Roman schools were
taught grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic, music, arithmetic, geometry,
and astronomy. The grammar of that day frequently included language,
criticism, history, literature, metre; the dialectic considered logic,
metaphysics, and ethics; while rhetoric contemplated the fitting of the
youth for public life and for the law.
But these schools, though dealing in real knowledge for a time,
gradually declined, chiefly on account of the declining moral powers of
the empire and the relaxation of intellectual activity, people thinking
more of ease and luxury and the power of wealth than of actual
accomplishment. The internal disorganization, unjust taxation, and
unjust rule of the empire had also a tendency to undermine education.
The coming of the barbarians, with their honest, illiterate natures,
had its influence, likewise, in overthrowing the few schools that
remained.
The rise of Christianity, which supposed that all pagan literature and
pagan knowledge were of the devil, and hence to be suppressed, opposed
secular teaching, and tended to dethrone these schools. Constantine's
effort to unite the church and state tended for a while to perpetuate
secular institutions. But the pagan schools passed away; the
philosophy of the age had run its course until it had become a hollow
assumption, a desert of words, a weary round of speculation without
vitality of expression; and the activity of the sophists in these later
times narrowed all literary courses until they dwindled into mere
matters of form. Perhaps, owing to its force, power, and dignity, the
Roman law retained a vital {358} position in the educational
curriculum. The school at Athens was suppressed in 529 by Justinian,
because, as it had been claimed, it was tainted with Oriental
philosophy and allied with Egyptian magic, and hence could not develop
ethical standards.
It is easy to observe how the ideas of Christian learning came into
direct competition with the arrogant self-assumption and the hollowness
of the selfish teachings of the old Graeco-Roman schools. The
Christian doctrine, advocating the development of the individual life,
intimate relations with God, the widening of social functions, with its
teachings of humility, and humanity, could not tolerate the instruction
given in these schools. Moreover, the Christian doctrine of education
consisted, on the one hand, in preparing for the future life, and on
the other, in the preparation of Christian ministers to teach this
future life. As might be expected, when narrowed to this limit,
Christian education had its dwarfing influence. If salvation were an
important thing and salvation were to be obtained only by the denial of
the life of this world, then there would be no object in perpetuating
learning, no attempt to cultivate the mind, no tendency to develop the
whole man on account of his moral and intellectual worth. The use of
secular books was everywhere discouraged. As a result the instruction
of the religious schools was of a very meagre nature.
Within the monasteries devotional exercises and the study of the
Scriptures represented the chief intellectual development of the monks.
The Western monks required a daily service and a systematic training,
but the practice of the Eastern monks was not educational in its nature
at all. After a while persons who were not studying for religious vows
were admitted to the schools that they might understand the Bible and
the services of the church. They were taught to write, that they might
copy the manuscripts of the church fathers, the sacred books, and the
psalter; they were taught arithmetic, that they might be able to
calculate the return of Easter and the other festivals; they were
taught music, that they might {359} be able to chant well. But the
education in any line was in itself superficial and narrow.
The Benedictine order was exceptional in the establishment of better
schools and in promoting better educational influences. Their
curriculum consisted of the Old and New Testaments, the exposition of
the Scriptures by learned theologians, and the discourses, or
conversations, of Cassianus; yet, as a rule, the monks cared little for
knowledge as such, not even for theological knowledge. The
monasteries, however, constituted the great clerical societies, where
many prepared for secular pursuits. The monasteries of Ireland
furnished many learned scholars to England, Scotland, and Germany, as
well as to Ireland; yet it was only a monastic education which they
exported.
Finally it became customary to found schools within the monasteries,
and this was the beginning of the church schools of the Middle Ages.
Formal and meagre as the instruction of these schools was, it
represents a beginning in church education. But in the seventh and
eighth centuries they again declined, and learning retrograded very
much; literature was forgotten; the monks and friars boasted of their
ignorance. The reforms of Charlemagne restored somewhat the
educational status of the new empire, and not only developed the church
schools and cathedral schools but also founded some secular schools.
The cathedral schools became in many instances centres of learning
apart from monasticism. The textbooks, however, of the Middle Ages
were chiefly those of Boethius, Isidor, and Capella, and were of the
most meagre content and character. That of Capella, as an
illustration, was merely an allegory, which showed the seven liberal
arts in a peculiar representation. The logic taught in the schools was
that given by Alcuin; the arithmetic was limited to the reckoning of
holidays and festivals; astronomy was limited to a knowledge of the
names and courses of the stars; geometry was composed of the first four
books of Euclid, and supplemented with a large amount of geography.
{360}
But all this learning was valued merely as a support to the church and
the church authorities, and for little else. Yet there had been
schools of importance founded at Paris, Bologna, and Padua, and at
other places which, although they were not the historical foundations
of the universities, no doubt became the means, the traditional means,
of the establishment of universities at these places. Also, many of
the scholars, such as Theodore of Tarsus, Adalbert, Bede, and Alcuin,
who studied Latin and Greek and also became learned in other subjects,
were not without their influence.
_The Rise of Universities_.[2]--An important phase of this period of
mediaeval development was the rise of universities. Many causes led to
their establishment. In the eleventh century the development of
independent municipal power brought the noble and the burgher upon the
same level, and developed a common sentiment for education. The
activity of the crusades, already referred to, developed a thirst for
knowledge. There was also a gradual growth of traditional learning, an
accumulation of knowledge of a certain kind, which needed
classification, arrangement, and development. By degrees the schools
of Arabia, which had been prominent in their development, not only of
Oriental learning but of original investigation, had given a quickening
impulse to learning throughout southern Europe. The great division of
the church between the governed and governing had led to the
development of a strong lay feeling as opposed to monasticism or
ecclesiasticism. Perhaps the growth of local representative government
had something to do with this.
