INTRODUCTION
TO
THE STUDY OF HISTORY.
INTRODUCTION
TO
THE STUDY OF HISTORY
Civil, Ecclesiastical, and Literary.
BY W. B. BOYCE.
LONDON :
for tfje lutfjor 6g
THEOPHILUS WOOLMER,
2, CASTLE STREET, CITY ROAD, & 66, PATERNOSTER ROW.
1884.
WYMAN AND SONS, PRINTERS,
GREAT QUEEN STREET, LINCOLN's-INN FIELDS,
LONDON, \V.C.
D
TO
SIR GEORGE WIGRAM ALLEN, K.C.M.G.
Toxtclh Park, Sydney, New South Wales,
THIS VOLUME IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED,
BY
HIS OWN AND HIS FATHER'S FRIEND,
WILLIAM B. BOYCE.
PREFACE.
THE links between the most remote past and the present are
comparatively few. They are to be found in the histories of
the ISRAELITES, the GREEKS, the ROMANS, and in that of one's own
country, be it England, or France, or Germany. The ISRAELITISH
history (that of the Bible) introduces us to that of BABYLON,
ASSYRIA, EGYPT, and PERSIA. GREEK history brings us to the very
beginning of European civilisation, and of free democratical govern-
ments. ROMAN history is the history of struggles for a mixed free
constitutional government, with encouraging success, which failed
only through the wars of conquest that led to the necessary esta-
blishment of the Empire. The history of our own country, or that
of France or Germany, is more or less connected with that of the
civilised world. In the excellent Students' Manuals published by
Murray there is a complete historical library compiled by writers of
eminence, and well adapted for the present use or future reference
of the reader, as introductory to the study of our great historians.
2. In the present work an attempt is made to exhibit the leading
events in the history of the world contemporaneously (as far as is
possible with due regard to chronological order). For the con-
venience of the student, the narrative is arranged in thirteen periods.
At the conclusion of each of these periods there is a brief retrospec-
tive review of the position and relative importance of the leading
political organisations and of the then state of the world. The
first period closes with the tenth century B.C. ; the second with the
foundation of the Persian Empire by Cyrus, 539 B.C. ; the third with
the empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. ; the fourth with the
Roman Empire under Augustus, and the Christian era ; the fifth
with the final division of the Roman Empire, 395 A.D. ; the sixth
to the revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne, 800 A.D. ;
viii Introduction to the Study of History.
the seventh to the Crusades, 1096 A.D. ; the eighth closes with the
reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. ; the ninth with the age
of the Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. ; the tenth with
the English Revolution of 1688 A.D. ; the eleventh with the French
Revolution of 1788 A.D. ; the twelfth with the Peace of Paris, in
1815 A.D. ; the thirteenth with the present year, 1884 A.D. A brief
reference to Literary History follows each period ; and, from the
Christian era, an equally brief notice of the History of the Christian
Church. These additional notices are not histories, but mere
reminders, that the student may not be so absorbed in secular his-
tory as to ignore altogether the existence of a LITERATURE and of a
CHURCH. All this, however, is no more than a mere epitome, — the
skeleton, not the body, of the history. Nothing less than the patient
study and mastery of the works of our great historians can convey
a correct notion of the history of the past. The perusal of such
writers as GROTE, THIRLWALL, ARNOLD, GUIZOT, BRYCE, FREE-
MAN, MAHAFFY, and FYFFE, is, in fact, an education of itself, and
one of the most likely means of inspiring and developing the
intellectual life of the student.
3. In order to maintain a connexion of subjects, as well as the
order of time, it is desirable for the student to group the histories
according to their affinities, and to take in order — (i) the Oriental
nations ; (2) the Greeks ; (3) Rome ; (4) the rise of the
European nationalities ; (5) the Middle Ages ; (6) the Renaissance,
the Reformation, and the Religious Wars up to 1648 A.D. ; (7) the
wasteful and unnecessary wars of Louis XIV., his contemporaries
and their successors up to the French Revolution of 1788 A.D. ;
(8) the French Revolution, and thence to the present year 1884.
A list of books, some of them absolutely necessary, and others par-
ticularly useful as references, is appended. Let it be, however,
clearly understood that the STUDY of history is no trifling matter.
If taken up as the mere amusement of leisure moments, in which
exciting incidents are chiefly regarded, the reader is simply wasting
his time over unconnected scraps of the romance of history. A
large amount of hard, dry reading, and, in addition, the habit of
comparing the statements and opinions of our great historians, is the
condition of success in this study. Perseverance is rewarded by the
Preface. ix
power to look back on the events of the past with such an interest
as enables us for a time to forget the present, and to place ourselves
in the standpoint of the great men, the makers of history. We thus
live again retrospectively as contemporaries of all the generations
of the past four thousand years, and yet enjoy more thoroughly the
present age. The panorama of the past is not, however, a pleasing
one to the thoughtful observer. There is much to gratify in the
ever-changing exhibition of the several stages in the rise and
progress of our complex civilisation, in the rapid transition, and
the alternate predominance and decline of the series of con-
quering races, and in the marvellous, and oft-recurring, revolutions
of political power. But, with all this, how painful is the record
of war, bloodshed, and wholesale murder ; and, what is even
worse than war and murder, the chronic misery, ignorance, and
degradation of the major part of the human family. History is to
us little more than an old almanack, registering details the most
painful and disgusting, unless we can recognise at the same time the
unmistakable tokens of moral government and of Divine discipline
and retribution. If nations be amenable to moral law, they must
be dealt with " according to their works," while existing as nations.
Believing in God's moral government "of the world, and in the justice,
wisdom, and mercy of the divine administration of the world's affairs,
we find rest in the faith of the Psalmist : " Clouds and darkness are
round about Him : righteousness and judgment are the habitation of
His throne " (Psalm xcvii. 2).
The list of books, some to be read, others to be occasionally con-
sulted, is now given, arranged according to the order recommended.
4. Books of reference, useful to those engaged in the study of
history : —
(i) Chronological Tables: —
NICOLAS (Sir H.), Chronology of History, i2mo. 1839.
Blair, Chronological Tables, i2mo. (Bohn).
CLINTON (H. F.), Fasti Hellenici, 3 vols. 41.0. and i2mo.
Fasti Romani, 2 vols. 4to. and i2mo.
Hales (W.), New Analysis of Chronology, &c., 4 vols. 8vo,
1830.
OXFORD CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES, folio.
Le Sage, Historical Atlas, folio (many editions).
x Introduction to the Study of History.
(2) Geography: —
Bunbury, History of Ancient Geography, 2 vols. 8vo. 1884.
MURRAY (SMITH), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography,
2 vols. 8vo.
FREEMAN (E. A.), Historical Geography of Europe, 2 vols.
1881.
KCEPPEN (Louis), The World in the Middle Ages, 2 vols.
8vo. with atlas. (Appleton, New York, 1856.)
VON SPRUNER MINKE, Historical Geography Atlas, 4to.
1880.
MURRAY, Ancient Atlas, 4to.
(3) Introductions to History : —
Priestley (Dr. J.), Lectures on History (Rutt), 8vo. 1839.
Bolingbroke (Lord), Letters on the Study and Use of His-
tory, 8vo. 1770.
Bossuet, Discours sur 1'Histoire Universelle, i2mo.
PLOETZ, Epitome of History, post 8vo. 1884. Very valuable,
and handy for reference.
Bigland, Letters on History, 121110. 1840.
Keightley, Outlines of History, i2mo.
Stoddart (Sir John), Introduction to Universal History, crown
8vo. 1850.
(4) Dictionaries : —
Haydn, Dictionary of Dates, i7th edition, 8vo.
MURRAY (SMITH), Dictionary of the Bible, 3 vols. 8vo.
Dictionary of Classical Biography, 3 vols. 8vo.
Greek and Roman Antiquities, i vol. 8vo.
WOODWARD and GATES, Encyclopaedia of Chronology, 8vo.
1872, is invaluable.
(5) Historical Origins : —
MAINE (H. S.), Ancient Law, Early Law and Customs,
Village Communities, 3 vols. 8vo.
N.B.— In the following lists of books there is no reference to
the original historical documents existing in print or in MS. in the
archives of the European nations, from which our original his-
torians drew the materials of their great works. The lists given
are purely for the English reader who desires to master the results
of the labours of these historians. The references to the Greek and
Latin classics are to English translations, as there are few non-
professional persons who can read Latin and Greek with the same
ease and pleasure as their own tongue. Guizot's remarks on the
Preface. xi
study of the Greek and Latin classics, apply, to some extent, to the
study of good translations. " I approve highly of those few years
passed in familiar intercourse with antiquity, for if one knows
nothing of it one is never anything but an upstart in knowledge.
Greece and Rome are the good society of the human mind "
(" Guizot in Private Life," 8vo., p. 136). The majority of readers
must be content to enjoy this good society through the medium of
an interpreter.
I. — ORIENTAL HISTORY.
(1) Books referring to Oriental History in general : —
LENORMANT, Ancient History of the East, 2 vols. 121110. ;
also in 3 vols. 4to. (French).
HEEREN, Historical Works, 6 vols. 8vo.
DUNCKER (MAX), History of Antiquity, 6 vols. 8vo.
Smith (Philip), Ancient History, 3 vols. 8vo.
Bunsen, Egypt's Place in the World's History, 5 vols. 8vo.
Lewis (Sir G. Cornewall), Astronomy of the Ancients, 8vo.
MAHAFFY, Prolegomena of Ancient History, 8vo. 1869.
RAWLINSON, Great Monarchies of the Ancient Eastern
World, 6 vols. 8vo.
Niebuhr, Lectures on Ancient History and Geography,
3 vols. 8vo.
Lectures on Ethnography, 2 vols. Svo.
Baldwin, Prehistoric Nations, 121110. 1869.
Eadie, Early Oriental History, 121110.
Keary (C. F.), Dawn of History, 121110. 1878.
Primaeval State of Europe, 121110. 1864.
De Coulanges, Aryan Civilisation, 121110. 1871.
(2) Books on Babylonia, Chaldea, and Assyria : —
LAYARD, Exploration of Nineveh, &c. 3 vols. Svo.
MAHAFFY, Twelve Lectures on Primitive Civilisation,
Svo. 1869.
Smith (George), Ancient History from the Monuments, 121110.
(Tract Society).
The Assyrian Eponym Canon, Svo. 1875.
Wright, History of the Empire of the Hittites, post Svo. 1884.
SAYCE (A. H.), The Empires of the East, 121110. 1884.
Babylonian Literature, Svo.
Fresh Lights from the Monuments, post Svo. (Tract
Society).
HACKNESS, Assyrian Life and History, 121110. (Tract Society).
Babylonian Life and History, 121110 (Tract
Society).
xii Introduction to the Study of History.
(3) Egypt.—
Wilkinson (Sir J. G.), Egypt, 3 vols. 8vo.
RAWLINSON (HENRY), Egypt, 2 vols. 8vo.
Brugsch Bey, History of Egypt, 2 vols. 8vo.
Sharpe, History of Egypt, 2 vols. i2mo.
(4) Biblical History :—
MILMAN (Dean), History of the Jews, 3 vols. 8vo ; 1 2mo. also.
STANLEY (Dean), History of the Jewish Church, 3 vols. 8vo.
STRACHEY (Sir EDWARD), Jewish History and Politics in the
Times of Sargon and Sennacherib, 8vo. 1874.
Russell, Connexion of Sacred and Profane History, 3 vols. 8vo.
Prideaux, Connexion of Sacred and Profane History, 3 vols.
8vo. (various editions).
Ewald, History of the Israelites, 6 vols. 8vo.
COOKE (Canon), Origins of Religion and Language, i vol. 8vo.
Kenrick, Phoenicia, 8vo.
Add to these the historical books of the Old Testament and the
prophetical writings, together with the history of HERODOTUS (either
in Rawlinson's or Bohn's edition), leaving out, for the present, the
very useful but rather perplexing dissertations. W. ROBERTSON
SMITH on the Hebrew prophets (i2mo.) may be read with advantage.
From the above list the student will wisely first select MAHAFFY'S
1 ' Prolegomena" and "Twelve Lectures on Primitive Civilisation,"
SAYCE'S " Empires of the East," Canon COOKE'S " Origins of
Religion and Language," and Deans Milman and Stanley's " Jewish
Histories," with Sir EDWARD STRACHEY'S "Jewish History and
Politics, &c." The interesting fact of a remote connexion between
the AKKADS of Babylonia and the first foundation of the CHINESE
civilisation, first discovered by M. Terrien de la Couperie, may lead
to yet more important discoveries.
II. — THE GREEKS.
(i) Histories: —
Mitford, History of Greece, 8 vols. 8vo. or i2mo.
GROTE, History of Greece, 12 vols. 8vo. or 121110*.
THIRLWALL, History of Greece, 8 vols. 8vo. or i2mo.
CURTIUS, History of Greece, 5 vols. 8vo.
Pocock (J.), Early History of Greece, i2mo. 1850.
(E), India in Greece, i2mo. 1852.
Cox, Athenian Empire, small (Longman & Co.).
Greeks and Persians, small (Longman & Co.).
Sankey, Spartan and Theban Supremacy, small (Longman &
Co.).
Preface. xiii
Ranke, Universal History (chiefly devoted to Greece), 8vo.
1884.
(2) Literary History : —
Mure, History of the Language and Literature of Greece,
5 vols. 8vo. 1850-1857.
MAHAFFY, History of Classical Greek Literature, 2 vols. 8vo.
(3) Important References to Greek History : —
MAHAFFY, Social Life in Greece, post 8vo. 1874.
Rambles and Studies in Greece, post 8vo. 1876.
GLADSTONE, Juventus Mundi, post 8vo. 1869.
Studies in Homer, 3 vols. 8vo. 1858.
FREEMAN (A. E.), Essays, First Series: Ancient Greece
(Homer), History of Athens, The Athenian Demos,
Alexander the Great, Greece under Macedonia. Essays,
Third Series : First Impression of Athens.
The student should compare GROTE and THIRLWALL in their
respective views of the Heroic Age, the beginning of free republican
institutions, the working of the democracies, the real character of
the sophists, and the causes which led to the domination of
Macedonia. Great light is thrown on these important matters
by CURTIUS, MAHAFFY, and A. E. FREEMAN. MAHAFFY has
courageously dared to give a sober and just estimate of the moral
character of the ancient Greeks, and FREEMAN has thrown light
upon the Demos, and, in fact, on every question which he dis-
cusses. We seem to know the old Greeks much better since
MAHAFFY and FREEMAN supplemented THIRLWALL and GROTE.
For the Heroic Ages CURTIUS, GLADSTONE, and MAHAFFY are wise
guides, avoiding the scepticism of Grote and the occasional credulity
of J. & E. Pocock and Eadie. But no one can understand the
Greeks except he peruse HOMER, Hesiod, HERODOTUS, THUCYDIDES,
Xenophon's Anabasis and CEconomics, PLUTARCH'S "Lives of
Eminent Greeks," ^ESCHYLUS, SOPHOCLES, EURIPIDES, ARISTO-
PHANES, DEMOSTHENES'S "Select Orations," and ARISTOTLE'S
" Ethics and Politics," with portions of PLATO. He is thus brought
in contact with the Greek mind. This may appear to be a serious
task, but all real historical study is a branch of mental callisthenics
requiring real work, rather than a lounge on a playground, in which
mere amusement or recreation is out of the question.
xiv Introduction to the Study of History.
III.— ROMAN HISTORY.
(1) Histories: —
Niebuhr, Lectures on the History of Rome, 3 vols. 8vo.
- History of Rome, 3 vols. 8vo.
ARNOLD (Dr.), History of Rome, 3 vols. 8vo.
MOMMSEN, History of Rome, 5 vols. i2mo.
Duruy, History of Rome, 3 vols. 4to.
Ihne, History of Rome, 5 vols. 8vo.
Liddell, History of Rome, i2mo.
Keightley, History of Rome, i2mo.
Cox, History of Rome, i2mo.
MERIVALE, History of Rome, i2mo.
Cabinet Encyclopaedia, History of Rome, 2 vols. i2mo.
(2) Portions of Roman History : —
Dyer, History of the Kings of Rome, Svo. 1868.
— Roma Regalis, Svo. 1878.
Ihne, Rome to its Capture by the Gauls, small (Longman
& Co.).
Seeley (J. R.), Livy's History, with Introduction, 1871.
Newman (F. W.), Regal Rome, Svo.
LONG (GEORGE), Decline of the Roman Republic, 5 vols. Svo.
Plutarch's Lives of Romans, 2 vols. 241110.
Merivale, Fall of the Roman Republic, post Svo.
Roman Triumvirate, small (Longman & Co.).
Beesley, Gracchi — Marius — Sylla, small (Longman & Co.).
Trollope, Caesar (Ancient Classics).
Forsyth, Life of Cicero, Svo.
Middleton, Life of Cicero, Svo.
Smith (Boswell), Rome and Carthage, small (Longman & Co.).
(3) The Empire: —
Capes, Early Roman Empire, small (Longman & Co.).
Age of the Antonines, small (Longmr,n & Co.).
Merivale, History of the Empire, 7 vols. Svo.
Arnold (W. T.), Roman Provisional Administration, 121110.
1879.
(4) Roman Law : —
Harris, Pandects of Justinian, 4to.
Sundry chapters in Gibbon's Roman Empire.
Savigny's works on Roman Law (in German).
(5) Discussions: —
Lewis (Sir G. C.) on the Credibility 01 the Early History
of Rome, 2 vols. Svo.
Preface. xv
(6) Sundry Essays : —
FREEMAN (E. A.), Essays, Second Series: Primitive Archaeology
of Rome, Mommsen's History of Rome, L. S. Sulla, The
Flavian Caesars. Essays, Third Series : First Impressions
of Rome.
ARNOLD with MERIVALE should first be mastered. DURUY'S
history, now publishing in English, will be improved by the editor-
ship of MAHAFFY, who might have been more usefully employed
in giving us students' histories of Greece and Rome. The con-
troversy on the early ages of Roman history will be found in
Sir G. C. LEWIS, in DYER and SEELEY. All FREEMAN'S Essays
must be studied. LONG'S history gives the clearest impressions of
the gradual decline of the Republic, but it is an instructive rather
than an exciting work; his edition of PLUTARCH'S "Lives of
the Romans," with notes, is very valuable. FORSYTH'S and
MIDDLE-TON'S lives of Cicero may be read and compared with
advantage, including the letters of Cicero. The little work in
Lardner's " Cabinet Encyclopaedia " on the " HISTORY OF ROME "
(2 vols. i2mo.) is admirable. POLYBIUS, though a Greek, should be
read carefully ; so also portions of LIVY (the Roman Hume), with
SALLUST and TACITUS. PLINY and STRABO should be consulted ;
together they form an encyclopaedia of Roman learning and science.
CICERO'S Offices, /.<?., moral duties ; his orations against Catiline
and Verres, with the Meditations of the EMPEROR MARCUS
AURELIUS and the Morals of EPICTETUS, should be read. They
give us the opinions of sober, thinking men, who, in an age of
singular corruption, were seekers after God, willing to be led
by '•''the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the
world" (John i. 9).
IV. — THE RISE AND FALL OF THE EUROPEAN NATIONALITIES.
GIBBON, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 8 or 12 vols. 8vo.
(Guizot and Milman).
GIBBON, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, 8 or 7 vols. 121110
(Bohn).
SISMONDI, Fall of the Roman Empire, 2 vols. 121110.
GUIZOT, Civilisation in Europe and in France, 4 vols. i2mo.
HODGKIN, Italy and her Invaders, 2 vols. 8vo.
xvi Introduction to the Study of History.
SHEPPARD (J. G.), the Fall of Rome and the New Nationalities,
1 2 mo.
SMYTH (W.), Lectures on Modern History, 2 vols. 8vo.
Mum, History of the early Khalifate, 8vo.
FREEMAN (E. A.), Essays, first series, Holy Roman Empire ; The
French and the Gauls. Essays, third series : The Illyrian Empire ;
Augusta Treverorum ; Goths at Ravenna ; The Byzantine Empire.
BRYCE (J.), Holy Roman Empire, post 80. (many editions).
Robertson, State of Europe (preface to his Life of Charles V.).
THIERRY (AM£DEE), Histoire d'Attila.
Re'cits de 1'Histoire Romaine au Vme Siecle.
Nouveau R£cit de 1' Histoire Romaine, I Vme et Vme Siecles.
(AUGUSTE), Narrative of the Merovingian Era, and Ten Years'
Historical Studies, 8vo.
JAMES (G. P. R.), History of Charlemagne, 2 vols.
Perry (W. C.), The Franks, 8vo. 1867.
FINLAY, Greece, from the Romans to our Time, 5 vols. 8vo.
After the chapters in GIBBON relating to the invasion of the empire
read the work of SHEPPARD (J. G.) ; the " Fall of Rome and the
Rise of new Nationalities," with GUIZOT'S "Civilisation in Europe
and in France," 4 vols. i2mo. The Essay in ROBERTSON on the
State of Europe after the Fall of the Roman Empire will have to
be checked by a comparison with HALLAM'S " Middle Ages."
BRYCE (J.), "The Holy Roman Empire" must be read by all who
desire to understand the influence of a body of beliefs and
traditions respecting Rome upon Mediaeval history. The reverence
of our barbarian ancestors for Roman civilisation and law, and for
Rome as the seat of imperial power, is a singular fact, having also
an important and beneficent bearing on the events of that unsettled
period. This fact is shown by BRYCE to be the link which connects
the history of antiquity through the Middle Ages with the present
times. HODGKIN'S "Italy and her Invaders," 2 vols. 8vo., with
SMYTH'S (W.), " Lectures on Modern History," 2 vols. 8vo., will
naturally follow. MUIR'S " History of the Early KHALIFATE," will
prepare the reader to understand FREEMAN'S splendid Essay, and
powerful vindication of the character of the Eastern Byzantine Greek
Empire, so shamefully libelled by Gibbon and others; all his
Essays will enliven and deepen the impression which we may have
already received of the character of this period of history. JAMES
(G. P. R.), and PERRY (W. C.), with the writings of the two
Preface. xvii
THIERRY'S, and SISMONDI'S, " Fall of the Roman Empire," 2 vols.,
carry the history of Europe through the Middle Ages.
V. — THE MIDDLE AGES.
HALLAM, Middle Ages, 3 vols. 8vo. or 121110.
DUNHAM, Middle Ages, 3 vols. i2mo.
Germany, 3 vols. i2mo. (Encyclopaedia, Lardner).
SISMONDI, History of France, in 8vo. volumes (not translated).
Italian Republics, i2mo. (Encyclopaedia, Lardner).
Michelet, History of France (the ist vol. translated).
KOHLRAUSCH, History of Germany, 8vo.
MENZEL, History of Germany, 3 vols. Svo.
STEPHENS (Sir J.), Lectures on the History of France, 2 vols. Svo.
Palgrave, History of Normandy, 4 vols. Svo.
Napier, History of Florence, 9 vols. i2mo.
MACHIAVELLI, History of Florence, 121110.
Michaud, History of the Crusades, 3 vols. 121110.
Von Sybel, History of the Literature of the Crusades, 121110.
DE COMINES (P.), History of Louis XL, 121110.
KIRK (John F.), History of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy,
3 vols. Svo.
FROISSART and MONSTRELET, Chronicles of, 4 vols. Svo.
PEARSON (Charles), England in the Middle Ages, 2 vols. Svo.
LONGMAN (W.), Lectures on the History of England, Svo.
History of the Life and Times of Edward III., 2 vols. Svo.
Palgrave, Merchant and Friar, and Lord and Vassal, 2 vols. i2mo.
BUSK (Mrs.), Mediaeval Popes, Emperors, and Kings, from 1125-
1268, 4 vols. Svo.
CHURCH, Beginning of the Middle AgesA
JOHNSON, Normans in Europe,
Cox, History of the Crusades, Vsmall (Longman & Co.).
STUBBS, Early Plantagenets, I
WARBURTON, Edward III., )
FREEMAN, (E. A.), Essays, first series: Early Sieges of Paris ;
Frederick I., King of Italy; Frederick II.; Charles the Bold.
Second series : Mediaeval Greece and North Italy. Third series :
Mediaeval and Modern Greece ; The Southern Slaves ; Sicilian
Cycles ; Normans at Palermo.
Graham, Archers on the Steppe, 121110.
Rambach, History of Russia, 2 vols. Svo.
Ralston, Early Russian History, i2mo.
Thomson, Ancient Russia and Scandinavia, i2mo.
Dante (Life by Mrs. Oliphant), i2mo.
• Church's Translation of De Monarchia, post Svo.
The history of this period is one which will require the student,
*
XV111
Introduction to the Study of History.
as the readiest way of arriving at a clear conception of the leading
facts, to compile tables for himself, presenting the contemporary
events in all the leading European states. The Oxford Tables, or
any other, will help in the formation of a plan. HALLAM is the
safest guide generally ; portions of the above list, i.e. some of the
books, and of these the particular chapters which refer to the
Middle Ages, should be read. The Chronicles and Memoirs referring
to the History of France were collected by GUIZOT and published in
31 vols. 8vo. (in French) : they belonged to the time from Clovis
to the thirteenth century. The Chronicles of England have been
published in a cheap form by Bohn.
VI. — THE RENAISSANCE, THE REFORMATION UP TO THE END OF
THE RELIGIOUS WARS, 1648 A.D.
SYMONDS (J. A.), History of the Renaissance in Italy, 3 vols. 8vo.
HALLAM, Introduction to the Literary History of the Fifteenth, Six-
teenth, and Seventeenth Centuries, 3 vols. 8vo.
Roscoe, Life of Lorenzo de Medici, 2 vols. 8vo. and 121110.
Leo X., 7 vols. 8vo. and 12 mo.
MAJOR, Life of Prince Henry of Portugal, and its Results, 8vo.
ROBERTSON, History of the Discovery of America, 3 vols.
History of Charles V., 3 vols.
Irving (Washington), Life and Voyages of Columbus, 4 vols. 8vo.
Companions of Columbus, 121110.
FROUDE, History of England, 12 vols. post 8vo.
HELPS, The Spanish Conquest of America, 4 vols. 8vo.
N.B.— Reprinted in a series of Biographies of the Spanish conquerors,
Cortez, Pizarro, &c.
BAIRD, Rise of the Huguenots, 2 vols. crown 8vo.
GARDINER (S. R.), Puritan Revolution, small (Longman & Co.)
Thirty Years' War, small (Longman & Co.)
History of England from James I. to the Civil War, 1603-
1642, 10 vols. post 8vo.
MITCHELL, Life of Wallenstein, 8vo.
Hart, Life of Gustavus Adolphus, 2 vols. 8vo.
Holling, Life of Gustavus Adolphus, i2mo.
PRESCOTT, Ferdinand and Isabella, 3 vols. 8vo.
Conquest of Mexico and Peru, 6 vols. 8vo.
History of Philip II., 3 vols. 8vo.
RANKE, History of the Reformation, 3 vols. 8vo
— Civil Wars of France, 2 vols. i2mo.
Ottoman and Spanish Empires in the Sixteenth and Seven-
teenth Centuries, 8vo.
Preface* xix
D'AUBIGNE, History of the Reformation, 5 vols. 8vo.
Worsley (Henry) Life of Martin Luther, 2 vols. 8vo.
Michelet, Memoir of Luther, 8vo.
HARE (Archdeacon), Vindication of Luther, 8vo.
MOTLEY, Rise of the Dutch Republic, 3 vols.
History of the United Netherlands, 4 vols.
Life of Barneveldt, 2 vols.
SARPI (Paul), History of the Council of Trent, folio.
SULLY, Memoirs, 5 vols. 8vo.
Retz (Cardinal), Memoirs, 4 vols. 121110.
James, Life and Times of Henry IV. of France, 4 vols. 8vo.
Macaulay, Essays : Lord Bacon, Van Ranke, Machiavelli, Burleigh,
and Hallam.
HUME, History of England from Charles I.
LINGARD, History of England.
We know more of the secret history of this period than of any
preceding, owing to the access now open to the State archives,
letters, memoirs, &c., of the parties who made the history of their
age. Such a revelation of insincerity, falsehood, treachery, and
cruelty, associated with the cause of religion, has never before or
since been exhibited to the world. " Everybody wore a mask.
.... No portion of history is more bewildering, difficult, and
unsatisfactory." The only great political event, after the reign of
Charles V., was the resistance of the Seven United Provinces to
Spain and the consequent overthrow of the Austro-Spanish Con-
federacy against European liberty. The most interesting facts are
connected with the Portuguese and Spanish discoveries eastward
and westward. MAJOR'S " Life of Prince Henry of Portugal," and
WASHINGTON IRVING and HELPS'S Lives of Columbus and his
followers, are our best authorities. Add to these PRESCOTT and
MOTLEY. The clearest and most impartial account of the beginning
of the Thirty Years' War is found in GARDINER'S " History of the
Thirty Years' War " (small) and his " History of James I. and
Charles I. up to 1642," 10 vols. i2mo. There is a history in
German, by VON ANTON GINDELY, of the Thirty Years' War, which
is said to be the best, but it is not yet translated into English. The
" History of the Reformation," by RANKE, and by D'AUBIGNE, are
from very different points of view. ROBERTSON and ROSCOE write
as if the interests of literature and art were far more important than
b 2
xx Introduction to the Study of History.
those of religious liberty and political freedom. HALLAM is con-
sidered by Archdeacon HARE to have misunderstood the views of
the great Reformer, Martin Luther, and the Archdeacon has
replied in his able vindication of Luther, 8vo.
VII.— THE WASTEFUL AND UNNECESSARY WARS OF Louis XIV.,
HIS CONTEMPORARIES AND THEIR SUCCESSORS, FROM 1648 TO
THE REVOLUTION OF 1788 A.D.
DYFR History of Europe from the Fall of Constantinople, 5 vols. 8vo.
SCHLOSSER, History of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries,
8 vols. 8vo.
HEEREN, Manual of the History of the Political Systems of Europe
and its Colonies from the Fifteenth Century, 2 vols. 8vo.
VOLTAIRE, Lives of Louis XIV. and XV. (various editions}.
James, Life of Louis XIV, 4 vols. 8vo.
RANKE, History of England principally in the Seventeenth Century,
6 vols. 8vo.
RANKE, History of the House of Brandenburg, Seventeenth and
Eighteenth Centuries, 3 vols. 8vo.
ST. SIMON, Memoirs, by Bayle St. John, 3 vols. 8vo.
PEPYS, Diary, 4 vols. i2mo.
Evelyn, Diary, 4 vols. 12 mo.
Burnett, History of his own Times, 6 vols. 8vo.
Clarendon, History of the Civil Wars, 6 vols. 8vo.
HUTCHINSON (LUCY), Memoirs of her Husband, 8vo.
Nugent (Lord), Memoirs of Hampden, 8vo.
MACAULAY, Essays : Sir W. Temple, Hampden, Sir W. Mackintosh
(History), Addison, War of Succession in Spain, Horace Walpole,
William Pitt the Elder (Lord Chatham), William Pitt, Lord Clive,
Warren Hastings, Madame d'Arblay, Frederick the Great.
MACAULAY, History of England, 5 vols. 8vo.
BANCROFT, History of the United States, 7 vols. i2mo.
LECKY, History of England from 1700, 4 vols. 8vo.
Pictorial History of England from Charles I. to George III.
Knight, History of England from Charles I. to Victoria.
Wraxall, History of France, 1574-1610, 6 vols. 8vo.
CARLYLE, Life and Letters of Oliver Cromwell, 3 vols. 8vo.
CARLYLE, Life of Frederick II. (the Great) of Prussia, 7 vols. 8vo.
D'AUBIGNE, Life of Oliver Cromwell, 8vo.
VAUGHAN (Dr. R.), Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell, 2 vols. 8vo.
Panton, Oliver Cromwell, 8vo.
COXE, House of Austria, 3 vols. i2mo. (Bohn).
Kings of Spain (Bourbon), 5 vols. 8vo.
- Life of the Duke of Marlborough, 3 vols. i2mo. (Bohn).
Life of Sir Robert Walpole, 4 vols. 8vo.
Preface. xxi
MACKNIGHT'S Life of Bolingbroke, 8vo.
SWIFT, Life of, by Foster and Craik, 2 vols. 8vo.
Crowe, History of France, 5 vols. 8vo.
HUME, History of the Stuarts ; BRODIE'S Reply to Hume, 2 vols. 8vo.
STANHOPE (Earl), History of Europe from Queen Anne to 1748,
7 vols. i2mo.
BURTON (J. H.), Reign of Queen Anne, 3 vols. 8vo.
MORRIS, Age of Queen Anne (Epochs, Longman).
HALE, Fall of the Stuarts (Epochs, Longman).
Yonge, History of the Bourbons, 4 vols. 8vo.
N.B. — There are also numerous memoirs in the French language, all
of which throw light on the manners and morals of French society.
. Horace Walpole's Letters, &c., and the numerous Memoirs, Diaries,
&c., since published refer mainly to English society.
Ludlow, History of the War of American Independence, small
(Epochs, Longman).
MACKNIGHT, Life of Edmund Burke, 3 vols. 8vo.
BURKE, Reflections on the French Revolution, 121110. ; Reply by
Mackintosh.
DYER and SCHLOSSER and HEEREN, with Earl STANHOPE, are
useful guides in helping the reader to classify and state, after his own
fashion, the leading events of this period. MACAULAY'S Histories
and Essays will, of course, be read. LECKY'S History of England
from 1 700 should be carefully studied. The ENGLISH REVOLUTIONS
of 1640-1688 should be thoroughly canvassed. CLARENDON,
BURNETT, CARLYLE, VAUGHAN, and PANTON for that of 1640, and
by old RAPIN, MACAULAY, HUME, BRODIE, HALE, MORRIS, BURTON,
and MACKNIGHT'S Bolingbroke for that of 1688. The history of the
resistance of Europe to the attempts of Louis XIV. to domineer over
Europe will always interest, while the rise of Prussia and the reign
of Frederick the Great, conterminous with the increase of the political
influence of Russia over Western Europe, are facts the results of
which, partly beneficial, are seen in the present political condition
of Europe. In the admiration of the bravery and skill of the
generals we must not forget the peculiar senselessness and wicked-
ness of most of the wars of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
The misery of Belgium, Germany, Poland, North Italy, and Spain,
in which these wars were carried on, should be kept in mind, and
the authors of these wars should be exhibited in their true colours
as the enemies of humanity. The stupidity and mischievous help-
xxii Introduction to the Study of History.
lessness of most of the Kings of Spain and of the Emperors of
Austria, the unprincipledness of the petty rulers of the Germanjind
Italian principalities, require to be laid open in detail. Two men
who desired peace are to be held up to the admiration of posterity,
Sir ROBERT WALPOLE and CARDINAL FLEURY, however blamable in
other respects.
The independence of the United States, and the spirit of reform
which led the leading statesmen of Europe to initiate (after a
fashion) important changes in their domestic government, are the
only pleasurable records of the eighteenth century.
VIII. — THE FRENCH REVOLUTION, 1788, 1789, TO THE
YEAR 1884 A.D.
Thiers, History of the French Revolution, 5 vols. 8vo.
History of the Consulate and the Empire, 5 vols. 8vo.
ALISON, History of Europe from 1789-1815, 10 vols. Svo.
History of Europe from 1815-1850, 8 vols. Svo.
VON SYBEL, History of the French Revolution, 4 vols. Svo.
FYFFE, History of Europe, 1788-1815, i vol. Svo. (The [second
and third vols., to the present time, in the press.)
LANFREY, History of Napoleon, 4 vols. Svo.
SCOTT (Sir W.), Life of Napoleon.
[The Memoirs of Las Casas, Bourrienne, Junot, and others, some
of them of very questionable accuracy.]
TAINE, Ancient Regime, Svo.
the Revolution, Svo.
the Jacobin Conquest, Svo.
NAPIER (Sir W. F. P.), History of the Peninsular War, 6 vols. Svo.
Mignet, History of the French Revolution, Svo.
Michelet, Historic View of the French Revolution, i2mo.
LECKY, History of Germany from 1 700, 4 vols. Svo.
Smyth (W.), Lectures, French Revolution, 3 vols. Svo.
CARLYLE, the French Revolution, 3 vols. Svo.
Massey, History of England under George III., 3 vols. 121110.
STANHOPE, Life of William Pitt, 4 vols. 121110.
MARTINEAU (Miss), History of the Peace following 1815, with
Introduction, 5 vols. 12 mo.
MOLESWORTH, History of England, from 1830-1867, 3 vols. i2mo.
WALPOLE (SPENCER), History of England, 1815-1841, 3 vols. Svo.
MACAULAY, Essays : Lord Holland.
Cassell, History of England from the Reign of George III.,
vols. 5-9.
KNIGHT (C), History of England, George III. to Queen Victoria.
Pictorial History of England from Charles I. to the end.
Preface. xxiii
WADE, History of England, 8vo.
GREEN (J. R.), Short History of the English People, 12 mo.
History, 4 vols. 8vo.
Making of England, 8vo.
Conquest of England, 8vo.
MACARTHY (JUSTIN), History of Our Own Times, 4 vols. i2mo.
IRVING, Annals of the Reign of Queen Victoria, 1837-1878, 3 vols.
The books devoted to the history of the FRENCH REVOLUTION
and its wars up to 1815 are TRIERS, ALISON, VON SYBEL, FYFFE,
and CARLYLE. The Lives of Napoleon by Sir WALTER SCOTT and
LANFREY will help to form a just opinion of that remarkable man.
For the Revolution itself SMYTH may be read with advantage, but
TAINE is the great authority. Thiers, and the other French his-
torians, are more or less apologists for the leading actors in that great
convulsion, and either minify or conceal the calamities endured by
the French people in its progress up to the period of the Directory.
Of FYFFE'S History, reference has been made in page 487.
NAPIER'S " History of the Peninsular War," though far from com-
plimentary to the English Ministry, does justice to the character
and ability of the Iron Duke. The history since 1815 may be read
in Miss MARTINEAU, 5 vols. ; MOLESWORTH, 3 vols. ; and SPENCER
WALPOLE, 3 vols. 8vo. ; and also in CASSELL'S " History of England
under George IV., William IV., and Queen Victoria," up to the
present time, which is a very readable and fair compilation of our
recent history. JUSTIN MCCARTHY has written a very lively " History
of Our Own Times " (from the accession of Victoria). GREEN'S
Histories in 121110. and in 4 vols. 8vo., need no recommendation.
They contain some valuable and impartial statements respecting
England and its conduct in connexion with the French revolutionary
proceedings; and the "Pictorial History of England" for that
period is full and reasonable. There are dozens of volumes relating
to France, Germany, and Italy, and Spain, Russia, and Poland, and
Turkey, and their political changes since 1815, some of them very
valuable, but they belong rather to the local histories than to the
general history of the world. So far as England is concerned, the
Lives of PITT, BURKE, Lord LIVERPOOL, CANNING, Sir ROBERT
PEEL, Lord PALMERSTON, Lord MACAULAY, CHARLES J. Fox (by
xxiv Introduction to the Study of History.
Lord Russell), Lord MELBOURNE, Lord BROUGHAM, SYDNEY SMITH,
Croker, and Lord Malmesbury, &c., may be read with advantage
For our Indian history, the Lives of CLIVE, WARREN HASTINGS,
ELLENBOROUGH, DALHOUSIE, and other Governors-General should
be read. The two great histories of India are by Mill and Thornton;
the narrative of the Sepoy Mutiny has been written by KAYE and
MALLESON, and by HOLMES and others. Every month some work
of history or biography appeals to the public judgment in favour of
new views, or some qualification of old ones, respecting the events
of the past century, — a century perhaps the most eventful and the
most important in its influence upon the future of any since the
world began. The political summaries month by month in some of
the magazines, especially in the Fortnightly, Contemporary, and
Macmillan, are not only useful summaries, but suggestive and valu-
able to the reader.
Much, however, as we may insist upon the study of political history,
without fear of dissent, there is another branch of universal history
which must be studied in connexion with secular history. The
great fact of all facts, the most extraordinary and influential in the
history of the world, i.e., the incarnation, life, and death, and the
teachings of our Lord and of his Apostles, together with the history
cf the Churches formed by them ; these are the topics which form
what is called Ecclesiastical History. In our day it has been written
by men of the highest literary ability and of wide and genial sym-
pathies, strangers to the odium theologicum too often manifested by
ecclesiastical writers. No man can claim the position of an educated
man who has paid no attention to this important branch of historical
knowledge.
5. ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY may be first studied in Murray's
Compendiums of General and English Church History ; then in
MILMAN, 9 vols., and ROBERTSON, 8 vols. But, to do full justice
to this branch of history, there are THREE works which must be
carefully read and often referred to. J. C. GEISLER, 5 vols. 8vo.;
Thomas GREENWOOD'S " Cathedra Petri," 6 vols. 8vo., of all his-
tories one of the most trustworthy and impartial, and well fitted to
guide towards right conclusions; NEANDER, 9 vols. 8vo. ; MOSHEIM
is valuable, especially in his "Affairs of the Christians before Con-
Preface. xxv
slantine." His other work, in six volumes, serves as an index to
most of the great questions in the history of the Church up to
the seventeenth century. MILNER gives the history of the genuine
Christianity found in the Churches before the Reformation. He
was the first to do justice to the piety of the Middle Ages, and
to the reality of the religion experienced by men whose creed
fell short of Scriptural truth. The vehement, unmeasured abuse
poured out upon his history by some of the High Church party,
and the affected contempt occasionally shown by the extreme
Liberals of the Broad Church party, may be to the sober reader
a warrant for its independent religious character. It should be
referred to for information as to the real Christianity existing
in the past ages, even the darkest, of the Church. Of the history
of the ENGLISH CHURCH (Episcopalian) we have ABBEY and
OVERTON'S "English Church in the Eighteenth Century," 2 vols.
8vo. ; PERRY'S " History of the Church of England," 3 vols. 8vo. ;
DR. HOOK'S "Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury up to James"
(very genial and fair from a High Churchman's standpoint) ; HORE
(A. H.), " Eighteen Centuries of the Church in England," 8vo., 1881 ;
MOLESWORTH (W. N.), " History of the Church of England from
1660," post 8vo., 1882. LECKY'S remarks on ecclesiastical affairs
are valuable from his philosophical standpoint. The ROMAN
CATHOLIC CHURCH- History of England, by DODD, from 1500 to
1688 (with Tierney's continuation), 5 vols. 8vo., gives the Romanist
view, and ought to be carefully read, in common with Archdeacon
REYNOLDS'S Reply, 8vo. A work, which, for its impartiality, appears
as if written by a most Liberal Episcopalian, or by a kindly Non-
conformist, of which DR. J. STOUGHTON, the Congregationalist, is
the author, gives a peculiar interest to the history of the English
Churches, — Episcopalian, Nonconformist, and Presbyterian, — since
1640 A.D. No one can read the eight volumes of this history with-
out learning much that will modify and correct his prejudices. There
is not a fairer or more genial work in our language. Its title is,
" The History of Religion in England" The author enjoyed the
friendship and esteem of the late Bishop SELWYN, and of the late
Archbishop TAIT.
I have not thought it necessary to notice the disputes respecting
xxvi Introduction to the Study of History.
the character and judgment of the Fathers of the Anti-Nicean
Church and the century following. In DONALDSON'S " History of
Christian Literature and Doctrine during the First Three Centuries,"
3 vols. 8vo. ; in D'AiLLE, on " The Use of the Fathers," 8vo., with
BLUNT'S work in reply, 8vo. ; in ISAAC TAYLOR'S (Senior) "Ancient
Christianity," 2 vols. 8vo., most readers will find as much as they
care to know. REEVES (W.), has also, in his translation of Justin
Martyr, &c., treated on the right use of the Fathers, 2 vols. 8vo.
Bishop KAYE'S three works on Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria,
and the Council of Nice ; STANLEY, on the Eastern Church and the
Council of Nice, may be read with advantage. Bishop LIGHTFOOT'S
Dissertations, prefaced to his " St. Clement of Rome," and to the
Epistles to the Galatians, Philippians, and Colossians, are very
valuable. For the general history of the old Church literature, before
the Reformation especially, the most impartial of the Romanists are
Fleury and Du-Pin. Dr. Smith's Dictionaries of CHRISTIAN ANTI-
QUITIES and CHRISTIAN BIOGRAPHY, 6 vols., royal 8vo. (Murray),
are invaluable. Many of 'the biographies are most interesting
reading, and are the most satisfactory records of the great eccle-
siastics of the Early and Mediaeval Church. BINGHAM'S " Origines
Ecclesiastics " is the great work on ecclesiastical antiquities.
RIDDLE'S (J. E.) work in one thick volume, 8vo., 1839, is more
convenient for the general reader.
The LITERARY HISTORY is little more than an index of names,
but will serve to remind the student of the existence of a literature,
Biblical, Egyptian, Oriental, Greek, and Roman, from the most
remote period. In the very brief sketches of the Schools of
Philosophy, the distinctive peculiarities of each school have been
exhibited. The histories of Greek and Roman literature, and the
histories of philosophy referred to in this volume are my main
authorities for the subjects to which they refer. Hallatris " Intro-
duction to the Literary History of the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seven-
teenth Centuries"; Sismondfs " Literature of the South of Europe";
Berringtoris " Literary History of the Middle Ages," with various
histories of American, French, Italian, German, and Sclavonic litera-
ture, will assist the student in his researches in this department.
English literary history has recently been a favourite study in our
Preface. xxvii
schools of learning. CRAIK'S unpretending " Sketches of the History
of Literature and Learning in England," 6 vols. i8mo., 1844, is one
of the best introductory works for English literature, as GOSTWICK
and HARRISON'S is for German literature. A general history of
European literature from the seventeenth century is a desideratum
which will no doubt in due time be supplied.
6. Beyond the remarks in pp. 45-47, I have not discussed the
controversial question of the " Origin of Religion." No additional
light has been thrown on the subject by the learned " HIBBERT
Lecturers." ToTheists the problem presents no difficulties. "The
existence of a Being from whom our own being has been derived
involves, at least, the possibility of some communication direct or
indirect. Yet the impossibility, or the improbability, of any such
communication is another of the assumptions continually involved
in current theories about the origin of religion. Now it is quite
certain that no such assumption can be reasonably made. The
perceptions of the human mind are accessible to the intimations of
external truth through many avenues of approach. In its very
structure it is made to be responsive to some of these intimations
by immediate apprehension. Man has that within him by which
the invisible can be seen, and the inaudible can be heard, and the
intangible can be felt. Not as the result of any reasoning, but by
the same power by which it sees and feels the postulates on which
all reasoning rests, the human mind may, from the very first, have
felt that it was in contact with a mind which was the fountain of its
own."1 This is the fact, in accordance with the revelations con-
tained in the early chapters of the Book of Genesis. With Canon
COOKE we are compelled to believe that " all truths which affect the
relations between man and God were made known by Divine
revelation," and that the facts resulting from the most diligent
inquiries into the origins of religious beliefs "are absolutely
irreconcileable with the theory which regards all spiritual and soul-
elevating religions as evolved by a natural process from a primitive
naturalistic polytheism."2 In the same spirit Guizot remarks,
"When my intellectual transformation took place, when my
1 Duke of Argyll on the " Unity of Nations," pp. 451, 452.
2 " Origin of Religion and Language," 8vo.
XXV1I1
Introduction to the Study of History.
opinions became settled, I turned my thoughts chiefly towards the
order of the universe, the destiny of man, the course, the laws, and
the aim of the Divine development. It was while considering these
subjects that the conviction of the Divine intervention flashed upon
me, and I recognised clearly and irresistibly the supreme Mind and
Will. They manifest themselves to me in the history of the world
as clearly as in the movements of the stars. God shows himself to
me in the laws which regulate human progress as evidently — much
more evidently, as I think — than in those which direct the rising
and setting of the sun" ("Guizot in Private Life," p. 114).
ERRATA.
Page 22,
» 94,
155,
156,
163,
172,
» 189,
» 244,
>, 265,
»» 270,
» 304,
»» 3»,
» 336,
»» 350,
» 394,
», 442,
»» 444
» 445
9,
36,
25,
2,
34.
line 2, read Semiramis for Semiramus.
» 27, were for was.
» 2> John for James.
vindicating for vindicated.
Damasus for Damascus.
raised for tripled.
submitted after A. D.
their for thier.
13, Magnus IV. for Magnus III,
1 6, omit time.
4, read decided for divided.
31. ,, da Romano for di Romeno.
40, „ 1700/^1706.
34. ,, Verden for Verdun.
23, insert led before vague.
6, ™WHorsley>rHorseley.
in the note , , Literary for Library.
lme 36, „ given birth for gone back.
CONTENTS.
PRELIMINARY NOTES ... ... ... ... ... Page i
1 The Chronology of the Ancient Nations ... ... i
2 The Original Seat of the Human Race after the Flood 5
3 The Unity of the Human Race 8
4 The Dispersion ... ... ... ... ... 10
5 Language and the Varieties of Language ... ... 12
6 Sundry speculations on the Origin and former Con-
dition of Man 14
FIRST PERIOD. — The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. ... 17
Babylonia, Chaldea, the Plains of Shinar ... ... 19
Assyria 21
Egypt 23
The Khita (Hittites) ... ... ... 27
Asia Minor 28
The Phoenicians ... ... ... ... ... ... 29
The Israelites ... ... ... ... ... ... 31
The Population of Europe ... ... ... ... 36
Greece 36
Italy — The Etruscans ... ... ... ... ... 40
Arabia ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 42
India ... ... ... ... ... ... 43
China ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 45
Religious History ... ... ... ... ... ... 45
Literature, Art of Writing, the Alphabet 47
State of the World 1000 B.C. ... ... ... ... 49
SECOND PERIOD. — From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire
539 4 £ ... 52
The Israelites ... ... ... ... ... ... 52
Assyria ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 54
Babylon, the Medes and Persians, Egypt, Lydia ... 57
Greece and the Hellenic World ... ... ... ... 60
Greek Colonies ... ... ... ... ... ... 63
Italy, Rome under the Kings ... 65
Carthage ... ... ... •*... ... ... ... 67
India, China 68
Religious History 68
XXX
Introduction to the Study of History.
Literature, Hebrew PaZe 1°
Greek ?i
Greek Philosophy 72
State of the World 539 B.C 75
THIRD PERIOD.— From the Foundation of the Persian Empire,
CIQ B C.t to the Empire of Alexander the Great,
lilac - 78
The Persian Empire ••• 78
Greece 82
The Persian War 84
The Peloponnesian War 86
The Spartan and Theban War 88
The Israelites 89
Philip of Macedon 9°
Alexander the Great, Invasion of Persia 91
Carthage 93
Rome a Republic ... ... ... ••• ••• ••• 94
India 95
China 96
Literature, Greek 96
Greek Philosophy ... 97
State of the World 330 B.C. 99
FOURTH PERIOD. — From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
to the Christian Era 101
Division of Alexander's Empire ... ... ... ... 101
Decline of Greece 102
Rome Master of Italy 104
The Punic Wars 105
Roman Conquests 107-110
Internal History of Rome ... ... ... ... m
The Land Laws (Latifundia) 112
The Gracchi ... ... ... ... ... 113-114
TheCimbri 115
Marius and Sylla 116-118
Pompey and Caesar 118-121
Marc Antony— the Triumvirates 122
Augustus the Imperator 123
The Roman Empire ... 123
The Jews I27
India, China I28
Japan \\\ I29
Literature, Greek I29
Greek Philosophy ... T^o
Jewish Literature ... !^o
State of the World, A.D. i .'.'.' .'.'.' .'" ", ti
Contents. xxxi
FIFTH PERIOD. — The Empire to the Final Division by Theo-
dosius, 395 A.D. ... Page 133
Cause of the Decline of the Empire ... ... ... 144
The Barbarians beyond the Roman World to the East ... 151
The Trade of the Empire 153
Ecclesiastical History — The Christian Church 154
Literature 164
State of the World 395 A.D. ... ... ... ... 167
SIXTH PERIOD. — From the Division of the Empire to the
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne
800 A.D " 169
The Western Empire ... ... ... ... ... 169
The Goths, Huns, and Vandals ... ... ... ... 171
Barbarian Settlements and the New Nationalities ... 175
Gaul, the Franks ... ... ... ... ... ... 176
Spain, Vandals, Suevi and Goths ... ... ... ... 177
Britain, the Saxons ... ... ... ... ... 177
North Africa ... ... ... ... ... ... 178
Italy under the Heruli and the Goths ... ... ... 179
Nature and character of the Barbarian Invasions ... 182
The Eastern Empire up to the Saracen Invasion ... 184
Rise and progress of the Saracens ... ... ... 187
The Empire of the German Franks 190
The Avars ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 193
The Eastern Empire to the time of Charlemagne ... 195
Scandinavia and the Eastern Plains 196
India, China ... ... ... ... . ., ... 198
Ecclesiastical History ... ... ... ... ... 198
Literature 205
Philosophy, Boetius and the Neo-Platonists ... 206, 207
State of the World 207
SEVENTH PERIOD. — From the Empire of Charlemagne to the
Crusades, 1096 A.D. ... ... ... ... 210
The Empire of Charlemagne 210
Decline of the Carlovingian Empire ... ... ... 216
The Feudal System 218
The Ravages of the Normans, Huns, and Saracens ... 223
The Three Kingdoms offshoots of the Carlovingian
Empire: — ... ... ... ... ... ... 226
France 226
Germany ... ... ... ... ... ... 227
Italy ... ... ... ... ... ... 231
The Contemporary European Nations 233
Spain 233
The British Islands 233
Scandinavia ... ... ... ... ... .. 234
xxxii Introduction to the Study of History.
The Plains East of Germany ••• fa& 234
The Eastern Empire
The Mahometan Khalifat 23°
India, China, Japan ••• 37
North Africa ... 23?
Ecclesiastical History
Literary History
Navigation and Discovery 244
State of the World, 1 096 A.D 245
EIGHTH PERIOD.— From the Crusades to the Reign of Rudolph
ofHapsburg, 1273 A.D 24«
The Crusades •• 248
Contest respecting Investitures between the Papacy and
the Empire 254
Rise of an order of Burgesses and Citizens, and the
formation of Municipalities 257
Predominant influence of the Papacy 259
Irruption of the Mogul (Mongul) Tartars under Ghengis
Khan 261
Leading Nations of this Period 265
Norway, Sweden ... ... ... ... ••• ••• 265
Denmark 266
The British Islands, Germany 267
Bohemia, Hungary, Poland ... ... ••• ••• 270
Livonia, Esthonia ... ... ... ... • •• ••• 270
Lithuania, Prussia, Moldavia, Wallachia, and Russia ... 271
France 271
Spain : ... 272
Italy 272
Eastern Byzantine Empire ... ... ... ••• 274
Seljuk Turks, Mongul States, India 274
China, Japan, Egypt, North Africa ... 275
Ecclesiastical History ... ... ... ... .-• 275
Literary History 276
Philosophy 277
The Scholastic Theology and Philosophy 278
Discovery of the Properties and Use of the Magnet ... 280
State of the World 1273 A.D 28r
NINTH PERIOD.— From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273, to the
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. ... 283
Consolidation of the Kingdoms of England, France, and
Spain 284
Continued Disintegration of Germany 288
Rise and Establishment of the House of Austria ... 291
Collision of the Claims of France, Germany, and Spain in
Italy 22
Contents. xxxiii
Extinction of the Greek Empire of the East, 1453, and
the Establishment of the Turks in Europe ... Page 293
Consolidation of the Czarship in Russia 295
Learning, Science, and the Art of Printing ... ... 296
Two Inventions, Gunpowder and the Mariner's Com-
pass ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 300
Discovery of the Passage to India by the Cape of Good
Hope, 1486-1497 301
Discovery of America by Columbus, 1492 ... ... 302
Progress of Trade, Agriculture, &c. 305
Contemporary History of Norway, Sweden, and Den-
mark ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 308
Poland, Hungary, Prussia ... ... ... ... ... 309
Turkey, Italy 310
Mongolian Irruption under Tamerlane ... ... ... 312
Persia, India, China 313
Japan, Trade in general ... ... ... ... ... 314
Ecclesiastical History ... ... ... ... ... 314
Literary History 318
State of the World 1520 A.U 322
TENTH PERIOD. — From Charles V. of Germany^ 1520, to the
English Revolution, 1688 .., ... ... ... 325
Rivalry of France with Germany and Spain ... ... 325
The Reformation ... ... ... ... ... ... 328
Decline of the Spanish Monarchy under Philip II. ... 334
Growth of the Power of France and England ... ... 337
The Turkish Power at its height under Solyman ... 341
The Thirty Years' War in Germany 345
Aggressive Policy and Wars of Louis XIV. ... ... 353
First appearance of Russia and Prussia in European
Politics ... ... ... ... ... 357
Contemporary Histories, Scandinavian Nations ... ... 359
Seven United Provinces (Holland) ... ... ... 361
Portugal ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 362
Switzerland 363
Poland 364
Italy 364
Turkey, Barbary States, Persia, India, China 365
Japan, European Settlements in America ... ... 366
Maritime Discovery by Spain, Portugal, England, Hol-
land, France, and Denmark ... ... ... 366-368
The Buccaneers 368
Trade and Commerce 369
Ecclesiastical History ... ... ... ... ... 370
Literary History ... ... ... ... ... ... 381
Philosophy 388
State of the World 1688 A.D 389
c
XXXIV
Introduction to the Study of History.
ELEVENTH PERIOD.—/>W« the English Revolution, 1688 to
the French Revolution, 1788 Pa& 394
A Retrospect — ••• '•' "• 394
From the Revolution of 1688 to the Peace of Ryswick,
1697 395
Preparation for the War of the Spanish Succession ... 397
War of the Spanish Succession, 1702-1713 ... 399
Great Northern War of Russia and Sweden, 1697-1709... 401
The Western Powers, 1 717-173 r ••• ••• 403
War of the Polish Succession, 1 733-1 738 404
War of the Austrian Succession, 1740-1748 404
The Seven Years' War between Austria and Prussia,
1756-1762 ... 4°7
First Partition of Poland, 1772 ... ... 408
War of the thirteen Colonies of America with England,
1773-1783 ••• ••• ••• 4io
Moral Condition of the Governments of Europe m the
Eighteenth Century 4*3
Efforts towards Improvement ... 416
Local Histories ... 422
Denmark and Norway ... 422
Sweden, Germany ... 423
Prussia, Poland ... ... ... ... ... ... 424
Switzerland, Holland 425
Great Britain and Ireland, Spain 426
Portugal, Italy, Russia 427
Turkey ... 428
Persia, India, China 429
Japan, Africa, United States ... ... ... ... 430
Ecclesiastical History 430
Literary History ... ... ... ... ... ... 439
Philosophy 444,447,449
State of the World, 1788 450
TWELFTH PERIOD.— From the Revolution in France, 1788, to
the Peace of Paris, 1815 ... ... ... ... 454
Introductory ... ... ... ... ... ... 454
Causes of the Revolution 456
Leading Events of the Revolution up to 1795— The
Directory ... ... ... ... ... ... 464
Wars of the Revolution to the Consulate of Buonaparte,
1792-1799 487
Wars of the Consulate and Empire, 1800-1815 495
Local Histories 1788-1815 505
England, Scotland, Ireland e0c
Spain **
Portugal, Italy, Switzerland, Prussia 508
Contents. xxxv
Holland, Sweden, Denmark, Russia, Turkey ... Page 509
Persia, India, China, Japan, United States of America ... 510
British Colonies 511
Ecclesiastical History 511
Literary History ... ... ... ... ... ... 514
State of the World 520
THIRTEENTH PERIOD. — From the Peace of Paris , 1815, to 1884 524
From 1815 to the Revolution 0/1830 in France ... ... 524
England ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 530
France ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 531
Germany, Italy 533
Spain, Portugal, Greece, Turkey . ;. ... ... ... 534
Russia ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 535
From 1830 to the great Revolutionary Year, 1848 536
France ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 536
England ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 537
Spain and Turkey 538
France ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 539
Spain, Sweden, Denmark ... ... ... ... ... 540
Turkey, Italy ... ... ... ... ... ... 541
Canada, India 541
From the great Revolutionary Year, 1848, to the Crimean
War, 1856 ... ... ... ... ... ... 541
France ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 541
Italy, Germany 545
Italy, Switzerland, England 549
United States of America ... ... ... ... ... 550
Russia ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 550
From the Crimean War, 1856, to the Overthrow of the
Second French Empire, 1871... ... ... . . . 552
Sepoy Mutiny 552
Italy free 553
French and English Interference in Syria 554
Russia after the War 554
War of Secession in the United States 555
Germany and Schleswig-Holstein, Denmark 556
Struggle for the Empire of Germany by Prussia and
Austria 557
Spain, France, England 557
Greece 559
Overthrow of the French Empire under Napoleon III.... 559
From the Overthrow of the French Empire to 1 884 561
Settlement of the German Empire 561
Russian and Turkish War 561
The Egyptian Outbreak 563
The French in Madagascar and Tonquin 564
Local Histories 565
xxxvi Introduction to the Study of History.
England Page 565
France ... 567
Germany ... 568
Holland, Belgium, Austrian-Hungarian Empire, Italy ... 569
Spain, Portugal, Russia, Greece, Turkey 570
Denmark, Norway and Sweden ... ... ... ... 571
Persia, India ... ... ... ... ... 571
China, Japan ... ... ... ... ... ... 572-
Korea, Egypt, Abyssinia, Morocco ... ... ... 573
South and South-Western Africa, Liberia ... ... 573
Zanzibar, Madagascar, the Pacific Islands 574
Australasian Colonies, New Guinea, Borneo ... ... 574
America and the Dominion of Canada ... ... ... 574
Mexico, West Indies 575
The Conclusion ... ... ... ... ... ... 575
Ecclesiastical History 577
Literary History ... ... ... ... .. ... 592
Philosophy : —
English ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 601
French 608
German 609
Italian 618
PRELIMINARY NOTES,
I. THE CHRONOLOGY OF THE
ANCIENT NATIONS.
II. THE ORIGINAL SEAT OF THE
HUMAN RACE.
III. THE UNITY OF THE HUMAN
RACE.
IV. THE DISPERSION OF THE EARLY
FAMILIES OF THE HUMAN-
RACE.
V. LANGUAGE, AND THE VARIE-
TIES OF LANGUAGE.
VI. SUNDRY SPECULATIONS ON THE
ORIGIN AND FORMER CON-
DITION OF MAN.
/. — The Chronology of the Ancient Nations.
i. To understand the order, the times, and dates of events,
so as to be able to arrange the facts of the histories in regular
succession and in correct relation to each other, is most
important. Unfortunately we have no chronological system upon
which we can depend before the tenth century previous to the
Christian era. All earlier dates referring to a remote antiquity are
mere guesses, generally shrewd, and approximately correct, but
having no claim to certainty. The ancient nations had no common
era or epoch. In the book of Genesis there are found fragments
relating to the creation, the flood, the genealogies of the fathers of
the human race, which probably have been handed down through
the leading families of the race of Shem, and finally incorporated
with the religious history of the Abrahamic family. Unfortunately
the numbers of the years attached to the genealogies differ in the
Hebrew, and in the Septuagint and Samaritan versions, all of them
having been either incorrectly copied or purposely modified by way
of correction by sundry editors. The true Biblical chronology is lost ;
that which is found in our English Bibles is the work of Archbishop
Usher, who follows the last recension of the Hebrew Bible, made
about 600 A.D. by the Jewish Rabbins of Tiberias. This chronology
is inconsistent with the early civilisation of Egypt in the time of
Abraham as exhibited to us in the book of Genesis. Between these
numbers and those of the Greek version (the Septuagint), made
from a far more ancient text of the Hebrew, 250 B.C., there are great
B
2 Preliminary Notes.
differences, but the extension of time given in this system does not
meet the requirements of the well-attested histories of either Egypt
or Chaldea. The Hebrew gives 1,616 years between the creation
and the flood; the Septuagint, according to Hales, confirmed by
Josephus, 2,262 years. Between the flood and the call of Abram,
the Hebrew gives 292 years; Hales, from the Septuagint, 1,072
years; the Samaritan, 972 years. Among the inconsistencies and
impossibilities of Usher's system may be noticed, that it makes
Noah and Abram contemporaries, the former living up to the fifty-
eighth year of the latter, and Shem living up to the hundred and
tenth year of Isaac and the fiftieth of Jacob, so that, according to
these systems of chronology, the building of Babel and the general
spread of idolatry took place in the time of Noah.1 The system
of Hales, corrected by Dr. Russell,2 appears to come nearest to the
truth. Recently F. R. and C R. Conder have thrown much light
upon the chronology of the Israelitish history.3 The variations of
the chronological systems will be seen in the following table :—
B.C.
B.C.
B.C.
B.C.
B.C.
Usher.
Hales.
Bunsen.
Bunsen, Jr.
Conder.
The Creation
4,004
... 5,441
... 20,000 ...
10,500 .
The Flood
2,348
- 3,155
... 10,000 ...
2,360 .
The Call of Abram...
1,961
... 2,078
... 2,870 ...
1,993 •
,. 1,186
The Exode from
Ezvut . . .
I.4QI
.. 1,648
1,120 ..
I.S63
I.U1
The Building of Solo-
mon's Temple 1,012 ... 1,027 ... 1,040 ... 971 ... 1,007
These great differences are of little importance practically, as
they are the largest in reference to pre-historic times, which are
almost unknown to us; after the tenth century B.C., the chrono-
logists in the main agree; our information respecting the early
history of the world until the sixth century B.C. is. mainly drawn
from the books of the Old Testament. The earliest Greek historian
extant is Herodotus, who lived so late as 400 B.C., while Moses
lived 1500 to 1600 B.C. Within the last generation, the discoveries
in Egypt and in the valleys of the Euphrates and Tigris have
opened out to us a new revelation of the past history of Egypt,
Assyria, Babylon, Persia, and the East. In the course of another
generation we may confidently expect still further discoveries,
through the labours of our learned Egyptologists and Assyriologists.
1 Hales' "Analysis of Ancient Chronology," 4 vols. 8vo.
9 Russell's " Connexion of Sacred and Profane History," 3 vols. 8vo.
3 Conder's " Hand-book to the Bible," crown 8vo.
Chronology of the Ancient Nations. 3
What the Greeks thought of their past history, as to their antiquity,
is to be seen in the Arundelian marbles, which profess to give the
exact dates of the most remote events in their legendary history
(B.C. 300-200). The Assyrian and Babylonian inscriptions give us
their estimate of the past history of their races. We take these as
probable guides, not as infallible ones.
2. The extraordinary claims to antiquity on the part of certain
Eastern nations and Egypt are common to all ancient races, with
the marked exception of the Israelitish people. We may safely set
aside the periods of hundreds of thousands of years in which gods
and mythical personages figure in the annals of Egypt and Babylon,
for instance; these chronological systems, no doubt, originated in the
calculation of astronomical cycles, just as we can calculate the past
appearance of the comets. The Egyptian basis for their chronology
was the Sothic period of 1,461 years, in which the rising of the Dog-
star again coincided with the beginning of their civic year, 2oth
July; the priests comprised the whole duration of the world in 251
Sothic periods equal to 36,525 years, during which period they
thought that the sun had twice risen in the west, and had twice set in
the east. Manetho, the Egyptian priest (whose work is lost, extracts
only having been preserved, the dates being evidently altered and
amended to suit chronological theories), has given us lists of kings and
dynasties ; the monuments of Egypt and the papyri of Turin con-
firm the accuracy of the names of the kings and of the dynasties
as given by Manetho, and, to some extent, the order of their
succession. "The very thorough investigation to which learned
experts have subjected the succession of the Pharaohs, and the
chronological order of the dynasties, have shown the absolute
necessity of supposing in the lists of Manetho contemporary and
collateral dynasties, and thus of diminishing considerably the total
duration of the dynasties. From the nature of the calculations,
based on the exact determination of the regnal years of the kings,
every number which is rectified necessarily changes the results of
the whole series of numbers. It is only from the beginning of the
twenty-sixth dynasty (666 B.C.) that the chronology is founded on
data which leave little to be desired as to their certitude."1 Another
eminent Egyptologist-, Mariette Bey, tells us "that the greatest of
all the obstacles in the way of establishing a regular Egyptian
chronology is the fact that the Egyptians themselves never had any
chronology at all; the use of a fixed era was unknown, and it has not
• l Brugsch-Bey, " History of Egypt," vol. I. pp. 31, 32.
B 2
4 Preliminary Notes.
yet been proved that they had any other reckoning than the years of
the reigning monarch." J If we compare the lists of Manetho with
those found on the Turin papyri, and in the tablets of Abydos and
Sakkara, the conviction is forced upon us that all these are mere
attempts to reduce a chronological chaos of disconnected dates into
a form acceptable to priestly and royal vanity. The impossibility of
arriving at satisfactory results in the absence of satisfactory data is
obvious, when we notice the contradictions in the systems of the
learned Egyptologists, in which between the highest arid the lowest
date of the reign of Menes (the first king of Egypt) there is a
difference of 3,000 years !
B.C.
Boekh 5,702
Unger 5,613
Mariette and Lenormant »5j°°4
Brugsch-Bey 4,455
R. S. Poole 2,717
B.C.
Lauth 4>i57
Lepsius 3*892
Bunsen (his early opinion) 3*673
,, (his later date) 3,059
Wilkinson 2,691
The Babylonish chronology of Berosus, setting aside the mythical
period, is comparatively sober and rational. Baron Bunsen in his
speculations has convinced himself that a Turanian dynasty was
reigning in Babylon 7,000 to 8,000 years before our era, of which
there is not a shadow of proof. Recent discoveries in Babylonia of
a Sargon who lived 3,800 B.C. are less improbable, though not yet
proved. We may exhibit the uncertainty of Egyptian chronology
by a reference to the difference in the dates given for the invasion
of Egypt by the Hyksos or Shepherd Kings and for their expulsion ;
in the one case 213 years, in the latter 183 years.
The Invasion of the Hyksos.
B.C.
Lenormant and Mariette 2,214
Brugsch 2,233
Lepsius.- 2,101
Bunsen 2,070
Poole 2,080
Wilkinson 2,020
The Expulsion of the Hyksos and the
beginning of the Eighteenth Dynasty.
B.C.
Lenormant and Mariette ,703
Brugsch...., ,700
Lepsius ,591
Bunsen ,633
Pcole ,525
Wilkinson ,520
Wej have no reasonable grounds for placing the civilisation of
Egypt higher than that of the Babylonians and Chaldeans. To
suppose that Egypt existed as a powerful kingdom for 3,000 or 4,000
years before the commencement of the eighteenth dynasty, and that
during that long period her rulers had confined themselves to the
1 Lenormant, " Manual of Ancient History," vol. i. p. 198.
The Original Seat of the Human Race after the Flood. 5
occupancy of the peninsula of Sinai and the conquest of some petty
tribes on the south, and that North Africa remained unmolested,
and that the rivalry with the states in the valley of the Euphrates
had not, until before 1300 or 1400 B.C. commenced, is not probable.
We do notice a change in the kings of the eighteenth dynasty
from 1700 B.C. It is most probable that all the dynasties, or most
of them before the arrival of the Hyksos, were contemporary, and
that Menes began his reign 2700 B.C., 3,000 years later than the
period assigned by Boekh. Suppose that the kings of the heptarchy
in England had been arranged as consecutive successors of Hengist
and Horsa instead of being arranged as contemporaries, the Egbert
of our history (827 A.D.) might be made to rule over a monarchy of
2,000 or 3,000 years instead of 400 years.
II. — The Original Seat of the Human Race after the Flood.
i. It is reasonable to suppose that, under providential guidance,
this locality would be one in which the conditions of soil, climate,
vegetable productions, and fitness for animal life existed. No
region in the world combines all these recommendations so fully as
the table-land bordering on the central range of Ararat, extending,
from Armenia to the Hindu Kosh, a plateau raised above the
lacustrine impurities and morasses of the slowly-draining plains as
left by the deluge. All tradition points to this district. On the
supposition that mankind spread from this position, we may har-
monise every linguistic phenomenon, and explain every ethnogra-
phical fact, and the farther we depart in any direction the greater
are the difficulties in which we find ourselves entangled. As for
those who contend that man was created independently in different
parts of the globe, it is sufficient to say that such an hypothesis is
unnecessary, since the spread of population can be accounted for in
a very satisfactory manner without the assumption of more than one
starting-point, and the differences of race observable in different
parts of the globe are not differences of species inconsistent with
one common origin. Such an hypothesis would leave unexplained
and inexplicable the proofs of an original identity of language, to
which philology is daily making additions of the greatest weight and
importance. These views, expressed by Dr. Donaldson,1 are valuable
as coming from a learned rationalistic divine, with no special pre-
judice in favour of orthodoxy whether in theology or criticism. On
this table-land mankind remained and multiplied for some centuries,
' "New Cratylus," second eel., p. 99.
(5 Preliminary Notes.
retaining, and possibly adding to, the arts and civilisation inherited
from the antediluvian world, and enjoying the comforts and con-
veniences of agricultural life. The great mountain-range " Ararat"
afforded many localities from which, at different points, the leading
branches of the human family may have begun their occupancy of
the face of the earth either southward, westward, eastward, or north-
ward, each branch of adventurous explorers retaining for generations
the remembrance of the primitive home ; and so it is that many of
the western Asiatics point to the ranges of Armenia, while the
Hindu races point to the Hindu Kosh as the home of the patriarchs
of their race. As these migrations consisted of men who had
retained the knowledge of the useful arts and of the civilisation of
the old world, we can better account for the early advancement of
society in Babylon, Assyria, and Egypt, &c.
2. It is possible for us to form some notion of the condition of
society among the Indo-European races on the table-land, before
their dispersion, by the help of philology applied principally to the
language of these races of the stock of Japhet. "We find in the
Aryan, Greek, Italic, Letto-Sclavonic, Germanic, and Keltic languages
words the roots of which must be considered as a common posses-
sion acquired before the separation, from which we can discover
their then stage of life. Here are common terms for members of
the family — father, mother, son, and daughter (the milker) ; for
house, yard, garden, citadel ; common words for horses, cattle, dogs,
swine, sheep, goats, mice, geese, ducks ; common roots for wool,
hemp, flax, corn (wheat, spelt, or barley) ; for ploughing, grinding,
and weaving ; for certain metals, copper or iron ; for some weapons
and tools ; for wagon, boat, and rudder ; for the elementary
numbers and the divisions of the year according to the moon : all
these words imply a civilisation of the Indo-European races adapted
to their agricultural and pastoral life." * There are other words also,
such as king, law, temple, palaces, shops, carriages, high-roads,
bridges, which belong to an after-period in the Aryan culture after
the removal from the table-land (Max Miiller, " Lectures," p. 34).
Thus it is evident that civilised life is the original normal condition
of man, while barbarism is the loss (by disuse) of the original
culture and arts of the race, by irregular offshoots, the wanderers,
the backwoodsmen of the primitive civilised centres. The remains
of these outcasts have been recognised, and inferences drawn that
the primitive man_was a savage, existing as the Samoeids of Asia
1 Max-Duncker, "Hist, of Antiquity," vol. iv. pp. 2, 3.
The Original Seat of the Human Race after the Flood. 7
and the Esquimaux of America; but this generalisation from
exceptional premises is most unsatisfactory. " We may also dismiss
the fanciful speculations respecting a stone period, and a bronze
period, and an iron period, as applied to a theory of the progress of
the human race from barbarism to civilisation. So far as the oldest
records tell us, the human family, in its earliest stages of progress,
possessed the use of the metals necessary for building, for hunting,
a-nd for agriculture ; and the fact of the existence of isolated com-
munities in the degradation of savage life is no proof of the general
uncivilised condition of the parent stock." 1 It is amusing to read
such remarks as the following, founded on an assumption of the
barbarous condition of the first human families : " Men must even
have made considerable progress towards civilisation before they
acquired the idea of property, and ascertain it so perfectly as to be
acquainted with the most simple of all contracts, that of exchanging
by barter one rude commodity for another." 2 Wherever were men
found who did not know the difference between mine and thine^ and
were unable to make exchanges ?
3. Physical causes probably contributed to delay the general
separation of the human race for some centuries. In the opinion
of some geologists, the inland seas of Aral, the Caspian, and the
Euxine, with the Sea of Azoph, formed originally one vast expanse
of water, spreading over the plains of northern Asia and eastern
Europe to the Baltic Sea and its gulfs. Gradually, through the
elevation of these plains and by the breaking open of a passage for
these waters through the narrow channel of the Hellespont into the
Mediterranean, these inland seas were restrained within their present
limits, and thus the plains of eastern Europe to the Baltic, and
those of Asia to the Arctic Ocean, became dry land. This change
may be referred to as the event which signalised the life of Peleg
(2754 B.C., Genesis x. 25). It is all but certain that central and
northern Europe were not occupied until long after the valleys of the
Euphrates and Nile and the eastern coasts of the Mediterranean.
With some few exceptions, as in Chaldea and Egypt, the migrating
tribes, gradually dispersed, continued for ages to live a nomad life,
not altogether neglecting agriculture, a mode of life most natural
and agreeable to a sparse population with the whole earth open for
pasturage. Even in our day, in all Asia west of the Indus, the open
plains north of the Caspian, and the plateau of Persia, and the
1 Donaldson, "New Cratylus," p. 99.
2 Robertson, "Hist, of America," vol. i. p. 3.
g Preliminary Notes.
plains of Asiatic Turkey are occupied by shepherd tribes, while the
banks of rivers have become the seats of a settled agricultural
population. We need not wonder that collisions between tribes
coveting the richer and best-.'watered pasturages, or envying the
wealth and comfort of the agricultural communities, would frequently
occur. Various stages of civilisation then, as now, existed in the
same territory, as the Hunter [State, the Shepherd State, the rude
beginnings of cultivation on partially cleared lands, and the more
perfect tillage of the experienced agriculturalist. In these migrations
the pure Theistical faith of the Patriarchal families became corrupted,
and by degrees was lost, superseded by Polytheistic notions, com-
bined with Atheistic and Pantheistic speculations. Much, too, of the
civilisation of the Patriarchal age was forgotten, through disuse, in
the transition state from settled to nomad life ; here and there were
small offshoots of the human family sinking into absolute barbarism
by their disconnexion with the main stock. But barbarism is not
(as has been assumed by some) the original state of the human race.
All our researches point to an early simple civilisation, improved by
some races and neglected by others, according to the differing
circumstances in which they were placed in the course of their
migrations. So also with respect to religion. Ebrard and others
have proved that, " if we pursue the religious history of the civilised
nations of antiquity, we find .... in proportion as we ascend into
the past, a greater approximation to the knowledge of the one living
holy God, in conjunction with a more vivid ethical consciousness of
the difference between good and evil."1 Lenormant recognises
" in the annals of humanity the development of a providential plan
running through all ages and all vicissitudes of society .... thus,
above all, it is that I am almost invincibly attached to the doctrine
of the constant and unlimited progress of humanity, a doctrine
unknown to Paganism, a doctrine born of Christianity." 2
HI.— The Unity of the Human Race.
i. Place together a specimen of the most perfect of the Caucasian
races and a specimen of the most degraded races, the Bosjeman of
South Africa or the aborigines of Australia, and it will then appear
difficult to admit the usual interpretation of the text, Acts xvii. 26,
in which St. Paul affirms that God " made of one blood all nations af
men to dwell on all the face of the earth." But, on the other hand,
"British and Foreign Evangelical Review," vol. xxix. p. 50.
Lenormant, vol. i. p. 16.
The Unity of the Human Race. 9
arrange in one line specimens of all the races beginning with the
highest down to the very lowest, the transition is so gradual, and,
in some cases, so imperceptible, that no one can reasonably doubt
the relation of each specimen to its predecessors and its successors
in the line, and the fact of the oneness, the unity of the race. " It
is not possible to establish a well-defined separation between the
separate races of men which graduate insensibly one into the
other."1 Physiologists generally agree in the opinion that the struc-
tural differences which are found in the separate races of mankind
coincide with similar varieties in the animal world, in the case of
certain domestic animals, as the dog, the swine, the horse, horned
cattle, sheep, goats, of each of which races there are a great number
of varieties, but all traceable to an original stock. Some of these
varieties have arisen within a brief period. For instance, the swine
taken to America by the Spaniards in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries, have produced varieties widely differing from the parent
stock and from each other. In respect also to colour there is a
perfect analogy in the changes which take place in domestic animals
and men. There is no organic difference between the skin of the
European and that of other races (the negro) such as would lead us
to imagine a diversity of species in mankind.2 In the negro the
darkened colour of the skin and the excessive development of the
black mucous secretion (pigment) which forms under the epidermis,
is unquestionably an effect of a burning climate and of a sun-power
operating for ages on successive generations (Lenormant), though
other causes may have also been in operation.
2. The theory of the evolution of all species from one original,
probable enough within certain limits, is thoroughly opposed to the
once popular theory of generic differences of the races of mankind,
and of separate creations of each race.
3. To those that believe in the divine providential guidance of
the human race, it will not be difficult to suppose that the variations
in the physique of the different races of men have gradually grown,
according to a mercifully-designed natural law, to fit them to enjoy
life in the climates in which we find them existing. In the black
races in Africa, and elsewhere, there is a large variety of types,
some scarcely distinguishable from the southern European of Spain
or Italy, and others widely removed from the highest type.
4. "It is true that there are great outward bodily differences
1 Lenormant, "Manual of Ancient History," vol. i. p. 49.
2 Prichard's "Natural History of Man."
I0 Preliminary Notes.
between the different races of men, and that there have been found
some advocates for materialism who ignore the spiritual indications
of unity, and deny the claim of the inhabitants of Africa to rank
with Europeans as the same animal. But a more enlightened
research has triumphed over all these difficulties, and it is now seen
that the physical differences of the races spread over the earth's
surface are explicable from secondary causes, on the hypothesis of a
primeval identity of origin, and a subsequent dispersion of emigrants
from the home of their family ; and that we may account in the
same manner for those differences in intellectual development which
correspond to the physical differences of nations."1
IV. — The Dispersion.
i. We know nothing of the time when the dispersion of the
human family began, or of the circumstances under which it was
conducted. In all probability it was orderly and in accordance with
the existing patriarchal organisations, " according to their genera-
tions in their nations" (Gen. x.). The family had grown into a
tribe, and the ordinary step towards the formation of the nation was
by an amalgamation of tribes. Before the general dispersion, there
had no doubt been many isolated departures of individuals and
families, who, thus separated from the civilised parent stock, soon
lost the habits and arts of civilised life and relapsed into savageism ;
the remains of some of the exceptional specimens of the race have
led some of the learned to form theories founded on the original
low, savage, and brutal condition of the first men ; theories opposed
by all the facts of accredited history.
2V Certain races which ethnologists term Turanian defy classifica-
tion; the name is derived from the word Turan ("land of dark-
ness "), applied to the lands north of the Caucasus and the Oxus.
These races, however, were (some of them at least) farther
advanced in the arts of civilised life than their contemporaries ; their
language may have been the original speech of the human family,
that which was " confounded " at Shinar (Gen. xi. 9), and thus
broken into a large number of dialects, varying in their vocabulary,
but all distinguished by the principle of agglutination which pervades
their grammatical structure. In the earliest periods of the history
of the human family, this form of speech seems to have prevailed
over Asia, from the Caucasus to the Indian Ocean, and from the
1 Donaldson, "New Cratylus," p. 70.
The Dispersion. 1 1
Mediterranean to the mouth of the Ganges and to Cape Comorin.
The first settlers in Europe, the Laps, Fins, Esths, Tshudes,
Basques, spoke dialects of this type. So also the Cushites of Arabia
and eastern Africa, and the original Mizraim in Egypt. We may
infer with some reason that these Turanians formed the advance of
the emigration in the general dispersion, and that they belonged
chiefly to the Hamite and Japetan branches of the human family.
Some philologists regard the Shemitish and Indo-European class of
languages as developments from this original Turanian. In the course
of time Shemitish and Indo-European languages largely supplanted
the Turanian.
3. The SHEMITISH tribes appeared to have followed long after the
Turanians, and to have been to a large extent intermingled with
them in Chaldea, Mesopotamia, and Syria. The bulk of the JAPETAN
tribes appear to have been restrained, for some ages, by physical
difficulties already noticed; possibly the fathers of the Tartar,
Mongolian races had departed north-eastward long before the other
families of this race had begun their migration. We may infer six
distinct migrating movements. The first > that of the KELTIC races ;
the second, that of the TEUTONIC (German) races ; the third (it may
be in point of time the second), that of the PELASGIC races, the
fathers and predecessors of the Italic, Hellenic, Illyrian and Thracian
people. Some suppose this migration to have passed through Asia
Minor, and to have left the lonians on the Egean before they crossed
the Hellespont into Europe, while others favour the passage by the
north of the Black Sea. The fourth was the settlement of the
ARYANS in PERSIA and Central Asia, about 2000 B.C. ; the fifth was
the movement of the EASTERN ARYANS into the Punjaub (INDIA),
and their subsequent occupation of all India north of the Dekkan ;
the sixth, the SCLAVONIC races. This sketch is in accordance with
facts at present known to us, but in the changes which follow these
migrations, in which the law of the strongest set aside the claims of
the first comers, many exceptions difficult to reconcile with this
scheme, or, in fact, with any scheme, may be noticed by historians.
The settlement of the Mizraim and others of the family of HAM in
Egypt and Africa, is by some of the learned connected with the
Turanian migration, with which the Karaites were largely identified.
In the opinion of Dr. Donaldson, founded purely on philological
considerations, the intermingling of some Sclavonic and Germanic
tribes produced the Lithuanians and the Pelasgi. While one branch
of the Germans (the low) took possession of Scandinavia, the other
branch (the high) were the progenitors of the Hellenes or Dorians,
I2 Preliminary Notes.
who settled on the highlands to the north of Greece. The Pelasgi
first followed and superseded the Keltic races in Italy and Greece.
In Italy there followed a Lithuanian settlement, and in Greece that
of the Hellenes. Our great historian, E. A. Freeman, regards the
Basques, Iberians, Ligurians, and Sikanians, and possibly the
Etruscans, as fragments of a vast pre-Aryan race, perhaps of BERBER
(African) origin. The Hellenic and Italic races, with the races akin
to them, Sikels, Thracians, Epirots, Illyrians, were the first of the
ARYAN migrations into Europe known to history. Coeval with these
the KELTS were pressing their way through the solid central Europe ;
they were the vanguard of the Aryan migration, within their own range,
and the first swarm which made its way to the Atlantic, exterminating
or absorbing their Iberian and other predecessors (generally called
Turanians by ethnologists). After these came the TEUTONS, the
Germanic races, who pressed on the Kelts from the east, and in their
wake the SCLAVONIANS. The LITHUANIANS, generally regarded as
Sclavonians, are remarkable as a people whose tongue comes nearest
of any to the Aryan model.
All these are speculations to be respectfully received as coming
from men of undoubted learning and research. The first volume of
"Herodotus," translated by Rawlinson, fourth edition, 1880, pp.
668-702 ; the two great works of Donaldson, the " New Cratylus" and
" Varronianus," and the invaluable work of Freeman, on the " Historic
Geography of Europe," are the safest guides to the ethnologist.
V. — Language and the Varieties of Language.
i. Some of the learned regard language as of purely human
invention. Languages no doubt grow and enlarge with the human
mind ; but language itself is the distinctive gift of God to the human
race, exercised by the first man in giving names to external things,
and in the expression of thought and feeling. " The most profound
and highly gifted of these philosophers (William von Humboldt),
who have devoted themselves to this study, have inferred that
language is the necessary and spontaneous result of man's constitution,
that human speech and human nature are inseparable, and conse-
quently that language was originally one." * " If any one thing more
than another can show the absurdity of those who speak of an
invented language, it is simply this fact, that the oldest languages are
always the richest in materials, the most perfect in analogy, the most
uniform in etymological organisation. Philology, too, instructs us
1 Donaldson, " New Cratylus" p. 79.
Language and tJie Varieties of Language. 13
that those very words which the believer in an invented language
regards as the most difficult to invent, and, therefore, as the last
introduced are in fact the basis of all languages \ for instance, the
pronouns and numerals, which Adam Smith considers of recent
introduction, are known to have been the very oldest part of every
tongue, for it is just these words which retain their identity in
languages which have been longest separate, and have therefore
become most unlike in other particulars."1 With the Shcmitic and
Indo-European class of languages philologists are familiar. With the
Turanian our acquaintance is limited.- Some suppose that all these
diverse languages originated at once in Shinar after the building of
Babel, in the first confusion of tongues (Gen. xi. 7-9), and that the
regularly-formed tongue of Shem and Japhet were exempted from this
change ; others would trace all these and other varieties of human
speech to a gradual modification of the Turanian, the original
language which began at Shinar. These views are not necessarily
contradictory.
2. There are some popular theories advocated in our serial
literature bearing on the languages and ethnology of the early nations,
which, though plausible, have never retained their position in public
opinion. One theory is that of a pre-Adamite race ; another is that
of limiting the action of the deluge to the race of Seth. Lenormant,
McCausland, and R. S. Poole, all of them believers in revelation,
favour these theories, and consider them capable of scriptural proof.
In the opinion of the majority of our archaeologists these hypotheses
create more difficulties than they remove.
3. The learned philologists of Europe have, in the present century,
overcome the apparently impossible task of deciphering and translat-
ing the hieroglyphical inscriptions of Egypt, and the cuneiform arrow-
headed characters of Assyria and Babylonia. The Rosetta stone, a
monument in honour of Ptolemy V., 200 B.C., was discovered by the
French in Rosetta, 1798; it was captured by the British troops in 1801,
and presented by George III. to the British Museum. This stone,
having three inscriptions, one hieroglyphical, another Demotic, and
1 Donaldson, "New Cratylus," p. 80.
* Of one of these languages, the Kaffir (South Africa), I can speak with some
confidence, having, fifty years ago, formed the first grammar ("The Kaffir
Language," 4to, 1834); this was followed by enlarged and improved editions by
W. J. Davis, and at length followed by the exhaustive grammar of J. W. Apple-
yard (8vo.). In the composition of this first grammar I had the benefit of the
help of a clever youth, since known as Sir Theophilus Shepstone, to whom the
Kaffir language was as familiar as his mother-tongue.
j^ Preliminary Notes.
the third Greek, afforded material for the commencement of a
scientific study, which resulted in the successful interpretation of
the Egyptian inscriptions. By Dr. Young in 1818, and by Cham-
pollion in 1822-1830, the foundations of the science of Egyptology
were laid. Since then Bunsen, De Rouge, Marietta, Lepsius, Bird,
Poole, Lenormant, and others have laboured diligently in these
investigations. The cuneiform, arrow-headed, wedge-like characters,
first invented by the Sumir Akkads of Chaldea first attracted the
notice of Grotefend in Germany some eighty years ago. Long-
perier and De Saulcy, influenced by the excavations of Botta and
Layard at Nineveh, took up the inquiry. Sir H. Rawlinson, Dr.
Hincks, and Jules Oppert devoted themselves to the investigation of
the inscriptions on the stone in Behistan, made by order of Darius
Hystaspes. The three languages, Assyrian, Persian, and Akkadian
were deciphered and translated to the satisfaction of the learned. The
process by which these wonderful results have been accomplished is
fully explained in Mahaffy's "Prolegomena to Ancient History,"1 and
by Heeren, Rawlinson, and others. The Coptic dialect of the old
Egyptian, the Zend (old Persian), and the Hebrew, Chaldee, and
Arabic languages were available for the explanation of the meanings
of the words when deciphered.
VI. — Sundry Speculations on the Origin and former
Condition of Man.
i. Believing in the revelation given to our race, recorded in the
book of Genesis, the writer of this work attaches no importance to
recent speculations by which that revelation has been ignored or
contradicted, but the fact of sundry theories, opposed to the Biblical
account, and the discussion of these theories, require to be noticed.
As far as possible, the following is a classification of the leading
works on the subjects :— (a.) ON THE ORIGIN AND EARLY CONDI-
TION OF THE RACE.— Geological Evidence of the Antiquity of Man,
4th edition, Svo., 1873 (Sir Chas. Lyell). Primaeval Man, 121110.,
1869 (Duke of Argyll). Evidences as to Man's Place in Nature,
8vo., 1868 (T. H. Huxley). The Descent of Man, 2 vols., 8vo.,
1871 (E. Darwin). The Recent Origin of Man, 8vo., 1875 (J- C.
Southall). Pre-historic Times, 8vo., 1878 ; Origin of Civilisation and
Primitive Condition of Man, 8vo., 1870 (Sir J. Lubbock). The
Age of Man, Geologically considered, i8mo., 1866 (John Kirk).
1 "Prolegom. to Ancient History," 8vo., 1870, pp. 96-112.
Sundry Speculations on the Origin of Man. 1 5
Archaia, 8vo., 1860; Origin of the World, 8vo., 1877; Life Dawn
on Earth, 8vo., 1875 ; Fossil Men, 8vo., 1875 (J. W. Dawson).
(£.) ON THE DIFFERENCE OF THE RACES OF MANKIND. — Natural
History of Man, 2 vols., royal 8vo., 1855; Physical History of
Mankind, 5 vols., Svo., 1841-47 (J. R. Prichard). Genesis of the
Earth and Man, 8vo., 1863 (R. S. Poole). Adam and the Adamites,
i2mo., 1864; Builders of Babel, 121110., 1871 (D. McCausland).
Natural History of the Varieties of Mankind, 8vo., 1850 ; Descriptive
Ethnology, 2 vols., 1859; Man and his Migrations, i2mo., 1851
(R. G. Latham).
2. The speculations on the ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE, the VARIETIES of
human speech, their differences, and their affinities have created an
extensive literature, from which the following may be selected : —
Hermes, 8vo., (J. Harris). Diversions of Purley, 2 vols., 8vo.,
1829 (J. Home Tooke). Language and the Study of Language,
8vo., 1868 (W. D. Whitney). Elements of Comparative Philology,
8vo., 1862 (R. G. Latham). Philosophy of Life and Language,
i2mo., 1847 (F- von Schlegel). Varronianus, and the New Cratylus,
1844-50 (J. W. Donaldson). Lectures on the Science of Language,
2 vols., 8vo., 1871 • On the Stratification of Language, Svo., 1868;
Chips from a German Workshop, 3 vols., 8vo., 1867-8 (Max-Miiller).
Principles of Comparative Philology, 8vo., 1874 (A. H. Sayce).
3. These lists are but a small selection from a large body of
valuable works ; they are, however, sufficient to exhibit the various
opinions held by the learned on the subjects to which they refer, and
with respect to which it is desirable for educated men to have some
acquaintance.
FIRST PERIOD,
The Earliest Nations ^tp to 1000 B.C.
i. BEFORE the discoveries of the last half-century, our knowledge
of the early history of Egypt and of Western Asia was confined to*
very valuable but fragmentary notices in the Old Testament, and im
the remains of Berosus and Manetho. The writings of Herodotus,
Ctesias, Diodorus and others tended rather to mislead than to-
inform the historical inquirer. Now, by the persevering labours of
our learned archaeological experts, in connexion with our laborious
excavators, the monumental remains of Egypt, Babylonia, and Assyria
have been opened to the investigation of the philologists of Europe,
by whose patient industry and critical acumen we are placed in a
position to understand more definitely the state of the ancient world.
The history of Egypt is becoming a reality; the fables of Ctesias are
no longer quoted as resting upon traditional or national records;,
while the actual condition of Babylonia, Chaldea, and Assyria can be
read in the brick tablets found in the mounds on the Euphrates and'
Tigris. What has been taught us from these sources may be with con-
fidence regarded as substantially true, after making some allowance^
for the influence of national vanity, and of party feeling, the existence'
of which was as evidently manifested in the most remote antiquity
as in our day. "It is one thing to decipher inscriptions and
hieroglyphs, but quite another thing to determine their exact value
when deciphered" (see the Spectator, Dec. 22, 1883). Monumental
statements are by no means decisive as to facts, but must be tested
by other evidences.
2. While, however, these discoveries refer mainly to nations
c
l8 First Period.
located between the east and south-east of the Mediterranean and
the rivers Euphrates and Tigris, which flow into the Persian Gulf, we
must not lose sight of the fact that the Mediterranean Sea is the
real centre of the ancient world. Mommsen truly remarks, The
Mediterranean Sea .... at once separates and connects the three
divisions of the old world. The shores of this inland sea were m
ancient times peopled by various nations, belonging, in an ethno-
crraphical and philological point of view, to different races, but
constituting in their historical aspect one whole. This historic
whole has been usually, but not very appropriately entitled^ the
history of the ancient world. It is, in reality, the history of civilisa-
tion among the Mediterranean nations ; and, as it passes before us
in its successive stages, it presents four great phases of development,—
the history of the Coptic or Egyptian stock dwelling on the southern
shore ; the history of the Aramean or Syrian nation, which occupied
the east coast, and extended into the interior of Asia, as far as the
Euphrates and Tigris; and the histories of the twin peoples,- the
Hellenes and Italians, who received as their heritage the countries
bordering on its European shores So far, therefore, as
cycles of culture admit of demarcation at all, we may record
that cycle as an unity which has its culminating points, denoted
by the names Thebes, Carthage, Athens, and Rome."1 We may
add to these "culminating points," so closely connected with
the Mediterranean, the additional names of Babylon, Nineveh,
Phoenicia, and Israel (Tyre and Jerusalem). These nations in
due course finished their work, after which, "new peoples who
hitherto had only laved the territories of the states of the Mediter-
ranean overflowed both its shores, severed the history of its south
coast from that of the north, and transferred the centre of civilisa-
tion from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic Ocean. The distinction
between ancient and modern history, therefore, is no mere accident,
nor yet a mere matter of chronological convenience. What is called
modern history is, in reality, the formation of a new cycle of culture,
connected at several epochs of its development with the perishing
or perished civilisation of the Mediterranean states, as that was con-
nected with the primitive civilisation of the Indo-Germanic stock,
but destined, like that earlier cycle, to traverse an orbit of its own."3
3. The earliest seats of civilisation are admitted to be the valleys
and rich alluvial deposits of the rivers, the Euphrates and the Tigris,
which empty themselves into the Persian Gulf, and the valley of
1 Mcmrasen, " History of Rome," vol. i. pp. 3, 4. 2 Ibid. p. 4.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 19
the Nile. This latter river, conveying in its floods the fertile soils
from the plains and mountains of Central Africa, has created the
narrow strip of cultivatable land, hemmed in by the sandy desert
for two or three miles on each side of the river, and then widening
into a Delta formed by the various channels through which the
mighty and once mysterious river reaches the Mediterranean : thus
was formed the land of Egypt. So also are the Euphrates and
Tigris ; cultivation is mainly confined to their banks. The vast
plain bordering on these banks, and which extends between these
rivers to the Persian Gulf, forms a rich pasturage for cattle. One
immense desert, beginning with the Saharan waste, which touches
the Atlantic Ocean, and then eastward reaches as far as the Yellow Sea,
crosses the- eastern hemisphere. It is only interrupted by the valley
of the Nile, by a narrow slip of land on the east of the Mediter-
ranean, and again by the more extensive valleys of the Euphrates
and Tigris. West of the Nile and the immediate west of the
Euphrates, are mere seas of sand, scarcely above the level of the
ocean. To the east of the Euphrates and Tigris the desert consists,
for the most part, of a series of terraced plateaux, from three to ten
thousand feet above the sea level. The land in the vicinity of these
rivers is inundated yearly, and, being kept watered by canals in
ancient times, produced rice and barley with an increase of two
hundred for one. The southern plain of Chaldea is a land of
incomparable fertility, yielding its fruits almost without labour ; thus
it is that in these plains all the races of the ancient world have
successively encountered each other. Babylon and Memphis have
been the two great centres of civilisation, though Babylon claims,
with reason, the priority ; they have even been rivals ; the struggles
of Egypt for superiority over the empires of Assyria and Babylonia,
and the re-action of the strife, constitutes the military history of these
ancient nations, until Alexander the Great united both under one
government.1
4. It is not, therefore, surprising to find, from the notices in the
book of Genesis and from the universal testimony of the historical
traditions preserved by the Greeks, that the earliest attempts in the
formation of distinct national governments were made in the plains
bordering on the Euphrates, and in the valley of the Nile.
BABYLONIA, CHALDEA, THE PLAINS OF SHINAR. The mythical
history of Berosus, which traces the antiquity of the Babylonian
kingdom to about 36,000 years before the Persian Conquest, may be
1 Lenormant, " Ancient History of the East," vol. i. pp. 339-341, abridged.
C 2
2D First Period.
safely disregarded, although his later dynasties are more reconcil-
able with the facts recorded in the brick tablets. That a Cushite
kingdom was established at Babel by Nimrod is certain from
Genesis x. 10 ; the entire plain of Chaldea was filled by a Turanian
population, supposed to have come from the east of Lake Aral ; the
Sumirs in the south and the Akkads in the north. With the Sumirs
began the early civilisation of Chaldea, though, in the opinion of
Sayce, "the pictorial hieroglyphics, which afterwards became the
cuneiform character, were first invented in Elam," which was peopled
by kindred Turanian tribes.1 The Akkads originally settled in the
mountains south of the Caspian, spread over Elam and the plains,
forming with the Sumirs one people : " the languages and dialects
spoken by them were agglutinative .... approaching more nearly
to the Ural-Altaic family of speech than to any other known group
of tongues." The principal cities of the Sumirs were Erech, or Uruk,
Nipur, Larsa (perhaps the Ellasar of Genesis, xiv. i), Zirgulla, Dur,
Chalma, Kuluna (Cahneh). The Akkadian cities were Babylon and
Kis ; Sippara and Agane" (or Agadhe) united formed one city — the
Sepharvaim of Scripture ; also Tiggaba, Duraba. and Hit : the
country was intersected by a network of canals. The existence of
several separate kingdoms, composed of one or more of these towns,
frequently at war with each other, exposed this desirable fertile terri-
tory to the invasion of a less civilised Shemitic race (the Chasdim),
who amalgamated with the old population. It is very difficult to
understand the changes which follow. There was an Elamite dynasty
under Kudur-Nankhundi I., 2280 B.C. ; after him Chedorlaomer
(Kudur Lagamar), Genesis xiv. i ; this was followed by an Arabian,
Chaldean, or Kassite dynasty, founded by Khammurgas, 2017 B.C.
Contemporary with these dynasties there were petty states, sometimes
independent, one of which had a Shemite dynasty, under Sargon I.,
who ruled over Agane' and Babylon ; this king claims to have had
a predecessor of the same name so early as 3780 B.C. Sargon I.
established the library at Agane, and caused the scientific work on
astronomy and astrology to be compiled in seventy-two books, with
another on terrestrial omens. He is celebrated as a great conqueror,
over-running Syria, Palestine, and even Cyprus ; all this is difficult
to reconcile with the existence at the same time of the Kassite
dynasty. Under this family, the petty rulers of Assur (one of whom,
Ismi-Dagon, flourished about 1820 B.C.) increased in power, then
became independent, and in 1270 B.C. conquered Babylonia. Sub-
'• Sayce, " Herodotvs," pp. 359, 360.
The Earliest Nations up to icoo B.C. 21
sequently Babylonia recovered its position ; and one of its kings,
Nebuchadnezzar, 1150-1120, is recorded as an active and able
ruler ; but the empire of the west of Asia was, from the thirteenth
century B.C., in the hands of the monarchs of Assyria.
One remarkable fact connected with these Babylonian Sumirs and
Akkadians, is their comparatively advanced position in the arts of
civilised life, and their possession of an extensive and varied literature.
With architecture, engineering, metallurgy, castings, pottery, textile
manufactures of a superior character, they were familiar ; so also with
the use of the mechanical powers — as the lever and the pulley ; and
with optics, sufficient to enable them to manufacture the lens. In
sculpture and painting they had made some progress. They had
made astronomical observations from a very remote period. Their
literature, preserved on brick tablets mainly, embraced works on
history, poetry (epic poems, fables, hymns), science, law, grammar
and vocabularies of Akkadian words with Shemitish explanations.