But the time came when great institutions were chartered at these
centres of learning. Students flocked to Bologna, where law was
taught; to Salerno, where medicine was the chief subject; and to Paris,
where philosophy and theology predominated. At first these schools
were open to all, without special rules. Subsequently they were
organized, and finally were chartered. In those days students elected
their own {361} instructors and built up their own organization. The
schools were usually called _universitas magistrorum et scholarium_.
They were merely assemblages of students and instructors, a sort of
scholastic guild or combination of teachers and scholars, formed first
for the protection of their members, and later allowed by pope and
emperor the privilege of teaching, and finally given the power by these
same authorities to grant degrees. The result of these schools was the
widening of the influence of education.
The universities proposed to teach what was found in a new and revived
literature and to adopt a new method of presenting truth. Yet, with
all these widening foundations, there was a tendency to be bound by
traditional learning. The scholastic philosophy itself invaded the
universities and had its influence in breaking down the scientific
spirit. Not only was this true of the universities of the continent,
but of those of England as well. The German universities, however,
were less affected by this tendency of scholasticism. Founded at a
later period, when the Renaissance was about to be merged into the
Reformation, there was a wider foundation of knowledge, a more earnest
zeal in its pursuit, and also a tendency for the freedom and activity
of the mind which was not observed elsewhere.
The universities may be said to mark an era in the development of
intellectual life. They became centres where scholars congregated,
centres for the collection of knowledge; and when the humanistic idea
fully prevailed, in many instances they encouraged the revival of
classical literature and the study of those things pertaining to human
life. The universities entertained and practised free discussion of
all subjects, which made an important landmark of progress. They
encouraged people to give a reason for philosophy and faith, and
prepared the way for scientific investigation and experiment.
_Failure to Grasp Scientific Methods_.--Perhaps the greatest wonder in
all this accumulation of knowledge, quickening of the mind, philosophy,
and speculation, is that men of so much {362} learning failed to grasp
scientific methods. Could they but have turned their attention to
systematic methods of investigation based upon facts logically stated,
the vast intellectual energy of the Middle Ages might have been turned
to more permanent account. It is idle, however, to deplore their
ignorance of these conditions or to ridicule their want of learning.
When we consider the ignorance that overshadowed the land, the breaking
down of the old established systems of Greece and Rome, the struggle of
the church, which grew naturally into its power and made conservatism
an essential part of its life; indeed, when we consider that the whole
medieval system was so impregnated with dogmatism and guided by
tradition, it is a marvel that so many men of intellect and power
raised their voices in the defense of truth, and that so much
advancement was made in the earnest desire for truth.
_Inventions and Discoveries_.--The quickening influence of discovery
was of great moment in giving enlarged views of life. The widening of
the geographical horizon tended to take men out of their narrow
boundaries and their limited conceptions of the world, into a larger
sphere of mental activity, and to teach them that there was much beyond
their narrow conceptions to be learned. The use of gunpowder changed
the method of warfare and revolutionized the financial system of
nations. The perfection of the mariner's compass reformed navigation
and made great sea voyages possible; the introduction of printing
increased the dissemination of knowledge; the building of great
cathedrals had a tendency to develop architecture, and the contact with
Oriental learning developed art. These phases tended to assist the
mind in the attempt to free itself from bondage.
_The Extension of Commerce Hastened Progress_.--But more especially
were men's ideas enlarged and their needs supplied by the widening
reach of commerce. Through its exchanges it distributed the
food-supply, and thus not only preserved thousands from want but
furnished leisure for others to study. It had a tendency to distribute
the luxuries of manufactured {363} articles, and to quicken the
activity of the mind by giving exchange of ideas. Little by little the
mariners, plying their trade, pushed farther and farther into unknown
seas, and at last brought the products of every clime in exchange for
those of Europe.
The manner in which commerce developed the cities of Italy and of the
north has already been referred to. Through this development the
foundations of local government were laid. The manner in which it
broke down the feudal system after receiving the quickening impulse of
the crusades has also been dealt with. In addition to its influence in
these changes, it brought about an increased circulation of
money--which also struck at the root of feudalism, in destroying the
mediaeval manor and serfdom, for men could buy their freedom from
serfdom with money--which also made taxation possible; and the
possibility of taxation had a vast deal to do with the building up of
new nations and stimulating national life. Moreover, as a distributer
of habits and customs, commerce developed uniformity of political and
social life and made for national solidarity.
SUBJECTS FOR FURTHER STUDY
1. What is meant by Renaissance, Revival of Learning, Revival of
Progress and Humanism, as applied to the mediaeval period?
2. The causes of the Revival of Progress.
3. The direct influence of humanism.
4. The attitude of the church toward freedom of thought.
5. The scholastic philosophy, its merits and its defects.
6. What did the following persons stand for in human progress: Dante,
Savonarola, Charlemagne, John Scotus Erigena, Thomas Aquinas, Abelard,
William of Occam, Roger Bacon?
7. Rise of universities. How did they differ from modern universities?
[1] _Advancement of Learning_, iv, 5.
[2] See Chapter XXIX.
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