It is singular that from this people, probably while resident near
Lake Aral, a small colony (of one hundred and twenty families)
carried this civilisation to China, a fact fully proved by a learned
French savant, M. Terrieu de la Couperie.1 But with all this supe-
riority in the arts and sciences, they are believed to have been the first
organisers of a system of idolatry, and were slaves to the most degrad-
ing of all the superstitions of the heathen world. In addition to
polytheism, image-worship, and the adoration of the heavenly bodies,
their minds were oppressed by the fear of sorcery, which is every-
where the accompaniment of that species of spirit-worship known as
Shamanism, which to this day is the ruling faith of the tribes of
southern Siberia. Besides three hundred heavenly spirits and six
hundred earthly ones, every inanimate object had, or was supposed to
have, a spirit, all of which were objects of fear, more or less to
be guarded against by exorcisms or charms, or otherwise propitiated;
the bondage of such a system must have been all but unbearable to
sensitive and tender consciences, and must have been a source of
gain to astrologers and exorcists.
ASSYRIA is referred to in Genesis x. n, 12, in connexion with
Assur (the Assyrian), who, departing from Babylonia, founded
Nineveh, Rehoboth, Calah, and Resen. Its rulers seem to have
been subject to Babylon, until the decline of the Kassite dynasty,
when Babylon became independent, perhaps in the sixteenth or
seventeenth century B.C. The history of Ctesias, compiled from the
1 Q uarterly Review, No. 307, July, 1882.
22 First Period.
Persian chronicles, represents Ninus as the founder of the Assyrian
empire, followed oy Semiranuis, a great conqueror so early as from
2,00 to 2000 B.C. Ninyas, her successor, was followed by a series
Of luxurious rulers, until the fall of the empire under Sardanapalus
in the ninth century B.C. This history is the exaggeration of national
vanity Herodotus, with more regard to probability, dates the com-
mencement of the empire in the thirteenth century B.C. (after the
subjugation of Babylon), under Ninus, the son of Belus. The
early kingdom had a very limited territory, extending from the
Lower Zab to a small distance north of Nineveh. Shalmanezer I.
made Nineveh a royal residence, and rebuilt Calah 1300 B.C., the
kingdom then extending to the northern mountains, and began to
assume an imperial character. It is very difficult to fix the period
of the Egyptian invasion of northern Syria and of Mesopotamia, and
of their contests with the Khita west of the Euphrates. Egyptian
vanity has probably greatly exaggerated the successes of their
monarchs of the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties, as recorded
on their monuments. The Khita and the northern Syrians, from
their position, suffered the most from these raids ; though Assyria and
Babylonia were more or less affected by them. Tiglath-Adar, the
Assyrian king,rconquered Babylon 1271 B.C.; his empire extended
over the valleys of the[Euphrates and Tigris, and from the Armenian
mountains to the^Persian Gulf. Under his successor, Bel-kudur-
uzur, 1240, Babylon rebelled, and he was killed in the attempt to
reconquer it, 1220 B.C. After him several kings, until Assur-risilim,
1150. This prince recovered lost territory, and subdued a number
of mountainous tribes, extending the empire to Lake Van (then
called the Upper Sea). Tiglath-Pileser succeeded, 1120. His reign
was one of successful warfare with the Khita in Syria, with the
northern and eastern tribes ; advanced as far as Lebanon and the
Mediterranean Sea, for the first time reached by the Assyrians. On
this sea the monarch sailed in a ship of Arvad (Phoenicia), and
killed a dolphin. He was passionately addicted to hunting the wild
bulls on Lebanon, and is said to have slaughtered a hundred and
twenty lions : at Assur he kept a park of animals for the chase.
The king of Egypt, knowing his taste, sent him a crocodile. Many
were his restorations of the old buildings and the erection of new
ones. He left Assyria the foremost monarchy in the world 1 100 B.C.
After him, his son, Assur-bel-Kala ; then Samsi-vul 1080. After
him the Assyrian power declined, its dependencies revolted, and the
Khita and the Syrians recovered their lost ground. This was its
condition at the beginning of 1000 B.C. These wars were annual
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 23
raids, alluded to (2 Sam. xi. i) as " the time when kings go forth to
battle" They were carried on by the Assyrian kings especially,
from the necessity of their position,, which compelled them to
support a large military class and their leaders by the plunder
acquired in the campaigns, and to replenish the treasury by the
tributes exacted. The most ruthless cruelty was exercised. The
conquered kings and chiefs were beheaded, impaled, or crucified, or
burnt alive, or flayed alive ; they were sometimes tortured and
mutilated, the tongues and the eyes torn out, and similar tortures
inflicted on hundreds of captives. This enjoyment of cruelty
appeared in the paintings on the walls of the palaces, which were
exhibitions of executions and tortures calculated to familiarise the
spectators with the sight of misery and pain. Conquered populations
were transferred to distant lands, the men of a nation being located
with the women of another country, without any regard to domestic
relationship. The plunder acquired consisted of the precious metals,
brass, cattle, horses, war-chariots, and instruments of iron. Large
numbers of slaves were captured, and these, with captives reduced
to slavery, were employed in public works, or canals, roads, &c.,.
and in the buildings in Assur and Nineveh. Yet these barbarians
were not insensible to the value of Babylonian culture, or of
commerce, Shalmanezer I: having established a library at Calah,
consisting of brick tablets of Akkadian literature accompanied by
Shemitish translations.
It will be noticed that in the political system of Western Asia
ASSYRIA and BABYLON formed one great power, generally opposed
and checked by the more concentrated power of EGYPT, and that
between these great and dominant empires there were subordinate
but independent states, as PHCENICIA, SYRIA, the KHITA, the
ISRAELITES, and sundry warlike tribes, whose geographical position,
as well as their varied resources, rendered them important allies to
the greater belligerents.
5. EGYPT was occupied at a very early period by an agricultural
population ; afterwards, probably, by a warlike caste, which, with its
earlier kingdoms, commenced probably not earlier than 2600 or
2700 B.C. "Egyptian history can be carried back with tolerable
exactness, but not with much detail .... to the commencement
of the eighteenth dynasty, 1703 or 1520 B.C., from which time the
whole country formed, with rare and brief exceptions, a single king-
dom. It is certain that there was a foreign conquest before this
time, and that a people [the Hyksos or Shepherd Kings], quite
distinct from the Egyptians, had possession of the country for a
24 First Period.
considerable period. But the duration of their dominion, which is
variously estimated at 260, or 511, or 900 years, is wholly uncertain,
and will, probably, never be determined. That there was an ancient
native kingdom before the [Hyksos] conquest may also be laid down
as an ascertained fact ; and numerous monuments may be pointed out,
such as the pyramids, very many rock tombs, the grand hydraulic
works at the Fayoum, and a certain number of temples which belong
to this period, and are capable of conveying to us a good idea of
its civilisation. Its duration cannot be estimated at much less than
seven centuries, and may, perhaps, have been longer, but no exact
account can be given."1
The first king of Egypt was Menes, who united the petty states and
founded the monarchy ; the beginning of his reign is fixed at widely
different dates, from 5702 B.C. to 2601 B.C. The principal pyramid
Guilders were the kings of the first, fourth, and sixth dynasties.
With this latter dynasty the old empire closed, 3500 B.C., or 2383,
-or 2140 B.C. ; then there is a blank in the history until the twelfth
dynasty, 3064, or 2218, or 2020 B.C., when the Middle Empire
begins ; great changes had taken place in the physical type of the
ruling class and in the religion of the people. Thebes was the
capital, not Memphis. The authority for the dates 5702 B.C. &c.
are the result of a modification of the lists and dates of the Egyptian
history by Manetho, written about 260 B.C. ; the monument gives
the names and occasionally the regnal years of the kings, but no
chronology, and no consistent list of the consecutive order of the
kings ; hence the monuments cannot be appealed to as authorities
confirming the chronological system of Mariette, followed by
Lenormant. To suppose that one nation existed in the possession
•of a high degree of civilisation and the possession of great power,
some two or three thousand years before the kingdom of Babylonia
and Chaldea, is highly improbable.2 The barbarous Shepherd
Kings (the Hyksos), a Shemitish people from Asia, conquered
Egypt 2214 or 2020 B.C., with the fifteenth dynasty: they
then adopted the Egyptian civilisation, but were expelled by the
founders of the eighteenth dynasty, 1703 or 1520 B.C. From the
fourteenth to the thirteenth century B.C., the Egyptian monarchs are
represented as warring with the Babylonians, the Ruten (Syrians), the
Khita (Hittites) and the Assyrians, in order to secure the suzerainty
1 See Geo. Wilkinson, " Herodotus," vol. iii. p. 357
2 See Rawlinson, «« Herodotus," vol. ii. G. Rawlinson, « Origin of Nations,"
pp. 149-161.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 25
over Syria, which, from the ranges of Lebanon to the Euphrates, was
the great battle-field of the rulers of Western Asia and Egypt. In
these wars the Egyptian land forces marched in the lowland path,
which, avoiding the hills of Palestine, skirts the Mediterranean Sea :
the military engines and the heavy material of war appear to have
been conveyed, with portions of the troops, by the navies of the
Phoenicians. Under the kings of the nineteenth dynasty, 1460-1288,
or 1412-1300, or 1324-1232, the family of the Ramesids advanced the
military power of Egypt; the first Rameseswas followed byRameses II.
the Sesostris of the Greek historians, a great conqueror, whose conflict
with the Khita has been celebrated by the poet Pentaur, 1360 B.C.;
but the first king whose views embraced the extension of the power
of Egypt over Syria was Thothmes I., who began to reign thirty-eight
years after the expulsion of the Hyksos, and whose ostensible object
was to avenge the irruptions of the Hyksos. These invasions of
Asia took place long before the consolidation of the empire of
Assyria, 1271 B.C. Under the king Meneph-thah, a singular attack
was made upon Egypt by the Libyans, assisted by various tribes,
Etruscans, Sicilians, Achseans, Trojans (according to the interpreta-
tion of the monuments). This was repulsed with great slaughter
(1350 B.C. perhaps). Lenormant regards this as the result of a
Libyan-Pelasgic league to resist Phoenician and Egyptian aggression
on the part of the Greeks and the inhabitants of Sicily and Italy.
If so, historians have under-rated the early civilisation of the tribes
of Italy and Greece. The nineteenth dynasty was closed by inferior
rulers. With the twentieth dynasty the decline of Egypt com-
menced; the conquests were lost; Egypt was ravaged by the Libyans;
and the Hittites and the High Priests of Thebes gradually encroached
upon the kingly power, so that, in about noo B.C., Her-hor, the
High Priest, founded the twenty-first dynasty. Their rule appears
to have been peaceful, and the dynasty lasted until 975 B.C.
The attacks of the Libyans, assisted by these primitive Greeks and
other northern allies, is a singular fact, which proves that the Greeks
of that early period were not only warriors but capable of forming
large temporary confederacies, as, for instance, that which is said
to have besieged Troy. "Egypt probably gave to the Greeks their
first glimpses of a settled and luxurious civilisation .... there
they would find towns wealthier than the fabled towns of the
Phoenicians ; the fields full of good things, the canals rich in fish, the
lakes swarming with wild fowl, the meadows green with herbs."1
1 A. Lang, Contemporary Review, 1879, pp. 138-200; also Gladstone's
" Homeric Synchronisms," pp. 138-200.
26 First Period.
Egypt was, indeed, the great power of the then western world.
Its architectural wonders, the pyramids, sphynxes, tombs, temples;
its canal from Bubaste through the Bitter Lakes to the Red Sea
(made by King Seti and Rameses II., nineteenth dynasty), and the
other numerous canals for the distribution of the Nile waters in irriga-
tion, its orderly administration, the power of the king and of the
priesthood, and the great wealth of the higher classes, so contrasted
with the condition of Greece as to bear the impression of its
superior wisdom. The Greeks, in their ignorance, looked upon
Egypt in the same uncritical spirit as European writers manifested in
the early accounts of China, until a nearer acquaintance dispelled
the illusion. Egypt possessed all the arts of civilised life, and its
higher classes enjoyed a high degree of luxurious comfort. The
sciences of astronomy, geometry, and medicine, and agriculture were
cultivated ; her literature, historical, biographical, moral, and poetical
was accessible to the higher classes in the papyri MSS. But the
bulk of the population, arranged in castes (if not by law, by custom)
were in a state bordering on slavery, liable to be drafted from home
by thousands when needed for public works. Circumcision was to
them an ancient rite, which had no religious associations : the fellah
of the nineteenth century is probably a fair representative of the
fellah under the Pharaohs. The religion of the ancient Egyptians
is a difficult question, hard to understand.
None of our Egyptologists seem to be satisfied with their own views
of the character of the religion of the Egyptians, so great is the diffi-
culty to reconcile the wide difference between the polytheism and
animal worship of the multitude, and the more spiritual conceptions of
the educated classes. The people were pre-eminently religious : the
cities were crowded with massive temples filled with worshippers,
who were attracted by the grand and artistic ceremonials within the
sacred buildings, and by the processions in the streets, or in barges on
the canals, or on the Nile; the festivals were numerous, a week rarely
passed without the performance of some special ceremony. A gross
polytheism, which embraced the heavenly bodies and the principal
divine attributes, and then descending to animal worship and the
lowest fetichism of a negro tribe, was the popular religion. Every
province and even every town had its particular deities. Under the
old empire Ptah was the superior deity, but under the Lower Empire
Amun was regarded as chief. There was an esoteric religion for the
educated classes, "a system combining strict monotheism with a.
metaphysical speculative philosophy on the two great subjects of the
nature of God and the destiny of man, which sought to exhaust
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 27
these deep and unfathomable mysteries." x The primary doctrine was
the real essential unity of the divine nature, the popular gods being
regarded as mere personified attributes of Deity, or part of the nature
which had been created and inspired by him. No educated
Egyptian conceived the popular gods as really separate and distinct
beings. The immortality of the soul, its accountability, and judg-
ment after death in the Hall of Truth, where Osiris presided, was
the enunciation of a great truth mixed up with fabulous circum-
stance. If by the decision of the judge the good deeds of the soul
preponderated, then it was purified in a purgatorial fire and admitted
to the presence of Osiris for a period of 3,000 years, after which it
re-entered its own body and lived once more upon earth, until,
having completed a reiterated cycle of years, it attained the perfect
union with God. In the case of the guilty soul which the judge
could not justify, it was sentenced to a series of transmigrations with
the bodies of unclean animals. If, after many trials, the result was
unfavourable, the final sentence was complete annihilation. The
expectation of again needing the body in the renewed life led the
Egyptians to take extraordinary care in the embalmment of the dead.
6. THE KHITA (the Hittites of the Bible) were, perhaps, Canaanites,
perhaps Indo-Europeans, as they were spread from Armenia to the
north of Syria, and from the Euxine to the west of the Euphrates,.
and had small settlements in Palestine. Their chief seat was in the
lands bordering on the west of the Euphrates and northern Syria ,
where the RUTEN, the Syrians, are also noticed as a distinct people.
Carchemish on the Euphrates, and Kadesh, on the Orontes, were
the head-quarters of the Khita. In the Book of Joshua (chap. i. 4)
their frontier, about 1500 B.C., is thus defined : — "From this Lebanon,
even unto the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the
Hittites, and unto the great sea" As a power they were able to cope
on equal terms with Egypt on the one hand and Assyria on the
other. In or about 1360 B.C. occurred the great battle of Kadesh,
between Rameses II. and the Khita, whose allies came from Asia
Minor and Kurdistan. The battle is described in a poem by a
Theban poet, Pentaur, and may be read in Brugsch's " History of
Egypt," vol. i. p. 46. In this battle Rameses barely saved himself
from defeat. A few years after, " the increasing movements of the
nations, and the growing troubles in Canaan, and the pushing
forward of whole races in West Asia, 'owing to the immigration of
warlike tribes of foreign origin, seem to have attracted the serious
1 "Ancient Egypt," by Rawlinson, vol. i. pp. 313-315.
28 First Period.
attention of the kings of the Khita as well as of the Egyptian
Pharaoh. The then Lord of Khita (Khita Sir) was the first to make
to his Egyptian friend the proposal, written on a tablet of silver, for
an offensive and defensive alliance."1 The Khita had not declined in
influence at the conclusion of this period (1000 B.C.). Their trade by
caravans from the ports of the Persian Gulf embraced India, Arabia,
Ethiopia (south of Egypt). Aden, near the entrance of the Red
Sea, is said to have been one of their depots. They passed through
the Cilician gates by the road to Sardis and the ^Egean, and con-
nected by their visits the Grecian States of the ^Egean with Assyria
and the East, bringing to the knowledge of the Ionian Greeks the
arts and manufactures of Babylon, &c. It is a matter of dispute
among the learned whether these people were of Canaanitish, or
Shemitish, or Indo-European origin, and whether their language was
Shemitic or agglutinative, or Indo-European. Carchemish was a
noted entrepot of commerce. The formation of independent king-
doms in Syria in the eleventh century probably curtailed the power
of the Khita over northern Syria. It is remarkable that the two
references to this people in the ist Book of Kings x. 29, and 2nd
Book of Kings vii. 16, were regarded by Professor F. Newman as
evidences of the unhistorical character of the books in which they
occur. To the labours and researches of the late G. Smith, and to
the learned investigations of A. H. Sayce, we are indebted for the
resuscitation of the history of the Khita.
ASIA MINOR, the grand peninsula which abuts upon south-eastern
Europe, was well known to the Khita, who, as traders, passed
through its central provinces as far as the ^Egean. The original
population of this country was probably Turanian, followed by
Phoenician, Shemitish, and, lastly, by Aryan races, all of them so mixed
up that the particular character of the population of each people is
to this day a matter of doubt. The Dardanian kingdom (Troy)
followed by the kingdom of Phrygia (remembered by its king Gordius
and the famous knot, which Alexander the Great cut when unable
to untie it), then the Lydian, who claim for their first dynasty, the
Atydae, an existence before the thirteenth century B.C. The
Phrygians were undoubtedly Aryans, and probably nearly allied to
the Hellenic races, who may have received the beginning of their
culture from them. The explorations of the learned are now being
turned in this direction, and have already thrown some glimmering
light upon the history of their early civilisation, and its origin in the
1 The treaty may be found in Brugsch, vol. ii. pp. 68-74.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 29
commercial enterprises of the Khita and the Phoenicians. The
Bithynians, Paphlagonians, and the Phrygians were supposed to be
connected with the Thracians on the European side of the Helles-
pont. Greek colonies, after the Dorian conquest of the Peloponnesus,
1104 B.C., were established by the dispossessed leader, who, in the
^Eolian, Ionian, and Doric settlements occupied the whole of the
west coast of Asia Minor, at that time inhabited probably by a
kindred race. By the rising power of the kings of Lydia the
further extension of the territory of these colonists was prevented.
The first coining of money is by Herodotus ascribed to the Lydians,
the date not known. Pheidon, Tyrant of Argos, 895-865 or 770-730
B.C., is said to have first made weights and measures, after the Asiatic
mode (Babylon), and Leake contends that the Greeks first originated
a coinage. It is very singular that up to the time of Darius
Hystaspes we do not read of any coinage in Asia or Egypt. Not a
single coin has been found in the excavations in Egypt, Babylon, or
Assyria, but many references to payment in gold and silver by
weight. But it seems unlikely that there should have been a coinage
in Lydia, and that neither the Khita nor the Assyrians and Baby-
lonians had any knowledge of this great convenience. It is possible
that while large payments were made in the precious metals by
weight, some tokens of small value were current and used in minor
payments, and that these have escaped the notice of historians.
7. The PHCENICIANS have been generally considered as a
Canaanitish people, one with the old founders of Sidon and Tyre.
Recently some of the learned incline to regard them as Shemites
emigrating from, the Persian Gulf, and taking possession of the
maritime settlements of the Canaanites and Syrians. Others
suppose that the Phoenicians occupied these cities before the
Canaanites were in possession of Palestine.1 These are mere
conjectures ; probably they were a mixed race of Hamite and
Shemite blood, drawn together by their commercial habits. As a
people they are remarkable for three things, (i) They were the
earliest navigators ; (2) the inventors of alphabetical characters ;
and, at the same time (3), like the Canaanites, addicted to the most
degrading, cruel, and licentious rites of all the ancient peoples in
their religious observances. Their trade by the Mediterranean Sea
extended to Greece, Italy, Spain, Gaul, and North Africa, and from
their ports on the Red Sea they visited Arabia Felix and India. By
land their caravan trade extended from Egypt through Central
1 See Rawlinson's "Herodotus," vol. i. ; also "Origin of Nations," pp.
199, 2CO-232.
3o First Period.
Africa- by a route through Babylon they passed through Elam to
the north-east of Asia ; by a route northwards they traded with
Armenia and the Caucasian tribes beyond in slaves and horses ;
from Gades, their Spanish outport, and from their colony of
Carthage, founded 1233 B.C., in north Africa they explored the north
and we'st coasts of Africa. For several centuries they were the sole
navigators in the Mediterranean Sea; their cities on the Syrian
coast were seats of the manufactories of cotton, linen, and of the
scarlet dye, as well as of glass and golden ornaments. In the
23rd chapter of Isaiah and the 27th chapter of Ezekiel there
are sketches of their trade. As the allies of the kings of
Egypt, they conveyed troops and warlike machinery to northern
Syria, and to their naval power the Egyptian settlements in Greece
were indebted, not only for their foundation, but for their stability.
The Phoenician cities were governed either by kings or suffetes (in
Hebrew sophetim — i.e., judges), assisted by an oligarchic council.
In their religion, as in that of the Canaanites, we see the dark side
of the idolatry of antiquity ; their practical abominations, opposed
to the purity and decency of private life ; the holocausts of human
beings, offered as sacrifices to appease the wrath of the gods, reminds
us of the censure in Deut. xxxii. 1 7, " They sacrificed unto devils,
not to God" Dean Stanley remarks : " The bright side of poly-
theism is so familiar to us in the mythology of Greece, that it is
well to be recalled for a time to its dark side in Palestine
The Gentile accounts are insensible to the cruel, debasing, and
nameless sins, which turned the heart of the Israelites sick in the
worship of Baal, Astarte, and Moloch." * The Phoenicians wor-
shipped the gods who were regarded as hostile to life with severe
abstinence, self-mutilation, and human sacrifices. Captives by-
thousands were offered to Moloch. The best-beloved and high-bred
children of the nation must be offered as propitiations to avert public
calamities, of which there is an instance recorded in 2 Kings iii. 27.
These rites were carried out fully by the Carthaginians. When
Agathocles of Syracuse besieged Carthage, 310-307 B.C., three
hundred children taken from the noblest families were sacrificed.
There was an image of the god Chronos, made of iron, heated by a
fire underneath. The hands of the image were fully stretched out
in a downward position, so that the victims placed upon them rolled
into a cavity filled with fire. The cries of the victims were drowned
by the noise of the drums and the fifes, the mothers compelled to
1 "Jewish Church," vol. i. pp. 209, 210.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 31
stand by without lamentation or sighing. Silius Italicus (in his
poem " Punica," A.D. 25-60) gives an invocation to the "paternal
gods" of Carthage, "whose temples are cleansed by murder, and
who rejoice in being worshipped by the agony of mothers." The
Canaanitish gods who were regarded as favourable to life were wor-
shipped with the most shameless prostitution and the most unbridled
debauchery.1 The religion of the Canaanites and the Phoenicians,
based on a false and diabolical notion of the character of God, was
the upas-tree, which poisoned the intellect, the heart, the morals,
and the social life of these races. Their extinction, partly by the
Israelites, and finally by the Romans, as a people accursed by
humanity, was a blessing to mankind. One good thing they gave
to Europe, in the alphabet which, it is said, Cadmus brought to
Greece in the sixteenth century B.C.
8. The history of the ISRAELITES, until within the present century,
had been generally regarded as a mere episode in the narrative of
the world's history, one exclusively belonging to the theology of the
old dispensation, and deriving all its interest from its position as
introductory to the knowledge of Christianity, the religion accepted
by the civilised world. In our day Dr. Hales and Dr. Russell have
called attention to the intimate connexion of this history with that of
the ancient world, while Ewald, in Germany, and Deans Milraan
and Stanley, in works which bear the impress of no ordinary learning
and genius, have given us, for the first time, detailed narratives which
cannot fail to attract and interest the general reader, and which must
not be neglected by the historical student, though he may differ largely
from some Of the opinions and theories of these admirable writers.
The Biblical history of this people is the best introduction to the general
history of the world. Students well trained in the narrative from
Genesis to Nehemiah are prepared to read with advantage the
records of Egypt and of the Oriental world, as introductory to the
classical narratives of Greece and Rome. The patient perusal of
the historical books of the Bible, in connexion with the works of
Milman and Stanley, yields, in fact, an amount of solid information
which is an antidote to the one-sided superficial historical scepticism
of some of our popular writers. In the education of the human
race, God had committed to the descendants of Abraham "the
oracles of God" Romans iii. 2; thus it is that, "while all other
nations over the earth have developed a religious tendency which
acknowledged a higher than human power in the universe, Israel is
1 Max-Duncker, vol. i. pp. 351, 352.
32 First Period.
the only one which has risen to the grandeur of conceiving of this
Va«&9&the one only living God. . . . If we are asked how it was that
ABRAHAM possessed not only the primitive conception of the Divinity
as He had revealed Himself to mankind, but passed through the denial
of all other Gods to the knowledge of the one God, we are content to
answer, that it was by a special revelation." * But, as Gladstone remarks,
" It was not monotheism alone which gave a special character to the re-
ligion of that Shemitish people (the Jews) It was the sense of sin;
it was the association of a moral law with Deity, as its living fountain
head ; it was, above all, the relation of the individual soul to God,
developed in the Psalms, with an intimacy and richness which have
made them the delight, the marvel, and the training school of the
Christian world."2 The chronology of the Israelite history is very
uncertain, the true numbers of the original Hebrew text having been
lost. The date of the exode from Egypt, given by Hales at 1648 B.C.,
is by Usher, as in the margin of our Bibles, 1491 B.C. ; by Bunsen,
jun., 1563 B.C. ; by Conder, 1541 B.C. The learned at present, with
Baron Bunsen, seem to favour the date 1320 B.C., a date very diffi-
cult to reconcile with the Biblical narrative. The date by Conder
seems a probable one, which meets most difficulties. The patriarch
ABRAM, of the line of Shem, resident in Ur of the Chaldees, where
idolatry had been very recently systematised and imposed with
authority upon the population, was divinely called to proceed to
Harran, and thence to the land of Canaan, about 2186 B.C. (according
to Hales' system of chronology). The promise given to him was
that he should be the progenitor of a great nation, and that in him
should " all the families of tht earth be blessed" (Genesis xii. 13).
Abram, afterwards called Abraham, and the succeeding patriarchs of
the tribe which they led, were, on a large and more dignified scale,
like the venerable sheiks of the more respectable and uncorrupted
of the Bedouin tribes of our day ; but they were independent rulers,
important from the number of their armed followers, and from their
wealth in cattle, &c. JACOB, the grandson of Abraham, removed
into Egypt, about 1971 B.C., with his tribe, which could not be less
than three thousand persons, and settled, by permission of the
Egyptian king, in the land of Goshen, 'the eastern and exposed frontier
of the Delta. When the kings of the eighteenth dynasty, jealous of
the increase of the Israelites, and fearing their possible sympathy
with the nomad races, recently expelled from Egypt, were led to
1 Max-Muller, "Chips from a German Workshop," vol. i. p. 172.
" Olympic System," Nineteenth Century, October 1879.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 33
attempt to reduce them to slavery, and greatly oppressed them, God
raised up MOSES as their deliverer. He led them out of Egypt, 1541
B.C., a body of 600,000 adults, to which number (including women and
children, about 2,000,000) the Israelites descended from Jacob, and
those adopted into the tribes had increased in the space of 430 years.
We have an all but perfect character in MOSES the man of God (Deut.
xxxiii. i), " a man who considered merely in an historical light . . .
has exercised a more external and permanent influence over the
destinies of his own nation, and mankind at large, than any other
individual recorded in the annals of the world .... to his own
nation Moses was chieftain, historian, poet, lawgiver. He was more
than all this — he was the author of their civil existence .... Moses
had first to form his people and bestow on them a country of their
own before he could create his commonwealth .... the virtue of
pure and disinterested patriotism never shone forth more unclouded
, . . . Let Moses, as contrasted with human legislators, be judged
according to his age, he will appear, not merely the first who founded
a commonwealth on just principles, but a lawgiver who advanced
political society to as high a degree of perfection as the state of
civilisation which his people had attained, or were capable of
attaining, could possibly admit. But, if such be the benign, the
prematurely wise and original character of the Mosaic institutes,
the faith of the Jew and of the Christian in the divine com-
mission of the great legislator is the more strongly established
and confirmed."1 After forty years' residence in the wilderness
of Arabia, south of Palestine, Moses died, and the Israelites,
under Joshua, commenced the conquest of Canaan, the land
promised by God to their great father Abraham 1501 B.C. Among
the class of "adopted" Israelites, not of the race of Abraham,
the names of Caleb and Othniel may be noticed. On the death of
Joshua the Israelites were governed by the ordinary rulers of the
twelve tribes, and occasionally by " Judges " raised up as patriotic
leaders to resist the oppression of foreign invaders from the neigh-
bouring nomad tribes. The Egyptian kings, satisfied with the non-
interference of the Israelites with their quiet passage along the sea-
shore, their land route to northern Syria and the Euphrates, were
not disposed to enter the hill country of Palestine in order to
interfere in the wars between the Canaanites and the people of
Israel. The last of the Judges was Samuel, by whom, to gratify the
wishes of the nation, Saul was appointed king 1071 B.C. DAVID
1 Milman's " History of the Jews," vol i. 8vo. pp. 213-215.
D
34 First Period.
began to reign 1051 B.C., and during his forty years' reign founded
a large kingdom extending from Egypt and the Red Sea to the
Euphrates, of which Jerusalem was the capital. The circumstances
of the times were favourable. The great powers, Egypt and Assyria,
were at that time distracted by internal troubles, and unable to
oppose. But the history of David, recorded in the Old Testament,
and his Psalms, are the lasting memorials of his life. SOLOMON, the
son of David, succeeded, ion B.C. His influence in his later years
was evil ; all his power and wealth used for selfish aggrandisement,
and his theoretic wisdom became practical folly. The sacred
historian faithfully depicts the good and the evil in his character.
The Temple, which he built, and for which his father David had
made provision, is one of the abiding associations of his name,
together with the Proverbs, the book of Ecclesiastes, and the Song
of Songs, which are attributed to him.
The Israelites were mainly an agricultural people, but they had a
national literature of songs, histories, biographies, &c., to which there
are references in their sacred books. These books comprise the five
books of the Pentateuch, the books of Ruth, Joshua, the Judges, and
the two books of Samuel, with the earlier Psalms, which were probably
in the hands of the educated classes in the settled period of peace
enjoyed in the reign of Solomon. The genuiness of the Pentateuch
and of the other books has been questioned by some of the learned
in Germany and England. These critics have pointed out words
and phrases which imply a later date, and so far they have done
good service towards the Biblical criticism of our day. They have
convinced the friends of the Bible that, in the many revisions of the
old text, words and phrases which had become obsolete have been
modernised, that marginal notes and explanatory additions have
unawares crept into the text, and that there may be a few interpola-
tions, referring simply to historical, chronological, or topological facts,
but which have no bearing on faith or morals. If, on these grounds,
the antiquity of the sacred books is to be discredited, then, there is
not a single old writing from Homer, the old Greek poet, down to
Geoffry Chaucer in England, which is not in the same position.
To Christians the testimony of the Jewish Church, corroborated
by the strong affirmation of Our Lord, is sufficient evidence. The
preservation of this sacred literature was favoured by the existence
of the priesthood, and of the Levites, distinct by their tribal origin
from the rest of the people, and separated to religious duties, by
whom some acquaintance with the history, and the ritual, and the
laws of the Mosaic code given to the people by Moses at Sinai was
The Earliest Nations up to icoo B.C. 35
absolutely necessary. Schools of the Prophets had been instituted
by Samuel, in which pious young men were trained by zealous
patriotic teachers in the knowledge of the Law. If at that time
the book of Job were known (which is not improbable), then some
of the deepest problems of philosophy were brought in contact with
the minds of Hebrew thinkers.
The failure of the Israelitish people to realise the ideal of a
theistical righteous community is the more to be regretted when we
consider the character of the institutions given to them. "By the
Law, to which they gave their free and unconditional consent, the
great Jehovah became their king .... the feudal lord of all their
territory .... Hence the Mosaic constitution .... was, in its
origin and principles, entirely different from every human policy. It
was a federal compact .... between the Founder of the state, the
proprietor of the land .... and the Hebrew nation, selected from
all the rest of the world for some great ulterior project : the terms by
which they held .... were their faithful discharge of their trust,
the preservation of the great religious doctrine, the worship of the
one great Creator .... the permanence of the national blessings
depended upon the integrity of the national faith. Apostasy ....
brought the curse of barrenness, defeat, famine, or pestilence on the
whole land : it was repressed with the most unrelenting severity ....
perpetual sacrifices enlivened their faith : frequent commemorative
festivals .... reminded them of all the surprising and marvellous
events of their national history .... Above all, the great universal
rite of sacrifice was regulated with the utmost precision .... The
ordinary festivals were of a gayer and more cheerful character.
Every seventh day was the Sabbath. Labour ceased through the
land .... The new moon, or the first day of the lunar month,
was a festival ; and on three occasions — the Passover festival, the
feast of Pentecost, and the feast of Tabernacles — all the males of all
the tribes were to assemble wherever the Tabernacle of God was
fixed. This regulation was a master-stroke of policy, to preserve
the bond of union indissoluble among the twelve federate republics
which formed the early state .... At each of these festivals the
frontiers were unguarded ; special divine protection at such times
was assured to them (Exodus xxxiv. 24.) The Sabbatic year was
another remarkable instance of departure from every rule of political
wisdom in reliance on Divine providence. The whole land was to lie
fallow .... At the end of seven periods of seven years .... the
Jubilee was appointed .... all the estates were to revert to their
original owners .... and the whole land returned to the same state
D 2
36 First Period.
in which it stood at the first partition .... the law (an agrarian
law) prevented the accumulation of large masses of landed property
in one family .... To one tribe, that of Levi, a tenth of the pro-
duce of the whole land was assigned, instead of a portion of the land
due to them as one of the twelve tribes .... But .... did the
Jewish people ever fulfil the noble scheme of the Jewish legislator ?
of the observance of the Sabbatic year, still less of the great
agrarian law of the Jubilee, we have no record .... The failure
impugns not the wisdom of the legislator .... it condemns only
the people of Israel, who never rose to the height of that wisdom." l
The violation of the covenant by the Israelitish people is specially
observable : (i) in the repeated apostasies of the nation from the
worship of Jehovah to the idolatrous abominations and cruelty of the
Canaanitish ritual; (2) in the neglect of that system of restraint
upon accumulation, which, if carried out, would have realised the
Utopia of philosophical speculation. For their violation of their
Covenant Act, their fundamental constitution as a people, they
suffered in their own land, in their captivities, and in their subse-
quent dispersion as we now see them.
So far the history has been confined to the ancient nations ot
south-western Asia, whose political system included Egypt ; but
there are already in Europe young and active races preparing for
the conquest of the known world.
9. EUROPE was peopled the last of the continents, receiving from
the East branches of the widespread so-called TURANIAN races, and,
perhaps, from the African BERBERS, the Iberians, Ligurians, &c., from
the south. Then followed the KELTIC emigration, the HELLENIC and
ITALIC, the Teutonic, and, last of all, the Sclavonic. The views of
.our scholars are given in the Preliminary Notes, IV. Dr. Donaldson
recognises a Sclavonic element in the old Pelasgic ancestry of the
^Greek races : whatever may have been the original stock, these Hel-
lenic Greeks were a remarkable people. " No race ever did so many-
different things so well as the Greeks. They were the first people
who thought of finding out the truth and reason in everything."2
The history of GREECE is all debatable land, especially in the
history of the early ages, the " origines" of the race. In England
we have three great writers— Mitford, Thirlwall, and Grote, besides
an English translation of Curtius, the German professor at Dorpat,
and of Max Duncker. The history of Mitford is that of a bitter
1 Milman's " History of the Jews," vol. i. pp. 148-160.
* C. A. Fyffe, " History of Greece," 241110. 1875.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 37
Tory, a hater of democratic institutions — in fact, a political manifesto
in 8 vols. 8vo. Freeman remarks that, " with all his blunders
and all his unfairness, he did good service in showing that Plutarch's
men were real beings like ourselves .... He was a bad scholar,
a bad historian, a bad writer of English, but he was the first
writer of any note who found out that Grecian history was a living
thing, with a practical bearing." * Gladstone thinks that, "notwith-
standing his prejudices, Mitford is an author whom no one need, even
at this day, be ashamed to consult or to quote .... He surely marks
one of the advancing stages of Greek historiography." 2 Thirlwall's
" calm judgment and consummate scholarship came to correct,
sometimes too unmercifully, the mistakes and perversions of Mitford;
but it was Grote who first looked straight at everything, without
regard to convenient beliefs, by the light of his own historical and
political knowledge.3 Grote ignores pre-historic and ethnological
speculations, thinking with Sir G. Cornwall Lewis that these ' rest on
no evidence.' " Certainly " they rest on no contemporary written
evidence j but surely they rest on an evidence of their own — that
evidence which is of the same kind as that which forms the ground-
work of philology, and of some branches of natural science — of
geology, for instance, which is simply archaeology before man.
Moreover, it sometimes happens, as in the case of the legendary
history of Mykene, that archaeological and legendary evidence coin-
cide so wonderfully as to leave no doubt that the legend has
preserved the memory of a real state of things."4 Curtius "came to
his Grecian history with the last results of ethnological and philo-
logical study .... which gave him, so far, a great advantage over
both his English predecessors.5 So far, by way of introduction to the
history of Greece, the most eastern peninsula of Europe, called by
its people Hellas, a territory much less than Portugal. It has an
extensive line of coast, broken up into innumerable bays and gulfs,
well furnished with natural harbours, and was thus divided into small
isolated districts by rugged mountain-ranges, between which the
valleys alone were adapted to cultivation. There is not one large
plain in the whole of Greece. Hence the inhabitants (the most an-
cient being the Pelasgi, after whom the Hellenes, a warlike kindred
people), though of one stock and speaking the same language, were
1 Freeman's "Essays," second series, pp. 111-155.
8 Homeric " Synchronisms," p. 190.
3 Freeman, pp. 155, 156. 4 Ibid., second series, pp. 113, 114.
5 Freeman's " Essays," second series, p. mi.
J. i^\~iiitlil} Y\f* *-JJ9 JOV-'* AUiVi.j VBW
5 Freeman's " Essays," second series, p. 151
.8 First Period.
never (except when a conquered people) united under one govern-
ment Each valley had its ruler, and of these petty political
organisations there were about one hundred in all Greece, but m
many different stages of progress as regards the arts and usages of
civilised life. Some remained in their original tribal organisations, as
the Illyrians, Epirots, and the more northern tribes— much in the
condition of the Albanians of our day. In most of these states
there was a king, with chiefs exercising a patriarchal government
over a free people, who expected to be ruled by their old customs.
Tribal wars were frequent, and inroads from the more barbarous
tribes to the north retarded the progress of civilisation. The
Phoenicians first introduced the use of letters and the culture of the
East. The legends respecting the power and legislation of Minos,
the Cretan legislator, probably refer to the effects of Phoenician and
Egyptian influence on that island, upon which, and upon the other
islands, and on the mainland, the Phoenicians and the Egyptians had
made settlements from the Deltan-Phoenician colony, rather than
from Phoenicia direct. For example— Danaus, from Egypt to Argos,
1500 B.C. ; Cadmus, from the East to Thebes, who brought over the
Phoenician alphabet, 1550 B.C. ; Cecrops, from Sais, in Egypt, who
founded Athens, 1555 B.C. ; Pelops, from Lydia, who gave his name
to the Peninsula (the Morea), and others in the sixteenth and
fifteenth centuries B.C., whose names are to be found in the old
legends. Perhaps some of these were rich and powerful settlers
from Phoenicia or Egypt. There are references also to some ex-
peditions in which leading Greek chiefs acted in unison; for instance,
that of the Argonauts to Colchis, "to procure the Golden Fleece;"
probably a raid upon the coasts of the Euxine, 1225 B.C. ; the War of
the Seven against Thebes, 1213 B.C., a family feud sung by the poets ;
the Trojan War, in which the Greeks under Agamemnon, king of
Myke'ne, besieged and destroyed Troy, in Asia Minor, after a ten
years' siege, to revenge the elopement of Helen with Paris, 1184 B.C.;
a war unimportant in itself, and which is mainly interesting to us
because the theme of the poem of Homer. In the year 1104 B.C.
the more warlike Dorian tribes from the north of Greece occupied
the Peloponnesus. This is called the Return of the Heraclida, the
leading chiefs of the Dorians deriving their claim to that territory
from their supposed descent from the mythical hero Hercules. We
read also of a Council of Amphictyons, representing a confederacy of
Hellenic tribes in and near Thessaly, which had charge of the Oracle
at Delphi and of the treasures deposited there, and from this
position had occasionally some influence in political affairs. The
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 39
reality of these events, with the dates affixed, which the makers of the
Parian Marbles received as authentic in the third century B.C., rest
on legends which, though believed by these Greek archaeologists,
have been questioned in modern times. Recently, however, there
has arisen a reaction against the excesses of this historical criticism,
a reaction quickened and confirmed by the excavations made at
Ilium, Mykene, and Tiryns, by Schliemann, and again by some
obscure intimations in the Egyptian records, which seem to vindicate
the substantial truth of some of the old legends. "The older
Shemitic histories, the Egyptian inscriptions, and the traditions of
the Greeks themselves agree that the Phoenicians certainly, and
perhaps the Egyptians, sailed with powerful fleets through the
^gean, and traded with enormous advantage with the rude inhabit-
ants of the coasts and islands, by means of their imposing wealth
and culture. They settled also in Greek waters, partly for commercial
and mining purposes, as, for example, at Thasos .... but partly,
also, from the desire of forming new empires. Just as distinguished
Athenians, like Miltiades or Iphicrates, became great princes among
* the butter-eating Thracians,' so we may suppose that the legends of
Minos, of Cadmus, and Danaus indicate sovereignties set up by
these civilised foreigners, in pre-historic days, among the Greeks
.... the legend of Minos seems to us the echo of the most
important of these sovereignties. But the pre-historic ruins at Argos,
Mykene, and Orchomenos show that Crete was not the only seat of
culture .... Gradually Greek, or semi-Greek chiefs began to
dispossess these Semitish forerunners of Greek culture. The native
chiefs seem then to have succeeded to the power and wealth already
centred at Argos, Myke'ne, Crete, and Orchomenos, and other such
favourable positions. The great Cyclopian ruins are found on the
very sites indicated in Homer as the seats of the greatest monarchs.
Accordingly, I conceive that Agamemnon, Menelaus, Nestor, and
others of the richer chiefs, but especially the Atreidse, rather inherited
a power and wealth, established originally by the enlightened
despotisms of Shemitic merchant princes, and not gradually acquired
by the extension of a local patriarchal sway .... The general tone
of the Iliad and Odyssey implies, then, not a nascent but a decay-
ing order of things — subordinated chiefs rebelling against their
suzerains, nobles violating the rights of their absent chief."1 To
suppose that the early history of Greece is wholly mythic, that is to
say, a series " of current stories, the spontaneous and earliest growth
: Mahaffy, "Social Life in Greece," pp. 15-18.
40 First Period.
of the Grecian mind," l is to ignore the fact that their varied and local,
as well as their general character, their agreements and their differ-
ences clearly and decisively point out to local hereditary tradition as
their true origin.
Soon after the Dorian conquest of the Peloponnesus the petty
kingdoms became first aristocratical and then democratical, according
as one or an opposite party prevailed. This may have been hastened
by the decay or extinction of the great historical families. Grote
considers that " the prime cause is doubtless to be sought in the
smallness and concentrated residence of each distinct Hellenic
society. A single chief, perpetual and irresponsible, was no way
essential for the maintenance of union the primitive
sentiment entertained towards the heroic king died out, passing
first into indifference, next — after experience of the despots — into
determined antipathy.2 A republican government requires for its
success a high type of national character. So far, in Greece, in
England, and the United States, as well as in old Rome and in
modern France, the paucity of that high type has been unfavourable
to the working of purely democratic institutions. Greece was known
to the Hebrews as Chittim (Numbers xxiv. 24 ; Daniel xi. 30) : the
name of Javan is also used (Isaiah Ixvi. 19 ; Ezekiel xxvii 13-19).
10. Italy, in ancient times, was confined to the territory of the
centre and south. North Italy, the valley of the Po, and the plains
of Lombardy belonged to Ligurians and the Gauls (Kelts); it
was only known as Gallia Cisalpina to the early Romans. Some
suppose the Ligurians to have been partly, at least, of Berber origin,
from Spain and southern Gaul. The Etruscans, whose origin is a
problem, came from the north, and drove the Umbrians, an old
Italian race, southwards. These Umbrians, Oscans, Opicians, Latins,
Samnites, and Volsci are supposed to be of the Indo-Germanico-
Sclavonic stock by Dr. Donaldson,3 in which the SCLAVONIC-
LITHUANIAN type can be recognised. According to Freeman,4
there were two branches of the Italian race, one nearly akin to the
Greeks—the LATINS ; the other, of the original Italic Aryan race,
the Sabines, Equians, Volscians, Samnites (i.e., the Oscans) ; in
the south, the old Pelasgic settlers from Greece. All these tribes
were related. The Greeks were their brothers; the Lithuanian-
Sclavonics their cousins. The political capabilities of the Greeks
1 Crete's " History of Greece," vol. i. I2mo. p. in.
2 Ibid., vol. iii. pp. 10-16,
3 " Varronianus," pp. 59-65.
"Hist. Geog. of Europe," vol. i. pp. 215, 216.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 41
and Italians differed. The Greek political unit and centre was his
own city ; he could not be welded into unity with other cities of his
own race, except by despotic power ; the only national feeling was
connected with games and the arts. The Olympian games, the
poems of Homer, the tragedies of Euripides, and others were the
links of union to the Hellenic races. On the other hand, "the
Italian surrendered his own personal will for the sake of freedom,
and learned to obey the state. In such subjection as this individual
development might be marred, and the germs of fairest promise in
man might be arrested in the bud. The Italian gained instead a
feeling of fatherland and of patriotism, which the Greeks never
knew, with an earnest faith in his own gods — and thus alone, among
all the civilised nations of antiquity, succeeded in working out
national unity in connexion with a constitution based on self-govern-
ment— a national unity which at last placed in his hands the
supremacy, not only over the divided Hellenic stock, but over the
whole known world."1
The ETRUSCANS remain to this day a puzzle to philologists and
archaeologists, an illustration of the incompleteness of our historical
knowledge. They trace their origin to the north-east, and call them-
selves " Rasena." Being totally unlike any other Italian people, the
opinion is that they were a Turanian people similar to the Finns,
and Basques, but Dr. Donaldson thinks they were a branch of the
Norse Scandinavians.2 They had first settled in Rhaetia ; then
in the plains of the Po, from the Ticino to the Adige and beyond,
forming there a confederacy of twelve cities at a very remote period ;
after this, driven onward by the Gauls or Germans, they crossed the
Apennines, and extended their territories to the Tiber, occupying
the land now called Etruria or Tuscany. Here they built twelve
cities, each of which was governed by a Lucumo (king). They had
also at that time settlements in Campania at Capua, and other cities.
Physically, they were short and stout ; their religion was gloomy ;
their architecture, sculpture, pottery, works in metal prove their
advancement in the arts of civilised life. In maritime affairs, they,
at an early period, covered with their piratical corsairs the western
Mediterranean, and formed a treaty with the Carthaginians to
oppose Greek colonisation. Their language appeared barbarian to
the Greeks and Romans, and is a mystery to this day : the alphabet
is of Greek origin. The remains of their massive buildings at
Fiesole, and elsewhere, resemble those of early Greece and Lydia.
1 Mommsen, vol. i. I2mo. pp. 30, 31. 2 " Varronianus," p. 69.
42 First Period.
ii Western and central Europe were first peopled by Turanian
races, widely and sparsely scattered, and afterwards mostly absorbed
by the Keltic races, followed by the Germanic and Sclavonic races.
SPAIN appears to have received, at a very early period, a Berber
population from north Africa, the Iberians, who occupied not only
Spain, but southern Gaul, and in Italy were known as the Ligurians.
The Basques, in the north of Spain, are supposed to be of Berber
origin. The Phoenicians, and the Carthaginians after them, estab-
lished trading stations on the southern and eastern coasts of Spain.
Carteia, supposed by some to have occupied a position near the
narrow neck of San Roque (Gibraltar), claims to be one of the oldest
cities in Europe, probably founded long before 1500 B.C. Tartessus,
at the mouth of the river Bcetis, was a Phoenician factory, from
which the name of Tarshish was taken by the Hebrews, and applied
by them in the same vague meaning as, a few years ago, we used to
speak of "the Indies." When first visited by the Phoenicians, "the
gold of its mines was a treasure not yet appreciated by its possessors.
They bartered it .... to strangers in return for the most ordinary
articles of civilised living, which barbarians cannot enough admire.
This story (from Herodotus) makes us feel that we are indeed living
in the old age of the world. The country, then so fresh and
untouched, has now been (1838) in the last stage of decrepitude ;
its mines, then so abundant, have been long since exhausted ; and,
after having in its turn discovered and almost drained the mines of
another world, it lies now like a forsaken wreck on the waves of
time, with nothing but the memory of the past to ennoble it." l
12. There are three ancient "geographical expressions," the
people of which were far removed from the revolutions and politics
of Europe, western Asia, and Egypt — namely, ARABIA, INDIA, and
CHINA.
ARABIA is said to have been settled by CUSHITE races, the Adites
and the Amalekites, the latter partially Shemitic. the Yoktanites,
from Shem, formed a large portion of the population, and with the
Ishmaelites, descended from Abraham, may be regarded as the
ancestors of the present Arabs. Yemen, known to the Egyptians as
Pun, was a Cushite centre of trade, to which the Egyptians, the
Phoenicians, and, at a later period, the Israelites resorted. The
Edomites (Idumeans), from their commanding position at Petra, had
the main control of the caravan trade, arrangements being made
with the tribes through which the caravans passed. The Moabite
1 Dr. Arnold's " History of Rome," vol. i. 486.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 43
and the Ammonite tribes were the near neighbours and, like the
Edomites, the antagonists of Israel.
INDIA. The history of this vast peninsula and continent (for such
it is) connects it with eastern Persia (Iran). The ARYAN races
settled in Iran sent forth the Aryan conquerors of India. These
Aryans were for many ages settled in BACTRIA, which was a powerful
state 2000 to 2500 B.C., the defence of eastern Persia against the
nomad tribes beyond the Oxus. Balk and Samarcund are ancient
capitals and centres of trade. It is supposed that the settlement of
northern and western India by the ARYANS took place between
2000 and 1500 or 1200 B.C., and that before this migration from
Persia, the religion of the Aryans in Persia had been modified by a
great reformer (Zarathustra) ZOROASTER : he was opposed to the
nature worship, the pantheism, and the polytheism, which had begun
to corrupt the pure Theism of the earlier Aryans. With him, the
gods of these Aryans, who had migrated to India, were regarded as
Daemons, and Indra and Seva as spirits of evil. lie aimed to teach
pure Theism; but, unable to account for the origin of evil, he
imagined the existence of two equally powerful gods — Ormuzd, the
good, the creator, the benefactor; and Ahriman, the evil, the source
of all moral and physical evil, and of death. Zoroaster is placed
by some earlier and later than 1000 B.C. — even so low as 400 to
500 B.C. : probably there were several successors and revivers of
Zoroaster who have been confounded with the original teacher.
Fire (as pure) is the only visible representation of Ormuzd admitted
into the Zend temples. Their religious book is the " ZEND AVESTA,"
the antiquity of which is not settled. The reforms of Zoroaster led
to a war among the Aryans, in which the followers of Zoroaster were
the conquerors ; hence the continued migration of the discomfited
party to India. In the " RIG VEDA," the sacred book of the Indians,
there are maledictions heaped upon Zoroaster. As the Aryans of
Iran pushed westward to Media and western Persia, the Turanian
inhabitants were by degrees subdued ; but the conflict of races has
been celebrated as that of Iran and Turan by the Persian poet
Firdousi. Before the invasion of the Aryans, INDIA had received
three large immigrations from its neighbours — (i) By a Thibetan race,
from which the Mongolians and Chinese received their first popula-
lation ; (2) A Kolarian race, now represented by the Santals, &c. ;
(3) A Dravidian race (the Tamils), Turanians who occupied
eventually southern India, and were able, by their civilisation, to
maintain their position against the Aryan races. All these races
were called by the Aryans Dasyus (enemies), Dasas (slaves). The
44 First Period.
Vedic hymns speak of them with scorn ; yet some of them were
advanced in civilisation, had castles and forts. They were driven
from the valley of the Ganges 1400 B.C., about which time the
Brahminical system (unknown to the Vedas) was established among
the Aryan conquerors. According to that theory (i) the caste of
the Brahmins is from the mouth of Brahma, there are the priests,
superior in dignity to all others ; (2) the Kshatriya, the military
class, from the arms of Brahma ; (3) the Vasyas, husbandmen, from
the thighs of Brahma ; (4) the Sudras, the lowest of the people,
from his feet, but all these are twice born. There was a long contest
between the Brahmins and the military class for the superiority of
position, in which the craft and prestige of the Brahmin prevailed.
These castes have been largely subdivided. The religion of
the Brahmins was pantheistic — all things and men are emanations
from Brahma, and the great end of life is to seek reabsorption into
Deity. The Suttee, however, is no part of the original religion of
the Vedas.1
" The political organisation of the people of India, whether Aryan
or Dravidian, seems to have borne a great resemblance to that of the
Teutonic people. It originated in the clearance of primeval forests
by the pioneers of humanity Every new clearance gradually
grew into a village ; these villages became subject to those internal
changes and revolution which are inseparable from the progress of
the human race .... In due course, the Village comprised a com-
munity of independent householders, each of which had his own family,
his own homestead, and his own separate parcel of arable land for
cultivation, and a common right to the neighbouring pastures ....
But, while the individual householder was the supreme head of his
own family, within the limits of his own homestead, he was bound,
as a member of the village community, to conform to all its multi-
farious rules and usages as regards the order of cultivation, and the
common right of his neighbours to graze their cattle on the pasture
.... The ancient village community of independent landowners,
governed by common rights and usages, naturally acquired a political
organisation of its own .... Its affairs were conducted by a
council of elders, or by the council in association, with a head man,
who was either elected to the post by the village community, or
succeeded to it as an hereditary right .... at a later period of
development each village had its own officials, such as the account-
ant, the nobleman, the priest, the physician, the musician. It had
1 See Max-Duncker : Talboys.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 45
also its own artisans, as the blacksmith, the carpenter, the worker in
leather, the tailor, the potter, the barber ; these officers and artisans
were generally hereditary, and were supported by grants of land rent
free, or by fees contributed by the landholders in grain, or perhaps in
money .... Village republics seem to last when nothing else lasts ;
revolution succeeds to revolution. Hindu, Patan, Mogul, Mahratta,
Sikh, English, are all masters in turn, but the village community
remains the same."1
CHINA was probably first possessed by pastoral tribes. At a very
early period a Turanian race, called the Bak, near the south-east
Caspian, connected with the Akkadians of Chaldea, and receiving
from them their civilisation, settled in China and were the founders
of Chinese civilisation and literature,2 the first king of whom we hear
was Fohi — then Hwang-to — then Yaou, who is supposed to have
lived 2,300 B.C. His empire extended from 23° to 40° north, and
from 6° west of Pekin to 10° east of Pekin. The capital was Ke-choo
in Shantung. The Shang dynasty succeeded 1766 B.C.; the Chow
dynasty, under Woo-Wang, 1,121 B.C. Their founder divided China
into seventy-two feudal states, which led to a series of internecine
wars.
13. RELIGIOUS HISTORY. — The origin of idolatry, whether in
Tsabaism, the adoration of the heavenly bodies, or in the symbolism
of the divine attributes, or in the reverence for ancestry, or in the
honours paid to the memories of deceased heroes and national bene-
factors, or in the corruption of patriarchal traditions, or in the
puzzles of philosophy in its efforts to account satisfactorily for either
natural phenomena or for moral evil, is one of the questions of the
day which will probably never be answered satisfactorily. Its varied
manifestations are matters of history, and some of them have been
already noticed in the case of the Babylonians, Assyrians, Egyptians,
and Phoenicians. The Greek polytheism (substantially common to
the Roman and Italic people) is in its bare, matter-of-fact details
familiar to every schoolboy. We may quote Grote's impartial
account : — "The mythical world of the Greeks opens with the gods,
anterior as well as superior to man : it gradually descends, first to
heroes, and next to the human race. Along with the gods are
found various monstrous natures, ultra-human and extra-human, who
1 Wheeler's " History of India," vol. iii. pp. 61-3 : Taiboys.
2 See Quarterly Review ', No. 307, July, 1882.
3 See the letters of M. Terrien de la Couperie in the Academy, October and
November, 1883.
4<5 First Period.
cannot with propriety be called gods, but who partake with gods and
men in the attributes of volition, conscious agency, and suscepti-
bility of pleasure and pain-such as the Harpies, the Gorgons ....
Sirens . . Cyclopes .... the Centaurs, &c. The first acts of
what may be termed the great mythical cycle describe the proceed-
ings of these gigantic agents— the crash and collision of certain
over-boiling forces, which are ultimately reduced to obedience, or
chained up or extinguished under the more orderly government of
Zeus, who supplants his less capable predecessors, and acquires
precedence and supremacy over gods and men— subject, however, to
certain social restraints from the chief gods and goddesses around
him, as well as to the custom of occasionally convoking and con-
sulting the divine agora." . . . . " The inmates of this divine world
are conceived upon the model, but not upon the scale of the
human. They are actuated by the full play and variety of those
appetites, sympathies, passions and affections which divide the soul
of man": they are "invested with a far larger and indeterminate
measure of power, and an exemption as well from death as (with
some rare exceptions) from suffering and infirmity."1 The Greek
mythology probably arose from personification of the forms of
nature, and by additions received from the Theologies and Theo-
gonies of the Phoenicians and the Egyptians. As a superstition it
had a firm hold on the masses, maintained by its festivals, pro-
cessions, and sacrifices, and by the necessity of believing in some-
thing besides and above material existence. As a religion it never
satisfied the educated and thoughtful. Such took from it what
appeared to them calculated to meet their spiritual aspirations, or
became the followers of the philosophical teachers who laboured to
reconcile the religious myths with scientific researches and human
reason. In Italy there was by far a deeper religious feeling than in
Greece. Practically the Greeks and Romans were fatalists. Even
Zeus is the minister of a stern necessity. Morality lost not a little
by the examples furnished in the popular histories of the gods and
goddesses of Olympus. The fear of retribution through the action
of the Furies operated to some extent in checking the commission
of great crimes, but was not generally associated with the sort of
future life described by the poets. The Greek mysteries were " frag-
mentary glimpses of future retribution : as also are the doctrines of
the unity of God and of atonement by sacrifice .... the con-
sciousness of guilt was not indeed first taught by them, but was felt
1 Grote, vol. i. pp. i, 3.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 47
generally, and felt very keenly by the Greek mind. These mysteries
were its gospel of reconciliation with the offended gods."1 If we
judge the idolatrous systems by their fruits as seen in the generally
depraved character of the common people in Egypt, the East, and
even in Greece and Rome, our language must be highly condemna-
tory. See also St. Paul (Romans i. 18-32) a true picture of the
heathen morality of the day. In the early ages, and in the more
simple form of idolatry, the aberrations of the intellect might be
less connected with the depravation of the heart, and the moral
evils of the system might be corrected to some extent by the tradi-
tions of the patriarchal ages. There were also many exceptions to
the prevalent errors of the age in men " who feared God and worked
righteousness" and as such were "accepted of him" (Acts x. 34, 35;
xvii. 20; Romans ii. 14, 15). The fashion now is to find some deep,
profound philosophy in connexion with all heathenish systems : the
fact is that too often these learned men, in their inquiries, are insen-
sibly led to find what they bring to them, the reflex of their own
preconceived conclusions and theories.
14. LITERATURE implies the art of writing for its conservation. But
of the changes in language after the first dispersion of the human
race we have no history, except what philologists infer by a com-
parison of the varied dialects of human speech. Pictorial writing
from simple signs, such as were found in Mexico and among the
North American Indians, up to the complex Egyptian hieroglyphics,
preceded the discovery of alphabetical writing. The learned have
come to the conclusion that all existing alphabets have been derived
from the Egyptian hieroglyphics. The Phoenicians have the credit
of first perceiving " the advantage of one definite symbol for one
sound, and the disadvantage of a dozen."3 From their alphabet
all the alphabets now used have been formed. The discovery
of the alphabet may fairly be regarded as the most difficult as
well as the most fruitful of all the past achievements of the
human intellect. There have been in fact five other great
systems of picture writing, (i) The Egyptian in five varieties, (2)
the cuneiform in nine varieties, (3) the Chinese in five varieties, (4)
the Mexican in two varieties, and (5) the Khita in four varieties.
But to use these systems requires the labours of a life. To invent
and bring to perfection our alphabet has proved to be the most
arduous enterprise in which the human intellect has ever been
1 Mahaffy, " Rambles in Greece," pp. 20, 21.
" Encyc. Brit," ninth edition, vol. i. p. 607.
48
First Period.
engaged. Its achievement taxed the genius of the three most gifted
races° of the ancient world. It was begun by the Egyptians, con-
tinued by the Shemites, and finally perfected by the Greeks. To
show that from certain hieroglyphic pictures, which were in use long
before the Pyramids were erected, it is possible to deduce the actual
outlines of almost every letter of our modem English alphabet, is
the object of the Rev. I. Taylor's work on the alphabet.1 As early
as the Second Dynasty the Egyptians had solved the hardest problem
of all, the conception of a pure consonant, which involves the
essential principles of alphabetic writing, but they advanced no
farther. It was reserved for the genius of an alien race (the
Phoenicians) finally to reject every vestige of homophones and
polyphones, of ideogram and syllabics, and boldly to rely on one
single sign for the notation of each consonantal sound. When
alphabetical writing was first invented we do not know, but in
Western Asia the art was probably in use before the time of Abra-
ham. In EGYPT the enchorial character of the hieroglyphic writing
superseded the more pictorial character before the seventh century
B.C. The ISRAELITES in the time of MOSES were acquainted with
alphabetical characters, having, no doubt, acquired them in their set-
tlement in the north-east of Egypt, with which PHOENICIAN traders
and Shemitish pastoral tribes came frequently in contact. They had
the documents which now form the Pentateuch, the books of Joshua
and the Judges, together with Ruth, and the book of faster (now
lost), possibly also the book of Job. EGYPT had an extensive litera-
ture, of which only a very minute portion has been deciphered and
translated. The writings are historical, geographical, theological and
moral discourses, poetry, letters, and romances; the mathematical
sciences, as astronomy and geometry, were cultivated, so also medi-
cine. Magic and astrology had a mighty hold on the minds of all
classes. One of the most important of the papyri is one of the
oldest, thought to be nearly as old as the monarchy ; it is called
"the ritual of the dead," but the Egyptian title was " the manifestation
ofUght," or, in other words, "the book revealing light to the soul."
There is a small epic of about 120 lines by Pentaour, the poet, on
the exploits of Rameses II. in his war with the Hittites (about
1360 B.C. ; also a sort of tour in Syria about 1400 B.C., very meagre
in the information it gives us. The short poems, letters, and
romances constitute of themselves a large literature, but as yet we
have access only to a small number. PHOENICIAN literature is all
1 2 vols. 8vo. 1883.
The Earliest Nations up to 1000 B.C. 49
lost. Sundry writers quoted by Josephus, and references to Mokhos
and Sanchoniathon, historians who are said to have lived before
the Trojan War, are all that remain. The remnants of certain
CHALDEAN poems and legends (preserved in the Assyrian library
of Assur-bani-pal, 670 B.C.) give us, among other things, the Epic
of Isdubahr and the Legend of the Creation, which belong to this
epoch, besides many other works, recorded on tablets, which have
not yet been prepared for the public eye. In IRAN (Persia) the
Zend Avesta, the sacred book of the early Persians ; in INDIA, the
Vedas, the earliest of the sacred books of the Hindus, were no
doubt in existence from 1000 B.C. to 1500 B.C., if not earlier. The
tendency of the learned is to bring these works much nearer to the
fifth century B.C. They represent, however, the views of the Persians
and the Hindus at the very beginning of their national existence.
In CHINA the book Y-King " the book of Changes," now unin-
telligible to the most learned of the Chinese, is attributed to Fuhi,
called also Mih-hi, whose date is from 2852 B.C. to 2737 B.C. In
the Akkadian Syllaberies there is said to be a key to the explication
of this book, interesting especially as showing the early remote
connexion between the first settlement in Chaldea and the founders
and fathers of Chinese civilisation.
State of the Known World 1000 B.C.
EUROPE.
SCANDINAVIA : Settled by Finnish and Tschudic races.
GAUL, Britain, and Central Europe : The Kelts in Gaul, the Germans
in the east of the Rhine, followed and pushed forward by
the SdavonianS) who occupied Eastern Europe.
SPAIN : By Kelts, also by Iberians (Berbers from Africa). The
Phoenicians had settled colonies in the south of Spain at a very
early period, at Gades, Carteia, Malaga, &c. ; also in Sardinia,
Corsica, and the Balearic Islands.
ITALY : North of the Po, the Gauls (Kelts), the Ligurians along
the Mediterranean towards Gaul, the Etruscans (Rasena)
from the north. The origin of this people very uncertain ;
they occupied the west centre of Italy, In the centre the
Umbrian, Oscan, Sabellian, and other tribes nearly related,
supposed to have descended from the Sclavonic Lithuanians^
E
-0 First Period.
and to have been mixed up with the Kelts, the Siculi,
Sicani, and Pelasgic races. In the south the old Pelasgic
population, originally from Greece, as the CEnotnans, lapy-
gians, and other tribes.
GREECE: Under the declining rule of the petty kings (Greek
or Phoenico-Egyptian Dynasties). Phoenician colonies, or
marts in Cyprus, Crete, Rhodes, the Cyclades—mmes of
Thasos, Siphnos, and Cimolus (gold and silver) worked by
Phoenicians.
A supposed Libyo-Pelasgic Confederacy, 1800 to 1400 B.C.,
opposed the progress of the Phoenicians in the Mediterranean
(according to Lenormant).
ASIA.
ASIA MINOR : The Dardanian kingdom Troy (1400 or 1144 B.C.) by
an Hellenic race; Phrygia: Midas I. reigned before the
Trojan War ; Lydia : The first Dynasty, the Atydse, ended
1232 B.C.; the Heraclidse succeeded; the Carians, a powerful
race.
PHOENICIA : Sidon, very ancient (though Marathos is perhaps prior),
was destroyed by the Philistines, 1209. Tyre, f. 2750 or
2267, then became the chief of all the Phoenician towns in
1150: Colonies in Greece and the Islands, in Malta, in
North Africa, in Spain : their ships explored the Euxine
and traded at Colchis for metals, gold from the Ural,
with hides and furs ; also by the Red Sea, into Arabia and
India : they were generally friends and allies of Egypt, which
needed the help of their fleets.
SYRIA : Various tribes, mainly under the Khita (Hittites), whose
power extended from Armenia, and perhaps part of Asia
Minor, along the west side of the Euphrates.
ISRAEL, under Solomon, ruled over Syria to the Euphrates, over
Philistia, Edom, Moab, and other tribes.
ASSYRIA : The kings of Nineveh extended their territories to the
Mediterranean 1120 B.C.; at the close of this period their
power was lessened by the revolts of many of their formerly
subject nations.
BABYLON had been conquered by the Assyrians 1271 B.C., but soon
became independent, though it remained a secondary power
until the seventh century B.C.
State of the Known World 1000 B.C. 51
MEDIA : Elam, Persia, and Iran, which extended to the Indus —
first settled by Turanians — then, by degrees, occupied by the
Indo-European races, between 2500-1200 B.C. : Bactria, an
important kingdom.
ARABIA : Its independent tribes in the north and centre. Yemen,
the seat of a large trade from Asia, and by the Phoenicians
and Kita, with Armenia and Europe.
INDIA : The Indo-European race predominant, and pushing its
way southwards. The Turanian or Dravidian race in the
south : other Turanian races in the north and centre of the
Peninsula.
CHINA : Under the Chow Dynasty, which had divided China among
seventy-two feudal states, occupying about one-half of what
is now called China in our map.
AFRICA.
EGYPT was under the Priest Kings of the twenty-first Dynasty, noo
to 975 B.C.
LIBYA (the Ribu) : inhabited by tribes, of which the Maxyes were
the most powerful : probably an Indo-European people —
white, blue eyes, fair hair — A company of Libyans, Greeks,
Ligurians, Siculi, &c., under Marmaiu, an African. These
Libyans had settled in Libya at a very early period, and had
subdued an older population.
ETHIOPIA (the Soudan), frequently subject to Egypt, but often
independent. It was settled by the Cushites in the time
of the eleventh and twelfth Dynasties — subjected by the
eighteenth and nineteenth Dynasties. There was a kingdom
at Meroe and another at Napata (Mount Berkel), which were
great emporiums for trade with Arabia and India. The
population was Cushite, a branch of the same race in Arabia.
CARTHAGE : Originally a settlement of the Sidonians, called Cambe;
then, before 1200 B.C., called Carthage. From this point
colonies were sent to South Spain, Corsica, Sardinia, the
Balearic Isles, and Malta.
While Ethiopian races spread over the south and east of Africa, the
Berber races (Indo-European in their origin) occupied the
Sahara and the interior tracts of all North Africa. They are
supposed to have first colonised the south of Spain.
E 2
SECOND PERIOD.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire
539 B.C.
i. AT the commencement of this period the great powers of EGYPT
and ASSYRIA were for a season powerless owing to revolutions in
their respective dynasties. The ISRAELITISH kingdom under
Solomon ruled from Egypt and the Red Sea to the Euphrates, appa-
rently on friendly terms with the KHITA (i Kings x. 29). But, on
the death of Solomon, the revolt of Jeroboam, aided by the King
of Egypt, established the kingdom of the Ten Tribes (that of
ISRAEL), while the two tribes, Judah and Benjamin, formed the
kingdom of JUDAH, under Rehoboam, the son of Solomon. The
Israelitish people were thus taught that their mission was not one
either of foreign conquest or of imperial power ; they were to under-
stand their position as that of a people intrusted with the divine
oracles, while enduring a long period of national humiliation. All
the conquests of David were lost ; the Syrians, Moabiles, Ammonites,
IdumeatiS) and others resumed their former independent positions.
The kingdom of ISRAEL lasted, amid many changes of dynasties, 255
years, and became to a very great extent idolatrous, though the
sacrifices and ritual of the Mosaic law were partially maintained.
Nineteen kings in all reigned in Israel, which was a purely military
monarchy. JUDAH was governed by twenty kings from Rehoboam
to the last of the kings of the house of David, Zedekiah, who was
carried captive to Babylon 587 B.C. Of these Asa, Jehosophat,
Uzziah, Jotham, Hezekiah, and Josiah, six in all, were loyal to the
maintenance of the worship of Jehovah. All the others, both in
Judah and Israel, gave way to the gross idolatry and to the licentious
and cruel worship of the Canaanitish nations; and this apostasy was
not the result of the exercise of kingly tyranny, but of the love of
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire 559 B.C. 53
the people for the idolatries of its neighbours. The kings and the
ruling class both of Judah and Israel were thus, with a few excep-
tions, a disgrace to humanity. Two prophetical teachers and public
opponents of idolatry, who may be called the tribunes of Jehovah,
the true kings of Israel, were raised up to testify to the guilt of the
kings and people : ELIJAH from 910 B.C. to 897 B.C., ELISHA from
897 B.C. to 838 B.C. After these remarkable men Hosea, Amos, and
Josiah laboured, and protested, and prophesied in ISRAEL ; while in
JUDAHy<?£/, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Obadiah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk,
and Zephaniah exercised the office of protesters against idolatry,
remonstrants against the sins of the kings and people, and advocates
for the pure worship of Jehovah ; thus calling the attention of the
people to their peculiar privileges and grand destiny, which they
were counteracting by their unfaithfulness and idolatry. Besides
these, Ezekiel and Daniel were the prophets of the Jews while in
captivity at Babylon. This prophetic dispensation was, in fact, the
divine administration of the theocratic government. By these
prophets JEHOVAH, the king of the Israelitish people, declared His
will : " These prophets were never patriots of the common stamp,
to whom national interests stand higher than the absolute claims of
religion and humanity The things for which Elijah con-
tended were of far more worth than the national existence of Israel,
and it is a higher wisdom than that of patriotism which insists that
divine truth and civil righteousness are more than all the counsels
of statecraft. Judged from a mere political point of view, Elijah's
work had no other result than to open a way for the bloody and
unscrupulous ambition of Jehu, and lay bare the frontiers of the
land to the ravages of the ferocious Hazael. But with him the
religion of Jehovah had already reached a point where it could no
longer be judged by a mere national standard, and the truths of
which he was the champion were not the less true because the issue
made it plain that the cause of Jehovah could not triumph without
destroying the old Hebrew state. Nay, without the destruction of
the state, the religion of Israel could never have given birth to a
religion for all mankind ; and it was precisely the incapacity of Israel
to carry out the higher truths of religion in national forms which
brought into clearer and clearer prominence those things in the faith
of Jehovah which are independent of every national condition,
and make Jehovah the God, not of Israel alone, but of all the
earth."1 In the writings of these prophets, which make one-fourth
1 W. Robertson Smith, "Prophets of Israel," pp. 78, 79, I2mo. 1882.
54 Second Period.
of the volume of the Old Testament, we have a vivid picture of the
moral corruption, and the political servility, and treachery and false-
hood of the kings, the priests, the nobles, and the people. Placed
between the great powers of their age, EGYPT on the one hand and
ASSYRIA and BABYLON on the other, the smaller states as Israel,
Judah, Syria, &c., always disunited, were thus incapable of main-
taining the balance of power betwen these two empires ; on the
contrary, they were tempted to invite the interference of one or
other of these great powers in their petty rivalries. The insincere
state policy of the kings of Judah, especially in their readiness to
yield and take oaths of fidelity to the predominant power, whether
Egypt, or Assyria, or Babylon, and the equal facility with which
these oaths were broken, makes one rejoice in the just judgment by
which the national existence of both Israel and Judah terminated
in the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities. The prophets were,
under all circumstances, the advocates of truth, sincerity, and faith-
fulness in political life, and suffered much persecution for their
uncompromising opposition to the tergiversations of the kings and
people, as we may observe in the case of the prophets Isaiah and
Jeremiah. The kingdom of Egypt was revived under Shishouk
(Shishack) of the twenty-second Dynasty, who invaded, took, and
plundered Jerusalem and 133 cities of JUDAH after the death of
SOLOMON, 976 or 981 B.C., when, after the death of Shishack, Azerch-
Amen (Zerah the Ethiopian) invaded JUDAH 940 B.C., he was de-
feated (2 Chron. xiv. 9-15). These movements from the west should
have taught the two kingdoms of ISRAEL and JUDAH, the PHOENI-
CIANS, and the petty kingdoms of SYRIA to unite for their mutual
defence against both EGYPT and ASSYRIA, knowing, as they did, that
their position placed them in the debatable land in which for
centuries past these two imperial powers had contended for the
mastery. But their rivalries blinded them to the sense of danger,
and led them to appeal to ASSYRIA for help against their rivals, thus
hastening the period of their subjection and final extinction.
2. The empire of ASSYRIA was revived by Assur-dan 940 B.C.
Assur-nazi-pal, 885 B.C., re-established his frontiers as far as the
Mediterranean, which the Assyrians had lost for 200 years. In
745 B.C. a new dynasty began with Tiglath - Pileser //., who
enlarged and consolidated the empire. In 743 B.C. he held a court
at Arpad, to which both Syria and Israel sent representatives to pay
homage to him as their suzerain. As the friend of Ahaz, king of
Judah, who sought his aid against Israel and Syria, this monarch
took Damascus, and thus destroyed the rule of the Benhadad family
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire 559 B.C. 55
740 B.C. Shalmanezer IV., one of his generals, succeeded 727
B.C: ; he blockaded Tyre several years, and died while besieging
Samaria, the capital of the kings of Israel, 723-2 B.C. SARGON,
another general, seized the power, took Samaria 720 B.C., and put an
end to the kingdom of Israel ; then, on his road to invade Egypt,
he conquered the Philistines, and defeated the Egyptians under
Sabaco the Ethiopian, at Raphia, 720 B.C. The KHITA were next
subdued, and their chief towns, Kadesh and Carchemish, taken and
destroyed 720-717 B.C. In 711 he took Ashdod and Jerusalem,
making Hezekiah his tributary (see Isaiah x. 6, 12, 22, 24, 34). Sen-
nacherib succeeded 705 B.C. He again threatened Jerusalem, and
was about to enter Egypt, when his army was miraculously destroyed
701 B.C. (Isaiah xxxvi. xxxvii.). This event is noticed in the Egyptian
annals, and ascribed to their gods. Babylon, never satisfied under
Assyrian rule, was reconquered by him. In his wars he took eighty-
nine fortified cities and 820 minor places in Babylonia, with Babylon
itself, which he defaced and partially burnt, 691 B.C. Esarhaddon
succeeded 681 B.C. He took Manasseh, king of Judah, to Babylon,
but after a while restored him, 676 B.C. Babylon was rebuilt by him
and beautified, and was his favourite place of abode. Tyre, as the
friend of Egypt, was again blockaded. EGYPT, under Tirhakah, was
conquered 672 B.C., and divided into twenty satrapies ; two rebellions
were followed by fresh subjugations 669 B.C. Assur-bani-pal) the
successor of Esarhaddon, had to reconquer Egypt. Thebes (No-
Ammon) was destroyed, and the ground strewed with its ruins, as
foretold in Nahum iii. S-io. Tirhakah fled to Ethiopia, but he and
his son again raised a rebellion, and for the fourth time the Assyrian
authority had to be re-established by arms. These expeditions, fol-
lowed by a revolt of the Assyrian soldiery, and by the rebellion of
the MEDES and the BABYLONIANS 652 B.C., exhausted the resources
of the Assyrian empire. The EGYPTIANS also revolted under
Psammetikos of Sais, assisted by Ionian and Karian mercenaries
sent by Gyges, king of Lydia. Esarhaddon II. (Sarakos) succeeded
625 B.C., the inroads of the barbarous Kimmerians diverted the
Medes and Babylonians for a few years, but in 606 B.C. the city of
Nineveh was besieged by the Medes and Babylonians, taken and
destroyed 606 B.C. The MEDES had begun to assert their inde-
pendence in 740, and again in 633 B.C., BABYLON under Nabo-
polassar in 625. The KIMMERIANS properly belong to the barbarous
tribes north of the Black Sea, who had fled from more powerful
Scythian tribes. They were the precursors of that great northern
swell of population which at that time, and for ages after, troubled
5 6 Second Period.
civilised Asia and Europe. This irruption is noticed by the Greek
poet Kallinicos 634 B.C., and also by the Hebrew prophets Zephaniah
(i.), and Jeremiah (i. 13-16; vi. 22-25). The large mounds
now found on the site of Nineveh, washed as they have been by
the rain of 2,500 years, have preserved to us the remains of the
buildings of the Assyrian monarchs, they explain to us the character
of the civilisation of the Assyrian nation. The principal prophecies
which refer to the fall of Assyria are Isaiah x. 5 ; xiv. 25 ; xxx. 8, 9 ;
Zephaniah ii. 13-15 ; Ezekielxxxi. 11-16 ; Nahum iii. 6, 7. The civi-
lisation of Assyria was derived from Babylon, its literature was that
of the old Turanian Akkads, translated into the Assyrian Shemitish
dialect. The first Assyrian library was established at Calah 1300
B.C.; the greatest library was established by Assur-bani-pal at
Nineveh 670 B.C., it had 30,000 tablets. This library had a cata-
logue, the tablets were arranged methodically and numbered.
Among other works is the great Babylonian epic, which incorporates
in the adventures of Isdubahr the history of the flood and the ark
in which Xisurthus was saved, the building of Babel, the confusion
of tongues, and the dispersion of the human race. The legend of
the creation also, as well as the history of the flood, are obviously
from the old traditions existing long before the time of Abraham,
preserved in the patriarchal families, and recorded for us in the
book of Genesis ; mythologies, treatises on geography, astronomy,
astrology, natural history also. The religious poems appear to have
-been written after the Shemites had succeeded in considerably
modifying the old spirit worship of the Akkadians. "The old
.sorcerer gave way to the priest, and the adoration of kings to the
worship of abstractions, and the people began to adore special
deities, such as the sun-god, the moon-god, and the sky." The
Shemites probably introduced with the worship of Assur a pantheon
of gods, the teaching respecting conviction of sin and the need of
a Redeemer. The oldest code of laws is an Akkadian one, records
of a banking-house in Babylon of a firm which existed through five
generations, and sundry cheques.1 The city of Nineveh was a sort
of province enclosed in walls 100 feet high, defended by 1,500
towers 200 feet high, the walls so thick that three chariots might be
driven abreast with ease; these walls, i8f miles long and n broad,
were in circuit 60 miles. Hence it is described in Jonah as "an
exceeding great city of three days' journey " (Jonah iii. 3). « That
which strikes us most .... is the unbounded command of naked
1 Set "Assyrian Life and History," M. E. Harkness. Translation.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire 559 B.C. 57
human strength possessed by these early kings, and the effect of
mere mass and indefatigable perseverance, unaided either by theory
or by artifice, in the accomplishment of gigantic results."1
3. There were now left four great powers in Western Asia,
including Egypt, which was politically an Asiatic power. These
were BABYLON, the MEDES and PERSIANS, EGYPT, and LYDIA. If
LYDIA had had time to consolidate its resources, and had known
how to conciliate and employ the skill of its Greek neighbours, it
might have established a power intermediate between European and
Asiatic civilisation, to the great benefit of the old world. But, having
come prematurely in collision with the MEDES, it was conquered by
Cyrus the PERSIAN, 554 B.C. EGYPT had already secured its inde-
pendence of Assyria, and had shaken off the Ethiopian Dynasty,
648 B.C. ("The Priests of Noph," Isaiah xix. 13), and was quite
prepared to contend with Babylon, as before with ASSYRIA, for the
lordship over Palestine and Syria.
4. NEBUCHADNEZZAR, the successor of Nabopolassar, followed
the old policy of the Assyrian kings, and opposed the attempts
of the kings of EGYPT to reassert their claim to Assyria and
to the region west of the Euphrates. Pharaoh Necho^ having
advanced as far as Megiddo on his way, was opposed by
Josiah, the excellent king of Judah, the faithful vassal of the king
of Babylon, and was there slain, 610 B.C. Necho then placed
Jehoiachim on the throne of Jerusalem. This prince had to submit
to Nebuchadnezzar, who captured Jerusalem 606 B.C., and sent away
Daniel and many other captives to Babylon. From this year is
dated the beginning of the Babylonish captivity (Jeremiah
xlvi. 1-12). In spite of the opposition of Jeremiah the Prophet,
Jehoiachim revolted against Nebuchadnezzar, relying upon the help
of Egypt, 602 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar, delayed by other wars, could
not avenge this insult until 597, when he took Jerusalem and put
Jehoiachim to death, placing Jehoiachin, a child (called also
Jeconiah and Coniah), in his room, who only reigned three months
and ten days. His mother and the leading chiefs again were led by
the Egyptian idolatrous party to rebel; but in 5 9 7-8 Nebuchadnezzar
took Jerusalem and carried the king and royal family, with 10,000,
in captivity to Babylon ; among them was Ezekiel the prophet.
Zedekiah, the youngest son of Josiah, was made king by Nebuchad-
nezzar (Ezekiel xvii. 13, 14). Infatuated by false prophets
(2 Chronicles xxxvi. 13), and relying upon Egypt, like his predecessors,
1 Grote, vol. iii. p. 405.
c3 Second Period.
he declared against Babylon. This was followed by the siege and
capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, 587 or 586 B.C. Zedekiah
was blinded, his sons and the princes of Judah slaughtered, and
himself sent a prisoner to Babylon. Other leading men and sixty
others of the people were put to death, and Jerusalem itself was
destroyed by fire, the walls broken down, the temple and the city
left a mere ruin. TYRE was taken 573 B.C., according to the
prophecy of Amos (who lived 787 B.C.) 1.9-10; Isaiah (who lived
713 B.C.) xxiii. 1-15 ; Ezekiel xxvi. to xxviii. Egypt, under Apries
(Hophra), was fearfully ravaged, and reduced to great distress, and
Ethiopia also. The conquest of Egypt by the Assyrians and
Babylonians was foretold by Isaiah, xix. 1-16; xx. 1-6; by Jeremiah,
xliii. 10-13 ; xliv. 29-30 ; xlvi. 13-26. Ezekiel forewarned Egypt,
xxix. to xxxii. The conquest of Ethiopia was foretold by Isaiah
(xx. 1-6), and by Zephaniah (ii. 12). The empire of Nebuchadnezzar
was the largest, the richest, and the most compact and powerful of
any which the world had yet seen. In his reign the intercourse with
Greece, through Asia Minor, had become not infrequent. We hear
of a Greek named Artimenides, the brother of the poet Alcaeus, who
served in the army of Nebuchadnezzar.1
DANIEL THE PROPHET was reared in the court of Nebuchad-
nezzar, by whom he appears to have been highly esteemed and
trusted, and upon whose hasty and indomitable spirit he may
have exercised a beneficial influence. (The remarkable prophecy
of Daniel (ch. ii.) is a sketch of the future changes of political
power in the world. Babylon, Persia, Macedonia, Greece, and
even the last empire, the iron rule of Rome, should give way to
a rule of moral and spiritual influences — the rule of Christ. This
kingdom is now gradually, though slowly and imperceptibly, ad-
vancing in the world, and preparing the way for a rule of spiritual
influences, and of justice and morality. In a subsequent revelation
the real character of the four grand empires is set before us. They
are presented in the similitude of savage beasts, denoting the divine
condemnation of their rapine and cruelty (Daniel vii. 1-7). The
captive Jews in Babylon appear to have been liberally treated,
Many became rich and prosperous, and the major part of them
became attached to territory bordering on the Euphrates, and
eventually chose it for their country. They were thoroughly cured
of their tendency to idolatry. Gradually the Jewish people were
dispersed over all Western Asia, Egypt, Greece, and Italy, carrying
Grote, vol. iii. i2mo. edition, p. 302.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire 559 B.C. 59
with them their spiritual news of the divine nature, completely
free from all Polytheistic errors. 1
The new BABYLONIAN KINGDOM thus became an empire under
the rule of Nebuchadnezzar, who has left an impression of a high
statesmanlike character, and of the possession of singular excellences
above the contemporary kings his neighbours. By him Babylon
was enlarged and beautified : the walls were estimated at from 40 to
60 miles in circuit, 32 to 75 feet thick, and from 150 to 365 feet in
height (varying in thickness and height, no doubt, according to the
necessities of the locality). The grand temple of Belus occupied a
site which was a square, each side 1200 feet. A tower, 600 feet
square, rose 1800 feet. The streets were laid out in straight lines,
enclosing large squares of arable and garden land. Numerous canals
running along most of the leading streets furnished supplies of water
for domestic uses and for irrigation. He made a road from Babylon
through the Western Desert to Sela and Elath, far shorter than the
old caravan route by Tadmor and Damascus. Thus Babylon was
again a centre of trade, where all the caravans from Cilicia, and the
north and west, and from Syria and Palestine touched the Euphrates.
The maritime trade was either direct from Babylon, through the
Persian Gulf, or through Gerrha, a port on the west side of the gulf,
which was an entrepot of the PHOENICIANS. This city, at one time a
very large one, is the Dedan of the Bible (Jeremiah xxv. 23 ;
Ezekiel xxv. 13) — a people who occupied the city and the islands
in the bay (the Bahrein Islands). The navigation extended to the
Red Sea and the east coast of Africa, and to Ceylon and southern
India. This trade and navigation from the Persian Gulf, so
prized by Nebuchadnezzar, was afterwards discouraged by the
Persians, who feared attacks on Babylon and Susa, which, not having
any fleet, they would be unable to repel. The land trade was by
roads westward to the Mediterranean, northward to Armenia and
the Black Sea, and eastern and north-eastern to India and China.
Babylon had from the earliest period been the seat of textile manu-
factures in wool, cotton, and linen, and for articles of gold and silver
workmanship, engraved stones, rich carpets. The Jews, as well as
the Greeks, while revelling in the descriptions of the wealth and
magnificence of Babylon, testify to its luxurious indulgences and
immorality. The death of Nebuchadnezzar was followed by the
decline of his empire. Evil-Merodach, who succeeded 561 B.C., was
followed by incompetent rulers. The Medes and Persians, under
1 See Dr. Pusey, " The Prophecies of Daniel," 8vo.
(5o Second Period.
Cyrus, besieged and took Babylon 539 B.C. Nabonadius (Nabonadus)
the king was heading the Babylonian army outside. He was defeated
by Cyrus (who gave him a principality in Carmania). Belshazzar
was the associate of Nabonadius left in charge of the city.1 This
explains why Daniel was appointed to be third ruler of the state
(Daniel v. 29). Cyrus led his army through the empty bed of the
Euphrates, by the water gates, "and the more distant parts of the city
were on fire long before the news reached the palace, perhaps before
Daniel had finished expounding the writing on the wall " 3 (Jeremiah
li. 30-32). Darius the Mede was placed in charge of Babylon, while
Cyrus was otherwise engaged. It is very difficult to identify this Darius,
and there is some obscurity in the details of the sieges of Babylon and
the position of Cyrus, but the whole power of the empire of the Medes
and Persians was eventually concentrated in the person of CYRUS.
(The following prophecies refer to the destruction and present con-
dition of Babylon : Isaiah xiii. 1-22; xiv. 14-23; xlv. 1-6; xlvii. 1-15;
Jeremiah 1. and li.) There is great obscurity in the history of the
fall of Babylon. The statements of both Herodotus, Xenophon, and
Abydenus are contradicted by some inscriptions on the clay bricks,
recently discovered, which affirm a peacable occupation of Babylon
by Cyrus, after a battle with Nabonidus. It is probable that these
inscriptions may be the history modified to gratify the national
vanity. We have patriotic histories of the peninsular war which
attribute the expulsion of the French to the bravery of the Spaniards,
forgetting the English army under Wellington. Cyrus may have
thought it politic to humour the vanity of the Babylonians. Sayce
thinks that the Darius of the book of Daniel was Darius Hystaspes.
5. GREECE AND THE HELLENIC WORLD. — By the Trojan war, and
by the colonies settled in Asia Minor, and by occasional intercourse
with EGYPT and PHOENICIA and LIBYA, the Greeks were brought
more frequently in contact with the more advanced world of
the East and South. By the KHITA the commodities of the East,
and the superior manufactures of ASSYRIA and BABYLON, had been
carried in caravans to the JEgean coast, and thence to Greece. With
the exception of MACEDONIA, a new kingdom carved out by a
Grecian adventurer, Perdikkas, of the royal race of Argos, in the
ninth century B.C., all the governments had become Republican.
He and his warlike successors established this small state, which
waited the proper time for aggrandisement. The government was
monarchic, after the fashion of the Homeric age, checked by a
1 Max-Duncker, vol. vi. p. 81. » « Student's History," p. 528.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire 559 B.C. 61
Council of Chiefs. In all the Doric states in the Peloponnesus, the
Doric conquerors had reduced the old inhabitants (the Greeks who
had been the glory of the heroic ages) to an inferior political position,
and in some cases, as in Sparta, a large portion of them became
Helots, slaves of the most degraded character. So in Thessaly, and
in other states where the rulers were a military caste, lording it over
the industrious classes. In all the Grecian states the citizens of the
towns seemed to claim a superiority over the country people, and in
the cities only the favoured possessors of the citizenship had any
share in the administration. The religion of the Greeks, " anthro-
pomorphic polytheism," though singularly beautiful, so much as to
extort the regrets of Hume and Gibbon that it could not be revived,
" being mainly a product of imagination and the aesthetic sense, with
no depth of root either in the reason or conscience, with feeble
philosophical and moral power and possibilities, has no claim to be
regarded as a great religion, and indeed would seem to have been,
in some measure, outgrown by the Greek mind when Homer wrote." *
Whatever there was of moral or religious power in the Greek religion
was traceable to the old traditions of the fathers of the race, im-
proved and enriched in after-ages by glimpses of a pure theology,
gathered by some of their travellers from intercourse with the East.
The mass of the people were superstitious in the extreme, from
which also the higher classes were not exempt; while popular
theology, or rather mythology, of the poets and of the legends had
little influence. Perhaps local superstitions had greater hold within
the sphere of their action than all the deities of Olympus. The
strongest bond of religious union was the attachment to particular
sanctuaries and to the common worship or festivals connected with
them. Hence, the Olympian games, celebrated every four years on
the Alpheus in Elis, which claim an antiquity long preceding the
Trojan war, reinstituted by Iphitus 277 B.C., with the JVemean,
celebrated at Nemea in Argolis, and the Isthmian, celebrated on the
Corinthian Isthmus, twice in every Olympic — these claim a high
antiquity also. The Pythian were established by the Amphictyons
after the Sacred War in which Cressa was destroyed, and the games
instituted out of the spoils of the city, celebrated every third
Olympic year. All these festivals helped to maintain the sense of
the unity of the Greek race. SPARTA, under the Dorian rule,
became a mere military encampment, as if in an enemy's country.
LYCURGUS, 880 B.C., arranged for the lands to be cultivated by the
1 Flint, " Philosophy of History," vol. i. p. 5.
(52 Second Period.
non-citizens and Helot population ; the freemen were as soldiers in
barracks or tents. Two kings, a Senate of twenty-eight, and an
Assembly of the free Spartans, constituted the government. The
power and territory of Sparta was increased by the conquest of
Messenia, after two wars, which lasted from 743 to 668 B.C., with a
short interval. In most of the other Grecian communities, the
dissensions and contentions for power among the people led to the
necessity of choosing or accepting able individuals as temporary
dictators (just as in Rome, and in all the revolutions in modern
Europe, especially France) to frame a platform of constitutional
government. In the history of ATHENS, for example, first, DRACO
621 B.C., then SOLON 590 B.C., had been chosen for this purpose, to
arbitrate between the exclusive claims of the great families, the aris-
tocratic party, and the Demos — i.e., the great body of the citizens,
most of whom were poor. These conflicting interests had led to the
usurpation of the supreme power in many cities by popular leaders
raised . to irresponsible positions of authority by the poorer classes,
who, being supported by a body of armed followers, became practically
despotic. These were called Tyrants, not merely because their
government might be strict and oppressive, but however it might be
exercised. The Greeks respected the hereditary king of the heroic
ages, but the elected demagogue ruler was their special aversion.
" The noble who failed in the struggle with his brother aristocrats,
this was he who taught the Demos their rights, and offered to lead
them against their former oppressors." Thus there arose a certain
phase of Greek " society, called the age of Tyrants, which has hardly
received fair treatment at the hands of historians. Politically, it was
an epoch of stagnation or retrogression ; but, socially and aesthetically,
in spite of the vices of many Greek despots, I hold it to have been
not only an age of progress in Greece, but even a necessary prelude
to the higher life which was to follow .... the degradation of
the lower classes, the undisguised violence of the nobles, made all
approach to a proper constitution impossible .... the Tyrants
systematically raised the common people and lowered the nobles
.... they gave the cities a strong government and peace, giving
the opportunity to develop commerce and to cultivate art. When
the Tyrants passed away, Greece, by this fusion of classes produced
by the Tyrants, was in fit condition to develop political life." l The
complaints of the aristocratic poet Theognis, driven from Megara by
a revolution, describes the consequences of a convulsion in which in
1 Mahaffy, " Social Life in Greece," pp. 82-84.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire 559 B.C. 63
Megara the ruling families had been supplanted by a Tyrant, such as
was from time to time experienced by many other cities. " We see that
the poet was connected with an oligarchy of birth and not of wealth,
which had recently been subverted by the breaking in of the rustic
populations, previously subject and degraded ; that these subjects
were content to submit to a single-headed despot, in order to escape
from their former rulers ; and that Theognis himself had been
betrayed by his own friends and companions, stripped of his property,
and exiled, through the wrong-doing of enemies, whose blood he
hopes one day to be permitted to drink. The condition of the
subject cultivators, previous to this revolution, he depicts in sad
colours. They dwelt without the city, clad in goat-skins, and ignorant
of judicial sanctions or laws ; after it, they had become citizens, and
their importance had been immensely enhanced. Thus, according to
his impression, the vile breed has trodden down the noble, the bad
have become masters, and the good are no longer of any account." l
The political meaning of the epithets good and bad differed from the
ethical meaning : the good were the wealthy, the noble ; the bad, the
low-born, the poor, the ignorant. In ATHENS, Pisistratus overturned
the reformed oligarchy of Solon, and obtained the supreme power,
and, though expelled thrice, retained his power until 527 B.C., when
he died. His power was exercised under the old forms, and was
supported by a band of Thracian mercenaries ; he maintained the
laws of Solon, greatly improved the city, collected a library open to
the public, and made, on the whole, a wise and noble use of his
position. But the Athenians never regarded him as a successor of
the Heroic kings. We must not forget that in Greece were made
the first experiments in the construction and working of free govern-
ment, which, however imperfect in their beginning, have served as
lessons and guides to the civilised world, and have had no small
influence on the progress of our race. Political science, the effort
to enjoy a free life in a well-ordered state, dates its origin from the
experiments of Greek statesmen and the thoughts of Greek philoso-
phers." 3 The literature of Greece has, next to the Hebrew and
Greek Scriptures, been the most valuable of influences in the educa-
tion of the human race.
6. Greek colonies were established along the ^Egean Sea in ASIA
MINOR, on the shores of the Euxine, in ITALY and SICILY, in LIBYA
(at Cyrene), soon after the Dorian conquest, 1104 B.C. Croton, in
1 Grote, " History of Greece," I2mo. edition, vol. iii. pp. 44, 45.
2 Quarterly Review, No. 148, p. 488.
64 Second Period.
south Italy, is connected with the endeavours of the great philoso-
pher, Pythagoras, to establish a society for scientific study, for
political improvement, and for the moral renovation of society, from
550 to 510 B.C. The colonies in Asia Minor, and of the Propontis,
and on the Euxine, and on the Palus Mseotis, were most important
for the trade of civilised Asia, and for that of the barbarous nations
north of the Euxine and the Caspian. The colonies to the west
were established, long after, 750 to 650 B.C., in SOUTHERN Italy
(called from them Magna Grsecia), and SICILY 600 B.C. ; most of
them were begun by the leaders of parties in the ministry. Of these
Sybaris has been famous for its luxurious habits, and has become a
proverb. Those in SICILY were afterwards peculiarly important from
their contest with the CARTHAGINIANS ; they formed the vanguard
of Hellenic civilisation— in Sicily especially— opportunely established
to check the ruthless policy of a Phoenician colony. A Greek
colony was formed in LIBYA by Battus at Cyrene 640 B.C. ; Marseilles,
in Gaul, was founded by the Phokaans 600 B.C. It will be seen
from these colonies that the extent of Greek influence is not to be
measured by the limits of Greek territory, properly called Greece or
Hellas. At a very early period, so early as the sixth century B.C.,
the mind of west Asia and of half Italy was, to some extent, influenced
by the Greek language, Greek literature, and Greek ideas on philo-
sophy and polity. Greek colonisation, at one time, seemed likely to
go far west. On the conquest of Lydia by Cyrus, " Bias of Briene,
548 B.C., proposed that all the Ionian cities should follow the example
of the Phokseans, and that there should be a general emigration to
Sardinia, in order that all might obtain a new country there, and that
there should be there found one great community, one city to be
founded by all in common. Had this proposal been carried out,
the achievements of Cyrus would have exercised a far deeper influence
over the distant west than the mere settlement of the Phokseans in
Atalia (Corsica). . . . The centre of Hellenic life would have been
transplanted from east to west, and the fate of Italy would have been
changed ; the Greeks would have retired before the supremacy of
the East in order to establish a strong insular power among the weak
communities of the West. But the lonians could not rise to the
height of such a resolution."1 " Herodotus bestows upon this plan
the most unqualified commendation, and regrets that it was not acted
upon. Had such been the case the subsequent history of Carthage,
Sicily, and even Rome, might have been sensibly altered." 2
1 Max-Duncker, vol. vi. p. 59. ' Grote, vol. iv. I2mo. p. 134.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire, 539 B.C. 65
7. ITALY. — In this period the Gauls occupied the north of Italy,
the Ligurians, supposed to be an Iberian race, the shores of the
Mediterranean extending from Etruria to south-east Gaul. Etruria,
under the Etruscans, was a powerful state, gradually pressing south-
ward upon the old Italic races, the Umbrians, Sikels, Oscans,
Sabellians, &c. Southern Italy received a large number of Grecian
settlements : Tarentum, Croton, Sybaris, Rhegium, Cuma, and others,
between 1030 B.C. and 600 B.C. The Latin tribes were near neigh-
bours to the aggressive Etruscans. Latium was supposed to have been
the adopted country of ./Eneas when he fled from Troy, and Alba
Longa was the seat of his reputed descendants for three centuries.
This fable, flattering to Roman vanity, is now by all scholars regarded
as a myth totally destitute of historical foundation. The plains of
Latium were originally covered with villages, the centres of the various
clans inhabiting the territory. These villages were sometimes inde-
pendent, but more generally connected with some central point of
union, the Civitas. Three tribes, the Ramnes, Tities, and Luceres,
combined to form the population of Rome (753 B.C.). The Tiber was
the natural highway for the traffic of Latium ; and Rome thus com-
bined the advantages of a strong position, commanding both banks
of the stream down to its mouth, afforded greater protection from
pirates than could be found in towns situated immediately upon the
sea-coast. To these commercial and strategical advantages Rome
was indebted for its early importance as the emporium of Latium.
It was governed by kings, of whom ROMULUS was the first ; and the
regal power was checked by a senate and popular assembly. Tarquin
the Proud, the last of the seven kings, was expelled 510 B.C. His-
torians, patriots, and poets have fallen into the great delusion of
regarding this event as the triumph of free principles of government
and the extension of political liberty among the population of that
city by the establishment of a republic. The real state of the case
was far different. Whatever may have been the crimes of Tarquin
the Proud, and of the Tarquinian regime, which was evidently of
Etruscan origin, the change was in favour of an aristocracy, and of
the limitation of the liberties of the old constitution of King Servius
Tullius, while the power and territory of Rome were greatly diminished.
But the early history of Rome is one of the battle-fields of
modern archaeologists. By the school of Niebuhr, Mommsen, and
others, followed by Ihne, Arnold, and Grote, the history of Rome,
up to near the First Punic War, is regarded as mainly mythical and con-
jectural. The learned critics have certainly made Out a fair case to
justify a measure of incredulity in reference to the details, recorded
F
66 Second Period.
by the regular historians, as Livy. But the attempt to reconstruct
the history has been a failure. Dyer, in his history of the city of
Rome, &c., has ably defended and all but proved the substantial
truth of the leading facts connected with the regal history. Roman
vanity has indeed falsified many particulars of the early history, and
in the opinion of Dr. Arnold, the Roman historians, in point of
accuracy and honesty, occupy a very inferior position compared with
those of Greece. That Porsenna was conqueror in the war after the
expulsion of the kings, and that Camillus did not overcome the
Gauls, may be true, and the common tradition false j but that the
leading facts of Roman progress and of the various constitutional
changes are preserved in the old traditions cannot be doubted. The
decried historians had access to documents now lost, and their mis-
takes and exaggerations come nearer to the truth and explain the
origines of Rome, on the whole, more satisfactorily than the ingenious
speculations of modern critics. The population of Rome consisted
originally of four classes : — (i) the populus, the original founders of the
city, called also the patricians ; these were divided into three tribes,
each tribe having ten curice: each curia, being a religious corporation,
distinguished by its peculiar sacred rites and objects of worship, was
divided into an indefinite number of gentes or clans ; a gens con-
sisting at first of parties tracing their descent (either naturally or by
adoption) from one common ancestor and having one family name ;
(2) the clients, consisting of the dependants -of the patricians, not
without political rights, but identified with the interests of their
patrons; (3) the plebs or plebeians, consisting mainly of the popula-
tion of towns conquered by the Romans, or of voluntary emigrants :
these were free, and often wealthy from their industrial and com-
mercial pursuits, but had no political power, and could not inter-
marry with patrician families ; (4) the slaves. The government was
first under the direction of an elective king, but after 510 B.C., in two
consuls, elected by the senate and people annually. The senate at
first consisted of three hundred members from the patrician families,
almost absolute in its authority, but checked by the comitia curiata,
composed entirely of the patrician class, in which the majority of
each curia directed the vote of that curia, and so through the thirty
curia the senate had the entire executive power at first, but this was
lessened by the successive additional power claimed and exercised by
the centuriates and tributes. The plebeians were first admitted to a
share in the government by the legislation attributed to Servius
Tullms, by which the plebs were divided into six classes proportional
to their wealth and the taxation paid by them. The first class
From 1000 B.C. to tJie Persian Empire, 539 B.C. 67
embraced the equestrian order (the knights), who formed the cavalry
and were possessed of property to the amount- of ^"320 and had
ninety-eight votes ! In the comitia centuriata the other classes were
reckoned at ninety-five centuries and had ninety-five votes. Thus
the political power and at the same time the public burdens of the
state fell to the wealthier classes. Another assembly was the comitia
tributa. This was purely a plebeian assembly, as it had reference to
the thirty tribes into which the plebs had been divided, and in
which the votes were taken by tribes without reference to wealth or
rank ; but this assembly possessed little importance until after the
expulsion of the kings. On the respective rights and powers of the
comitias (curiata, centuriata, and tributa] there is considerable
difference of opinion among scholars ; the comitia curiata, however,
became a mere form when in 337 B.C. Publius, by the second Publian
Law, compelled the senate to permit any law to be discussed in the
comitia tributa, and, as a matter of course, to be recognised by
the senate. The history of the struggle for two hundred years for
popular rights is on the whole highly creditable to the Roman
people, on the one hand, for only asking for what was reasonable; and
to the senate, on the other hand, for knowing how to yield. In the
popular interest, the fact that the meetings of the comitia tributa did
not require the religious sanction of the patrician priestly officials
was a great 'ad vantage, for the comitia centuriata could at any time
be dissolved, when it suited the patricians to declare the omens
unfavourable.
8. CARTHAGE was a Tyrian city, established for commerce; it
was at first a city merely, not a nation, though in after-times
exercising imperial power over conquered or allied nations, besides
the neighbouring territory occupied by the wealthy citizens in
villas and gardens, and by a numerous agricultural population. Its
government, like that of all Phoenician cities, was monopolised by
the great families who formed an hereditary aristocracy, modified at
a later period by a small amount of democratic influence. The fleet
of Carthage was the main support of its power. An army formed of
mercenaries, enlisted from the population of North Africa, Liguria,
Gaul, and Spain, was fully employed in securing its possessions
in Spain, and afterwards in wars for the extension of their frontier.
The colonies made by Carthage were practically mere factories for
trade, or military positions, and none of them ever attained to the
importance of the Greek colonies, as, for example, Agrigentum and Syra-
cuse. HANNO, in his fleet, explored Western Africa as far as Guinea,
580 B.C. So early as 550 B.C. the Carthaginians had fought with
F 2
68 Second Period.
the Phokaan fleets, and had begun to take up positions in Sardinia.
The interests of their commerce led to a treaty with Rome, 508 B.C.,
for its regulation on the coast of Italy and to prevent communication
with Africa. The Carthaginians agreed to make no trading settle-
ments on the shores of Latium and Campania, while the Romans
agreed not to sail on the African coast to the south of the Hermaean
Promontory (the north-east point of Africa). Hatred to the Greeks
as commercial rivals, and as opponents in the struggle for the
possession of Sicily, was one characteristic of their foreign policy :
they were anxious to join with the Persians in the attempt to over-
whelm the national existence and civilisation of Greece.
9. INDIA before 500 B.C. — The Aryans\&& spread as far as Bengal.
The code of Manu, supposed to be of a very remote antiquity by
Sir W. Jones, who dates it from 1820 B.C., is now by the critics
brought down to the fifth and sixth century B.C.; and even so recent
as the fourth century B.C. This may be true as to the code in its
present stage, but it is obviously compiled from old laws of very
remote antiquity. In the mythological poetical histories of India,
the "Puranas" record a war between the solar dynasty of Oude,
supported by Brahma, with the lunar dynasty. The Maha-Barata,
•is a legend of the family feuds in the lunar dynasty. These events are
supposed to relate to events from 1400 B.C. to 1000 B.C. The real
history of the Indian kingdom is very uncertain until the Mahom-
medan invasion. The most remarkable revolution is. the rise and
predominance of BUDDHISM for a period of four hundred or five
hundred years. This was a reaction against the power and rule of
BRAHMINISM, which is thought to have commenced long before the
time of Buddha (called also Gotama and Sakya Muni) who was born
•625 B.C., and died 543 B.C.
CHINA, at so early a period as 936 B.C., began to suffer from the
incursions of the Tartar tribes on its northern frontier. Muh-Wang,
of the Chow Dynasty, then reigned, and the empire was disturbed by
the wars of the sub-kingdoms. In the sixth century the two great
philosophers Lao-tsze and Confucius flourished.
10. Religious History. INDIA (Northern) : The Aryan races had
already passed from the simple partial civilisation and nature-
worship of their ancestry into the Brahminical rule, the dominion of
caste. The four principal, the Brahmins (priests), Kshatriyas (soldiers),
Vaisiyas (merchants), and Sudras (cultivators), are subdivided into
many distinct classes, and outside the castes are the degraded Pariahs.
The doctrine of the transmigration of souls, and the final rest of the
purified by the absorption of the soul in the Nirwana, is common to
From IOOQ B.C. to the Persian Empire, 539 B.C. 69
Brahminism and its rival system Buddhism. This great reaction
against the exclusive Brahminism is supposed to have commenced
before the birth of Buddha. He is said to have ignored the existence
of the Deity, and to have denied the efficacy of prayer, and to have
resolutely broken the bondage of caste. His moral code approaches
very near to that of Christianity, enforcing goodness and kindness as
the only merits by which the soul could rise in its transmigration.
The five deadly sins were murder, theft, adultery, drunkenness, and
falsehood. Buddhism has recently been the subject of much literary
controversy, A. Lillie, in his popular "Life of Buddha" (1880),
and Mr. E. Arnold, in his poem, "The light of Asia," stoutly oppos-
ing the atheism attributed to the system by the article in the
" Enclyclopaedia Britannica," ninth edition, and by Rhys Davids in
the " Hibbert Lectures." The early accounts of Buddha which exist
among the southern Buddhists are comparatively free from the fables
in the writings of the northern Buddhists. These latter attribute to
Buddha a birth, life, and miracles similar to those of our Saviour,
obviously copied from the apocryphal Gospels, or from the genuine
Gospels introduced into India about 300 A.D. Some of the learned,
ignorant of the disparity between the genuine and the fictitious
histories of Buddha, and relying upon the veracity of the northern
fables, inferred that the character of the Christ of the Gospels had
originated in the myths respecting Buddha which might have reached
Palestine. But there is not the slightest trace of any such historical
connexions between Buddhism and Christian literature, or of any
such traditions current in Asia either before or immediately after the
Christian era. The legends in question do not appear in northern
India until the fourth century after Christ.1 The Jains, a sect which
is contemporary with Buddha, are equally opposed to Brahminism,
especially in regard to the transmigration of souls after death.
In IRAN (Eastern Persia) the teachings of the Zend-Avesta, ascribed to
Zoroaster, were fully received. This dualistic system survives among
the Parsees of India to this day. The Magi were the priests. Fire was
the grand symbol highly revered. Originally there were no temples,
altars, or statues, and the sacrifices were offered on the tops of the
hills. In CHINA the common-sense secular philosophy of Confucius
(550 B.C.) has helped to form and stereotype the Chinese character.
He did not interfere with the old national ancestor worship, but
1 See British and Foreign Evangelical Review^ vol. xxxi. 729 ; the Nineteenth
Century i December, 1880; Rev. Spence Hardy, "Legends of the Buddhists,"
"Eastern Monachism."
70 Second Period.
confined himself to purely ethical teaching. A much more pro-
found though less popular philosophy or religion was taught by
Lao-tsze, the contemporary of Confucius. It is called Tansm, and its
Bible is the "Tao-Teh-King," "a genuine relic of one of the most
original minds of the Chinese race." * Under the name of Too, the
reference is to God as the way to heaven. God is considered as the
author of nature, and as the great exemplar to men and to govern-
ments. The present system of Taoism is a corruption of the original
teaching, in which Lao-tsze is deified.
1 1. LITERATURE in this period was mainly confined to the Hebrews
and the Greeks. The writings of the Phoenicians, the Carthaginians,
and even of the Egyptians, have perished, leaving mere fragments.
The Assyrian and Babylonian literature exists only on brick tablets,
of which but a small part have been excavated, and fewer still
translated, so as to be accessible. The literature of the Phoenicians,
and of their colonists, the Carthaginians, is lost. What would we
give for the narrative of the voyage of the Phoenician ships which,
sailing from the Red Sea, circumnavigated Africa by command of
Paraoh Necho, 611-609 B.C., or for that of Hanno, the Carthaginian,
who, about 580 B.C., sailed along the western coast of Africa as far
Guinea?
The HEBREWS had the writings of the Prophets, the successors of
Samuel, who wrote the historical books of Ruth, Samuel, Kings, and
Chronicles, the last two after the Captivity. These are compilations
from contemporary writers to which there is frequent reference. The
Psalms are attributed to DAVID and others of the Hebrew worthies,
some of them as early as Moses, and others after the Captivity : the
Songs, the Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes to SOLOMON chiefly, though with
subsequent additions. The prophetical writings begin with Jonah,
825 B.C. (Jonah is a vindication of Jehovah's love even for the
heathen, and a sharp reproof of Jewish narrow exclusiveness) ; Joel,
Hosea, and Amos, 810-750 B.C. ; Isaiah, 758-698 B.C. ; Micah,
756-697 B.C. ; Nahum, 720 B.C. ; Habakkuk and Zephaniah,
630-629 B.C.; Obadiah, 588-583 B.C.; Jeremiah, 629-586 B.C.;
Daniel, whose life was spent in Babylon, 606-534 B.C. ; Ezekiel,
595~568 B-c. These last three were the prophets of the Captivity. The
date of Zechariah is a controverted point, but Haggai and Malachi,
the last of the prophets, lived between the return from the Captivity,
534 B.C., to about 400 B.C. Ezra and Nehemiah, to whom the books
so called are ascribed, were the contemporaries of these later
1 British Quarterly, No. 155, pp. 74-107.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire -, 539 B.C. 71
prophets. No writer of a later date has been admitted into the
" Canon " by the Jewish authorities. The prophetical writings are
singular, occupying a position claimed by no other literature. They
express to us the decisions and will of the Supreme Ruler of the
universe on points bearing upon the great question of the principles
of the divine moral government over nations and individuals,
reminding us that, while " clouds and darkness " may hide from us
right views respecting the divine administration, yet " righteousness
and judgment are the habitation of His throne " (Psalm xcvii. 2).
They also present to us most encouraging views of the future con-
dition of the human race, when the Christian dispensation shall have
been fully realised on earth.
The GREEKS had poets before Homer, as Orpheus, Linus, Musceus,
and Jalemus. Homer, the greatest of all EPIC POETS, may have
lived 800 B.C. His subject was the war of Troy and the return of
Ulysses to Ithaca. Hesiod some time later. These poets are specially
identified with the polytheism of the Greeks. Hesiod records the
cosmogony received in his age. By individualising the powers of
nature, and forming genealogies of these fictitious impersonations of
natural phenomena, he tempted the unbelief of men like Thales to
introduce " the conception of substances, with their transformations
and sequences, in place of that string of persons and quasi-human
attributes which had animated the old legendary world."1 The
LYRIC POETS were Archilochus, 700 B.C., Kallinus, Tyrtaeus, Alkman,
Alkaeus, Sappho, from 670 to 610 B.C. ; Simonides, 540 B.C.,
Anacreon, 650 B.C., Pindar, 520 B.C., Ibykus, 540 B.C., .^Esop,
560 B.C., &c. The earliest prose writers — Cadmus of Miletus,
540 B.C., Akusilaus of Argos, 550 B.C., Pherekydes of Syros, 560 B.C.
Of the philosophical writers this Pherekydes and Anaximander were
the first who committed their views on philosophy to writing. Grecian
philosophy began with the famous constellation of the seven wise
men of Greece — Solon the Athenian, Thales the Milesian, Pittakus
the Mitylenean, Bias the Prienian, My son of Chenae, Cheilon the
Spartan, Periander of Corinth — "the first persons whoever acquired
an Hellenic reputation grounded on mental competency, apart from
poetical genius or effect ; a proof that political and social prudence
was beginning to be appreciated and admired on its own account." 3
These men were " persons of practical discernment in reference to
man and society," in whose homely sayings or admonitions we
have the earliest manifestations of social philosophy, long preceding
1 Grote, vol. iv. p. 515. 2 Ibid., p. 128.
72 Second Period.
" the growth of dialectics and discussion." The first philosophers were
scientific investigators, setting aside the legendary and polytheistic
conceptions of nature taught in the Theogony of Hesiod. " They
endeavoured to treat the visible world as a whole, and inquire when
and how it began, as well as into all its changes .... All these
were topics admitting of being conceived in many different ways
.... but not reducible to any solution, either resting on scientific
evidence or commending steady adherence under a free scrutiny." ]
This impossibility of a satisfactory solution of these questions led
many to despair in the search after truth; "hence the vein of
scepticism which runs through the Greek philosophy." Oriental
science, such as it was, received through PHOENICIA or from the
KHITA, to Ionia, probably originated the philosophical movement in
Greece. THALES of Miletus, 640 B.C. (claiming a descent from Kadmus
the Phoenician), was founder of the Ionic School of Philosophy, which
aimed at discovering the one principle or substance from which all
things could be deduced. Thales thought that this primary sub-
stance was water (moisture). That he was acquainted with the
astronomical learning of the East is probable, as he is reported to
have foretold an eclipse of the sun (which took place September 30,
610 B.C., or May 28, 585 B.C.). Anaximander of Miletus,
610-550 B.C., supposed a primeval infinite principle including all
qualities potentially, whose essence it was to be eternally pro-
ductive of different phenomena. The earth was evolved from a fluid
state, and men first lived in the water like fishes. He is said
to have made the first sun-dial and the first geographical map.
Anaximenes (548-500 B.C.) of Miletus, generally agreed with
Anaximander, but regarded the air as the first principle. He
discovered the obliquity of the ecliptic by means of the
gnomon. Heraclitus of Ephesus (500 B.C.), the weeping philosopher,
regarded fire as the elemental principle, the divine spirit of nature.
" He was the first to proclaim the absolute vitality of nature, the
endless change of matter, the mutability and perceptibility of all
individual things in contrast with the Eternal Being, the supreme
harmony which rules over all."2 Contemporary with the Ionic school
was the singular and isolated Pythagoras of Samos (580-520 B.C.),
the foundation of whose teaching was that numbers are the cause of
the material existence of things, the ultimate nature of things as
explained by Lewes.3 Thus each individual thing may change all
its peculiar attributes except its numerical ones, it is always one
1 Grote, vol. iii. p. 518.
* Lewes, "History of Philosophy," p. 61. 3 Ibid>> pp> 2^ 2^
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire, 539 B.C. 73
thing. So also the Infinite must be one. In the original one all
numbers are contained, and consequently the elements of the whole
world. In the opinion of Von Ranke, " the doctrine was based
upon a perception of the invariable mathematical laws which govern
the motions of the heavenly bodies. In these motions numerical
relations appeared of such importance that the philosopher, con-
fusing form with substance, fancied he recognised in number a
divine creative force which ruled all things from the beginning."1
He taught at Crotona, in opposition to the public religion, a
secret religion, which Von Ranke thinks successfully opposed the
Phoenician superstitions then issuing from Carthage to overflow the
Western world. The theory of the metempsychosis, borrowed from
the Egyptians, was combined with the doctrine of moral retribution,
in which the soul an emanation from the central fire, the principle
of heat, was destined to pass successively through several bodies.
The stars are regarded as divinities, the daemons as a race between
the gods and men.2 In the political revolutions of Crotona Pytha-
goras and his followers founded a secret society, which was destroyed
500 B.C. "The infinite of Anaximander became the one of Pytha-
goras. Observe, that in neither of these systems is mind an attribute
of the infinite."3 The Eleatic School of Philosophy was formed by
Xenophanes of Kolophon 570-480 B.C., who settled in the Phokean
colony of Elea, and there openly derided the popular theology, taught
that all things that exist are eternal and immutable. God is the most
perfect essence, but cannot be represented ; He is all hearing, all
thought, all sight, the one is God (pantheistically), one existence under
many moods; he was opposed to the poets, preferring "problems
to pictures."4 Parmenides of Elea, 460 B.C., taught that the under-
standing alone is capable of contemplating truth ; the senses could
only afford deceptive appearances ; pure existence is thought and
knowledge ; all existences are one and identical.5 Being alone
exists, there is no becoming. The tendency here is clearly towards
scepticism.6 To the same effect, Melisstis of Samos (444 B.C.). All
that we learn from our senses is simply appearances ; also Zeno of
Elea, 460 B.C., who opposed reason to mere experience, and laid the
foundation of a system of logic. With "Zeno closes the second
great line of independent inquiry which, opened by Anaximander^
and continued by Pythagoras, Xenophanes, and Parmenides, we may
1 Ranke, "Universal History," p. 286. 2 Tennemann, pp. 66, 67.
3 Lewe?, "History of Philosophy," p. 30. 4 Lewes, p. 41.
5 Tennemann, vol. i. p. 73. 6 Lewes, p. 48.
Second Period.
characterise as the mathematical or absolute system. Its opposition
to the Ionic, physical or empirical systems was radical and constant
The two systems clashed together on the arrival of Zeno at
Athens • the result of the conflict was the creation of a new method
-dialectics. This method created the sophists and the sceptics* The
atomic schools founded ^ Leucippus (Abdera or Miletus 500 B c.),
who advocated the existence of matter filling all space, composed of
atoms, different in form but invariable, indivisible, and imperceptible.
By these all things emit heat, motion, and thought, even the soul
itself. Democritus of Abdera 500-450 B.C., the laughing philosopher,
agreed with Leucippus, cultivated science, and first guessed that the
Milky Way is composed of millions of stars. He regarded sensation
as arising from images emanating from external objects— hence
thought. Then followed others unclassified as to school. Diogenes
of Apollonia, 472-460 B.C., blended the teachings oiAnaximenes and
Anaxagoras, air— i.e., the soul, thought — was the fundamental prin-
ciple. Archelaus of Miletus, about 450 B.C., a disciple of Anaxagoras,
taught that all things came out of chaos by fire and water;
mankind had gradually risen from the common herd of animals ;
our ideas of just and right are merely conventional. Anaxagoras ',
of Clazomense, a friend of Pericles, 500-428 B.C., taught that an
omnipotent, world-ordering mind was the origin of all things. This
mind was God, not the creator but the indwelling ruler, the soul of
the universe, not a moral intelligence, simply zprimum mobile. He
was the first who reached the idea of a divine formative intellect.
As a scientific man, he saw in the sun, and moon, worlds like our own.
Empedocles of Agrigentum, 490-440 B.C., of a noble family, rejected
all the gods and their worship. His philosophy agreed partly with
Xenophanes, Heraclitus, and Anaxagoras. In the case of Em-
pedocles, it is all but impossible to define the peculiarity of his
teaching. It is said that he began to fancy himself to be something of
a divine person, and that he threw himself into the crater of Mount
Etna in order to conceal the fact of his mortality. Von Ranke
remarks : " This triad of ancient seats of philosophy — Crotona, Elea,
and Agrigentum — is very remarkable. In the Graeco-Sicilian colonies
those ideas were developed which owed their origin to the contrast
of Greek and Eastern minds in Ionia. They form the foundation
of all the philosophy of the human race."2
1 Lewes, " History of Philosophy," pp. 53, 54.
2 Ranke, " Universal History," p. 288.
From 1000 B.C. to the Persian Empire •, 539 B.C. 75
The State of the World 539 B.C.
EUROPE.
SPAIN, occupied by Iberian (Berber) and Keltic races. One of
these races, the Turdetani, in the south, had made consider-
able advances in civilisation, perhaps through their intercourse
with Phoenician and Carthaginian traders, by whom settle-
ments had been made on the southern and eastern coasts ;
also a Greek colony at Saguntum probably in the sixth
century B.C.
GAUL. Keltic races in the north and centre. Iberian races in the
south. Massilia (now Marseilles), founded by the Phokeans
about 600 B.C. The Greeks, having so early as 1000 B.C.
begun to rival the Phoenicians and to take from them the
trade of the Eastern Mediterranean, now began to compete
with them in the West. In Britain Kelts, and perhaps a
few Teutonic tribes in the East.
SCANDINAVIA. Finnish and Tschudic (Turanian) tribes sparsely
scattered. The Goths, a Teutonic race, enter Sweden from
Germany.
GERMANY. The Keltic tribes, gradually driven westward or absorbed
by the Teutonic races. To the east of Germany, the vast
plains now known as Poland and Russia were occupied by
Sclavonic races, who either absorbed or destroyed their
Turanian predecessors. On the shores of the Black Sea and
of the Sea of Azoph, Greek colonies, chiefly from Miletus,
had been planted so early as the eighth and tenth centuries
B.C. These colonies extended their trade over the whole of
what is now Russia and Poland, and eastward beyond the
Caspian Sea.
ITALY. Keltic tribes in the north. Iberian Ligurians on the coast
from Gaul to the borders of the Etruscans. The Rasena
(Etruscans) in Tuscany. Greek colonies in southern Italy,
most of them established between 750 and 650 B.C. The
Umbrians, Oscans, Sabellians, Samnites, Latins, and other
powerful tribes occupied Central Italy. The Romans, of
Latin origin, occupied a strong and commanding position
76 Second Period.
under their kings. Sicily, originally settled by the Sicani
(Iberians), and by the Siculi (an Italic race), had also
Etruscan colonies, and then the far more important Greek
settlements at Naxos, Syracuse, Agrigentum, and the
Phoenician or Carthaginian settlements at Panormus, Solseis,
and Motye (735 B.C.). Sicily was to the Phoenicians what
Egypt is to England, the half-way house to valuable pos-
sessions; Spain was to the Phoenicians what India is to
England; hence, in after-years, the Carthaginian efforts to
drive the Greek colonists from Sicily. Phalaris, the Greek
tyrant of Agrigentum, 565 B.C., is remembered mainly by
certain letters attributed to him, which called forth the
famous controversy of Bentley against Boyle in the eighteenth
century in England.
GREECE, and the Islands, under a number of petty republics of
which Athens and Sparta were the chief. Two petty king-
doms, Macedonia and Epirus, far behind the rest of Greece
in civilisation ; the Greek colonies in Asia Minor first subject
to Lydia, and then to Persia.
ASIA.
CHINA, under the Chow dynasty, which ruled over several subor-
dinate kingdoms.
INDIA. The Aryan races in the north. The beginning of the
Buddhist reaction against Brahminism.
THE EMPIRE of the Medes and Persians extended from the ^Egean
to the Indus, and as far north as Bactria, but within these
boundaries were a large number of self-governed kingdoms
and satrapies, which were only nominally subject to the
"great king." Of the regions of Central and Northern Asia
beyond the Caspian and the Himalaya Mountains we know
nothing, except from occasional inroads of the Kimmerians
and Scythians upon Asia Minor and Media. A Median
king, 607 B.C., built a wall ninety miles long and 120 feet
high, between the Caucasus and the Caspian, as a barrier
against them.
JAPAN, originally settled from the continent. The first Mikado
began to reign in the seventh century B.C.
State of the World 539 B.C. 77
AFRICA.
EGYPT, much exhausted by the Babylonian ravages, but as yet under
its own king.
ETHIOPIA, long subject to Egypt, In the eighth century B.C.,
Napata (the seat of a great sanctuary devoted to the worship
of Amun in the sixteenth century B.C.) became the capital
of the kingdom of Meroe, under a branch of the Her-hor
dynasty of Thebes. The rulers were the princes of Noph
(Isaiah xix. 13 ; Ezekiel xxx. 13), who for a season governed
Egypt from 750-650 B.C., contending with the Assyrians for
the rule over that country.
THE BERBERS, the ancient Libyans (Lehabim, Gen. x. 13, 14), from
whom the Kabyles, Tuarechs (Tauricks) are descended,
occupied Northern Africa. A Greek colony had been settled
at Cyrene, 631 B.C., by the island of Thera. Barca was an
offshoot of Cyrene, founded about 550 B.C.
THE CARTHAGINIANS dominated over all North Africa (westward of
Libya).
THIRD PERIOD,
From the Foundation of the Persian Empire,
539 B.C. to the Empire of Alexander
the Great, 330 B.C.
i. THE main event of these 200 years is the resistance of the
rising, vigorous civilisation of the West, as represented by Greece, to
the less vigorous civilisation of the East, of which Persia was a
favourable specimen. The final triumph of the Greeks was the
conquest of Persia by Alexander, through which the Macedonian
Greeks spread the ideas and the language of Greece into Egypt and
the far East, even into India. Meanwhile the Phoenician Cartha-
ginians in North Africa, the Romans in Italy, each of them gradu-
ally advancing and consolidating their power, were preparing to
contend for the sovereignty of the Western world.
The PERSIAN EMPIRE has not generally been regarded as meriting
much notice from historians. Max-Duncker is the first of modern
historians who has done justice to the character of the Persian
Government: — "The Persian empire is commonly spoken of as
extending from the ^gean to the Indus ; but in this vast extent of
territory are included kingdoms under their native kings, vast
governments under satraps, only nominally dependent upon the
Great King, acknowledging his authority simply by payment of
tribute. They were so far independent as to engage in war with
each other, and to hire Greek and other mercenary troops in self-
defence. The large territories in Turkey, in Asia, and Persia were
not so 'far reduced to deserts as they are now, but were inhabited by
Turcoman or Arab tribes, who then, as in our day, paid tribute when
the ruling power was able to enforce it. The empire of Cyrus was
From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, &c. 79
far more compact than the preceding empires of Babylon and
Assyria, or the present Governments in Asiatic Turkey and Persia.
A thorough revolution had been accomplished by Cyrus. The pre-
dominance of Shemitic culture and arms had passed away into the
hands of the Aryans of Iran. From the mountains of his native
land Cyrus had subjugated in thirty years three great empires, Media,
Lydia, and Babylonia. None of the conquerors before him had
achieved results which could be compared with his. He understood
how to maintain his conquests ; he was not compelled, like the
rulers of Assyria, to begin each year a new struggle against his
defeated opponents ; he knew how to institute arrangements which
secured an existence of two centuries. The kingdom rested on the
rule and devotion of the Persians ; they were the ruling tribe ; free
from contributions and taxes, they had only to render military service.
The Medes of the same race and religion [Iranians and Zends] were
closely identified with the Persians. Pliny states that the conquest
of Asia yielded to Cyrus 24,000 pounds of gold besides gold and
silver plate. Alexander found in Persia 180,000 talents, equal to
forty millions sterling. Under Darius Hystaspes the tax on cul-
tivated land produced 7,600 talents of silver, equal to 2-J millions
sterling, and from Indian tribute equal to three millions sterling, the
entire revenue being perhaps fourteen millions sterling. Cyrus was the
least bloody among the conquerors and founders of empires in the
East. He took the place of a native king to the conquered people.
Among all the native rulers of the East no one is like him, and one
only approached him — Darius Hystaspes."1 It is supposed, from the
evidence of the inscriptions, that Cyrus was an Elamite, of the royal
Persian clan of Teispes, who took possession of Elam on the fall
of the Assyrian empire. See Ezra i. 2 ; Isaiah xxi. 2, where the
original Elam is rendered by the more familiar word Persia?
2. Cyrus, •, the founder of the Persian empire, was the object of
admiration to both Jewish and Greek writers. He was evidently a
man intellectually and morally above his countrymen. As a Theist
of the old Iranian faith he was opposed to Polytheism, but in
political action patronising where he found it established. The sup-
position to the contrary, advanced by Sayce,3 is founded on the fact
of Cyrus's patronage of the popular gods of the conquered nations,
which does not affect his personal belief in his own Zoroastrian creed.
The kings of Persia were of the Achsemenian family of the royal tribe
1 Vol. vi. pp. 92-387, abridged.
2 "Fresh Light from the Ancient Monuments," p. 180. 3 Ibid., pp. 168-175.
So From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.
of the Pasargadze. The seats of empire were at Susa, Persepolis, and at
Ecbatana, the old capital of the Medes. Both these central positions, by
the institution of regular posts carried by horsemen, were connected
with the distant points of this vast empire. The title of " the great
king " was given to the sovereign of Persia by the Greeks as well as
by the Asiatics. A large amount of wealth taken from Sardis and
Babylon, valued at one hundred and twenty-six millions sterling, met
the expenses of the state until the reign of Darius Hystaspes. The
old Median religion, as reformed by Zoroaster, was the religion of the
state ; the emblem of Deity was fire ; the Magi were a caste specially
devoted to astrology, astronomy, and ritualistic forms. Cyrus had
probably been prepossessed in favour of the Jewish exiles in Babylon
by their monotheism, and by what he had heard and seen of the
prophet Daniel, and by the designation of himself by his titular
name as the conqueror of Babylon by the prophet Isaiah (chap. xlv.).
He at once permitted the restoration of the Jews to their own land
5266.0. In a just and necessary war, defending the north-eastern
provinces of his empire from the old enemies of southern Asia, the
nomad Scythian tribes, he was killed in battle 529 B.C. Cambyses,
his son, succeeded ; he put to death his brother Bardia, to whom
Cyrus had left the remote East, Bactria ; then he conquered
Egypt, which had revolted. The cruelty attributed to him is very
doubtful. He desired to subjugate Carthage, but the Phoenicians
refused to assist with their fleet. One of the Magi took the name
and claims of the 'dead Bardia, and usurped the throne of Persia
while Cambyses was yet alive, 522 B.C. After Cambyses' death he
was for a while acknowledged, but within six months the deception
was discovered, and he was slain by Darius Hystaspes, of the family
of Cyrus, 522 B.C. A civil war, with the revolt of the Medes, was
not finished for five years 517 B.C. Darius soon after is said to have
crossed the Bosphorus, and marched across the Danube, along the
shores of the Euxine with a large army, but the Scythians retreated
before him and he had to retrace his steps. His object was, pro-
bably, to get the settlements of the Greeks on the northern Euxine
under his power. He had by his officers placed Thrace and the
Greek Chersonesus under his power 513 B.C. ; then followed the re-
conquest of Egypt and the conquest of Barca, the Greek colony
(Cyrene) 512. A fleet was sent to explore the west of Europe, which
advanced as far as Crotona in Italy, the real design of which was to
ascertain the position of the Greeks. It is well to call to mind the
extent of the empire, for the Strymon, which separates Thrace from
Macedonia, was 3,000 miles to the Indus, from Memphis to Sogdia
to the Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. 81
2,500 miles, from the ^Egean Sea to Susa 1,755 miles. The post was
carried from Ephesus to Susa in five or six days. Travellers with
baggage could reach Susa in ninety days. Aryan life- and culture
were now dominant through the whole breadth of Asia. The
Behistan inscription which DARIUS placed in an inaccessible position
on the famous rock on the route from Babylon to Ecbatana yet
remains in the three tongues (Aryan, Turanian, and Shemitic), to
testify to the fame of Darius. The world had never seen such an
empire. Beyond the ^Egean Sea a branch of the Aryan stock, the
Hellenes, had developed an independent civilisation and city life in
small mountain cantons, in a peninsula all but surrounded by the
sea. " The eye of the potentate of Asia looked, no doubt, with
contempt on these unimportant communities, whose colonies in Asia
and Africa had long been subject to him, on states of which each
could put in the field no more than a few thousand warriors
Was it possible that these small cantons, without political union or
common interests, living in perpetual strife and feud .... was it
possible that these cantons could maintain their independence
against Persia? .... It was a question of decisive importance for
the civilisation and development of humanity, whether the new prin-
ciple of communal government which had been carried out in the
Hellenic cantons should be maintained, or pass into the vast limits
of the Persian empire, and succumb to the authority of the king —
state-power, and even life : absolute authority and the will of the
majority, abject obedience and conscious self-control — the masses
and the individual — these were ranged opposite each other, and the
balance was already turning in favour of overwhelming material
force."1
Aristagoras, Tyrant of Miletus, " morally contemptible, but gifted
intellectually with a range of ideas of unlimited extent, made for
himself an imperishable name by being the first to entertain the
thought of a collective opposition to the Persians on the part of all
the Greeks, even contemplating the possibility of waging a great and
successful war upon them."2
The contest was hastened by the revolt of the Greek colonies
in the ^Egean, in which the Athenians had assisted the revolters,
500-494 B.C. Darius was deeply offended, and sent out Datis and
Artaphernes, 492-490 B.C., to occupy Greece. All the islands and
most of the states in the mainland submitted, and sent the tokens
1 Max-Duncker, vol. vi. pp. 406-408.
2 Von Ranke, "Universal History," p. 161.
G
82 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
of their submission, " earth and water," to the Persian camp. The
Athenians began the resistance, and defeated the Persian generals
at Marathon by an army of ten thousand, commanded by Miltiades.
Darius died 490 B.C. in the midst of his preparation for a second
invasion. Xerxes succeeded, and prepared an army said to consist of
1,700,000 men and 1,207 Phoenician ships, 482-481 B.C.; the army
passed through Asia Minor, and Xerxes crossed the Hellespont,
and began the greatest and most unfortunate of all the expeditions
which have crossed that strait to invade Europe.
3. GREECE had hitherto been without any bond of political union.
Each state viewed its neighbour as a rival, and each state was, as in
all freely-governed communities, divided by the contentions of two
parties, the aristocratic and democratic. " The full and perfect sove-
reignty of each separate city formed the political ideal of the Greek
mind ; the less advanced members of the Hellenic race did not fully
attain to the conception because they did not fully attain to the per-
fection of Greek city life In the earliest times this system
of small separate communities formed the whole political world of
which the Greeks had any knowledge."1 Sparta was essentially
military and aristocratic, was in all her policy opposed to democracy,
and established oligarchies where it had the power ; it was reconciled
to the subjugation of the Greek colonies in Asia by Persia, and never
punished or redressed the arbitrary deeds of its commanders.
Athens, on the contrary, having expelled the last of the sons of
Pisistratus (Hippias) 510 B.C., was, from the restored constitution
of Solon (liberalised by Cleisthenes), essentially democratic. All
power was invested in the whole body of free citizens (the Demos),
practically not exceeding from five to six thousand male adults, and
representing a population of twenty to thirty thousand of the citizen
population. Meetings were held every eight days in the open air,
by which the magistrates and generals were chosen, and legal points
decided. Such an assembly was a mere mob, but, on the whole, an
intelligent mob, though too [easily influenced by orators, and occa-
sionally hasty and capricious in its decisions. The non-citizens
formed a middle class, generally engaged in trade, having no poli-
tical rights ; with the slaves they formed the bulk of the population.
The Athenian Demos has been fully described by Grote, and de-
fended by him and by Freeman against Mitford and his aristocratical
school. "The essence of this typical Greek democracy is that
it unites all power, legislative and judicial, in the assembly of the
1 Freeman, " Essays," second series, p. 116.
to the Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. 83
people Its legislative pawers were greatly narrowed by one
of its own committees, but its executive powers were unbounded.
.... This mob restrained itself just where the modern Parliament
gives itself full freedom, and it gave itself full freedom just where a
modern Parliament restrains itself." The practice of ostracism, the
legal banishment of dangerous popular leaders, is defended with
good reason as better than revolutionary proscription and bills of
attainder. By this plan " the honourable exile of one stood instead
of the proscription of many Mitford was right enough in
assuming that an English county meeting reached the very height
of political ignorance ; only he should not have thence leaped to
a similar conclusion as to the assembled people of Athens
Such writers forget that the common life of the Athenians was itself
the best of political educations. We suspect that the average
Athenian citizen was in political intelligence above the average
English member of Parliament The defect of the Demos
was that it was the offspring of an enthusiasm too highly strung, and
of a citizenship too narrow to allow of lasting greatness."1 This last
remark of the earnest common-sense historian qualifies the implied
admiration which precedes.
Thus the democracy of Athens was an exclusive and privileged
class, altogether different from the democracies of France or America,
or the ideal democracies of some of our political constitution-mongers
from the Abbe Sieves down to Major Cartwright. In fact, all the
democracies were exclusive and aristocratic, far beyond what we
have seen exemplified in modern times among the French, German,
Italian, and English noble and titled classes. Commerce and the
mechanical arts were despised. " In well-regulated states/' Aristotle
remarks, " the lower order of mechanics are not admitted to the
rights of citizenship." In Thebes, for instance, no one who within
ten years had been engaged in retail dealing could be elected into
the magistracy ; but, while it was degrading for a Greek to carry on
any of those employments personally, he could, without losing his
respectability, have them conducted by others on his account ; hence,
manufactories and workshops, as well as mines and lands, were held
by the first men in the state. These narrow prejudices may be ex-
cused in the case of the Greeks ; among professedly Christian nations,
whose " Great Teacher," by his own position and practice, dignified
and sanctified manual labour, the indulgence in such exclusiveness
1 Freeman, "Essays," second series, pp. 107-147.
G 2
84 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
is not only silly and hurtful, but sinful The slave class were
chiefly the property of the free citizens, who owed the leisure which
gave them the opportunity of political life to the enforced labour of
bondsmen, an inconsistency which none of the great writers of
antiquity appear to have noticed. To them slavery was a necessity,
and it had, in their opinion, always existed, and that no civilised
society could exist without it. Politically, it was to be checked and
regulated, but supported. The Athenian slaves were generally the
best treated in Greece, and had many holidays ; but the slaves of
Nicias, hired out to labour in the mines of Laurium, were less
fortunate. A thousand of them were let out to Souas, the Thracian,
at an obol per day (one penny and a farthing) for each, the lessee
being bound to restore to him the same in number ! The yearly rent
paid for each slave was thus half the price paid for him in the
market. If a slave lived for three years, Nicias made a profit of
fifty per cent, on the outlay. These slaves at Laurium worked three
hundred and sixty days in the year, had only five days' rest in the
three hundred and sixty-five days : the work was poisonous.1 Nicias,
the Athenian, would have had small sympathy with our philanthropic
legislation on slavery, factory labour, &c., &c. The jealousy of the
citizen class towards the wealthier and highly-descended families
occasioned most of the seditious and party contests which retarded
the prosperity and eventually destroyed the liberties of Greece. The
taxation fell heavily upon this wealthy class, not only in direct pay-
ments, but in the obligation to provide for public festivals and shows,
and to meet the extraordinary cost of the galleys in time of war.
There were not only rivalries among the Greek states, but also a
desire for conquest, and for the annexation of neighbouring territory,
even among these petty republics. Sparta had conquered and
made slaves of the Messenians; but it had rivals in Tegea and
Argos. Athens had rivals in Megara and ./Egina. The hostile
invasion of the King of Persia obliged these rivals to unite for
their common protection and for the glory of Greece. Instead
of remaining a mere multitude of small states, disunited, envious,
and jealous of each other, they were led by the vigorous ex-
ample of Athens and Sparta to unite, although but for a while, in
resistance to Persia. The success at Marathon against the army of
Darius — 490 B.C. — emboldened them to resist the more formidable
invasion of Xerxes, in which the number of the Persian armies, the
difficulty of finding subsistence for them, and the unfitness of the
1 MahafFy, " Rambles in Greece," pp. 169, 170.
to the Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. 85
mountain territory of Greece for the action of large armies, were all
in favour of the success of the Greek patriotic resistance. It was,
however, easy for the Persian army to pass through Thrace, Mace-
donia, and Thessaly. The first serious check to them was given at
the Pass of Thermopylae, where Leonidas, with his three hundred
Spartans and seven hundred allies, fell, overwhelmed by numbers
(July 6, 480 B.C.). The Athenians wisely abandoned Athens, which
was burnt by the Persians (July 20), and looked to their fleet for
deliverance. By this fleet the Persian fleet was defeated and
destroyed at Salamis (September 23, 480 B.C.). Xerxes, after eight
months' campaign, returned to Persia, crossing the Hellespont
leisurely and with kingly state, leaving Mardonius as commander of
the Persian army in Greece. Mardonius occupied Athens, but he
was defeated and killed at Platcea (September 25, 479 B.C.) by the
Greeks under Aristides and Pausanias. On the same day the
Persian fleet was defeated at Mycale by Leotychides and Xanthippus ;
after which the war became an aggressive one. Attempts have been
made, by Richardson in 1770 and by the Comte de Gobineau in his
" Histoire des Perses" (published before 1870), to represent the
history of the Persian and Greek wars in a point of view favourable
to the Persians. They have been regarded by the learned as eccen-
tricities of opinion requiring no serious notice. In this aggressive
war the leadership was with Sparta ; the object was to free the Greek
colonies in Asia Minor from Persian rule, Sparta was far from dis-
interested, the Spartans being generally unfair, tyrannical rulers. "At
home, under an iron system which taught each successive generation
that their highest virtue was to preserve, not to impair, the institutions
of their fathers, they were utterly unable to act the part of conquerors ;
for conquest, being the greatest of all possible changes, can only be
conducted by those who know how to change wisely Thus
the Spartan had no idea of turning their (after) triumph over Athens
(at the end of the Peloponnesian War) to any other account than
that of their pride and rapacity.''' * So also, in this war against Persia,
envy and jealousy of Athens led them to oppose the fortification
of Athens and the Piraeus (478-477 B.C.), which, however, wer
accomplished by the policy of Themistocles.
The haughtiness of the Spartan Pausanias disgusted the Greeks,
and the hegemony or leadership of the Greek fleets was transferred
to Athens, the Spartans withdrawing their four hundred and seventy
ships. This maritime league under Athens unfortunately led the
1 Arnold's " Rome," vol. i. pp. 493, 4.
86 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
Athenians, like the Spartans, to consider what was merely military
precedence as implying the rights of sovereignty. An opposition
league was then formed by Sparta, which had, at that time, full
rule over the Peloponnesus, and partially over other states beyond
Peloponnesus. Cimon, the Athenian commander, is said, after the
defeat of the Persian fleet and army near Cyprus, to have concluded
a peace, 449 B.C., with the Persian king Artaxerxes, in which the
Great King recognised the independence of the Greek colonies, and
•Consented that his fleet should not navigate the ^Egean, and that his
troops should not approach within three days' march of the coast ;
but this is supposed to be an exaggeration of Greek vanity. Mean-
while, the hatred of the Spartans towards Athens, fully reciprocated
by Athens, found occasion for open war in the dispute between
Corcyra and Corinth, its mother-country, 434-432 B.C. The
Athenians took part with the Corcyrians, and the Spartans with the
Corinthians ; and this was the commencement of the Peloponnesian
War, which lasted 431-421 and 418-404 B.C., in round numbers
twenty-seven years (including the three or four years' truce), and of
which the only valuable result was the history of Thucydides. The
leaders on the side of Athens were Cimon, Pericles, and Alcibiades ;
on the side of Sparta, Lysander. The great orator, Pericles, exercised
a commanding influence in Athens, until his death 429 B.C. Under
•his auspices the grand buildings, the glory of Athens, were erected,
and the fine arts largely patronised. Athens, during the war, had
looked forward to the formation of an empire over the Grecian
colonies in Sicily, and had sent an expedition, under Nicias, 415 B.C.,
'the largest ever sent by any Greek state. It was an enterprise
unparalleled in the past history of Greece. The object of the
Athenians was not merely to assist the Ionian colonies in Sicily
against the Dorians (Syracuse, &c.), but to bring Sicily and the
Greek colonies in south Italy under Athenian influence, and to form
with these a league against the Carthaginian power, which had ever
been adverse to the Greeks. The disastrous end of this expedition
"hastened the ruin of Athens, which was compelled to submit to
Sparta 404 B.C. It is remarkable that two great events, bearing
upon the interests of the Greek population, have been transacted in
Sicily. The defeat of the Carthaginians at Himera, who had
1 leagued with Xerxes to attack the Greek colonies, while his armies
were invading Greece itself, in 480 B.C., is one of these ; the other
: is the defeat of the Athenian attack on Sicily, 415-413 B.C. "The
late of the whole western world was involved in that sweeping ruin
of the fleet of Athens in the harbour of Syracuse. Had that great
to the Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. 87
expedition proved victorious, the energies of Greece during the next
eventful century would have found their field in the West, no less
than in the East. Greece, and not Rome, might have conquered
Carthage ; Greek, and not Latin, might have been at this day the
principal element of the languages of Spain, of France, and of Italy j
and the laws of Athens, rather than those of Rome, might be the
foundation of the laws of the civilised world." x The occupation of
Athens by the Spartans was followed by the nomination of thirty
men — the Tyrants — with supreme power, by whom one thousand
four hundred impeachments and executions were at once carried out.
These, with their successors (ten in number), were expelled by the
efforts of Thrasybulus and a party of exiles, by whom the Jaws of
Solon were restored. Mahaffy remarks that the massacre of Corcyra
428 B.C., the murder of two hundred and twenty-five Platsean
prisoners in cold blood by the Spartans 428 B.C., the condemnation
by the Athenians of the Mitylenians to death, of whom one thousand
were actually executed 427 B.C., should not be forgotten in our
admiration of Greek culture and refinement. The Athenians put
many hundreds of the inhabitants of Melos to the sword to make
way for a colony of Athenian citizens. Lysander, after the battle of
^Egospotami, 405 B.C., put to death three thousand prisoners, who
submitted to a fate which, had they been successful, they would have
inflicted on the Spartans. With all their intellect, the Greeks were
wanting in heart ; their humanity was spasmodic, not constant, and
included no chivalry to foes or to helpless slaves.2 " A long and
careful survey of the extant literature of ancient Greece has convinced
me that the pictures usually drawn of the old Greeks are idealised,
and that the real people were of a very different .... of a much
lower character. They were probably as clever a people as can be
found in the world, and fit for any mental work whatever." 3
4. In the thirty-three years which elapsed between the conclusion
of the Peloponnesian War and the war of the Thebans against
Sparta, 404-371 B.C., the philosopher Socrates was put to death in
Athens on a charge of impiety, 399 B.C. The expedition of the ten
thousand Greeks, under Xenophon, to assist Cyrus the Younger in his
revolt against his brother Artaxerxes, failed through the death of
Cyrus in battle at Cunaxa ; but the Greeks managed to retreat from
the very heart of the empire with safety, a proof to them of the
1 Arnold's " History of Rome," vol. i. pp. 347, 348.
2 Mahaffy, " Social Life in Greece," pp. 176, 234-243.
3 Ibid., " Rambles in Greece," pp. 19-22.
88 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
weakness of the Persian empire, 401 B.C. The Spartans made a
disgraceful peace with Persia, called the Peace of Antalddas, 317 B.C.,
by which the Persian supremacy over the Asiatic colonies was re-
established. This, if true, was the result of the rivalry of Athens
and Sparta, and of the help which both of them had received from
Persia. Then, the Great King had found it easier to influence the
leaders of political parties in Greece by bribery, and to engage them
in wars with each other, than to conquer them in the battle-field.
The contest between the Spartans and the Thebans commanded by
Epaminondas and Pelopidas, tfi-tfz B.C., in which the Spartans
lost the battle of Mantinea, was humiliating to Sparta; but, not-
withstanding this check to Sparta, Thebes, after the death of
Epaminondas, was unable to take the lead. It has thus become
evident that there was no leading power in Greece which could
secure a union of its states against foreign aggression. " It had
never been a compact society, — a nation, — but a number of indepen-
dent political units, animated by feelings of suspicion and jealousy,
and dislike of all, except the members of its own city. Beyond this
stage, which made the city everything, Greece, as a whole, never
advanced.1 Men as nearly allied in blood as the men of York and
Bristol still regarded the power of making war upon each other as
the highest of their privileges (a proof of the possession of sovereign
power within their own limits), and looked upon the exercise of this
power, not as a stern necessity, but as a common incident in the
ordinary course of things." Hence, it was hardly possible for Greece
to retain its independence, when a powerful, concentrated military
monarchy had arisen on its very borders, for they were unwilling to
acknowledge the supremacy of any one state as their leader, by
whom, united together, they might hope to repel even a superior
power. The most natural and desirable of all conditions for Greece
would have been such a confederacy, a permanent bond of union ;
yet the thought of such a general fixed union of the states of Greece,
on equal terms, seems never to have occurred to a single Greek
statesman. This neglect is a reproach to their practical ability.
There were, no doubt, great difficulties to overcome ; so there were
in Switzerland, in the Seven United Provinces, and in the thirteen
British colonies in America ; but among these, when the necessity
was evident, there were found men able to conciliate opposition and
to carry out the union. Greece, however, had not trained men to
feel and care for the Greek people as a whole. The sympathies of
1 Coxe, " Persians and Greeks," p. 4.
to the Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. 89
the most patriotic were limited to his own city, and thus disunited,
led astray by local politicians, caring only for party interests, the
Greeks could oppose no effectual resistance to Macedonia, the rising
power outside, which was well acquainted with its weakness. Greece
had poets, philosophers, and orators, and great soldiers, and able
generals, but they had no Cavour or Stein ; they had no great
general in whom they could trust to fight for Grecian objects.
Instead of this they were wasting their powers as mercenary troops
in the service of Persia, or Egypt, or Carthage. Greece at last
submitted to Macedonian supremacy, because its petty states were
too proud and jealous to acknowledge one of their own states as a
leader. From the time of the successful resistance to the Persian
invasion, there had been a gradual decline in the moral feeling of
both the Athenians and Spartans, and of the Greeks generally.
Increase of luxurious habits, which required enlarged pecuniary
means, with the increasing cost of the armies, felt by all the cities,
arising out of the employment of mercenary troops — a practice which
grew and increased in the Peloponnesian War — induced the petty
states, Athens and Sparta also, to look to the Persian government of
Asia Minor, and to the Great King himself, for subsidies in their
wars with each other, and to rejoice in this unequal alliance.
5. Meanwhile the ISRAELITES who had been carried captive, at first
by the Assyrians and lastly by the Babylonians, had been permitted
to return to their own land, by the decree of Cyrus, B.C. 536, after
seventy years of captivity (dating from the first beginning of the
Captivity, 606 B.C.). The number of those who returned with
Zerubbabel (prince of Judah) and Jeshua (the high priest) was about
50,000, chiefly of the tribes attached to the former kingdom of Judah,
though there appear to have been portions of the other ten tribes
with them. Hence they were called Jews. They began to rebuild
Jerusalem, to restore the walls, and to lay the foundations of the
Temple. In this they were opposed by the SAMARITANS, originally a
mongrel race of heathens (2 Kings xvii. 23, 24), mixed up with a
degraded class of the old Israelitish population, who had, however,
retained some imperfect knowledge of the old Jewish religion, and
desired to be identified with the Jews. This union was rejected,
their claim to the Jewish nationality denied, and hence their oppo-
sition to the Tews in Jerusalem, by their intrigues with the Persian
court and with the local officials of Persia. THE TEMPLE was,
however, rebuilt and dedicated, 515 B.C., and many, probably of the
later captivities who had seen the old temple rejoiced, and yet wept,
when the foundations of the new were laid, 535 B.C. EZRA, a priest
90 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
in favour with Artaxerxes (Longimanus), was permitted, seventy-eight
years after the first party had returned to Jerusalem, to lead a band
of Jews returning to their own country, and was vested with power
to regulate the affairs of the newly-restored people, 458 B.C.
NEHEMIAH, one of the royal cup-bearers, also in favour with Arta-
xerxes, was sent, 444 B.C., to regulate the government and to establish
more thoroughly a rigid adherence to the Law of Moses. The
prophets Haggai and Zechariah, who lived for some time after the
return, were followed by Malachi, the last of the Prophets, contem-
porary with Nehemiah. The strict reforms of Ezra and Nehemiah,
especially the law against mixed marriages, were offensive to many,
even of the priests. One Manasseh, the son of Joiada the High
Priest, left Jerusalem and built a rival temple on Mount Gerizim, near
Samaria, carrying with him the Pentateuch as the only authority for the
Mosaic Law, 409 B.C. The High Priest of the Jews, with a council
(the Sanhedrim), had the direction of Jewish affairs, under the
Persian Government, which always respected the religion of the Jewish
people. The Samaritans, with their new temple, were regarded by
the Jews with great aversion as schismatics. The Hebrew language
gradually changed to a Syriac-Chaldaic dialect. No writing which
was not accepted as a sacred book before 420 B.C. was included in
the Canon of the Old Testament, according to the testimony of
Josephus, l a priest and competent witness ; no writing being
accepted as of divine authority which had not had the sanction of
a prophet ; and we know there was no prophet from Malachi,
400 B.C., to the time of John the Baptist. This is confirmed as true
(up to their own time) by Jesus the son of Sirach (Ecclesiastes
xlix. 10), and by the author of the first book of Maccabees, iv. 46
and ix. 27, 14-41.
6. After the death of Epaminondas, PHILIP OF MACEDON slowly
and almost imperceptibly crept into the position at which he aimed
from the very first. Philip had been three years a hostage at Thebes,
and had learned the art of war under that able commander Epami-
nondas. He established a regular. army, larger and better disciplined
than that of any other Grecian state. In the Sacred War he assisted
the Thebans and Thessalian nobles in the war against the Phokians,
who had plundered the temple of Delphi, 355 B.C., of 10,000 talents.
Athens and Sparta supported the Phokians. In the end peace was
made, the Phokians conquered, and their position in the Amphic-
tyonic Council given to Philip, 346 B.C. Before the conclusion of
1 "Josephus against Apion," book i. chap. 8.
to the Empire of Alexander the Great \ 330 B. C. 91
this Sacred War Philip had made himself master of the thirty cities of
Olynthia. The Olynthians had sought the alliance of Athens, and
the great orator, Demosthenes, had delivered his first great speech
against Philip, B.C. 352. The Athenians were divided in their views
respecting the policy of Philip, and when convinced of the necessity
of opposing him they were too late. The Athenians and Thebans
were defeated by Philip at Chaeronea, B.C. 338, and Philip was thus
master of Greece. At a congress of all the Greek states, at Corinth,
war was declared against Persia, and Philip was appointed General-
in-Chief of the forces of Greece. He was soon after assassinated,
336 B.C. ; but his son and successor, Alexander, after checking the
inroads of the northern barbarians and capturing Thebes, which had
revolted after the death of Philip, prepared to carry out his father's
plans. The severe example of Thebes, rased to the very ground,
was a proof to the Greeks of the power and determination of the
young monarch, whom they had accepted as their leader in the room
of his father. ALEXANDER crossed the Hellespont with about 40,000
men; an army so perfectly disciplined, and so superior to any
other army, that it could probably, without any difficulty, at that
time have conquered the world. This was no wild enterprise after
the Greek mercenaries were beaten. After the death of Xerxes
domestic treasons, the frequent rebellions of Egypt, the lax adminis-
tration of the central government, which could not prevent the
private wars of satraps against satraps, and was compelled to allow
the leading satrapies to become hereditary, were plain indications,
palpable to all Greece, of the decadence of the empire. The Persian
armies, though large, were a mere militia, the only efficient troops
being bodies of Greek mercenaries commanded by Memnon the
Rhodian and others. When Alexander, after visiting the site of
Troy, had reached the Granicus, a small stream flowing from Mount
Ida into the Propontis, Memnon advised the Persian generals to avoid
a battle by retreating, to lay waste the country, and destroy the towns
in their line of march, so that, for want of provisions, the invaders
might be checked. This advice, which might have saved the
empire, was rejected as degrading to its dignity. The Persians were
defeated at the Granicus ; and as the Greek, Memnon, the only
person likely to have been a formidable opponent, soon after died,
the career of Alexander was unimpeded until he came to Issus, a
town in the mountain-ranges of Cilicia, near the passes, the Syrian
gates. In the plain near Issus, Darius Codomannus advanced with
600,000 men, and with him his mother, wives, and harem, as il
certain of victory, and the more so as he had among them 30,000
92 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
Greek mercenaries. He was defeated and lost his baggage, and the
whole of his family and harem were made prisoners. In this battle
Alexander not only defeated the Persians, but the republican southern
Greeks, their allies, and the special enemies of his rule, 333 B.C.
After this the conqueror passed through Syria. Sidon, the oldest of
the Phoenician cities, received him as a deliverer. Tyre resisted,
but, after a seven months' siege, was taken by storm, with great
destruction of life. 30,000 were sold for slaves, 2,000 crucified. In
the course of the siege the island of Tyre was united by Alexander's
mole to the mainland, and thus Tyre was, and remained defenceless,
332 B.C. Gaza was next besieged, and taken after three months ;
and then it is probable that Alexander visited Jerusalem, and was
conciliated by the High Priest Jaddua. Egypt made no resistance,
and Alexander founded the town of Alexandria, as a link between
the East and the West, and as an emporium of the trade of the East
and of India, 331 B.C. Leaving Egypt, Alexander crossed the
Euphrates into Mesopotamia, and met Darius at Gaugamela (twenty
miles from Arbela), a wide plain between the Tigris and the moun-
tains of Kurdistan. Darius's forces were estimated at a million by
some, and by others at 240,000, with 200 scythe chariots and 15
elephants. The loss of the Macedonians was trifling, but 300,000
of the Persians are said to have fallen in the contest, which ended in
the defeat of Darius, 331 B.C., who, the next year, was murdered by
the traitor Bessus. Alexander passed through the whole of the dis-
tant provinces to the north-east, and invaded Northern India, but
was compelled, by the unwillingness of his troops to pass beyond the
Hyphasis (the Sutledge), to return westward, 325-324 B.C. The
return was as adventurous as his previous marches. Vessels were
built on the Sutledge. The army sailed down the Indus to the
Indian Ocean. Thence Alexander and the army proceeded through
Gedrosia and Caramania to Persepolis. The fleet, under Nearchus,
proceeded to the Persian Gulf, keeping close to the land, arrived first
at Harmozeia (Ormus), and then at the mouth of the Euphrates. This
voyage is celebrated as " the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea." At
Babylon, which Alexander had designed to make the seat of his
empire, he received ambassadors from the Carthaginians, the
Romans, and three other peoples of Italy. He had grand plans of
uniting the people of the East with the West. He thought that the
predominant races might be amalgamated with the subject races by
inter-marriages, education, equal laws, and commerce. It is said
that he designed to explore the coast of Arabia to the head of the
Red Sea, then to circumnavigate Africa, and, entering the Mediter-
to the Empire of Alexander the Great > 330 B. C. 93
ranean by the Pillars of Hercules, to spread the terror of his arms
along its western and northern shores, and, finally, to explore the
northern extremity of the Lake Mseotis (Sea of Azoff). The charac-
ter of Alexander had deteriorated, as was manifested by the murders
of Philotas, of Parmenio, of Clitus, and of Callisthenes, on most
frivolous grounds, and by his assumption of divine honours. In the
latter part of his life he acted, in the opinion of the Greeks, the part
of a barbarian rather than that of a Grecian king. Death put an
end to his plans, at the early age of thirty-three, by a fever the result
of excess at Babylon, 323 B.C. Niebuhr, Droysen, and Grote express
opinions unfavourable to the character of Alexander. Archdeacon
Williams, Thirl wall, and Freeman are his defenders, the latter
especially. In his opinion, Thirlwall's narrative of the History of
Alexander " is the nearest approach to the perfection of a critical
history .... It is, therefore, on the whole, the Alexander of
Thirlwall, rather than the Alexander of Grote or of Droysen, who
deserves to live in the memory of mankind, and to challenge the
admiration of the world." 1
The fate of Tyre was foretold by the prophet Zechariah (490 B.C.)
x. 3, 4 ; the rise and fall of the Persian empire by Daniel (553 B.C.)
viii. 1-7, 20-21 • xi. i, 3. The imagery employed by the prophet,
namely, the ram's head, with horns one higher than the other, is
found in the ruin of Persepolis. A he-goat was the Macedonian
standard.
7. Meanwhile two powerful states, one in Africa, one in Italy, were
gradually extending their territories and consolidating their power,
thus preparing for a contest for the dominion of the West. These
were : CARTHAGE in North Africa, and ROME in Central Italy, to
whose early history we have already referred. The history of the
rivalry of these two great nations forms a most interesting chapter in
the history of the world. Carthage was the ally of Persia against
Greece. The people of Selinus, in Sicily, having invited the help of
the Carthaginians, this invasion was defeated by Gelon, of Syracuse,
and Theron, of Agrigentum, at Himera, 480 B.C. Soon after, the
Siculi, the old people of Sicily, were subdued by the Greek colonists,
who destroyed Trinacria, the capital of the Siculi, 452-440. The
Carthaginians again invaded Sicily, assisted by the Siculi (409), and
made great progress, until, by treaty with Syracuse, the west of Sicily
was yielded to Carthage — the east being under Syracuse, 340 B.C.
A large portion of the south and east of Spain was subdued by the
1 Freeman, " Essays," second series, pp. 171, 172.
94 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
Carthaginians ; but the inhabitants of the Carthaginian subject
provinces, whether in Africa, or Sicily, or Spain, were never
assimilated to their conquerors, but remained a distinct, and gener-
ally inimical people. The newly-formed republic in ROME had to
emancipate itself from Etrurian control, and regain, by little and little,
the power and territory it had lost in the revolution of 510 B.C. The
dispute respecting the monopoly of the public lands by the patricians,
headed, on the part of the people, by Spurius Cassius, 486 B.C., by
Genucius, 473 B.C., disturbed the commonwealth. The senate opposed,
not only openly, but by secret murders. Spurius Cassius " shared the
fate of Agis and Marino Faliero " l ; Genucius was found murdered
in his chamber. Another grievance, the inequality of the bearing of
the law upon the interests of the plebeians, was considered, and all the
powers of the consuls were superseded, 450 B.C., by the appointment
of the decemvirs, ten commissioners appointed to prepare a new code
of laws. The result was the Ten Tables, which were promulgated for
the information of all classes. After two years, the misconduct of
Appius Claudius led to a revolt, and to the restoration of the old
consular government. It was while these dissensions were going on
the Gauls from the north invaded Italy, plundering Etruria and
its vicinity. The Romans came in collision with them, and were
defeated on the river Allia, and their army destroyed, 389 B.C.
Rome itself was occupied and burnt ; only the Capitol remained.
The siege was relieved, either by the help of Camillus and his troops,
or by a large payment to the Gauls. After this, the dissensions of the
higher patrician classes with the plebeians, which had commenced
in the kingly period, was aggravated by the pressure of the debts in-
curred by the plebeians in the time of war, when, at their own
expense, they had to fight the battles of the state. By the following
steps a more equitable condition of affairs was secured, (i) The
consular power was modified by the appointment of tribunes of the
people (493 B.C.) intrusted with extraordinary powers for the protection
of popular interests ; and in 470 B.C. there were chosen by the tribes
alone, through the Publilian Law of Volero, "the second grand
charter of public liberties.3 The laws were reduced to writing by
the appointed ten — the decemviri, 451-447 B.C. (2) The legislative
power of the senate was checked by the additional influence gained
by the assemblies of the tribes (in which the plebeians had the chief
power). By laws made 449, and confirmed 339 and 287 B.C., the
resolutions of these assemblies, instead of being simply binding on
1 Arnold. 2 Ibidi
to the Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B. C. 95
the plebeians, were recognised as binding all classes, without the sanc-
tion of the senate or the assemblies of the curies or of the centuries.
The tribunes had the power of impeaching magistrates, generals, and
consuls (after the expiration of their term of office). To the senate there
remained one check on the licence of the democracy. They could at
any time create a dictator with absolute power. The first appointment
took place 498 B.C. This office, no doubt, saved the republic several
times, and at length was used by Marius and Sylla, and, last of all,
by Julius Caesar, to destroy the spurious sham republic, which, by
degrees, had superseded the genuine one. (3) An equality of civil
and social rights naturally followed the success of the plebeians in
their struggle for a share in the legislative power. (The legislation
of the decemvirs, in 450-449, gave increased power to the plebeians
in the tribes). The law forbidding the intermarriage of patricians
and plebeians was abrogated 445 B.C. The consulship was thrown
open to the plebeians 366 B.C., and by the year 300 B.C. they were
declared eligible to fill all the offices of the republic. Thus united,
the Romans had nearly accomplished the conquest of Italy by the
time of the rule of Alexander in Greece and Asia. All the petty
states of Latium, and Etruria, and Central Italy had been subjugated.
This success may be accounted for, in a great measure, to the facility
of associating the conquered people with themselves, making them
partners in the work of aggression, and in due time admitting them
to a share in its civil government. With the Samnites, the bravest
and most formidable of the Italian rivals of Rome, the Romans had
two wars : 343-341, 326-304. At the end of the second war they
became politically subject to Rome. It was well for the Romans, and
for the world at large, that Alexander the Great had been led to the
conquest of the East rather than westward to the conquest of Italy.
Livy thinks that the Romans would have been fully equal in the
contest, and at last victorious ; but this is the opinion of national
vanity only. Degraded as Greek society had begun to be in the
time of Alexander, it was capable of benefiting the East, but the
Italics and other peoples of Western Europe would have been morally
and socially injured by the occupancy of their territories, and by the
debasing influence upon their social life, which must have followed
their conquest by the Greeks. The old Romans and the people of
Central Italy were at this time remarkable for their sober and
moderate habits, and their rigid morality, their respect for law and
order. This favourable condition of society continued until after the
Second Punic War.
8. INDIA became better known to the Greeks by the invasion of
96 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
Alexander the Great. At that time there was a large Aryan kingdom
on the Ganges, and also some very powerful non-Aryan states.
Chandragupta (312 B.C.), the opponent of Seleucus, ruled over all
North India, to the Vindya Mountains. Darius Hystaspes had long
before conquered Cabul, and levied a tribute of nearly two millions
sterling on that land. Skylax, his admiral, had sailed down the
Indus, and up the Red Sea back again to Egypt. Alexander's
admiral, Nearchus, sailed down the Indus, and arrived at the mouth
of the Euphrates, 326 B.C. The Buddhist reaction against Brahmin-
ism was gaining ground.
9. CHINA continued in a disordered state, divided into so many
states during the Chow Dynasty. Mencius, i.e., Mengtsen, the
great philosopher, lived about 371 B.C. — a teacher of practical ethics
like Confucius.
10. The LITERATURE of this period was mainly Greek. The period
from 500-300 B.C. may be considered as the golden age of Greek
culture both as to literature and art. It was, however, confined to
Athens and the Greek colonies in Africa, Sicily, and Italy, (i) His-
torians. The earliest is Hecatseus, the father of history, 500 B.C. ;
Herodotus, the great pictorial historian, 484-408 B.C. ; Thucydides,
the philosophical historian of the Peloponnesian War, 471-411 B.C. ;
Xenophon, whose narrative of the expedition of Cyrus the Younger
and the retreat of the ten thousand Greeks from the Euphrates, made
him famous as a general as well as a writer, 444-362 B.C. ; Charon
of Lampsacus, 464 B.C. ; Ctesias the physician, 405-401 B.C. (2)
The great tragic poets, who were the influential moral teachers of
their age ; ^Eschylus, 500 B.C. ; Sophocles and Euripides, 480 B.C.
(3) Satire and comedy. Aristophanes and Menander of the middle
comedy, 485 B.C. The early tragedies were first exhibited on the
stage by Thespis 535 B.C. (4) The lyric poet Theognis, 525-488
B.C., describes with high aristocratical indignation the overthrow of
his party in Megara. (5) The fine arts, architecture, sculpture,
painting, were cultivated with zeal in Athens, and especially patronised
by Pericles; the names of Phidias, Polycletus, Praxiteles, and
Lysippus (sculptors), Zeuxis, Polygnotus, and Apelles (painters),
Ictinus, Callicrates, Callimachus, 400 B.C., Hermogenes, 350 B.C.
(architects), stand forth as the highest in their respective professions.
It is scarcely necessary to apologise for the fine arts. " If the fancy,
the sense of beauty, grace, and elegance are never to be addressed,
the higher faculties will grow torpid from disuse, the mind will
dwindle and degenerate, and intellectual progress will be arrested.
.... A race without wants is a race without ideas A thing
to the Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. 97
of beauty is a joy for ever."1 (6) The great orators, Gorgias,
444 B.C., Antiphon, Andocides, with Pericles and Lysias, 430-400
B.C., Isocrates, 436-338 B.C., Isaeus, Lycurgus, Demosthenes, 382 -
324 B.C., and ^Eschines, 389-314 B.C. (7) The physical a.n& mathe-
matical sciences were at first connected with the development of the
early philosophy by Thales, Anaximander, Pythagoras, and Anaxi-
menes and others, as already noticed (p. 72); Hippocrates, the
father of medical science, 460-357 B.C. ; Eudoxus of Cnidus, 406-
350 B.C., cultivated astronomy, and made the first map of the stars.
Heraclides of Pontus taught the daily rotation of the earth on its
own axis and the immovability of the firmament of the fixed stars.
Aristotle, born 381 B.C., was as highly distinguished for his labours
in natural science as in philosophy ; and Theophrastus, his pupil,
born 371 B.C., was the father of the science of botany. (8) Music
was cultivated in Athens, and in 444 B.C. Pericles had the Odieum
built for musical performances ; Aristoxenes of Tarentum, a writer
on music, 350-330 B.C. (9) Philosophy. The dissatisfaction resulting
from the insufficiency of all theories to solve "the problem of
existence," produced the Sophists,2 a much-calumniated body of
philosophers, stoutly defended by Lewes and Grote. They formed
no sect ; each teacher stood on his own individual opinion ; their
main talent was in the art of disputation ; the chief early repre-
sentatives of this class were Gorgias, 440 B.C. (the nihilist) ; Prota-
goras (the individualist); Prodicus, 420 B.C. (the moralist) ; Hippias
(the polymathist). The later representatives are Polus (the rheto-
rician) ; Thrasymachus (who taught that right was might) ; Callicles,
Euthydemus, Diagoras of Melos, with Critias, the enemy of
Socrates, are regarded as both morally and intellectually inferior to
their predecessors. Socrates, 470-400 B.C., the Athenian philo-
sopher, was the disinterested opponent of sophistry, mysticism, and
philosophical charlatanism; bold and independent in his political
life, he had a conviction of duty impelling him to advocate truth
and justice, and to enlighten the opinions of his townsmen by
private converse with all coming in contact with him ; he taught
without fee or payment of any kind, endeavouring especially to arrive
at clear ideas on moral subjects. Attacked and ridiculed by
Aristophanes in his comedies, he was at last tried and condemned to
death on a charge of impiety, and also of being a corruptor of youth,
400 B.C. Among the numerous disciples of Socrates were the
1 Quarterly Review, vol. clii. p. 545.
2 Lewes, " History of Philosophy," p. 87.
H
98 From the Foundation of the Persian Empire, 539 B.C.,
founders of the Cynic school, of the Cyrenaics, the Sceptics, the
Megaric school, and those of Elis and Eretria. But the most cele-
brated of his pupils were PLATO and ARISTOTLE. It is impossible to
give, within any reasonable limits, even the barest sketch of the
philosophy of Plato, undoubtedly the greatest of the philosophers.
He taught the existence of an eternal first cause — God, from whom
emanate the souls of men ; but " it is Plato's doctrine of ideas
which constitutes his peculiar realism, and in virtue of which he has
been considered the father of the realistic philosophy." He thought
that the genuine philosopher " might ascend beyond the sphere of
sense, perception, and opinion to the direct intuition of that super-
celestial world in which dwelt the essences and originals of all things
true and beautiful. , This super-celestial sphere, the home of the
gods and of the purified and enfranchised philosophic spirit, he held
to be spiritual, eternal, and immutable, such as might be known by
the pure intelligence, but was separate from matter or sense ; con-
taining, however, the original and archetypal ideas, of which all the
things of time and sense were but the imperfect embodiment and
shadowy copies It will be seen that Plato's philosophy was
an attempt to reconcile the sensational scepticism of earlier philo-
sophers with a deep ground of realism and faith. His doctrine of
the real, supersensible existence of essences, by participation of
which all sensible existences and qualities have their being, though
in itself a mere verbal illusion, playing on abstract terms, laid the
foundation of the scholastic doctrine of the real and independent
existence of general terms or abstract ideas, which was the funda-
mental tenet of the realism of the Middle Age doctors, and which
was opposed by the nomination of those who held such genera or
general terms to be the mere names of classes, designating no
distinct entities." 1 Four leading schools sprang from the teaching
of Plato, (i) The Academy under his immediate disciples. (2)
The Peripatetics, under Aristotle. (3) The Epicureans, founded by
Epicurus, and (4) The Stoics, by Zeno. Of these the most remark-
able is ARISTOTLE, whom Plato regarded as the mind of his school ;
he refuted "the grand Platonic dream," the theory of eternal ideas;
e regarded ideas as " the production of the reason, separating by a
logical abstraction the particular objects from those relations which
are common to them all • he was, however, no sceptic, he believed
that truth was an heritage for man." Sir William Hamilton seems
Dearly "justified in saying that Aristotle held to certain
1 Dr. James H. Rigg, London Quarterly Review, vol. xv. pp. 582-585.
to tJie Empire of Alexander the Great, 330 B.C. 99
primary facts, beliefs, or principles, true but undemonstrable, them-
selves absolutely certain, and the fountains of certainty to all else ;
that he 'formed knowledge on belief, and the objective certainty of
science or the subjective necessity of believing.' .... Of some of
the chief features in the modern inductive logic it cannot be doubted
that he had an anticipation, whilst almost unto this day his syllogistic
logic has ruled unrivalled. Doubtless he over-rated— indeed, alto-
gether misunderstood — the value of his deductive logic, which it is
now well known can be no instrument in itself of direct or proper
discourse Stoicism maintained that man has within himself
the test of truth and the power of moral control But its
main glory was its ethics; its principle of duty and self-abne-
gation, its high ideal of virtue, the honour it rendered to moral
excellence."1
State of the World, .3.30 B.C.
EUROPE.
SPAIN. Kelts and Iberians. Carthaginian settlements in the south
and east ; a Greek colony at Saguntum.
BRITAIN AND GAUL occupied mainly by Keltic tribes. The Iberians
from Spain spread from the Pyrenees to the Garonne.
Teutonic tribes mixed with the Kelts north of the Seine.
The Greek colony in Massilia traded by the route of the
Rhone with Britain.
GERMANY. A Teutonic population, pressed by the Sclavonic tribes
from the East.
SCANDINAVIA. A Teutonic population, pressing the Finns, Lapps,
and other kindred races northward.
EASTERN PLAINS OF POLAND, RUSSIA, &c. Peopled mainly by
Sclavonic races, with Finns, Tschudes, and similar races, to
the north. Sundry tribes from Central Asia begin to settle
north of the Black Sea (Euxine). The Greek colonies in
the Crimea and on the Euxine to the east are the marts for
the northern trade.
1 Dr. Rigs, London Quarterly Review, vol. xv. pp. 585-587.
H 2
ioo From the Foundation of the Persian Empire,
ITALY. The Kelts (Gauls) in the north. The Etruscans, and sundry
tribes in the centre. The Ligurians along the Mediterranean
from Gaul to the Etruscan boundary. The Greek colonies
in the south. Rome, which had been recently burnt by the
Gauls 390 B.C., rapidly advancing towards the conquest of
Italy.
SICILY was the battle-ground of the Greek colonies and the
Carthaginians.
GREECE. All its republics submit as allies to Macedonia.
ASIA.
THE OLD PERSIAN EMPIRE, conquered by Alexander the Great ; the
Phoenician cities and the Jews under his rule.
CHINA, under the Chow Dynasty, which ruled over several dependent
states.
INDIA became better known to the Greeks by the invasion of Alex-
ander the Great. Aryan kingdoms in the north and on the
Ganges, and some powerful native states. By 'the voyage of
Nearchus from the Indus to the Persian Gulf geographical
knowledge was increased 326 B.C.
JAPAN. The Mikado rulers gradually conquering the native Ainos.
AFRICA.
EGYPT. Conquered by Alexander the Great. Alexandria founded
by him.
ETHIOPIA. Petty kingdoms in Napata and other portions of Meroe.
THE BERBERS over Northern Africa between the Carthaginians and
the Sahara. The Greek colonies in Cyrene.
THE CARTHAGINIANS (the enemies) of the Greeks) controlled the sea-
coasts of North Africa and of Southern and Eastern Spain.
FOURTH PERIOD,
From the Empire of Alexander, 330
to the Christian Era.
1. THE leading events of this period are — (i) The division of the
Empire of Alexander, followed by the rise of the Parthian empire,
east of the Euphrates, and occupying in part the position of the
old Persian empire ; (2) the rivalries of the new Greek kingdoms in
Macedonia, Egypt, and Syria, a history, on the whole, of cultivated
sensuality, depravity, and cruelty, as disgusting as it is tiresome ;
(3) the deterioration of Greece itself, through the loss of its popula-
tion and resources ; (4) the gradual absorption by Rome of the Greek
kingdoms and states, and of the territories of Carthage in Africa and
Spain, and the conquest of Gaul.
2. The sudden death of Alexander at Babylon, 323 B.C., was
followed by the dissensions of his leading generals, each aiming at
the supreme power, and, failing in that, to secure for themselves
independent kingdoms. In the wars ensuing the family of Alexander
was destroyed, and the empire divided. The battle of Issus, 301 B.C.,
left Cassander king of Macedonia, Ptolemy Lagus king of Egypt
including Gyrene ; Seleucus king of Syria and of all Asia to the
Indus ; Lysimachus king over Thrace and part of Asia Minor ;
other divisions followed. Lysimachus was killed 283 B.C., and out
of his kingdom arose the petty kingdoms of Pergamos, Bithynia,
Pontus, Galatia, and Cappadocia (in Asia Minor). A few years later,
250 B.C., Bactria (under a race of Greek kings) and the Parthians
threw off the yoke of the kings of Syria, and their kings, the Arsacidae,
ruled from the Euphrates to the Indus. Soon after, Armenia revolted
from Syria, and thus within seventy years after Alexander's death
102 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
there were no less than eleven kingdoms formed out of his empire,
besides the petty republics of Greece, which maintained for a while
their independence. The first formal division of Alexander's empire
is foretold in Daniel viii. 8. All these states were engaged in
frequent wars with each other, and, with the exception of Parthia and
Bactria, were within two centuries conquered by the Romans, and
formed mere provinces of its vast empire. Bactria was conquered
by Parthia and the Tartar tribes 125 B.C.
3. The Grecian republics, though nominally independent, yet were
greatly influenced by the kings of Macedon. In Athens, DEMO-
STHENES, the patriotic orator, 322 B.C., and Phocion, the uncorrupt
administrator, 318 B.C., were sacrificed to party influence. Two
confederations were formed, to maintain a union of effort in defence
of the national liberty, by the ^Etolians and Archaeans ; but these
were separate, and accordingly opposed to each other. The Achcean
League had for its object freedom and equality for all the Grecian
states. The leading men in this movement had a high character for
fairness and probity. About 254 B.C. they began to restore the
fabric of their old constitution, under Aratus of Sicyon. The
ALtolian League was simply a revival of the confederation of its tribes.
It has been called " the curse of Greece," as its leaders manifested
no self-restraint or sense of right and wrong. In ancient times, as
Mommsen remarks, " a nation must be hammer or anvil." The
petty Grecian states were of necessity in the position of the anvil ;
Philip of Macedonia was the -first hammer, the Romans the second.
It was impossible to infuse new political life into a people gradually
and yet rapidly declining in numbers and in resources. The
conquests of Alexander had opened the East to the enterprise of the
young and active spirits of the small communities, whose narrow
limits and bitter factions were distasteful to men to whom all Asia
and Egypt offered employment and wealth. The poorer classes
found employment as mercenaries in the East, and in Egypt, and in
Carthage and Sicily. The loss of population was not filled, up by
the demand for labour, as Greece had no manufactures of any
moment, or call for agricultural labour, beyond what was supplied by
its slave population. This decline of population and of resources
was obvious within less than a century after the conquests of
Alexander ; every generation the decay was more observable. Poly-
bius, 140 B.C., and Strabo, 29 B.C., besides the eloquent reflections
of Sulpicius to Cicero, which are given in Middleton's " Life of
Cicero," are witnesses of this decline. Messenia almost deserted;
Laconia had only thirty towns left in lieu of a hundred ; Arcadia
to the Christian Era. 103
utterly decayed, and with ^Etolia and Acarnania devoted to pasturage ;
Thebes a mere village; Thessaly equally without towns. In the
time of Plutarch, Greece could hardly raise three thousand heavy-
armed soldiers, the number raised by Megara alone in the Persian
War. Athens and Corinth alone maintained a respectable position
as cities. These changes are partly accountable to economical
causes, and were not beyond a remedy, had the moral feeling of the
Greek people been correct and pure. " The historian traces this
decay to a taste for luxury and ostentation; but this could only
apply to the wealthy, and is by no means adequate. The real cause
struck deeper, and was much more widely spread," the indifference
to family life, the refusal to rear children. " Described in general
terms, it was a want of reverence for the order of nature, for the
natural revelations of the will of God ; and the sanction of infanticide
was by no means the most destructive or the most loathsome form
in which it manifested itself. This was the cancer which had been
for many generations eating into the life of Greece." l So also the
Greeks in Asia and Egypt, like their rulers, lived generally in defiance
of all moral restraints. The history of the kings of Egypt and of
Syria is, with few exceptions, one of the most disgusting and degrad-
ing on record. The conquest of Asia and the East by Rome began
the moral clearance of Greek Asiatic society. The history of Greece,
after Alexander, is dismissed with contempt by its great historian
Grote, who, referring to the Achaean League, remarks : — "With this
after-growth, or half-revival, I shall not meddle. It forms the Greece
of Polybius, which that author, in my opinion, treats justly, as having
no history of its own, but as an appendage attached to some foreign
centre and principal among its neighbours, Macedonia, Egypt, Syria,
Rome. Each of these neighbours acted upon the destinies of Greece
more powerfully than the Greeks themselves. The Greeks ....
present, as their most marked characteristic, a loose aggregation of
autonomous tribes, or communities, acting and reacting freely among
themselves,, with little or no pressure from foreigners. The main
history of the narrative has consisted in the spontaneous grouping of
the different Hellenic factions, in the self-prompted co-operation, the
abortive attempts to bring about something like an effective federal
organisation ; or to maintain two permanent rival confederacies ; the
energetic ambitions and endurance of men to whom Hellas was the
'entire political world. The freedom of Hellas, the life and soul of
this history from its commencement, disappeared completely during
1 Thirhvall, " History of Greece," pp. 460-465.
104 From the EmPire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
the first years of Alexander's reign."1 Another able writer deals in
censures, which must be taken with some qualification :— " Especially
great appear the Romans and the Italians .... their military
rudeness shows in the most advantageous light when we compare it
with the base and grovelling temper of the Greeks, with their enmities
and envies amongst one another, and their readiness to sell friends
and country to the highest bidder, or to offer them up to their petty-
passions and grovelling desires."2
4. Rome was rapidly advancing towards the conquest of Italy,
south of the Rubicon. The Gallic irruption, and the taking of
Rome by the Gauls, after the battle of Allia 389 B.C., was but a
temporary check, and the calamity excited little interest beyond the
confines of Italy. So infrequent was the intercourse of nations that
the news of the capture reached Athens in the form of a story, that
an army of hyperboreans had taken a Greek city called Rome,
situated near the Great Sea. By the year 346 B.C. the Gauls had
been either driven from Italy or destroyed. Then followed the First
Samnite War 342-340 B.C. ; then the Latin War 339-337 B.C. ; then
the Second Samnite War 325-304 B.C., and a third 298-290 B.C. ;
after which, to the disgrace of the Romans, the brave and magnani-
mous Pontius of Telesina, the Samnite general and patriot, was
brutally put to death, after being led in chains in the triumphal
march of the conqueror in Rome. After this the Etruscans, with
the Boii and Senones bordering on Gallia Cisalpina, were reduced,
280 B.C. Another enemy, Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, connected with
the family of Alexander the Great, was stimulated to emulate his
career, and to carve out for himself an empire in Italy and Sicily.
Invited by the Tarentines and aided by the general sympathy of the
Greeks of southern Italy, the war continued from 282 B.C. to 272 B.C.,
after which Pyrrhus left for Sicily, and soon after was killed at Argos in
Greece. All Italy (not including Gallia Cisalpina) was now subject to
Rome, 266 B.C. Some of the Italian nations had already been admitted
to all the privileges of Roman citizenship ; others, as allies or con-
federates of Rome, retained their territorial rights, but were bound to
furnish supplies of troops, money, and corn ; some of the subject states
were severely dealt with and placed under great restriction. Single
cities were either municipia, with right of Roman citizenship, or
colonies settled by Roman citizens, to whom lands were assigned in the
vicinity, or prefecture, which were municipia governed by a magistrate
1 Grote, " History of Greece," I2mo. vol. xii. pp. 211-213.
" History of Rome " (Cab. Encyc. vol. i. p. 247).
to the Christian Era. 105
sent annually from Rome. The extension of the Roman territory
to the Alps by the conquest of the Gauls in north Italy was nearly
completed when the First Punic War with Carthage commenced,
264 B.C. "The ten years preceding the First Punic War were pro-
bably a time of the greatest physical prosperity which the mass of
the Roman people ever knew. Within twenty years two agrarian
laws had been passed on a most extensive scale, and the poorer
citizens had received besides what may be called a large dividend in
money out of the lands which the state had conquered. In addition
to this, the farming of the state domains, or of their produce,
furnished those who had money with abundant opportunities of
profitable adventure No wonder, then, that war was at this
time popular But our 'pleasant vices' are ever made
instruments to scourge us ; and the First Punic War, into which the
Roman people forced the senate to enter, not only in its long course
bore most heavily upon the poorer citizens, but, from the feelings of
enmity which it excited in the breast of Hamilcar, led most surely to
that fearful visitation of Hannibal's sixteen years' invasion of Italy,
which destroyed for ever, not indeed the pride of the Roman
dominion, but the well-being of the Roman people " l . . . . " Be-
ginning her career of conquest beyond the limits of Italy, Rome
was now entering upon her appointed work, and that work was
undoubtedly fraught with good." 2 But the occasion of the First
Punic War was dishonourable to Rome. Certain mercenary soldiers
had seized Messana in Sicily, destroyed the citizens, and held
possession against the Syracusans, 284 B.C. They were beaten in
the field and blockaded in Messana by Hiero, king of Syracuse, and
then, driven to extremity, sent a deputation to Rome, praying that
" the Romans, the sovereigns of Italy, would not suffer an Italian
people to be destroyed by Greeks and Carthaginians," 264 B.C. It
was singular that such a request should be made to the Romans,
who only six years before had chastised the military revolt of their
brethren Mamertines in Rhegium, taking the city by storm, scourging
and beheading the defenders, and then restoring the old inhabitants
(270 B.C.). The senate was opposed to the request of the Messana
deputation; but the consuls and the people of Rome, already
jealous of Carthaginian influence in Sicily and the Mediterranean,,
resolved to protect the Mamertime buccaneers and to receive them
as their friends and allies. Thus dishonestly and disgracefully did
the Romans depart from their purely Italian and continental policy,
1 Arnold, " History of Rome," vol. ii. pp. 538-540. 2 Ibid., p. 545.
106 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
which had so well succeeded, to enter upon another system, the
results of which no one then could foresee. Some excuse may be
found in the fact that the Carthaginians had been placed. by their
partisans in Messana in possession of the citadel, and this great rival
power of Carthage was thus brought unpleasantly near to the recent
conquered territory of Rome. The fear of Carthaginian influence
overcame the natural reluctance to an alliance with traitors false to
their military oath, the murderers and plunderers of a city which they
were bound to protect. Thus began " the First Punic War, which
lasted, without intermission, twenty-two years, a longer space of time
than the whole period occupied by the wars of the French Revo-
lution." x In this war Duilius won the first naval battle near Mylae
(Melarro). Regulus invaded Africa proper, the territory of
Carthage, with great success, until beaten and taken prisoner at
Zama, 256-255 B.C. The war was carried on in Sicily and on the sea
until 241 B.C., when peace was made on conditions that the Cartha-
ginians should evacuate Sicily and make no war upon Hiero, king of
Sicily (the ally of the Romans), that they should pay 3200 Euboic
talents (about £i 10,000) within ten years, 241 B.C. The effects of
an exhausting war were soon overcome by ancient nations, so that
both Rome and Carthage rapidly recovered, " because wars in those
days were not maintained at the expense of posterity."2 Rome had
to check the Illyrian pirates and to complete the conquest of
Cisalpine Gaul and the Ligurians 238-221 B.C. Meanwhile the
Carthaginians, hampered by a three years' rebellion of its mercenary
troops, quietly permitted the Romans to take possession of Corsica
and Sardinia, and agreed to pay 1200 talents as compensation to
Roman merchants. On the other hand, measures were in process to
re-establish the Carthaginian power ; the patriotic party, the Barcine
family, under Hamilcar, commenced the carrying out of the
extensions and consolidations of the territories in Spain. Hasdrubal,
his son-in-law, continued the same policy by wars and alliances until
the Romans, naturally jealous, were pacified by the engagement of
the Carthaginians not to extend their conquest to the north of the
Ebro, thus securing the people of Massalia (Roman allies), and
keeping the Carthaginians at a safe distance from Italy. Saguntum,
an independent city, originally a Greek colony, was, by this treaty,
not to be molested by the Carthaginians, but Hannibal, the son of
Hamilcar, who succeeded Hasdrubal, besieged and took Saguntum
after a siege of eight months, 219 B.C. (ostensibly in defence of a
1 Dr. Arnold, " History of Rome," vol. ii. p. 561. " Ibid., vol. iii. p. 24.
to the Christian Era. 107
Spanish tribe). Upon this, war was declared by the Romans 218
B.C., and then the Second Punic War began, which lasted nearly
eighteen years, "the most memorable of all that were ever waged,"
in the opinion of Livy. It will be ever remembered for the remark-
able campaign by which Hannibal entered Italy from Spain, through
Gaul across the Alps, and kept his army there for sixteen years ;
and also for the equally remarkable steady pertinacity of the opposi-
tion offered by Rome. The route taken by Hannibal was by the
Pyrenees, through southern Gaul by Narbonne and Nimes to the
Rhone, about two days' march above Avignon, then through the
country of the Allobroges, through Chamberry, and by the Pass of the
Little St. Bernard (or Mont Cenis) to Ivrea in Italy. The battles
of the Ticinus and Trebia made Hannibal master of all northern
Italy, 218 B.C., after which his victories on the Lake Thrasymenus,
217 B.C., and at Cannae, 216 B.C., caused all the nations of central
and southern Italy to throw off the Roman yoke, with the exception
of the Latins and a few isolated cities. But by 215 B.C. Hannibal's
career of successes terminated ; he received little help from Carthage,
and none from his ally, Philip III. of Macedon. The Romans
carried the war into Spain, to cut off all help from that quarter, and
at last into Africa. Scipio defeated the Carthaginians (commanded
by Hannibal, who had been recalled from Italy) at Zama, 202 B.C.,
and peace was concluded, by which the Carthaginians gave up all
their ships of war (except ten) and their elephants, and agreed to pay
10,000 talents within fifty years. The African ally of the Romans,
Masinissa, received the two Numidias, and thus Carthage was placed
defenceless under the power of Rome. " The immediate results of
the war were the conversion of Spain into two Roman provinces ; the
union of the hitherto dependent kingdom of Syracuse with the
Roman province of Sicily ; the establishment of a Roman instead
of the Carthaginian protectorate over the most important Numidian
chiefs ; and, lastly, the conversion of Carthage from a powerful
commercial state into a defenceless mercantile town. Moreover, it
brought about that decided contact between the state systems of the
East and the West which the First Punic War had only foreshadowed,
and thereby gave rise to the closely impending decisive interference
of Rome in the conflicts of the Alexandrian monarchies." * In this
war one fourth of the citizens of Rome had fallen, and three hundred
thousand Italians ; four hundred towns destroyed. The senate of
Rome required a nomination of one hundred and seventy-seven persons
1 " Mommsen, " vol. ii. pp. 189, 190. -. •
io8 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
to make up its number. The distressed country population became
demoralised ; robber bands multiplied, so that in Apulia alone seven
hundred men in one year had to be condemned for robbery.
5. There is but one opinion as to the beneficial character of the
results of the triumph of Rome, although " no single Roman will
bear comparison with Hannibal." .... "It was clearly for the
good of mankind that Hannibal should be conquered ; his triumph
would have stopped the progress of the world He who
grieves over the battle of Zama should carry on his thoughts ....
and consider how the isolated Phoenician city of Carthage was fitted
to receive and to consolidate the civilisation of Greece, or by its
laws and institutions to bind together barbarians of every race and
language into an organised empire, and prepare them for becoming,
when that empire was dissolved, the free members of the common-
wealth of Christian Europe." * And again, " If under the conditions
of ancient society, and the savagery of the warfare which it
tolerated, there was an unavoidable necessity for either Rome or
Carthage to perish utterly, we must admit, in spite of the sympathy
which the brilliancy of the Carthaginian civilisation, the heroism of
Hamilcar and Hannibal, and the tragic catastrophe itself call forth,
that it was well for the human race that the blow fell on Carthage
rather than on Rome. A universal Carthaginian empire could have
done for the world, as far as we can see, nothing comparable
to that which the Roman universal empire did for it. It would not
have melted down national antipathies ; it would not have given a
common literature or language ; it would not have prepared the way
for a higher civilisation and an infinite purer religion. Still less
would it have built up that majestic fabric of law which forms the
basis of the legislation of all the states of modern Europe and
America." 2 " We look in vain for any legacy left by the Phoenicians
(Carthage) to the world except the development of peaceful trade ;
they taught the world no politics, no religion or arts. They have
left us no orators, no poets, no historians ; and yet it may be that in
this they have only suffered the fate of vanquished nations. Who
knows but that, had they defeated the Romans, they might have
perpetuated a literature equal to that of the Hebrews ? But, still,
they could never have replaced the Greeks in politics, in the arts,
and in the general power of assimilating other nations to themselves
.... for this reason, they were swept away as soon as they had
1 Arnold, " History of Rome," vol. iii. p. 65.
2 Bosworth-Smith, " Rome and Carthage," pp. 21, 22.
to tJie Christian Era. 109
done their work." * These opinions will meet with the approval of
most thoughtful men; but the necessity for the destruction of
Carthage itself is quite another question. The Roman power was
not affected in after-ages by the wealth and trade of the new
Carthage on the old site, or of Alexandria. One great evil is
obvious ; there was no rival left to exercise a moderating influence
on the ambition and covetousness of the governing class at Rome ;
hence resulted the rapid corruption of public and social life ; the
dissolution of the old Roman manners, and the equally rapid
extinction of the old Roman population in Rome and in Italy,
supplanted by the enormous addition made to the slave population
after the Second Punic War. Free labour and slavery cannot exist
together; hence the brave old warlike farmers, the civic and the agricul-
tural free labouring population had ceased to exist in the first century
before the Christian era. Rome itself became a city, peopled by
the refuse of the conquered nationalities. This deterioration of
manners and race may be dated from the return of the army of
Manlius from Asia, about 187 B.C.
6. Three wars with Philip III. of Macedon followed, 214-204
B.C., again 200-197 B.C. After the second war, which gave the
Romans the predominance in Greece, by the taking from Philip the
hegemony of the Greek states, a war with Antiochus III., the Great,
of Syria, followed, 192-190 B.C. This monarch, offended by
the interference of the Romans in declaring the Greeks of Asia
" free and independent," endeavoured to form an alliance with Mace-
donia and the Greek states against Rome. The ^Etolians were his
allies ; Macedon and the Achaeans remained firm to the Romans.
Antiochus was defeated at Thermopylae, in Greece, and, followed by
the Romans into Asia, was again defeated at Magnesia, and com-
pelled to pay fifteen thousand talents, to deliver up his fleet and ele-
phants, and to abandon all Asia Minor west of the Taurus. Eumenes,
king of Pergamus, and the Rhodians, the allies of the Romans,
were rewarded by additions of territory. On the death of Philip III.
Perseus, his son, began the Third War with Rome, 171-168 B.C.,
which ended in the battle of Pydna, and the subjection of Mace-
donia, Illyria, and Epirus. In Epirus seventy cities were sacked in
one day, and one hundred and fifty thousand of the inhabitants sold
into slavery. One thousand of the leading Achaeans, suspected of
attachment to Macedonian rule, were sent to Rome and detained
there seventeen years. Assisted by a revolt in Macedonia, the
1 Mahafly on " Primitive Civilization," p. 174.
no From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
Achseans again opposed the Romans ; they were defeated and con-
quered by Mummius, the consul, who sacked and burnt Corinth,
and thus the whole of Greece with Macedonia became Roman
provinces 146 B.C. The same year what is called the Third Punic
War was ended. This really was merely the carrying out the
determination of Rome to destroy the city of Carthage. After two
years' resistance Carthage was taken and levelled to the ground
146 B.C. The wars with Macedonia prevented the possibility of a
consolidation of Greek power under Macedon, which might have
preserved Greek nationality. With the destruction of Carthage there
was no rival power left to excite the few, or check the ambition, of
the leaders of the Roman oligarchy. In Spain alone, among .the
Celtiberians and Numantians of the North, there was resistance,
which terminated in the taking of Numantia after a siege of
fifteen months, 133 B.C. Roman conquest was not interrupted by
the dissensions of the Roman factions, or by insurrection of the
slaves, or of the Italian allies. In three wars with Mithridates,
king of Pontus, 88-84, 83, 74-63 B.C., the Roman power in Asia
was sustained arid firmly established. In Africa the Jugurthan
war, 111-105 B^C., ended with the capture of Jugurtha, and placed
all north Africa under Roman rule. Transalpine Gaul was formed
into the Roman "provincia" 123 B.C. Syria and Armenia became
Roman provinces 64 B.C. Gaul was conquered by Julius C?esar 58-49
B.C., and Egypt ceased to be a united kingdom after the battle of
Actium, 30 B.C. The history of these conquests cannot be given in
detail ; that of Gaul is the most important. "The Kelts in every fea-
ture resemble their Irish descendants — brave, poetical, amiable, clever,
but, in a political point of view, a thoroughly useless nation." * ' In
the opinion of Mommsen, the Gauls were incapable of resisting the
Germans, and that Caesar, by his repulse of Ariovistus, the German,
postponed the occupation of the west of Europe by the barbarians
four centuries. " That there is a bridge connecting the past history
and glory of Hellas and Rome with the prouder fabric of modern
history ; that western Europe is Romaic, and that Germanic
Europe is classic ; that the names of Themistocles and Scipio have
to us a very different sound from those of Azoka and Salmanazzar ;
that Homer and Euripides are not merely like the Vedas and
Kalidasa, attractions to the literary botanist, but flower for us in our
own garden— all this is the work of Caesar."2 "In the mighty
vortex of the world's history, which inevitably crushes all people that
are not as hard and as flexible as steel, such a nation (the Kelts)
1 Mommsen, vol. iv. p. 287. * Ibid., vol. iv. pp. 285-289.
to the Christian Era. 1 1 1
could not permanently maintain itself. With reason the Kelts of
the continent suffered the same fate at the hands of the Romans as
their kinsmen in Ireland suffer down to our day at the hands ot
the Saxons — the fate of becoming merged as a leaven of future
development in a political superior nationality/'1 But, leaving
these doubtful speculations, tinged with some national prejudice, it
is necessary to turn to the struggles and dissensions of the city of
Rome, the attempts at reform, and their failures, which prepared the
way for the extinction of the Republic.
7. The internal history of the Roman people reveals to us two great
struggles : that for equality of civil and social position between the
populus (the old aristocratic patricians, the original people, at one
time the only people) and the plebeians, the free inhabitants (as dis-
tinguished from the clients, who were dependants upon the great
patrician families). But before 174 B.C. this struggle had ended.
Even the office of pontifex maximus had been granted to a plebeian,
300 B.C., and the populus now comprehended the entire free popu-
lation, all of whom were eligible to the highest offices. A new order
of nobility arose, the nobiles or optimates, consisting of persons whose
ancestors had filled curule offices (who had passed the chair), such
as the sedileship, prastorship, or consulate. None but the richest
families could belong to this order, as the first step to office, the
sedileship, was burdened (since the First Punic War) with the cost of
the public shows and games. The equestrian dignity was also in the
hands of the rich, having no longer any connexion with the cavalry
service, but with the amount of property held. The rest of the popu-
lation were termed ignobiles and obscuri, and their members homines
novi. The other struggle was respecting an agrarian law to regulate
the appropriation and use of the public lands — the ager publicus.
This land was at first occupied by the patrician " populus," as lease-
holders under the state, claiming also an exclusive right as a class
to the enjoyment of such leases, which, in fact, were the main sources
of the wealth and power of their order. The claims of the plebeians
to a share in this monopoly led to the agitation for an agrarian law.
The nature of this law was not understood by historians before the time
of Heyne (1793) followed by Niebuhr and Savigny. It had no refer-
ence to private property in land, but related solely to the public lands.
The object of the proposers of these laws was to limit the extent of
the public lands held by individuals, and to appropriate portions
among the poorer citizens of Rome. These, and the smaller pro-
prietors around Rome, had, in the preceding generation, to fill the
1 Mommsen, vol. iv. p. 285.
H2 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
armies, and to furnish the means for their own personal equipment,
while carrying on the annual campaigns in the wars in Italy. To meet
these burdens, they had been, and were yet, compelled to borrow
largely of the moneyed class, and were legally liable to be sold with
their families, as slaves, to meet the claims of their creditors. Hence
the occasional interference of the state with the claims of the creditors,
sometimes by lowering the amounts due, or by erasing the debts.
But these temporary expedients could not save the then poor citizen
farmers from ruin. Patriotic, far-seeing men saw in the alteration of
the land laws the most probable means of permanent relief. Spurius
Cassius, 486-458 B.C., had begun the contest, and the temporary
secessions of the people from Rome, 492 B.C., 448 B.C., 395 B.C.,
had proved the intense feeling of a large party in this question. The
Licinian Laws, 375-362 B.C., the Publilian Laws, 339 B.C., aimed to
limit the holding of the public land to 500 jugera (from 280 to 300
English acres), and to assign portions, varying from 2 to 14 jugera,
to the poorer citizens. These 500 jugera, all arable land, formed no
paltry farm, considering the right of pasturage on the outlying lands,
for 100 large, or 500 small cattle, the fertility of the soil, and the
frugal habits of the people. Such a farm is regarded as a handsome
property in the Roman territory in the present day.1 Each attempt
of the patriotic advocates of these laws was followed by some advan-
tage to the people, but the laws were evaded or revoked, as oppor-
tunity offered ; and the evil of the decrease of tillage, through the
enlargement of pasturage and the employment of slaves to the
exclusion of free labourers and free proprietors, went on increasing
day by day. This state of affairs alarmed Tiberius Gracchus, when
brought to his notice in his journey through Tuscany to join the
Roman army before Numantia, in Spain, 137 B.C. He saw large
domains covered with droves of cattle tended by mounted shepherds,
while swine were running wild in the forest — miles and miles of land
abandoned to the boar and the buffalo. Here and there a solitary
herdsman might be seen with his staff or his pike to defend himself
against the wolves and wild boars. And these few inhabitants were
generally barbarians (Thracians, Iberians, or Africans), ignorant of
the language of Rome. This monopoly of land (latifundia) natur-
ally led to another evil (proletariat the crowded beggar population
of large towns, especially of Rome. To understand the nature of
the social and political problems connected with these words is, to
all of us, a matter of importance. These explain the decline of the
1 Niebuhr in Foreign Quarterly, No. xxxiii.
to tJie Christian Era. 113
Roman Empire. They discover to us the nature of that cankerworm
which is stealthily, but steadily and continuously, impairing the
vitality of our modern civilisation. Tiberius Gracchus, first of all,
137-133 B.C., and next, Caius Gracchus, his brother, 124-121 B.C.,
after carrying a series of enactments to remedy these evils, fell a
sacrifice to the fears and the revenge of the opponents of the agrarian
laws. The regulations in favour of small grants to the poorer citizens
were neutralised by the permission given to the recipients to sell
these lands. From 139 B.C. to 123 B.C. the ballot was used in
all cases where votes were taken. But from that time bribery was
used to such an extent that voting became a profitable and easy
trade, and special agencies arose for managing elections and evading
the law. A tribune, Bonus (119 B.C.), carried a law against the
future division of the public lands, with a provision that the rents
should form a fund for the relief of the poor. This poor law was
repealed, so far as the tax was concerned, in B.C.; and thus, by the
persevering scheming of the oligarchic faction, the poorer classes
lost both land and the poor money. Great was the party violence in
these contests. When Tiberius Gracchus was killed, three hundred
persons fell with him ; and when his brother, Caius Gracchus, fell,
three thousand persons were killed in the streets, or strangled in
prison. On the question of the policy of the Gracchi there is,
great difference of opinion — just as in England, on the Reform Bill
of 1832. Mommsen (the German historian) appears to approve,,
on the whole, the policy of the Gracchi, but complains of the
irregularity of the procedure, as if it were possible to carry out
reforms affecting powerful interests without a great departure from
ordinary routine. In such cases the spirit of the constitution,
rather than the letter is to be considered. That such measures above
law are dangerous, no one doubts, and they are only justifiable
when absolute necessity requires prompt and extreme remedy. The
evils which result as the consequence of such irregular action lie at
the door of those who obstinately oppose the necessary reforms.
Mommsen thinks that, as Rome was governed by a senate, it was
contrary to the spirit of the constitution when Tiberius Gracchus sub-
mitted the domain question to the people, and when he uncon-
stitutionally deposed his tribunal colleagues— that the burgess
assemblies in the comitia had become mere mobs, and that the
comitia itself had also become a mere meeting (a contio), such as was
called to consider, but not to decide, and that by such contiones
practically the decrees were passed, each contio thus decreeing
itself lands out of the public purse. These contiones had no
i
H4 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
legal significance, " practically they ruled the street, and, already, the
opinion of the street was a power in Rome." Scipio ^milianus knew
the composition of improvised contiones, when, in 133 B.C., he
said, in a speech to the populace, "Ye, to whom Italy is not mother,
but step-mother, ought to keep silence ; surely ye do not think that
I will fear those let loose whom I sent in chains to the slave-market."
In Mommsen's opinion, " when any one, whom circumstances and his
own influence with the proletariate enabled to command the streets for
a few hours, found it possible to impress on his projects the stamp of
the sovereign people's will, Rome had reached, not the beginning,
but the end, of popular freedom — had arrived, not at democracy, but
at monarchy." And yet, again, he makes admissions which tell against
his objections : " The aristocratic government was so thoroughly per-
nicious, that a citizen who was able to depose the senate, and to put
himself in its room, would, perhaps, have benefited the common-
wealth more than he injured it."1 A. H. Beesley 2 takes a decidedly
favourable view. He thinks that Tiberius Gracchus was guilty of
beginning a revolution in Rome, in the sense that a man is guilty
who introduces a light into some chamber filled with explosive
vapour, which the stupidity or malice of others had suffered to
accumulate. :The effects of the reactionary legislation after the death
of Caius Gracchus is described as follows : " Slave labour, and
slave discontent, latifundia, decrease of population, depreciation of the
land, received a fresh impetus, and the triumphant optimates pushed
the state step by step further down the road to ruin .... Ten years
after the passing of the Bsebian law it was said that among all the citi-
zens there were only two thousand wealthy families .... The death of
Caius prolonged the senate's misrule for twenty years : twenty years
of shame, at home and abroad .... before those who had drawn
the sword against the Gracchi perished by the sword of Marius im-
potent, unpitied, and despised." 3 The greatest of all evils resulting
from the legislation of Caius Gracchus was the legalising abuses
connected with the right of all citizens in Rome to purchase grain
from the public stores at a low price, the loss being borne by
the state. Fifty years later the quantity sold to each was limited to
the 40,000 purchasers. Clodius (the demagogue, the enemy of
Cicero) enacted that i \ bushel per month should be given without
payment. There were soon 320,000 claimants. These Julius Csesar
reduced to 150,000, and Augustus fixed the number at 200,000.
., ..^..
1 Mommsen, vol. iii. pp. 97-100.
2 In the " Gracchi," &c. " Epochs of History." 3 Ibid., pp. 30, 6l, 62.
to the Christian Era. 1 1 5
Various attempts were made to remedy the evils resulting from the fail-
ure of the agrarian reform, and in after-ages the settlement of colonies,
in order to provide for disbanded soldiers and others, displayed the
consciousness of the existence of a growing evil rather than the best
means for its alleviation. The lands of Italy were depopulated, the
mongrel degraded mob of Rome, fed by largesses of corn from the
tributes of Sicily, Africa, and Egypt, had no wish to lead a life of
labour as farmers, distant from the amusements and comforts of
Rome, their sole desire "panem et circenses." And so affairs con-
tinued for more than four centuries, when " the (barbarian) flood
came and destroyed them all " (Luke xvii. 26). There were other
dark spots in the victorious picture of Roman progress, which should
be made more prominent in the histories of Roman prosperity.
Three Slave wars in Italy and Sicily (134-132) — (103-401), the
last of which (73-71) was a war with revolted gladiators. Add
to these the extensive piracy carried on in the Mediterranean, for the
extinction of which large powers were granted to Pompey, by whom
the pirates were effectually quelled 67 B.C. The Roman world, and
Rome itself, had to pay dearly for the benefits connected with the
rule of Rome.
8. The invasion of the Cimbri (perhaps a mixed race of Kelts and
Teutons) was repelled by the consul Marius, both in Gaul and in
North Italy, 103-101 B.C. About 320,000 men are supposed to
have been slain in this conflict. The Social or Marsic War on the
part of a large number of the Italian allies, who demanded the full
franchise, continued three years, 90-88 B.C. Full 300,000 lives were
lost in this contest. When the war was over, the Romans wisely
granted them the franchise. Eight or ten tribes were added to the
thirty-five already existing. The new citizens had to appear in person
at Rome to give their votes in the polling booths. " The enrolment of
the Italians among her own citizens deserves to be regarded as the
gravest stroke of policy in the whole history of the republic ....
Doubtless it helped in some measure to accelerate the destruction
of the old national sentiments. But these were already mortally
stricken, and were destined quickly to perish in the general corruption
of society. It reduced the legions more directly to instruments of
their generals' personal ambition ; but the strongest check to that fatal
tendency had been already removed by the enlistment of the lower
classes of Rome by Marius, and these the necessities of the state
«... had both justified and approved .... It undermined the
despotic rule of the oligarchy." l This measure, whether deemed
1 Merivale, "Fall of the Roman Republic," p. 98.
I 2
u6 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
wise or the contrary by the historians, was a necessity which could not
be avoided. It might have led to the re-establishment and perpetuity
of the republic had the people and leaders of Rome understood the
practicability of representing the scattered and distant, as well as
those near and on the spot, by the election of delegates (as in modern
times). A parliament of representatives of the Italian states, working
in connexion with the senate, might have altered, not only the history
of Rome, but the history of the world. As it was, the extension of
the franchise did no harm to the republic, which had virtually ceased
to exist. The history of Rome from this time is one of personal
struggles for power. It becomes a mere biography of Marius, of Sylla,
of Pompey and Caesar, of Marc Antony and Octavius Caesar, mingled
with notices of Catiline and Cicero, Brutus and Cato. In the
interests of humanity, the vast provinces governed and plundered by
the nominees of the Roman oligarchy required some change by
which the extortion and the tyranny of these oppressors might be
controlled. The provinces longed for the rule of one over Rome
itself and over them.
9. MARIUS, the son of a day labourer, rose from the ranks, was
patronised by Scipio at Numantia, and, by his marriage with the
aunt of Julius Caesar, was placed in a position to aspire to the
honours of the state. His bravery and energy, accompanied by
coarseness of taste and habits, contrasted with those of his rival
Sylla, the noble, literary, but debauched leader of the oligarchy, a
man brave but cruel, of whom it is said that " no act of kindness or
generosity is recorded of him." At the end of the Social War, Sylla,
the consul 88 B.C., obtained the command of the army against
Mithridates, This was opposed by the partisans of Marius, who, in
Sylla's absence, nominated Marius to the command against that
sovereign in the place of Sylla. Sylla, who had not left Italy, at
once returned to Rome with part of his army, and Marius had to
fly from Rome. Since Marius (107 B.C.) had enrolled as soldiers
the rabble of the forum, men without property, and thus created a
mere mercenary body of soldiers in lieu of the old citizen troops,
the Roman armies became not so much the forces of the state as ol
the general who commanded them. These popular, brave, daring,
and fortunate generals became practically the rulers of the common-
wealth. Sylla having left for Asia with his army, Marius returned
to Rome, favoured by the consul Cinna, 87 B.C. Then began a
merciless slaughter of opponents for five days and nights without
interruption, and after this there were daily executions for four
months in Rome and in all Italy. " The sympathies of Marius lay
to the Christian Era. 1 1 7
wholly with the best element which was left among the inhabitants
of Italy. The villager of Arpinum, whose grandfather had not been
a full citizen, felt with the remnant of the old rural plebeians ; still
more strongly, perhaps, did he feel with the unenfranchised allies.
If the daring plebeian bearded the nobles to their faces, the stout
yeoman looked with no favour on the law which distributed corn
among the idle populace of the city."1 Marius was, no doubt, mad,
and his death early in 86 B.C. was a relief to his party. Cinna died
84 B.C. On Sylla's return, 83 B.C., the younger Marius, assisted by
the Samnites, nearly took Rome, but were defeated at the Colline
Gate, November i. The city had never been in such peril since the
conquest by the Gauls. This placed Sylla in possession of Rome
and of the supreme power. Then began the work of vengeance.
Next day from three to eight thousand prisoners were massacred :
then twelve thousand prisoners captured at Praeneste were slain (with
the exception of the Romans and the women and children) ; the
body of Marius was torn from its grave and thrown into the Arno ;
about two hundred senators and two or three thousand of the
equites were put to death, besides thousands of the common
people in Rome and also numbers in the cities of Italy. Etruria
was so thoroughly ravaged, everywhere the old population perished,
and the language lost ; in all Italy cities were dismantled, the
Samnite people annihilated, and the confiscated lands divided
among 120,000 of Sylla's soldiers. Sylla was appointed dictator
for an indefinite period, empowered to re-form and re-construct the
commonwealth. Sylla is one of the most marvellous characters in
history. Beesley thinks that, when Sylla saw Marius "gradually
floundering into villany, he more than felt the serene superiority of
a natural genius for vice."2 He was luxurious, licentious, a scoffer,
and yet superstitious, cynical, contemptuous of public opinion,
without confidence in human nature, and yet without fear. All his
legislation had for its object the revival of the old constitution and
the old restrictions, although most of the old families had already
perished. " Ten years sufficed to overthrow the whole structure of
this reactionary legislation." In the year 79 B.C. Sylla, after killing
fifteen consulars, ninety senators, two thousand six hundred knights,
and one hundred thousand Romans and Italians, and confiscating
their goods, resigned his power, in the market-place of Rome, and
returned to his dwelling fearless and unhurt ; he amused himself
with literature and in writing the memoirs of his own life, until his
1 Freeman, " Essays, "second series, p. 281. 2 The Gracchi, p. 80.
Ii8 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
sudden death 78 B.C., aged sixty. "Stained with the blood of so
many thousand victims, and tormented with a loathsome disease, he
quitted the world without a symptom either of remorse or repining."1
His character has been studied by historians who have no sympathy
with his crimes or his vices. "The cold-blooded politic massacres
of Sylla seems to us to imply a looser moral state than the ferocious
revenge of Marius, or even than the bloody madness of Caius or
Nero. That such a man should have done such deeds puts human
nature in a far more fearful light than it is put by the frantic crimes
of silly youths whose heads were turned by the possession of abso-
lute power His crimes were greater in degree than those
either of Caesar or Buonaparte .... but he had an object before
him which was not wholly selfish ; he was above the vulgar ambition
of becoming a king and the father of kings .... he had not
been working and sinning only for his own gains or his own vanity ;
there was a kind of patriotism in the man, perverted and horrible as
was the form which it took."2
10. After the gladiatorial rebellion, which was put down at last by
Pompey 71 B.C. (a partisan of Sylla), a man cultivated and moral,
" but destitute of the real generosity which makes and retains
friends" . . . . " feared by all, admired by some, trusted by few, and
loved by none,"3 he became one of the leading men of Rome.
Crassus, the great capitalist, was another. Caius Julius Caesar was
the third. Julius Caesar, of high patrician descent, yet connected
by marriage with Marius and Cinna, looked upon himself as the
heir of their policy in its better aspects; reckless, lavish, and
licentious, but literary and cultivated, " he was saved from being a
monster of pride and selfishness by no moral principle, but only by
the geniality of his temper and the kindness of his disposition."*
Pompey and Crassus obtained the consulship B.C. 70. In 67 B.C.
Pompey was intrusted with extraordinary powers, by which he was
able to put down the formidable piracies which had made the
navigation of the Mediterranean unsafe. Next year his party
recalled Lucullus, who was engaged in the war with Mithridates, and
Pompey was appointed his successor. After defeating Mithridates,
he put an end to the monarchy of the Seleucidae in Syria, and
extended the bounds of the Roman empire to the Euphrates,
63 B.C. In the absence of Pompey, Julius Caesar, by degrees,
1 Merivale, "Fall of the Roman Republic," p. 149.
2 Freeman's " Essays," second series, pp. 282-287.
3 Merivale, " Fall of the Roman Republic," p. 169. 4 Ibid., p. 185.
to the Christian Era. 119
allowed his opinions (which were not friendly to the oligarchic
senate) to be known, and, by a large expenditure, kept up the
attachment of the popular party in Rome. He was elected pontifex
maximus, and, though deeply in debt, borrowed still more largely
to insure his election. The conspiracy of Catiline, discovered and
put down by the decision of the great orator Cicero, the consul for
the year 63 B.C., ended with the death of Catiline in battle, 62 B.C.
Caesar, after commanding in Spain, 61 B.C., became consul 59 B.C.,
by the help of Pompey, and at the expiration of his term of office
obtained Cisalpine Gaul, and Gaul beyond the Alps, as his sphere
of command, 58 B.C. This was the result of a tacit understanding
between Pompey, Crassus, and Caesar, though as yet the triumvirate
was not what it became at a later period, a regularly-appointed board
for the administration of affairs. This first triumvirate was simply
an understood compact by which the three parties bound themselves
to advance the special objects of each other. The conception of
this compact was due to the genius of Caesar alone, 56-61 B.C. The
views of the three were different : Pompey and Crassus aimed at
such an ascendancy as would make them independent of the senate
and of the populace of the forum ; Caesar had other and less selfish
views — he saw that the city had become an empire, and that this
empire could no longer be governed as a city or municipality for the
benefit of the citizens. All the conquered peoples looked up to an
autocracy. It was his ambition to be himself the man, and thus
supply the want, the necessity of the empire. Such, no doubt, were
the grounds by which he justified to himself his actions, and these
have been too readily accepted by historians. "It was well for
the world that a man of genius should arise at such a crisis to
direct the general sentiment, and show how it could be realised."1
" Caesar's private means had been long exhausted ; the friends who
had continued to supply his necessities had seemed to pour their
treasures into a bottomless gulf; so vast was his expenditure in
shows, canvasses, and bribes, so long and barren the career ot
public service through which this ceaseless profusion had to be
maintained. At this period, when the bold gamester was about to
throw his last die, he could avow that he wanted two hundred and
fifty million sesterces (above two millions sterling) to be worth
nothing ! Before he could enter on the administration of his
province he had pressing creditors to satisfy and expensive prepara-
tions to make."2 To this impediment of debt there was another, a
1 Merivale, "Fall of the Roman Republic," p. 69. 2 Ibid., p. 252.
120 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
decree of the senate to retain him at home. He borrowed of
Crassus an amount equal to two hundred thousand pounds, and,
once at the head of his troops, his foes would not dare to recall him.
While Csesar was carrying on the wars which led to the conquest of
Gaul, Crassus was killed in the Parthian campaign at Carrhae, 53 B.C.
After this Pompey felt some jealousy of Cesar's military glory and
popularity, and, yielding to the oligarchic party, did not oppose the
recall of Csesar, while himself retained his office and power 50 B.C.
Csesar without an army, and Pompey with his army, would have
placed Caesar helpless at the mercy of his enemies in the senate.
Csesar, conscious of his power and popularity, determined to assert
his right to justice and equal consideration, crossed the Rubicon
49 B.C., the legal boundary of Italy. A large party in Italy and in
Rome sympathised with him. Italy was gained in sixty days.
Pompey left for Greece. Caesar, having first defeated the Pompeians
in Spain, followed Pompey into Greece 48 B.C. The Battle of
Pharsalia and the subsequent flight and murder of Pompey in Egypt
left Csesar the sole master of the (so-called) republic. Froude
regards Pompey " as a weak, good man, whom accident had thrust
into a place to which he was unequal ; and, ignorant of himself and
unwilling to part with his imagined greatness, he was flung down
with careless cruelty by the forces which were dividing the world."1
After settling the affairs of Egypt in favour of Cleopatra, and then
•defeating the successor of Mithridates in Asia Minor, Caesar returned
to Rome, 47 B.C. After a brief stay there he proceeded to Africa,
and defeated the Pompeians at Thapsus (of whom Scipio, Juba, and
Cato committed suicide), and returned to Rome, 46 B.C. Again he
departed for Spain, and defeated the Pompeian party in Spain at
Munda, Varus, Labienus, and thirty thousand of their army killed
in the battle. Cnseus Pompey fled, but soon afterwards was killed.
Caesar again returned to Rome, 45 B.C., to celebrate his fifth triumph,
and to carry on the reforms which he deemed necessary for the
prosperity of the state. His measures were comprehensive and
able : he revised the list of the recipients of corn, and reduced the
number ; he extended the franchise of Roman citizenship to Cis-
alpine Gaul, the Gallic legion, and all scientific men. To Trans-
alpine Gaul he gave the Latin franchise. He restored the Roman
senate, adding to it his friends, until it contained nine hundred
members, many of whom were Gauls. The calendar was reformed ;
military colonies established in the provinces, of which Corinth and
1 "Life of Csesar."
to the Christian Era. 12 1
Carthage were the most important; and endeavours were made
towards mitigating the hardships of slave life. He entertained grand
and gigantic schemes of first crushing the Parthians, then returning
across the Tanais and Borysthenes, subduing the northern barbarians,
and finally attacking the Germans in the rear, but on the isth March,
44 B.C., he was assassinated in the senate-house by Brutus, Cassius,
Casca, Cimba, Trebonius, and others. This murder might be
cynically described, in the language of a modern French statesman,
not merely as a crime, but worse, as a mistake, and a most unfor-
tunate one. To use the expression of Cicero, "the tyrant is dead,
but the tyranny survives." It survived and was perpetuated, and
was too often exercised by men who, as the successors of Caesar,
were a disgrace to his name. Caesar was no traitor to the republic,
which had, before his time, ceased to exist except in name. Nor
was he unfaithful to his colleague Pompeius. It was Pompey,
whose jealousy permitted the recall of Caesar to the position of a
private citizen, while he himself had his army and retained all the
authority of his position. Caesar was willing to give up his army
provided his rival did the same. Armies had ceased to belong to
the republic, they now belonged to their leaders. In the possession
of supreme power Caesar honestly endeavoured to reform and recast
the old regime, and to adapt it to the changed circumstances of the
times. He had a heart, and never abandoned his friends as Pompey
had done. " Whatever he undertook and achieved was penetrated
and guided by the cool sobriety which constitutes the most marked
peculiarity of his genius. To this he owed the power of living
energetically in the present, undisturbed by recollection or expecta-
tion Caesar was the entire and perfect man."1 There are,
however, other opinions of Caesar's character worthy of consideration.
Dr. Thomas Arnold, in his " History of Rome," remarks : " If from
the intellectual we turn to the moral character of Caesar, the whole
range of history can hardly furnish a picture of greater deformity."
In Froude's eyes he is a great political creator, a statesman with a
single eye to justice and good government.2 " Mommsen justifies
the act of Caesar, in substituting his own rule for that of the senate,
by precisely the same reasoning which he employs to justify the
senate of an earlier period for superseding the rule of the people.
In each case the usurpation was rendered legitimate by exclusive
ability to govern."3 Caesar has the advantage of being, on the
1 Mommsen, vol. iv. pp. 451-457. - Quarterly Review, No. cxlviii. p. 68.
3 Edinburgh Review i No. cl. p. 512.
122 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
whole, better as a master than any of his competitors for power ;
but neither he nor they can be justified, much less do they deserve
eulogy. His death was followed by fourteen years of civil war,
proscriptions, and misery.
ii. The death of Caesar left for a time Marc Antony, his
lieutenant, at the head of affairs. The murderers, unable to oppose
the popular feeling and the power of Caesar's followers, fled from
Rome to organise their armies in the provinces. Marc Antony had
to compete with Octavius, the nephew of Caesar, who, as his heir,
claimed a position and a voice in the commonwealth. The great
orator, Cicero, was opposed to Marc Antony, and at this time
delivered his famous philippics in the senate against him. Marc
Antony, checked at Mutina 43 B.C., found it necessary to come to
terms with Octavius. The result was, not the re-establishment of the
old oligarchy, but the formation of the second triumvirate (near
Bonnonia) 43 B.C., consisting of Octavius, Lepidus, and Marc Antony.
These three were to reign over Rome together,- to possess the
consular power in common for five years, and to dispose of all the
magistracies. Their decrees were to have the force of law, without
requiring the confirmation of the senate or people. In the disposal
of the provinces the two Gauls fell to Antony, the Spains and pro-
vincia to Lepidus, Africa and the islands to Octavius. Proscriptions
followed. The triumvirs framed a list of the names of those whose
death would be regarded as advantageous to any of the three, and
on this list each in his turn pricked a name. The consul Pedius
was directed to put to death seventeen persons at once. This was-
done in the night. Antony's first victim was the orator Cicero.
Froude speaks of Cicero as " a tragic combination of magnificent
talent, high aspirations, and true desire to do right, with an infirmity
of purpose and a latent insincerity of character which neutralised,
and could almost make us forget, his nobler qualities." 1 Lepidus
gave up his brother Paullus ; after which, three hundred senators
and two thousand knights were proscribed and perished. After thus
securing Rome, by leaving no one able to raise resistance, Octavius
and Antony defeated and slew Brutus and Cassius in two battles
at Philippi 42 B.C., after these two aristocratic murderers, whom,
modern ignorance has styled patriots, had ruled over the East with
such oppression and tyranny, that their defeat was received by the
provinces as a blessing. The triumvirs then quarrelled. Antony
seemed inclined to ally himself with Sextus Pompeius. Lepidus was
1 " Life of Caesar."
to the Christian Era. 123
removed from the triumvirate, and an open rupture took place
between Antony and Octavius. Antony was defeated at Actium
31 B.C., and retreated to Egypt, where he stabbed himself, and died
in Cleopatra's arms 30 B.C. ; her own suicide followed, and Octavius,
better known as Augustus, returned to Rome, and is henceforth
regarded as the first monarch of the empire of Rome. The system
followed by the republic in appointing its praetors and consuls (on
leaving office) to the government of distant provinces, with absolute
power and with armies under their command, had borne its natural
fruit. Pompey, Caesar, and suchlike men, having once, for periods
of years, exercised supreme power over nations larger and more
populous than Italy, were naturally unwilling to submit to the
authority of a degraded and selfish oligarchy as represented by the
senate, or to an ignorant and greedy mob which had succeeded to
the place of the Roman comitia. It was well for Rome that it fell
into the hands of Augustus. Freeman defends the senate, and his
remarks, so far as they apply to the general beneficial actions of the
senate previous to the triumvirate, are just; but this was a very
different senate under the dictatorship and murderous executions of
the triumvirs. Upon this latter senate that of Augustus, renewed
and reformed by him, was a great improvement, especially as it had
no longer the power to plunder and tyrannise over the provincials.
The time in which there had been free discussion in the old senate
had long passed away, and there were few left who regretted the
previous senates as assemblies " deserving the grateful remembrance
of mankind."1
12. "The hour has at length arrived for the full acquiescence of
both nobles and people in the inevitable yoke impending upon them
for a hundred years ; but, if the hour has arrived, so has the man
also. Octavius and his epoch were made for each other. At no
other period could he have formed the monarchy on an immovable
basis j but even at that era none but himself could so have fixed it.
.... The art of the last conqueror of the Romans lay in the
concealment of his art, in persuading his subjects that the republic
still continued to exist, while they were, in fact, no better than the
slaves of a monarchical despotism." 2 All this is true, but the
" despotism " was better than that triumviral anarchy and murder
and a helpless senate. The "slavery " consisted not in the loss of
constitutional government, but in the non-exercise, by a mob, of
1 Freeman's "Essays," second series, pp. 337-339.
2 Merivale, "Fall of the Roman Republic," p. 544.
124 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
suffrages, the abuse of which had ruined the republic. The position
of Augustus was well defined in the expression of Tiberius, his
successor : " I am master of my slaves, imperator of my soldiers,
and prince of the citizens." * There was another side, by no means
pleasing. From the will of the emperor there was, however, no
escape. He might or not observe legal forms, or he might, by a
quiet message, bid a man open his veins in his bath and die ; or he
might send his death-warrant to the greatest of his nobles by his
soldiers, who could execute it without opposition. There was no
safety in flight, for there were only barbarians outside the Roman
world. The populace of Rome and the praetorian guards were the
only powers which the emperors feared, and which were the only
practical checks on his authority. Bunsen happily describes the
imperial government as " a system of rule from above, without any
degree of spontaneity from below."2
The Roman empire under Augustus contained a population
estimated at from 85,000,000 to 120,000,000, one-half of which
were slaves, or serfs, variously employed, some in trades, but all of
them practically under the control of their masters. About 200
tribes or nations, exhibiting every variety of civilisation, language,
and religion, were thus placed under a strong and generally equitable
government. The army, a standing army of thirty legions, each
averaging 12,000 men, in all 360,000, was stationed in the provinces,
chiefly to guard the frontiers. Italy had 20,000 praetorian guards,
whose head-quarters were at Rome. Five fleets were stationed in the
Mediterranean and Black Seas and the British Channel. Gibbon
gives the entire amount of the army and navy at 450,000. Excellent
roads and regular posts kept up an easy communication between
Rome and the distant provinces. The revenue of the empire has
been estimated at from fifteen to twenty millions sterling (not
including that portion of the cost of the armies and of the civil
government of the provinces paid out of the provincial treasuries).
In the administration of the government, Augustus and his
immediate successors maintained the forms of the republic. He
himself was dictator, imperator, tribune, censor, and pontifex
maximus : all these offices united in him made him legally the
sovereign of the empire. The consuls and magistrates were appointed
as usual, but the offices were mere titles by which the friends of the
imperator were rewarded. The senate was completely subservient,
1 Merivale, "Fall of the Roman Republic," p. 547.
2 Edinburgh Review, No. cxxix. p 330.
to the Christian Era. 125
and the old assemblies of the people were by degrees discontinued.
This mongrel race, demoralised by grants of corn and the idleness
thus fostered by a mistaken charity, were truly what Cicero calls
them, the "fax populi" ; they enjoyed their animal life cheered by
the public games and spectacles, and could not regret the republican
institutions, which were only remembered by the most aged; nor had
they any wish to fall back upon a state of society in old republican
Rome, in which every man who was a citizen had to work for his
living, and fight gratis, or for a small pay, for the state. The govern-
ment of the distant provinces was administered by Augustus and by
the senate. Augustus had permitted the patronage and control of
the senate over these provinces, which needed no armies for their
defence ; their governors were called proconsuls, and had no military
power. Other provinces exposed to invasion, in which military
governors were appointed by Augustus, were ruled by praeses,
legates, or propraetors, with regular salaries, and were under strict
control, so that the provinces were great gainers by the transition
from the oligarchic to the imperial government. The tyranny of the
worst of the emperors, though a great evil to the senate and the
higher classes of Rome, did not affect the populace or the provinces.
A certain portion of the revenue was administered by the senate,
but the larger portion by the emperor. His private revenue was
derived chiefly from the public lands. Officers called procurators
were appointed by the emperor to watch over and collect his
revenues, and sometimes these men had the government of small
provinces conferred upon them, as in the case of Pontius Pilate, who
was Procurator of Judea. Egypt was governed by a Roman knight
(eques) invested with almost regal power.
There was great variety of political status in the provincial towns
of the Roman world, but, in all cases, a large amount of self-rule.
Each conquering general, guided by a commission or instructions
from the senate, had framed the law of each province, had fixed the
amount of tribute, and had given or withheld special privileges to
friends or foes. But the old forms of natural life were respected, and
the provinces were left to manage their own local affairs as they pleased.
Each province lived its separate life with its varying usages. The
cities were either colonise or municipia, to which were granted the
full Roman franchise. Others had the Latin rights, usually con-
nected with the Latin race, and participating in its privileges.
Others were free or federate cities, with the rights of freedom and
immunity from taxes, guaranteed by special treaty. There were also
stipendiary towns, subject to tax and tithe, but administered by their
126 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
own magistrates. Around each of these were grouped a number of
villages, hamlets, cantons, more or less dependent on the central
town. In towns of the higher class the magistrates held office only
for a year : the duumviri (like the consuls), the two aediles, two
quaestors, or treasurers. The council (ordo decurionum) consisted
of ex-magistrates, and others of local dignity and wealth. Popular
meetings, in these cities, were held and votes taken of approval and
disapproval, long after they had ceased in Rome itself. Popular
contests were real, and accompanied by strong excitement (as in our
own elections in England). These offices were rather burdensome than
lucrative. In the decline of the empire, when the responsibility for
the taxes was laid upon them, the burden was felt to be unbearable,
and men were compelled by law to accept offices and obligations
from which they endeavoured to escape." 1
" There had been a general decline of population in the ancient
world, which may be dated from the second century before Christ.
The last age of the republic was, perhaps, the period of the most
rapid exhaustion of the human race; but it was arrested under
Augustus, when the population recovered for a time in some quarters
of the empire, and remained at least stationary in others." ~ Rome
itself had a population of about i,oi6,ooo,3 which may be arranged in
four classes : the first consisting of the senatorial families, the equites,
or knights, the functionaries, and citizens, whose incomes equalled
200,000 sesterces (equal to ,£1,700) ; the second class, inferior
functionaries, bankers, merchants, traders, and artisans, who had
their "colleges," i.e., clubs or guilds ; the third class, the proletarians,
rated according to numbers, who, having no property, paid no taxes,
and lived upon the public largesses of corn. Their number in the
time of Julius Caesar and of Augustus was 320,000 ; the fourth class
consisted of strangers and slaves. The free population and the
slaves may be reckoned at half a million each ; the garrison, under
Nero, 16,000.
We must not conceal the cruelty of the Roman commonwealth to-
wards the conquered. Witness the execution of Pontus, the gallant
leader of the Samnites, 290 B.C. When Capua was taken, in the Second
Punic War, the senators were beheaded, and the whole population,
mainly a civilised and educated class, sold for slaves. Caesar's Com-
mentaries abound in instances of cold-blooded cruelty which, at that
1 W. W. Cope, "Early Empire."
2 Merivale, " Hist, of the Roman Empire," vol. vii. p. 608.
3 According to Champagny, quoted by Sheppard, pp. 27-81.
to the Christian Era. 127
time, were considered justifiable in war. Eight hundred cities were
destroyed by him, provinces desolated, the populations reduced to
slavery, thousands mutilated and drowned, and no matter to him, as
they were not Romans. " He was chary of Roman life and Roman
blood — he would spare it when it could be spared — but he would
spill it like water when the spilling of it was necessary to his end." l
The Veneti were severely punished for their resistance, the senate
put to death, the people sold for slaves. At Avaricum (Bourges),
out of a population of 40,000, only 800 escaped. And at Alesia
(Alise) the same mercilessness was manifested. The brave Vercin-
getorix, who so nobly defended his people, and who at last gave
himself up to Caesar, inspired neither admiration nor pity. After an
imprisonment of six years he was strangled, just as Caesar's triumphal
car was ascending the capitol. What a blot on the general magna-
nimity of Caesar ! But with him, as with all the Romans of his day,
there was no respect for life, or for human rights, outside of Rome ;
and this led to an equal disregard of the life of the citizens of Rome
itself. The instances here cited are but specimens of the recklessness
of human life and the indifference to human suffering common both
to the ancient Romans and Greeks. Neither must we forget "the
inherent wickedness of the empire itself," to use the strong language
of Freeman, which, though correct, must be taken in connexion with
the fact that it was for the time a less evil than anarchy. " The Roman
empire did its work in the scheme of Providence ; it paved the way
for the religion and civilisation of modern Europe .... it may
have been a necessary evil .... a lesser evil in the choice of evils,
but it was in itself a thing of evil all the same. It showed with ten-
fold aggravation all that we look upon with loathing in the modern
despotisms of Austria and Russia .... whatever were its results,
however necessary, it was in its own time, it was in itself a wicked
thing, which for so many ages crushed all natural, all intellectual life
in the fairest regions of three continents." -
13. The affairs of the Jewish nation, settled in Palestine (concen-
trated in the narrow limits of Judea), but mixed up with a Greek-
Syrian population in the north (Galilee), form no part of the general
history of this period. The conquests of Alexander and their division
among his generals changed the condition of affairs in Egypt and
Syria nominally, but left Judea as a sort of intermediary land, alter-
nately subject to Egypt and Syria. The Jews remained unmolested
1 A. Trollope, "Ancient Classics : Csesar," p. 167.
2 Freeman's "Essays," second series, pp. 335, 336.
128 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
placed under the power of Egypt, while inhabiting the rugged
highland territory between the plains of the coast and the Jordan
valley. The old Philistine cities, Gaza, Joppa, Accho, were rebuilt
and settled by Greeks. So also Scythopolis and Caesarea-Philippi to
the north ; to the east, Philadelphia and other towns beyond
Jordan. After a contest of one hundred and forty years, Palestine
became Syrian, 188 B.C. Antiochus Epiphanes, king of Syria,
endeavoured to destroy the Jewish religion and to establish his
Grecian polytheism. (The sufferings of the Jews are exhibited in the
books of Maccabees, and referred to in Hebrews, xi. 35-38.) Resist-
ance began at Modin, 166 B.C., under a priest, Judas Maccabeus (the
Hammer, called also the Asmonean, after his family name). Before
his death, in battle, he had obtained an alliance with Rome, 161 B.C.
Jonathan, his son, and Simon, the brother of Jonathan, secured
the independence of the Jews 143 B.C. John Hyrcanus, son of
Simon, maintained the national independence 141 B.C. He destroyed
the Samaritan temple on Mount Gerizim 109 B.C. The Grecian
tastes and the beginnings of the religious corruption are seen in Aristo-
bulus I., who assumed the title of king 106 B.C., and in Alexander
Jannaeus, 104 B.C., and Hyrcanus II., 78 B.C. Aristobulus II. disputed
the succession, and compelled Hyrcanus to resign. In this family
quarrel Antipater, an Idumaean, and the Romans interfere. Hyr-
canus was restored to the priesthood, but placed, not as king, but
ethnarch of Judaea, 64 B.C., by Pompey. After the battle of Pharsalia,
Julius Caesar made Antipater Procurator of Judea, Samaria, and Gali-
lee, 48 B.C., Hyrcanus remaining High Priest. This was the beginning
of the supplanters of the Maccabean (Asmonean) family. Herod,
the son of Antipater, favoured by the Romans, became king 36 B.C.
His cruelty and tyranny are well known. He died soon after the
birth of our Lord, 4 B.C.
14. India. Buddhism continued to increase and rival Brahminism.
In 247-244, Asoka, one of the successors of the great Chandragupta,
was the leading protector of the Buddhists. Under him a grand
council was held at Patna, 244 B.C., which revised the formulas of
the system. It contined from this time to be the popular religion in
India, and extended to Ceylon. The Greek kingdom of Bactria was
destroyed by a Tartar tribe, 126 B.C. There were about eighteen
native states of whose history in detail we know very little, and
what is related of them is very doubtful. Vikramaditya, king of
Ujjain, drove back the Scythian invasion 57 B.C.
China. The disordered state of China continued. The Chow
Dynasty was superseded by the Tsin Dynasty, 255 B.C. In 246 B.C.
to tlie Christian Era 129
Che Hwang-te, the first real emperor, began to reign. His
capital was Heen-yang (Segan Foo). He chastised the Heung-noo
Tartars, and drove them to the mountains of Mongolia, put down
rebellion, and ruled over all China proper. He began the great
gigantic wall 214 B.C., and had all the books referring to the past
history destroyed. On his death the empire was torn by dissensions
until 206 B.C., when Kaou-te established the Han Dynasty (first at
Lozong in Honan, and then at Changan in Shensi). His successor
tried to recover the lost literature of old China, and partially suc-
ceeded. China was disturbed by the Heung-noo until 121 B.C.,
Woote subdued them. The Han Dynasty was ready to fall by the
beginning of the tenth era.
Japan. The Mikado rulers advancing and pressing the Ainos
further north.
15. LITERATURE. Greek: In philosophy we have to notice Arce-
silaus, the founder of the Middle Academy, 278 B.C. ; Pyrrho, of Elis,
the Sceptical philosopher, 300-280; Carneades, the founder of the
Third Academy, 213-129; Philo of Larissa, the founder of the
Fourth Academy; and Antiochus of Ascalon, his pupil, 100-69 B-c-
But, apart from the niceties of the philosophic school, the practical
philosophy of the century and a half before Christ was either that of
the Stoics, adopted by some of the wisest and best of the Romans,
or that of Epicurus, modified to meet the growing taste for mere
sensual enjoyments. Epicurus, who lived 340 to 270 B.C., was no
sensualist, for while he taught that pleasure was the main end of life,
he also taught that there could be no pleasure apart from virtue.
There is no ground for the general misconception of the character of
his philosophy. The mathematical sciences were patronised by the
Ptolemies in Egypt; Euclid, the father of mathematics, 323-283 B.C.;
Apollonius (conic sections) 250 ; Eratosthenes, mathematics and
geometry, 175 B.C.; Hipparchus (162-127), the first cataloguer of
the stars; Aristarchus of Samos, 280-264 B.C., anticipated the Coper-
nican system, except the law of gravitation ; Archimedes in Sicily,
212-146 B.C. ; Aristophanes of Byzantium (under the Ptolemies, 213)
invented the Greek accents ; Aristarchus, a grammarian who studied
Homer, 160-100, lived in Egypt. In poetry and Greek literature,
Theocritus, Bion, and Moschus, 275 B.C. ; the Alexandrine poets,
Callimachus, 256, Apollonius Rhodius, 196 B.C., Theophrastus (the
Characteristics), 280 B.C. Among the historians Berosus (History of
Babylon), 300-280 B.C.; Polybius (History of Greece; a work "full of
the most profound political wisdom"), 204-123 ; Arrian- (History of
Alexander), 100 B.C.; Dionysius of Halicarnassus (Roman History),
K
130 From the Empire of Alexander, 330 B.C.,
50 B.C. ; and Diodorus Siculus, 60 B.C., who attempted a sort of
universal history. Latin: The most ancient Latin is found in the song
of the Fratres Arvales, an agricultural corporation adopted by the
Romans from the Sabines, and in the Laws of the Twelve Tables (the
decemviri), all of which had become obsolete in the second century
before Christ. Ennius, a Greek, was the first author in Latin
literature. He taught the Oscan and Greek languages, and was the
friend and teacher of old Cato and the Scipios, 239-169 B.C. Livius
Andronicus, Cneius Nevius Pacuvius, Accius, were dramatic poets
240-219 B.C. Nevius indulged in satire, which brought upon him the
anger of the Scipios and the Metelli. Fabius Pictor and Cincius Alimen-
tus were annalists 225-119 B.C. Cato the Censor wrote on husbandry -,
234-146 B.C. Plautus and Terence, the greatest of the dramatists^
190-146 B.C. The Greek philosophy was first introduced into Rome
by the embassy sent by the Athenians, consisting of Carneades of
the Academy, Diogenes the Stoic, and Critolaus the Peripatetic, and,
although condemned by Cato and the old school, became popular
among the Roman nobles. This study, and that of the Greek litera-
ture, was further promoted by the influence of the Achaean hostages,
brought to Italy after the conquest of Achaia, -146 B.C., among whom
was Polybius, the friend of Paulus ^Emilius and of Scipio Africanus.
From this time it became the fashion for all well-educated Romans
to read, speak, and write the Greek language. The decay of the
old Roman character has been attributed to the influence of the
Greek philosophy, but this is a mistake. Roman integrity and sim-
plicity had ceased to be prominent virtues of the Roman character
long before the Greek philosophy was popular at Rome. Lucretius,
the poet of the Epicurean philosophy and of the atomic theory, pub-
lished his poem 57 B.C. The writings of Julius Caesar (Commen-
taries), 100-45 B-C. j Cicero (letters, orations, and philosophy), 105-43
B.C. ; Sallust (history), 86-46 B.C. ; Varro (agriculture and grammar),
1 1 6-2 8 B. c. ; and Nepos (biographies) 40 B. c. The poets of the Augus-
tan age— Virgil, 71-19 B.C., Horace, 65 B.C.-8 A.D., Tibullus, 51 B.C.,
Catullus, 84-47 B.C., Ovid, 43 B.c.-i8 A.D., Propertius, 24 B.C.— are
well known. Maecenas was the great patron of literature, and Livy
was the historian, 59-17 B.C.
JEWISH LITERATURE.— The foundation of Alexandria affected the
literature of Judea. Thousands of Greeks were settled in that city
and endowed with peculiar privileges. For them, and for the use of
the Alexandrian library, founded by Ptolemy Philadelphia 260 B.C.,
the translation of the Jewish Scriptures into Greek was commenced
about 250 B.C., and perhaps completed by 200 B.C. This is called
to the Christian Era. 131
the Septuagint, from a supposed company of seventy translators.
There are also a series of writings in the Greek language which form
the Apocrypha, often appended to the Old Testament, but not
received as authoritative by the Protestant Churches. The most
valuable of these are the Wisdom of Solomon, a philosophical
treatise by some Alexandrian Jew, about 145 B.C. ; the book of
Ecclesiasticus, or, the Wisdom of Jesus the Son of Sirach, written
in Hebrew 280 or 219 B.C., and translated into Greek 230 or 180 B.C. ;
the two books of Maccabees (historical), probably written early
in the first century B.C. Another apocryphal book not included
in the collection appended to the Bible is the book of Enoch,
supposed to be that quoted by the Apostle Jude ; this book was
written between 144 and 50 B.C. in the opinion of Ewald. The
translation called the Septuagint had a very important influence
in bringing the facts of the Jewish history and of the teachings of
the prophets within the reach of the literary heathen. It became
the version used exclusively by the Jews dispersed over the world,
and even in Judea itself. The language of the Septuagint was
the language mainly spoken by our Lord and his Apostles, and the
language in which the Gospels and the Epistles were first written ;
though some think the Gospel of Matthew first appeared in the
Hebrew-Syrian of that period.
State of the World at the Christian Era, i A.D.
EUROPE.
THE ROMAN EMPIRE comprised Gaul, Spain, Italy, Greece, Sicily,
Thrace, Illyricum, Mcesia, Rhaetia, with Crete and the Greek
Islands ; also Corsica and Sardinia.
SCANDINAVIA, with Germany, as yet inhabited by Teutonic tribes,
pressed by Sclavoniahs from the East.
THE BRITISH ISLANDS inhabited by Keltic races ; a German emigra-
tion settled on the east coast.
ASIA.
ASIA MINOR and its petty kingdoms, with Syria, Armenia to the
Euphrates, belonging to Rome.
K 2
132 State of the World at the Christian Era.
ASIA, west of the Indus and east of the Euphrates, to the Parthians.
INDIA disturbed by the contests between the Buddhists and the
Brahmins.
CHINA under the declining power of the Han Dynasty.
JAPAN under the Mikado rulers, gradually driving the Aionos
northward.
AFRICA.
EGYPT and north Africa to Rome. The Berbers and other nomad
races kept in check by the Roman power. The city of
Carthage and territory adjacent had been re-colonised,
122 B.C., by the Romans.
ETHIOPIA had its own king at Meroe, and also in Abyssinia there
were petty kingdoms, whose history is doubtful.
FIFTH PERIOD,
To the Final Division of the Roman Empire
by Theodosius, 395 A.D.
I. — The Empire to 395 A.D.
i. THE firm establishment and long continuance of an empire
comprising all the civilised nations of the world surrounding one
great lake, the Mediterranean Sea, is a fact unparalleled in the past
history of mankind, and one which cannot reasonably be expected
to recur at any distant future. Its peculiar civilisation isolated it
from all barbaric influences and sympathies. It was the world, the
whole world, to the Roman, who could not conceive of any condition
of society apart from the institutions of Rome. For four centuries-
trie history of this empire is really the history of the world ; with the
exception of the Parthian and Persian semi-barbarous rule to the
east of the Euphrates, and the vast and unexplored barbaric world
to the north and east, occupying the countries now known as-
Scandinavia, Germany, Poland, Russia, and the vast region extending
to the great wall of China. In this vast unknown region there were
powerful tribes already beginning to press upon the Sclavonic and
German races, and preparing to occupy positions dangerous to the
partially civilised races bordering on the Roman frontier. Long
before, the Romans had had some experience of the bravery of the
Keltic Gauls in the burning of Rome 395 B.C., in the war with the
Cisalpine Gauls, 236-222 B.C., and in the fearful invasion of the
Kimbri and Teutones, 113-101 B.C., from which they had been
delivered by the victories of Marius. Thoughtful men might-
suppose that the barbaric power far beyond what had hitherto been
encountered might be a source of trouble to the state, but no one
!34 To the Final Division of the
anticipated danger. So far, the barbarians had made raids simply
for plunder, and the ability of the legions had on all occasions been
equal to the task of repression and control. For four centuries the
Roman world, except on its frontiers, knew nothing of war. There
was internal peace and security ; freedom of transit from Britain to
the south of Egypt, and from the western Atlantic to the Euphrates ;
a general security of life and property such as had never been known
before. Outwardly, there was what the world had never known
before — a comity of nations united in one citizenship, the only
palpable division being the predominance of the Latin language in
the West, and that of the Greek in the East. The great lake, the
Mediterranean, was the highway of commerce, the bond of union
between the North and the South, the East and the West; the
piratical fleets, which once had interfered with navigation, had been
put down by the strong hand of Rome, and the Roman world had
peace. Men with incomes derived from estates, the higher classes of
Roman society, the financial companies which farmed the revenues,
the trading classes, in fact, all who had property or position,
might probably think that the golden age had commenced. How
the slave, the gladiator, the serf, and the classes not included
in the gifts of bread bestowed on the proletarian mob of Rome,
regarded the world around them, we cannot tell ; but we may imagine
that, from their point of view, the prospect was by no means satis-
factory. But then, as now, the prosperous classes were hardly aware
of the pinch which was felt by the classes with which they seldom
came in familiar contact. This increased and increasing harshness
and selfishness of the Roman character, in the decline of the republic
and during the empire, was, to some extent, combated and checked
among the higher classes by the Stoic philosophy, and yet more
largely and effectively in all classes by the spread of Christianity.
2. To assist the memory, it may be desirable to adopt the classifi-
cation of the Roman emperors proposed by the able author of
" Italy and her Invaders." T
(i) THE JULIAN AND CLAUDIAN EMPERORS. — Augustus, the
Imperator, exercised an absolute despotism under the forms of the
old republic (as already shown). One great event distinguishes his
reign, the birth of our Lord at Bethlehem, shortly before the death
of Herod the Great, king of Judea, under the protection of Rome
4 B.C. " Henceforward, the Roman empire acquires, in our eyes, a
nearer interest ; as a country to which we were before indifferent, it
1 Thomas Hodgkin, 2 vols. 8vo., 1880.
Roman Empire by T/ieodosms, 395 A. D. 135
becomes at once endeared to us, when we know it to be the abode of
those we love. In pursuing the story of political crimes and miseries,
there will be a resting-place for our imaginations, a consciousness
that, amidst all the evil which is most prominent on the records of
history, a power of God was silently at work, with an influence
continually increasing, and that virtue and happiness were daily more
and more visiting a portion of mankind which till now seemed to
be in a condition of hopeless suffering. The reader who has accom-
panied us through all the painful details presented by the last century
of the Roman commonwealth, will be inclined, perhaps, with us to
rejoice in the momentary contemplation of such a scene of moral
beauty."1 But this period of the world's history was regarded by
Livy as the beginning of a decline : " The day of action for doing
and daring had gone by, and now the dead calm of the Pax Romana
was spread over the earth." He hopes that "one reward of this my
toil (his history) will be that, for a time at all events, I shall be
enabled to forget the desolation which has come upon our nation,
that has now reached a pitch of iniquity at which it can bear neither
its own vices nor yet the remedies for them." 3 One great misfortune
darkened the last days of Augustus, the defeat and destruction of
Varus and his legions, numbering thirty thousand men, in the
Teutoburg Forest in Germany, by the German hero Arminius, 9 A.D.
This was deeply felt by the old emperor, and he was frequently
heard crying out, " Varus, give me back my legions ! " Tiberius
succeeded, 14 A.D., an able but cruel tyrant. By his Procurator of
Judea, Pontius Pilate, our Lord was crucified at Jerusalem, 30 A.D.
While Tiberius "was most unpopular with every class at Rome
.... he was regarded by the provincials as a wise, a temperate,
and even a beneficent sovereign It almost seems as if there
had been one emperor in the capital and another outside the walls."3
The reason is, that in Rome there were numerous rich and influential
families, many of them known to be opposed to the imperial rule, of
whom the emperor was jealous, and from which jealousy they suffered.
The asserted disgraceful excesses of the old Tiberius at Capri have
possibly some foundation, but must be received with caution as the
statements of personal enemies. Caligula was a madman, 37 A.D.,
but not without critical judgment, when he compared Seneca's
disjointed sentences to sand without cement. Claudius, 41 A.D.,
1 Dr. Thomas Arnold, " Encyc. Metrop.," vol. x. p. 380.
2 "Ancient Classics : Juvenal," pp. 48, 49.
3 "Ancient Classics: Tacitus," p. 55.
136 To the Final Division of the
had occasional glimpses of good sense and right feeling ; he first
admitted a Gaul into the senate, thus beginning the practice of
infusing provincial blood into the Roman councils. Nero, who
ruled from 54 to 68 A.D., began with promise of virtuous action,
which was followed by the display of folly, and by the exercise of a
capricious cruelty upon the wealthy and senatorial families at Rome.
Under Nero the first persecution of the Christians commenced, after
the fire which consumed a large portion of the city of Rome, 64 A.D.
"Nero fiddled while Rome was burning," and charged the guilt of
the fire to the Christians. In this persecution St. Paul, and probably
St. Peter, suffered martyrdom, 64-68 A.D. In the opinion of Canon
Farrar,1 and others, Nero is the typical Antichrist of the Apocalypse,
The tyranny of these emperors and of their successors met with no-
popular resistance, as it was mainly experienced by the higher classes,
and was little known and cared for beyond the precincts of the court
The mongrel population of Rome were satisfied with their free grants
of corn and the games and shows provided for them at the public
cost, while the provinces had reason to be thankful for the jealous-
oversight of the imperial ruler, who would tolerate no injustice, at
least, in his subordinates. With Nero the Julian and Claudian
Caesars became extinct 68 A.D. Of the Caesarian family, numbering
forty-three, thirty-two died violent deaths. After the brief rule and
speedy deaths of Galba, Otho, and Vitellius, Vespasian began the
line of
(2) THE FLAVIAN EMPERORS. — Vespasian, the commander of the
Eastern armies, began to reign 69 A.D. ; he was compelled by the
extravagance of his predecessors to replenish the treasury by
increased taxation. Titus, his son, commander in the East, put
down the rebellion of the Jews, destroyed the Temple and the city
of Jerusalem, according to the prediction of our Lord (Matt, xxiv.,
Mark xiii., Luke xxi.). Titus succeeded Vespasian, 79 A.D. ; he is
called "the delight of mankind." Domitian, his brother, who
succeeded, 81 A.D., was an able but stern tyrant. It was but small
comfort to the sufferers to know that " in all his cruelty and wicked-
ness there was an intelligent purpose," that is to say, from his point
of view.2 With him the Flavian house came to an end. He was
the last of the twelve Caesars to whom that term has been specially
applied.
(3) THE ADOPTED EMPERORS began with the aged Nerva, chosen
by the senate, 96 A.D. With his reign commenced a period of
1 " Life of St. Paul," vol. ii. p. 292. 2 " Ancient Classics : Pliny," p. 26.
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A.D. 137
eighty-four years, which Gibbon terms the happiest of all periods in
the history of the world. " If a man were called upon to fix the
period in the history of the world during which the condition of
the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would without
hesitation name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to
the accession of Commodus, 96-180 B.C. The vast extent of the
Roman empire was governed by absolute power under the guidance
of virtue and wisdom. The armies were restrained by the firm but
gentle hand of four successive emperors, whose character and
authority commanded involuntary respect. The forms of the civil
administration were carefully preserved by Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian,
and the Antonines, who delighted in the image of liberty, and were
pleased with considering themselves as the accountable ministers of
the laws."1 Trajan, 98 A.D., was a conqueror who carried the
legions beyond the Euphrates, humbled the Parthians, and extended
the northern frontier by the annexation of Dacia. Hadrian, 117
A.D., " the most versatile and paradoxical of men," travelled over
the whole empire, and suppressed with great severity an insurrec-
tion of the Jews. By his " Perpetual Edict," he simplified the
rules and forms of law, and prepared the way for the codifications
of the later emperors. Antoninus succeeded 138 A.D. "The
consent of antiquity plainly declares that Antoninus was the first,
and, saving his colleague and successor Aurelius, the only one of the
emperors who devoted himself to the task of government with a
single view to the happiness of his people .... he equally
deserved to be called the Numa of the empire, but his great merit
.... was his protection of the Christian.2 Marcus Aurelius, 161
A.D., had a laborious and disturbed reign, through wars with the
Parthians and the invasions of the northern tribes. A terrible plague,
brought by the armies from the East, spread over the empire,
followed by a long-continued scarcity by fires and earthquakes ; the
cruel persecution of the Christians followed the panic terror caused
by these calamities. Niebuhr is of opinion that the ancient world
never recovered from the loss of population occasioned by this
pestilence, which had a second outbreak in the reign of Commodus,
during which two thousand died daily in Rome. From this time
the decline of the power of Rome began. The barbarian power
was aggressor j that of Rome was purely defensive. The emperor,
whom Lecky calls " the last and most perfect representation of
1 Gibbon's "Roman Empire," chap. ii.
2 Merivale, " History of Rome," p. 533.
,38 To the Final Division of the
Roman Stoicism,1 was conscious even before the mass of Tiis
countrymen of the downward course on which the empire had
entered. The despondency of the philosophic emperor is strongly
marked in the book of 'Meditations' .... In the mind of
Aurelius Stoicism became more than ever a matter of conscience
and religion The fastidious pride of the Roman philosopher
could not brook the simple creed on which the Christian leant, and
by which he ruled his actions. To live for the state .... was the
highest social duty in the eyes of the Romans, and especially
in the eyes of the Roman emperors. While the people denounced
the new believers as offenders against the majesty of the gods of
Rome, Aurelius was not unwilling to punish them as offenders
against her civil principles .... it is but too certain that the last
and purest teaching of heathen morality issued in a deadly conflict
with the truth in Jesus Christ."2 Commodus, the son of Marcus
Aurelius, succeeded 180 A D.; his mad career ended with his murder,
192 A.D. Up to this period the prescription of law and usage had
been carefully observed by the ruling power from Augustus (except
by the mad emperors), each despot professed to be guided by the
traditions and precedents of the republic. But the military revolu-
tion by which the empire was distracted established the direct
supremacy of the army for succeeding generations. Thus we come
to a new series of military rulers, dependent on the will of the army.
(4) THE BARRACK EMPERORS, the creation of the praetorian
guards of Rome or by the armies on the frontiers. Some excuse
may be found for the soldiery, in the small pay and the excessive
price of the necessaries which the soldiers themselves had to provide.
The full pay was eight pence a day, with deductions only five pence.
All arts and manufactures had declined as the better instructed
slaves died out, and all articles of manufacture became inferior and
dearer. The cost of covering for the feet was equal to twenty-two
francs ; beef and mutton, two and a half francs the pound j pork,
three francs sixty centimes ; poor wine, one franc eighty the litre ; a
fat goose, forty-five francs ; a hare, thirty-three francs ; a hundred of
oysters, twenty-two francs. This is the view of Michelet (i. 24), but
surely some of these prices are under peculiar circumstances. The
emperors were at last obliged to clothe and feed their troops.
Pertinax, a brave ruler, perished in a mutiny of the soldiers.
Didius Julianus purchased the empire from.the mutineers, but soon
" History of Christian Morals," vol. i. p. 316.
2 Merivale, "History of Rome," pp. 539, 540.
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A.D. 139
perished. Septimius Severus, by the help of the army of Pannonia,
became emperor 193 A.D., ruled sternly but wisely until 211 A.D.
Caracalla, his son, a mad tyrant, conferred the citizenship upon the
whole of the free population of the empire, "annihilating legal
distinctions;" this act completed the work, which trade, literature, and
toleration to all religions but one were already performing, and left,
so far as we can tell, only two nations still cherishing a national
feeling. The Jew was kept apart, by his religion, the Greek boasted
his intellectual superiority 215 A.D.1 Between Caracalla, who perished
217 A.D., to the reign of Diocletian, sixteen emperors reigned during
a period of 65 years up to 282 AD. Among these were Macrinus,
Elagabalus, and Alexander Severus, the latter of these firmly oppos-
ing the corruption of his age ; Maximin, 235-8 A.D., who repulsed
the German and other barbarians; Philip, who in 248 A.D. cele-
brated the secular games in honour of the one thousandth year from
the foundation of Rome ; Decius, the persecutor of the Christians,
who died bravely opposing the Goths, 251 A.D. These Goths,
originally from Scandinavia, settled in the Ukraine, and took posses-
sion of Dacia, and then crossed the Danube into Moesia. Gallus,
25 1-253 A.D., consented to pay them a yearly tribute. A great famine
and plague over southern Europe, from 252 to 260 A.D., is said to
have carried off one-half of the population. Valerian, after a series
of wars with the barbarians, was taken prisoner by the Persians,
160 A.D. Gallienus, 260-268 A.D., was successful against the
Persians and Germans; the latter advanced as far as Ravenna.
At this time thirty aspirants for the empire were in the field; they were
called " the thirty Tyrants." Among these, Odenatus, of Palmyra,
and his wife Zenobia, also Tetricus in Gaul. Claudius II. defended
the Alemanni and Goths, 268-270 A.D. Aurelian re-established the
empire, but relinquished Dacia to the Goths. Alarmed by the
invasions of Italy by the Marcomanni and Alemanni, he wisely
enlarged and strengthened the walls of Rome. The Emperors
Tacitus, Probus, and Carus, 275-282 B.C., were fully occupied in the
defence of the frontier. Probus first began on a large scale to form
settlements of the barbarians on the frontiers — on the Rhine, the
Danube, in Thrace, Illyria, and in Britain. The army had received
recruits from this source from the time of Julius Caesar, whose
Germanic legions won the battle of Pharsalia. The praetorian life-
guards of Tiberius were Germans. " Many writers have condemned
this plan of barbaric enlistment, and have seen in it one of the
1 Bryce, "History of the Roman Empire," p. 6.
140 To the Final Division of the
causes of the fall of the empire ; they do not see that it was a simple
necessity. It may have taught the discipline of Rome, but without
it Rome could not have held Italy for a week. The degraded rabble
of foreigners and freedmen who filled her streets would not have
stood a single shock of northern war."1 Frequent and serious
seditions in the armies and the relaxation of military discipline
emboldened the barbarians to make these inroads into the empire.
The dislike of the Roman population for military life obliged the
emperors to depend upon barbarian volunteers. By degrees, these
came to form the largest and most effective part of the Roman
legions ; 2 after Constantine, they formed the majority of the troops ;
after Theodosius, a Roman soldier is an exception. The evils arising
out of the absence of any fixed law of succession to the throne are
obvious in the history of the emperors. From Augustus to Dio-
cletian, nine emperors fell victims to private conspiracies ; eighteen
were slain by a seditious soldiery; only twelve died in peaceable
possession of their dignities ; while thirty aspirants to the empire had
fallen in the attempt. Diocletian, 284-305 A.D., the son of a slave,
had risen to the consulship and the government of Mcesia, and was
felt to be the man needed to meet the emergencies of the state,
distracted by rebellion within and threatened by the barbarians
outside. Having chosen Maximian as his colleague, he celebrated
with him the last triumphal procession ever held in Rome, 303 A.D.
Milan was made the seat of the government for the west, and
Nicomedia for the east. Diocletian is thus the first of the
(5) PARTNERSHIP EMPERORS. " Recognising the impossibility of
properly ruling these vast dominions from only one seat of govern-
ment ; recognising also the inevitable jealousy felt by the soldiers of
the provinces of their more fortunate brethren, under the shower of
donatives at Rome, he divided the Roman world into four great
prefectures, which were to be ruled, not as independent states, but
still as one empire, by four partners in one great imperial firm.
This principle of partnership or association was made elastic enough
to include also the time-honoured principle of adoption."3 By
taking a colleague and then appointing two Caesars, Diocletian gave
a fourfold personality of imperial rule, hoping to act with fourfold
imperial power in four imperial positions, the immediate objects
being to check the rising up of pretenders to the empire, and the
1 Sheppard, pp. 171, 172.
2 Bryce, " History of the Roman Empire," p. 15.
3 Hodgkin, " History of Italy," pp. i, 16.
Roman Empire by Theodosiits, 395 A.D. 141
more effective defence of the frontiers against the barbarians. "The
founding of the kingdoms of modern Europe might have been
anticipated by two hundred years, had the barbarians been bolder,
or had there not arisen in Diocletian a prince active, adroit and
politic enough to bind up the fragments before they had lost all
cohesion, meeting altered conditions by new remedies. By dividing
and localising authority, he confessed that the weaker heart could
no longer make its pulsations felt to the body's extremities. He
parcelled out the supreme power among four persons, and then
sought to give it a factitious strength by surrounding it with an
Oriental pomp which his earlier predecessors would have scorned." *
A pompous phraseology was introduced (too much of which is left
to lower the purity of language and to lessen the reverence due to
legal authority even in our day); for instance, our clemency; my
eternity ; the illustrious ; the spectabiles ; the clarissimi ; the per-
fectissimi ; the egregii, &c. ; sickening and silly epithets. Diocle-
tian's colleagues generally resided at Milan, or Aries, or Treves ; at
the instigation of Galerius, Diocletian became a persecutor of the
Christians, while Constantine Chlorus, the other colleague, was
favourable to them. When Diocletian thought fit to abdicate and
retire to Salona, he obliged his colleague Maximian to retire also,
305 A.D. After some confusion in the succession of the emperors
and the Caesars, Constantine the Great, the son of Constantine
Chlorus, became sole emperor, 323 A.D. He is the first of the
(6) THEOLOGICAL EMPERORS. Constantine removed the seat of the
empire to the new city of Constantinople, which he had founded and
called by his name. " The important results of this measure have
vindicated the wisdom of Constantine." The new city was fit to do
a work which Rome was incapable of doing. As a city, as a
fortress, as a local seat of government, it has been more eternal
than old Rome ; it never opened its gates to a slave or barbarian
conqueror until 1453 A.D. It has been for fifteen hundred years
an imperial city, and seems as if destined to be the seat of the
empire of two worlds."2 Constantinople secured the Eastern
Empire, and perpetuated its existence for ten centuries after the
Western Empire had fallen. A new organisation was given to the
empire, and the civil and military appointments were separated.
3. The conversion of Constantine to Christianity was, no doubt,
the result of his personal convictions. There might also be some
1 Bryce, "History of the Roman Empire," p. 8.
2 Freeman's " Essays," third series.
To the Final Division of the
admixture of policy. Christianity, though at that time less pure
than in the second century, had made itself felt as a power in the
empire. Rome, the stronghold of paganism, was not friendly to
the Constantines : the old paganism existed without life or zeal ;
the new religion was all life and activity ; in faith and zeal every
other system was not to be compared to it; and in intellectual
energy it was more than equal to the pagan mind of the age. The
lonely man, unhappy in his family and without the solace of those
friendly relations with equals which could not be realised by the
emperor, found consolation in the affection and admiration of the
Christian bishops and clergy with whose interests he had identified
himself. Of his sincerity there can be no doubt. The profound
spiritual truths of Christianity were scarcely appreciated by him, but
he found a firm foundation for his faith in the historical evidences
afforded by the gospels and epistles, and in the traditions of the
Churches. In his public and domestic life there is much that is
painful to narrate. The deaths of his wife, of his son, and of his
father-in-law and brother-in-law throw a shade over his character
which cannot be removed nor even extenuated. These events help
to illustrate the hardness of the Roman character in domestic re-
lations ; yet Constant! ne's severity, however guilty the sufferers may
have been, cannot be defended. But, in justice to this great but
imperfect character, we must remember that, while we know his
crimes, we know but little of the malign influences to which he was
subjected, or of his deep remorse, of which his heathen contem-
poraries speak. He went steadily forward in the main purpose of
his later life, the advancing the interests of the Christian religion.
"In rapid succession the act of toleration, the observance of
Sunday, the public prayers in the army, the abolition of the punish-
ment of crucifixion, the encouragement of slave emancipation, the
prohibition of astrological divination, of cruel and licentious rites
and gladiatorial games, became law. Every one of these acts was a
gain to the empire and to mankind, such as not even the Antonines
had ventured to attempt, and of these benefits none has been alto-
gether lost. Undoubtedly, if Constantine has to be judged by the
place which he occupies among the benefactors of mankind, he
would rank, not among the secondary characters of history, but
among the very first."1 " .... It is one of the most tragical facts
of all history (says John Stuart Mill) that Constantine, rather than
Marcus Aurelius, was the first Christian emperor. It is a bitter
1 Stanley, "Eastern Churches," p. 195.
Roman Empire by Thecdosius, 395 A.D. 143
thought how different the Christianity of the world might have been
had it been adopted as the religion of the empire under the auspices
of Marcus Aurelius instead of those of Constantine."1 This is the
expression of a natural feeling ; but is not the power and reality of
Christian truth more fully manifested in the subjugation of a cha-
racter so wayward and imperfect as that of Constantine, than it
would have been in the case of the philosophic emperor who was
" not far from the kingdom of heaven " ? He died 22 May, 337 A.D.
" So passed away the first Christian emperor, the first defender of
the faith, the first imperial patron of the Papal See, and of the whole
Eastern Church, the first founder of the Holy Places — pagan and
Christian, orthodox and heretical, liberal and fanatical, not to be
imitated or admired, but much to be remembered and deeply to be
studied."2 The empire was divided between his sons: Constantine II.,
who ruled over the west ; Constantius over the east ; and Constans
the central provinces. By the death of Constantine, 340 B.C., and
of Constans, 350 B.C., Constantius was left sole emperor. He was a
persecutor of the orthodox party, but was manfully resisted by the
great Athanasius, whose single-handed opposition to the Arian world
has extorted the admiration of even Gibbon. Julian the Apostate
succeeded his uncle Constantius, 361 A.D. Having no reason to
love the religion of his uncles, he became, through the influence of
pagan literature and philosophy, desirous of re-establishing the
ancient idolatry ; Christians were removed from public employment,
and all the influence of the government employed to decry Chris-
tianity, but with little effect. In other respects he was a brave and
able ruler, whom Gibbon delights to honour as the opponent of the
Christian faith, but was also compelled to censure for his pitiful
superstition and vanity. He was killed in battle with the Persians,
363 A.D. The attachment to paganism, says Neander, lingered
especially in many of the ancient and noble families of Greece and
Rome, among old or new families who wished to be thought old,
and who would be sure to take up the cause of ancestral evidence
against modern innovation. Jovian, his successor, proclaimed uni-
versal toleration, and died a few months after his accession. He is
the last of the Theological emperors.
(7) THE SOVEREIGNS OF THE SINKING EMPIRE, Valentinian I. and
Valens, 364 A.D. The Huns having driven the Goths from Dacia, and
compelled them to cross the Danube into the Roman territory, the
fugitives were at first permitted to settle in Mcesia. These Goths,
1 Quoted by Stanley, " Eastern Churches," p. 185. 2 Ibid., p. 220.
144 -To the Final Division of tJie
properly supported by the Roman power, might have opposed an
effective barrier to the attacks of the Huns, but, by the tyranny of the
Roman governor, they were driven to rebellion, and over-ran Moesia,
Thrace, and Macedonia. Valens was defeated and killed by them
near Adrianople 378 A.D. Theodosius the Great, his successor, made
peace with the Goths, settling them in Moesia, Thrace, and in Asia
Minor. In the west, the family of Valentinian I., consisting of Gratian
and Valentinian II., were destroyed by the rebels Maximus and
Eugenius. Theodosius avenged their death, and became sole emperor,
394, 395 A.D. On his death, 395 A.D., the final division of the empire
took place. The east and the west never again formed one empire ;
the separation was made permanent by differences in theological
opinions and in the usages of the Latin and Greek Churches.
4. So far, outwardly, the empire seemed to be a permanent reality,
as in the days of Augustus and the Antonines. It seemed to the
men of that day identified with the existence of the social order and
stability of the world itself. There was nothing in the relative
positions of the empire and the barbarians outside which implied
any superiority on the part of the latter. Under wise arrangements,
the pressure of the barbarian forces on the frontier, by the judicious
settlement of border territory, and by timely support of friendly and
semi-civilised tribes against their fiercer enemies, might have become
its military defence — its outward barrier at least. The real weakness
of the empire arose from the pressure of taxation (which neutralised
the advantages of a high degree of personal liberty and of self-
municipal government in the provinces), the practical effect of which
was to render the empire not worth the sacrifices necessary to be
made in its defence. The central government of the empire had
failed to carry out the end of all good government, the well-being of
society ; its fiscal laws were a barrier in the way of progress ; the
whole structure of Roman society was decaying and past repair.
The temporary improvement of trade, manufactures, and agriculture
under the early empire had long ceased. The provincials only knew
the central government as an exactor of taxes, and they had no
inducement to fight for, and die in defence of, the unity of the
empire.
II- — The Came of the Decline of the Empire.
5. The causes to which the decline of the empire may be traced
had been operating for centuries, (i) The numerical decline of the
free, especially the agricultural population first observable in Italy. In
Italy the small landholders, the class from which the armies of the
Roman Empire by TJieodosius, 395 A. D. 145
republic were drawn, gradually disappeared, consumed in war, or
driven by debts incurred by the wars, had sold their small farms to
the larger proprietors. Thus agriculture gave place to pasturage,
and the land was in charge of the slaves of the landholders. In-
fanticide had become common among all classes, as children were a
burden to the luxurious inhabitants of the large cities as well as to
the poor. In such an artificial state of society, whether in the old
world or in the new, surreptitious checks upon population imply a
hardness and coarseness of feeling indicative of a corrupt society
hastening its own extinction. (2) Latif undid, or, in other words, the
monopolising of the arable and pasture lands of Italy and the
provinces by the large proprietors, chiefly the senatorial and official
families. The public lands, the property of the state, were rented
mainly in large portions to the capitalists, or the senatorial official*
The laws to restrain and limit the extent of these properties, called
the agrarian laws, which caused so much dissension in Rome under
the republic, were evaded, and under the empire had become a dead
letter. In process of time the nominal tenant claimed the proprietor-
ship. These large territories laid out for the pasturage of cattle
required fewer slaves, and excluded the free cultivator. (3) The
increase of the slave population, not only on the large estates, but
in the cities, as servants and artificers, was a serious evil. Some'
great families possessed in their households large numbers, either at
Rome or in their suburban villas. No room was left for the free
mechanic or manufacturer. It is calculated that at least one-
half of the population of the empire was composed of the slave
class ; hence the rapid decline of the productive power of the
empire, and the increasing poverty of all classes of the popu-
lation. These slaves were men of the same colour as the free class.
Their condition varied with their education and the character of
their masters. In the rural districts there was no influence of
opinion in favour of humanity ; and even such a man as Cato the
Elder could discuss merely as an economical question the advan-
tages and disadvantages of working the slave to a premature death,
or prolonging life by a liberal usage for the sake of the profit of the
natural increase by births. Slave life had been lightly regarded. A
million perished in the Servile War in Sicily ; 60,000 in the rebellion of
Spartacus, put down by Crassus. The establishments of the wealthy
contained from 200 to 4,000. Some Roman families owned on their
estates 10,000 to 20,000. The story in Tacitus of the execution of
all the 400 slaves of one of the Cornelian families, because of the mur-
der of the master by one of the slaves, illustrates the position of their
L
146 To tJie Final Division of the
class. A slave was simply an animal, sometimes a highly educated man.
A slave could live in hope of a considerate master or the prospect of
manumission ; this was the forlorn hope of the slave. The teach-
ings of Christianity were received readily by the better class of the
slave population in Rome. (4) Proktaria naturally follows lati-
fundia and slavery ; and to understand the meaning of these words,
latifundia and proletaria, is to understand the history of the progress
and decline of society in the civilised world. The population of
Rome and of the larger cities, as Carthage, consisted partly of an idle
class, maintained by supplies of corn from the state and amused by
gladiatorial shows and public games. In these there was no support for
law and order, but an element of danger equal to that of slavery. The
government which fed and amused them had to watch them jealously
as an inimical power. In Rome, Augustus fed 300,000 of this class.
Trajan, Hadrian, and the Antonines increased the number to 500,000,
and their successors had a still harder task to perform in supporting
the multitude, who had neither property nor the knowledge of any
useful art by which they might earn their living. These free-born
state paupers were for the most part beggars, idlers, badly clothed,
even in winter, with a tunic, rarely with a toga. What we call the middle
class, which constitutes the healthy bulk of modern society, appears to
have been confined to such a small number of unimportant indi-
viduals in the cities as to have escaped the notice of historians.
(5) The necessary increased and increasing expenditure of the im-
perial government. For some years, during the later rule of the
republic and during the reign of the early emperors, the accumulated
wealth derived from the plunder of Macedonia, Carthage, Asia, and
Egypt more than met the extravagance of the most reckless of the
emperors. Some of the emperors were economical. Tiberius and
the Antonines are said to have left in the treasury sums equal jto
twenty-six or twenty-eight millions of sterling money. The exact
revenue derived from the taxes upon property, the poll-tax, the customs,
and the tributes of the provinces cannot be ascertained, the estimates
varying from fifteen to forty-six millions sterling, according to the
nature of the calculations, whether based on gross amount paid by
the people, or on the net amount transmitted to the treasury, deduct-
ing the cost of the provincial administration. The wars, which
rendered necessary a large expenditure on the frontier armies, the cost
of four emperors in the place of one, the largesses given to the
soldiery, the bribes to the barbarians on the frontiers, added largely
to the public burdens. A modern financier, by a wise and just
arrangement of the incidence of taxation, might have rendered the
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A.D. 147
payment more easy. But we must not forget that for two or more
centuries the wealth of the empire consisted mainly in the stock of the
hoarded plunder gradually expended by the government. There was
very little creation of fresh wealth either by agricultural or manufactur-
ing industry. In modern times we can calculate the value of the national
industry annually by its exports and imports. No one has attemped
to guess the productive power of the industry of the Roman empire.
(6) A system of taxation, oppressive and unjust. The taxes levied
consisted of (a) the customs duties on imports, &c. ; (b} a land-tax,
made on the basis of a census and survey taken every fifteen years.
The land was valued according to its produce (including the slaves
and the cattle). This tax was partly paid in coin and partly in pro-
duce, as corn, oil, wine, wool, which articles were conveyed to the
imperial depot at the cost of the tax-payer. There was no power to
make reductions or compensations, and money was not accepted for
articles payable in kind. Hence, in many cases, cultivation became
unprofitable and fell into disuse. Within sixty years after the death
of Constantine the government was obliged to relieve from taxation
330,000 acres in Campania, the most fertile land in Italy, equal to
one-eighth of the whole surface. This land had become exhausted
and unproductive through the neglect of manure ; (c) a capitation
tax amounting to ^9 per head, but by head is meant more than
several heads counted as one, in the case of the poor, while the rich
were counted not by units, but as heads, according to the amount
for which they were deemed liable ; (d) a lustral or trade contribution
on persons in professions, trades, cSic., paid every fourth year ;
(e) crown money (the aurum coronarum), exacted on any occasion
of a public or private nature which could be put forth as an excuse
for further taxation ; (/) the weight of taxation was felt all the heavier
after the beginning of the second century, from the gradual dis-
appearance of the gold and silver in circulation. The gold and
silver of the empire was always going out in subsidies, or in articles
of Eastern luxury, and there were no mines of the precious metals
largely productive, and no manufactured articles the demand for
which would have spared the bullion. The fiscal system of the
empire rapidly overtook the profits of labour and of trade, and soon
began to prey upon the capital of the trader and the cultivator,
reaching the point of declension in which industry and enterprise are
paralysed. (7) The mode of levying the taxation was peculiarly
oppressive and unjust. A fixed amount, according to the census,
was required from a town or district, which must be paid. What-
ever failure might have occurred in production, either from the
L 2
148 To the Final Division of the
seasons or from the abandonment of cultivation by impoverished
landholders or occupiers of houses, or from any other cause, had to
be made good by the solvent proprietor. So also in the larger towns
in which corporations (curia) existed. The members of the curia
(the decuriones) comprised the persons possessing property equal in
value to twenty-five acres of land (more or less); these, the governing
class, were made responsible for the amounts due by the community
to the revenue, and they were empowered to levy the same from the
inhabitants, and if these could not pay the decuriones must them-
selves find the amount. They had also to find horses and equipages
for the judges and all civil and military servants travelling on the busi-
ness of the state. As population and wealth declined year by year, the
burden was felt to be intolerable even before the time of Trajan, but
it had to be borne ; there was no escape, as no member of the curia
could remove from the city, or give up his official position, except by
the abandonment of his property. No excuse was admitted, not
even (in Christian times) a desire to enter the Church or the
imperial army. Hence we may understand the gradual impoverish-
ment of the landed proprietors and of the citizens as the normal con-
dition of Roman life in the decline of the empire especially. An
appointment to office in the curia was considered as nearly equal to
a sentence of confiscation of property. Large numbers of the culti-
vators of Gaul especially fled to the forests and the mountains and
became brigands. From the era of Diocletian, 300 A.D., these
Bagaudae, as they were called, became a cause of alarm to the ruling
powers. Men with property began to doubt whether the evils of
their position as Roman citizens were not greater than the advantages
derived from their responsibility to the Roman government, and
then, as a natural consequence, to look upon the barbarian rule as a
lesser evil than the Roman tax-gatherer. It is a remarkable fact that
the Italians and the provincials soon lost all fear of barbarian rule.
The imperial mercenary troops and the barbarian chiefs might fight
for the possession of the land while the population looked on with
indifference. Judging from the picture of the oppression and misery
connected with the collection of the taxes, drawn by Lactantius
(300-325 A.D.), we need not wonder at this indifference towards the
imperial rule. " It were impossible to number the officials who were
rained upon every province and town ; but the public distress, the
universal mourning was when the scourge of the census came, and
its takers, scattering themselves in every direction, produced a general
confusion, that I can only liken to the misery of a hostile invasion,
or of a town abandoned to the soldierv. The fields were measured
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A. D. 149
to the very clods, the trees counted, each vine plant numbered,
cattle registered as well as men. The crack of the lash and cry of
the tortured filled the air. The faithful slave tortured for evidence
against his master, the wife to depose against her husband, the son
against the sire .... In taking ages they added to the years of
the children and subtracted from those of the elderly. Not satisfied
with the returns of the first enumerators, they sent a succession of
them, who each swelled the valuation as a proof of service done, and
so the imposts went on increasing. Yet the number of cattle fell off
and the people died. Nevertheless, the survivors had to pay the
taxes of the dead."1 Constantine, the Christian emperor, endeavoured
in vain to ameliorate these evils. The necessities of the state were
imperative. Having swallowed up income and profit, they were now
devouring the capital of the population. (8) The deep corruption
of life and manners in the Roman world. " This taint was not found
in the genuine old Roman character, but was imported into it from
Greece. Looking back through the mists of pre-historic time, we
can clearly discern the Aryan progenitors of the Greeks, the Romans,
and the Goths, cherishing certain religious beliefs, and certain ideas
of a strong and pure morality, which guarded the sanctity of the
home. The Teutons, when they descended upon the dying empire,
still preserved that precious Aryan inheritance intact. The Greeks
had long since lost it, or bartered it away for other gifts— the products
of their delicious climate, their sensibility to artistic impression, an
analytical intellect, and a capacity for boundless doubt. In later
ages, Rome, influenced by her Hellenic sister, had lost it too, and
the corruption of her great cities showed, in all its hideousness, the
degradation which might be achieved by a civilisation without
morality and without God." 3 The classical writers testify to the
correctness of St. Paul's description of the moral depravity of the
ancient world.3 So also " the relics of Pompeii and Herculaneum,
the satires of Persius and Juvenal, the epigrams of Martial, and the
terrible records of Tacitus, Suetonius, and Dion Cassius. And yet,
even beneath this lowest deep there is a lower deep, for not even in
their dark pages are the depths of Satan so shamelessly laid bare to
human gaze as they are in the sordid fictions of Petronius and
Apuleius." 4 Family life, once a sacred thing, so that for 520 years
a divorce hac1 been unknown, became corrupt. " Women were
1 Lactantius, " De Morte," quoted by Michelet, vol. i. p. 241.
2 Hodgkin, " History of Italy," &c., vol. i. p. 520. 3 Romans i. 18-32.
4 Farrar, " Early Days of Christianity," vol. i. p. 2.
To the Final Division of the
married to be divorced, and divorced in order to marry again ; and
noble matrons counted the years, not by the consuls, but by their
discarded husbands." * " The theatrical and amphitheatrical per-
formances of that age, idolatrous in their origin and unspeakably
immoral in their tendency," fostered that indifference to human
suffering, the result of which is obviously displayed in the toleration
of gladiatorial combats. Augustus had in his time exhibited 8,000
gladiators and 3,500 wild beasts. In the sham sea-fights of Claudius
19,000 men fought in each. Titus in one day butchered thousands
of Jews in the games at Berytus. In Trajan's games 10,000 men
had to fight each other. In all these cases the fighting was real, and
there was great slaughter. The miserable condition of the slave
populations also was a reproach to humanity. These cultivated
heathens of Rome were " without excuse," for although the Epicurean
and the Sceptical philosophy had shaken the foundations of the old
Roman morality, the Stoic philosophy, plainly and practically taught
in the writings of Epictetus and others, had appealed to the moral
sense and the higher aspirations of mankind. Pitiable, indeed, was
the moral and intellectual position of the upper classes of Roman
society. " They were destitute of faith, yet terrified at scepticism.
They had long learned to treat the current mythology as a mass of
worthless fable .... but they were the ready dupes of every wander-
ing quack who chose to assume the character of a mathematicus or
a mage. Their official religion was a decrepit theogony ; their real
religion was a vague and credulous fatalism which disbelieved in the
existence of the gods, or held with Epicurus that they were careless
of mankind. The mass of tho populace either accorded to the old
belief, which saved them the trouble of giving any thought to the
matter .... or else they plunged with eager curiosity into the
crowd of foreign cults, among which a distorted Judaism took its
place." c< Christianity had already begun to vindicate the unity and
brotherhood of the human family in connexion with the great truth of
God's universal love and purpose of mercy towards all mankind. Such
teachings, we know, were not without their influence ; they attracted
especially the slave class and the freedmen, who found in the brother-
hood of the Church that fraternity for which they yearned. Opinions
and principles which man's higher nature recognised as good by slow
degrees changed the character of society. Their influence in our day,
though checked by self-indulgence, by self-conceit, and by the intense
' Seneca, quoted by Farrar, " Early Days of Christianity," vol. i. p. 7.
2 Ibid., vol. i. pp. 12, 13.
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A.D. 151
absorption of men's minds in the pursuit of material interests, is on
the increase, and will, we trust, at some future period renovate the
world. (9) No national patriotism found place in the empire of
Rome, nor could any provincial patriotism supply its absence. The
provincials witnessed generally with indifference the supercession of
the old officials, and made easy terms with their barbarian masters.
No glorious forgetfulness of self, no efforts of despairing patriotism
graced the extinction of the Roman empire in the West. Duruy,
quoted by Merivale, truly remarks, " The old age of nations is rarely
venerable, least of all that of Rome."
/// — Beyond the Roman World to the East.
6. THE PARTHIAN EMPIRE continued to be the enemy of the
empire, as it had been of the republic. Originating in the revolt
of an Indo-European race from the north, which had expelled
the governor appointed by the Seleucidae of Syria, 261-248 B.C.,
it remained under the Arsacidae until 226 A.D., when the Parthian
rule was set aside by one Artaxerxes, a native of Farz, who
established the dynasty of the Sassanides as rulers over the
Persian empire, and revived the old Persian faith of Zoroaster.
INDIAN history during this period is very difficult to unravel.
Buddhism (a reaction against Brahminism), which had established
itself in India under King Asoka, 250 B.C., was holding its ground
against its Brahminical opposers. In CHINA, the first Han Dynasty
was supplanted by the Eastern Han Dynasty under Lew Sew, 23 A.D.
This Dynasty fell 220 A.D., and China was for a long time (above
three centuries) distracted by civil wars. From 221 to 265 A.D. is
the epoch of the three kingdoms, Wei, Wai, and Shuh. In 265 A.D.
the Dynasty of Tsin in Honan reunited the empire for a short time,
when it was again divided. Buddhism was first introduced into
China 65 A.D. Before we had any knowledge of Chinese history,
China was the realised Utopia of the philosophers of the eighteenth
century. " They could point to one people whose pure and rational
morality, purified from all the clouds of bigotry and enthusiasm, shone
with an almost dazzling light and splendour above the ignorance and
superstition of Europe .... and to this semi-barbarous nation they
habitually attributed maxims of conduct that neither Roman nor
Christian virtue had ever realised."1 THE BARBARIAN WTORLD,
outside the Rhine and the Danube, comprised the Germanic (Teu-
tonic) tribes, the Sclavonic races in North Germany, Poland, and,
further east, the Scandinavian races beyond the Baltic, and the
1 Lecky, " History of Christian Morals," vol. i. p. 125.
152 To the Final Division of the
Gothic tribes (Gepidae, Ostrogoths, and Visigoths) north of the
Danube, in Dacia. The Gothic tribes appear to have migrated from
Sweden (which country is called by the old chroniclers " officina
gentium ") ; perhaps affording but poor support for its population, the
enterprising warlike class were driven to seek new homes by emigra-
tion. The Goths crossed the Baltic, and the last party received the
name of Gepidae (the Loiterers). They then settled in the Ukraine,
forming three nations — the Ostrogoths, of which the Amali were the
royal race ; the Visigoths, of which the Balti were the royal race ; and
the Gepidae. All these were Teutons of the Low-German race allied
to the Dutch, Frijians, and Jutes, and Angles (our Saxons). After a
.severe contest the Emperor Aurelian gave up Dacia to them, 270 A.D.,
and they occupied Hungary (Dacia), Transylvania, Moldavia, and
Wallachia. " This was a piece of real statesmanship. Had a similar
policy been pursued all round the frontiers of the Roman empire,
that empire, though in somewhat less than its greatest extent, might
be still standing." * Here for a century they remained at peace with
Rome, and adopting by degrees its civilisation. By the labours of
Ulfilas (whom Constantine called " the Moses of the Goths " ) they
were converted to the Arian form of Christianity, and with
Christianity they received the art of reading and writing, and, soon
after, a translation of the Scriptures into the Gothic tongue, 311-381.
This was the beginning of a great change in the Gothic-Teutonic
nations, all of which received Christianity in the fourth century
except the Franks and the Saxons. There was every probability that
.the regions inhabited by the Goths as the friends of Rome would be
the earliest civilised, and remain the firmest barrier against the outer
barbarians; "but a strange and terrible event, which falsified all
these reasonable expectations, changed the destiny of every country
in Europe, from the Volga to the Straits of Gibraltar." The HUNS,
a barbarous Tartar race (Mongolian or Finnish), who for ages had
dwelt along the Lake Baikel to the Wall of China, and had been the
undisputed lords of Northern Asia and a constant trouble to the
Chinese, found their inroads checked by the erection of the Great
Wall of China, 213 B.C. In the year 121 B.C. the Emperor Vouti
defeated and broke up the power of the Tanjou (the Hunnish chief),
and in 93 A.D. the Huns were driven westward. A large body of
them settled in Sogdiana (east of the Caspian), and are known as the
Euthalites or Nepthalites. Another division of them advanced to
the Wolga, and occupied on its eastern banks a country called after
1 Hodgkin, "History of Italy," vol. i. p. 63.
Roman Empire by Thcodosius, 395 A.D. 153
them " Great Hungary." Here it is supposed they were driven for-
wards by their implacable enemies, the Sinepi Tartars. On the
banks of the Don they encountered the Alani, a pastoral people of
Germanic and Sclavonic blood, whom they conquered and absorbed
into their own body. The Ostrogoths submitted, so also the Gepidae.
The Visigoths fled to the Danube, which was the boundary of the
empire, and implored the protection of the Roman Emperor of the
East, 376 A.D. Here was an opportunity of securing the services of
a brave people as a barrier to the empire, by affording them assist-
ance and treating them as allies. A warlike population more than
a million in number crossed the Danube under terms the most in-
sulting to a brave people; 200,000 of these were warriors; and these
Visigoths might have been strengthened by the Ostrogoths, who
desired to be received as allies. The treatment they received from
the Roman government drove the men who might have been allies
into rebellion. They defeated and slew Valens at Adrianople,
378 A.D., and ravaged the Roman provinces. The Gothic youth
who had been given as hostages were, in the terror of the moment,
treacherously murdered in Asia, to the great disgrace of the Roman
government, and to the natural increase of the enmity of the Goths.
An attempt on the part of the Ostrogoths to invade the empire was
defeated 386 A.D. ; this, with the quarrels of the Gothic chiefs, and
the prudent policy of Theodosius, the colleague of Gratian, led to a
peaceful settlement of the Visigoths in Mcesia and in Thrace. An
army of 40,000 Goths was maintained by the government as
"fcedorati," 383-395 A.D. These concessions were deemed dan-
gerous, and so they were. Their justification was necessity. Had
the Romans supported the Goths against the Huns, the Goths might
have retained their homes in Dacia, Wallachia, &c., and the horrors
which the empire suffered from Attila and others might have been
spared. With respect to the Goths, the fact that Alaric himself was
manageable when there were statesmen who knew how to conciliate
and rule, and that his successor was made to act as a friend rather
than an enemy, are so many proofs of the imbecility of the Roman
statesmen. The HUNS remained in undisputed possession of the
territory abandoned by the Gothic tribes, and by the terror of their
savage bravery compelled, in a few years, the submission of all the
Germanic and Sclavonic tribes from the Rhine to the Wolga.
The trade of the empire was mostly within itself. There was a
regular but circuitous supply of articles of luxury from India and
China, for which, as there were no commodities provided in the
empire which had any market in these distant lands, the price was
1 54 To the Final Division of the
paid in gold and silver, thus adding to the drain upon the bullion of
the empire. There are notices of the beginning of silk manu-
facture in Italy, though probably later than the fifth century, a linen
manufactory in Spain, and one of cotton in Malta. There were also
about thirty-nine manufactories of arms in the empire. The chief
trading cities were Alexandria, Rhodes, Ephesus, and Antioch, with
Marseilles and Carthage. A considerable land trade through Ger-
many and the tracts now known as Poland and Russia, with the
Baltic nations, and from the Black Sea to Tartary and China. Through
Egypt and her navy they had a trade with Arabia and India.
7. THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY of this period is most important,
as its main topic is the greatest of all events in the world's history —
the incarnation, the life and teaching, the death and resurrection
and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ. The fact of the existence,
the teaching, and the death of Christ, no rational man in the present
age denies. In the opinion of the most learned and thoughtful of
our scholars, there is no way of accounting for the phenomena of
€hrist and Christianity except by the admission of the truth of the
facts and teaching presented to us in the Gospels, the Acts, and the
Epistles, which form the New Testament. They cannot be ignored,
as they are entwined in the history of the human race. Jesus Christ,
in multiform manifestations, confronts us in every page of the modern
history of mankind. " The most advanced sceptic cannot deny that,
by His life and teaching, He has altered the entire current of history,
and raised the standard of human morality. He closed all the
history of the past, and inaugurated all the history of the future,
and all the most brilliant and civilised nations worship Him as God."
His character has compelled the wonder and admiration of many
of the wise of this world, who do not fully recognise His Godhead.
" He was (says Renan) the individual who had made the species
take the greatest step towards the divine ; the Christ of the Gospels
is the most beautiful incarnation of God in the most beautiful of
forms; His beauty is eternal; His reign will never end. Kant
testifies to his ideal perfection. Hegel saw in Him the union of the
human and the divine. Spinoza spoke of Him as the truest symbol
of heavenly wisdom ; the beauty and grandeur of His life overawed
even the flippant soul of Voltaire. Between Him and whomsoever
else in the world (said Napoleon I.) there is no possible term of
comparison. If the life and death of Socrates are those of a sage
(said Rousseau), the life and death of Jesus are those of a God. He
is (says Strauss) the highest object we can possibly imagine with
respect to religion, the being without whose presence in the mind,
Roman Empire by T.heodosius, 395 A. D. 155
perfect piety is impossible Jesus, in His all but perfect life,
stood alone and unapproached in history. James- Stewart Mill
spoke of Him as a man ' charged with a special, express, and unique
commission from God to lead mankind to truth and virtue.' In his
three essays he also speaks of Christ as 'the ideal representative
and guide of humanity.' " l Some of these testimonies to Christ,
the result of the power of truth, remind us of the occasion when
" unclean spirits .... fell down before Him, and cried out, saying,
Thou art the Son of God" (Mark iii. n). Christ, as set before us
in the Gospels, is the enigma, the inexplicable mystery, which
confronts the rampant infidelity of our day. The character and
person of Christ stand out the invincible bulwark of the faith of the
Christian Church. Whatever hypotheses may be adopted, apart
from the admission of His divinity, they all fail to meet all the
conditions of the problem ; to use the language of our modern
philosophy, they are ' unthinkable.' To suppose that ' Christianity
owed its strength and success to Hellenic culture is so contrary to
historic evidence,' that he who makes the supposition .... shows
himself disqualified for the task of reading history aright, and appre-
ciating what are its moving forces Christianity confronted
the thought of Greece with a greater thought by far, and brought
satisfaction to the needs which the culture of Greece could awaken,
but could not satisfy It also met those new wants of
humanity which had been awakened for the first time in history by
the wide dominion, the equal justice, and the common citizenship of
the Roman empire."2 No historical records occupy a more firm
position than those of the New Testament. The Epistles to the
Churches were, many of them, written before some of the Synoptic
Gospels, all the Gospels, except the Gospel of St. John, before the
destruction of Jerusalem, 69 A.D. The critical faculty of the early
Christians could not easily be deceived, when they had already been
convinced " of the certainty " of the facts by living witnesses who
had been personally acquainted with the facts. Our conviction of
the genuineness and the authenticity of the records rests on the
Christian consciousness of these primitive Christians, of which the
decisions of the councils of the Church are the undeniable evidence
— the evidence, not the authority. Before the destruction of Jerusalem,
Christianity had been preached in the leading cities of the Roman
empire. In the generation preceding Constantine it is calculated
1 Farrar, "Encyc. Brit.," ninth edition, vol. xiii. pp. 657, 670.
2 Spectator, April 14, 1883.
156 To tJte Final Division of tlie
that one-fourth of the population of the empire had accepted openly
or secretly Christianity, that the zealous pagans were few in number,
and that the majority of the population were either too ignorant, or
too indifferent, to care for anything beyond the old pagan ritualism
to which they had been accustomed (a form without power to interest
or attract). This progress of the Church was accomplished in spite
of the so-called Ten Persecutions — that by Nero 64 A.D., Domitian
81 A.D., Trajan 107 A.D. (in which latter the remarkable letter of
Pliny vindicated the integrity of the Christians of Bithynia appeared) ;
then follow the persecutions by Hadrian, 107 A.D. ; by Marcus Aurelius,
163 A.D. • by Severus, 201 A.D. ; by Maximin, 235 A.D. ; by Decius,
249 A.D.; byGallus, 252 A.D.; by Valerian, 258 A.D. ; and by Diocletian,
303 A.D. The Roman government looked with suspicion on the
exclusiveness and the unity of the Christian Church, which, from its
organisation, appeared to them to be an " imperium in imperio"
representing also principles opposed to the religion and institutions
of the empire. The attempts to ignore the exercise of a special
divine influence on the labours of the Christian teachers because
natural or, in other words, providential, causes co-operated in the
spread of Christian truth, is a dispute about words. God's providence
is evident in the natural order of events, and is also recognised
in the power exercised by Gospel truth on men's consciences.
"Middleton and Gibbon rendered a real, however undesigned,
service to Christianity by attempting to prove that the rapid exten-
sion of the primitive Church was merely the natural result of natural
causes. For what better proof could be given of the divine origin
of any religion than by showing that it had at once overspread the
civilised world by the expansive power of an inherent aptitude to the
nature and to the wants of mankind ? " * Lecky 2 also explains the
progress of Christianity as due to the disintegration of the old
religions and the general thirst for something to believe ; and also
to the singular adaptation of Christianity to the wants of the times,
and to the heroism which it inspired. He considers that " never
before was a religious transformation so manifestly inevitable. No
other religion ever combined so many forms of attraction as Chris-
tianity, both from its intrinsic excellence and from its manifest
adaptation to the special wants of the time." The gradually
increasing importance of Christianity as a system, and the rapidly
increasing number of its professors, may be measured by the literary
1 Sir James Stephen, "Essays on Eccl. History," I2mo., p. 233.
2 In his " History of European Morals," vol. i. pp. 410-418.
Roman Empire by Theodosins, 395 A.D. 157
movement among the philosophical class of teachers and satirists^
the rationalists of expiring paganism, who were seeking to establish
Neo-Platonism and other kindred philosophies in its place. To
these the teachings of the Christian Church were the only barrier.
Crescens, 161 A.D., Lucian, 170 A.D., Celsus, iSoA.D., Porphyry, and
others, all of them able and learned, have anticipated most of what
has since been written on their side of the question. The life of
Apollonius Tyanasus, a Pythagorean philosopher, or rather a
pretender to miraculous power and profound knowledge, who was
born about i A.D. and died 96 A.D., has been invidiously placed in
competition with the character of Christ Christianity was not
without men equally able and learned to defend its claims. These
defences are known as " Apologies " — i.e., defences, and were put
forth by Quadratus and Miltiades addressed to Hadrian 122 A.D. ;
by Justin Martyr to Antoninus Pius, 148-150 A.D. ; to Marcus
Aurelius, 161-163 A.D. ; also by Melito, 170 A.D. ; by Origen, 235 A.D.,
and by Eusebius and Jerome in the fourth century. The Emperor
Gallienus first recognised Christianity as a " religio lirita" 259 A.D.
Galerius published an "Edict of Toleration" 312 A.D. In the
following years it was not only tolerated, but became, under Con-
stantine, the established religion of the empire, 324 A.D. "When
Constantine .... took Christianity to be the religion of the empire,
it was already a great political force, able — and not more able than
willing — to repay him by aid and submission Suddenly
called from danger and ignominy to the seat of power, and finding
her inexperience perplexed by a sphere of action vast and varied,
the Church was compelled to frame herself upon the model of the
secular administration .... and just as with the extension of the
empire all the independent rights of districts, towns, or tribes had
disappeared, so now the primitive freedom and diversity of individual
Christians and local Churches .... was finally overborne by the
idea of one visible Catholic Church, uniform in faith and ritual." 1
Unhappily, there were Christians who applied the laws of the Jewish
theocracy to the Christian system, especially in the trying periods of
the Donatist and Arian controversies.
8. The secular benefit derived by the Church from the adoption
of Christianity by Constantine were, no doubt, great, but they have
been much exaggerated. It must be remarked that the Christian
Church was a power which first created a public opinion in the
Roman empire opposed to the avowed principles and practices of
1 Bryce, pp. 10, u.
i$S To the Final Division of the
the imperial government. It had accumulated and retained,
by the connivance of the authorities, large possessions, and its
revenues were readily supplied by the voluntary gifts of Christian
believers. Already the bishop of each imperial city was the arbiter
and judge in most cases of dispute in which the parties were
Christians ; he was the dispenser of charitable funds, aided by large
numbers of clergy and laity equally charitable, and generally sym-
pathising with the poorest, the slave not excepted. Constantine and
his successors legalised these exercises of spiritual power and zeal,
and to some extent increased their sphere of action. In Rome
itself the bishop was transferred to the palace of the Lateran ; the
estates and property confiscated by Diocletian were restored ; new
places of worship of peculiar grandeur were built and endowed by
the state, as the Lateran, the Vatican, St. Paul extra muros, St. Agnes,
St. Laurence, St. Marcellinus, and St. Peter in via Laricanae. The
value of these endowments may be guessed by the ascertained
revenue of three of these amounting to about twelve hundred pounds
sterling. To the Church in general the benefits were yet more
valuable. All the privileges claimed by the Church, and all the
property possessed by the Church, were confirmed by the state, and
the exercise of the jurisdiction of the Church in ecclesiastical matters
was enforced by the civil law. Each church, with its bishop and
subordinate presbyters, deacons, &c., formed a spiritual municipium.
Although there was no formal state support for the clergy — so that,
in some cases, the clergy were obliged to engage in trade — yet from
the contributions of the faithful, and by the voluntary payment of
tithes, the revenue of a bishop is calculated by Gibbon and others
to have equalled six hundred pounds per annum of our money.
The Church was permitted to receive and hold gifts of property and
land, and this power was occasionally so absurd as to call forth severe
edicts, one especially in 370 A.D. by Valentinian I., respecting which
St. Jerome remarks : " I do not complain of the edict, but I grieve
that we should have deserved it." The clergy, however, were
partially exempted from civil jurisdiction, and the privilege of
sanctuary was granted to the Christian Church. The establishment
of Sunday as a day of rest was a step which secured one day's rest
in seven to the labourer and an opportunity for attendance upon
public worship. The right assumed by the clergy of exercising a
moral censorship over all classes, even the very highest, seems to
have been regarded as essential to their position, and was used freely
towards all classes of offenders, as, for instance, the governors of
provinces, the clergy often opposing them in cases of cruelty and
Roman Empire by T/wodosius, 395 A. D. 159
oppression, after the fashion of the old tribunes of the people. In
the arrangement of the various bishoprics the Church followed
closely the new political division of the empire introduced by
Constantine. This led to a great variety in the relative ranks of the
bishops, some becoming exarchs, or primates, or patriarchs. The
chorepiscopoi (country bishops) were by degrees suffered to die
out, as their humbler positions reflected painfully on that of the
bishops generally. The revenues of the churches were distributed,
one portion to the bishop, another to the clergy, a third to the cost
of public worship, and a fourth to the poor.
The Christian religion rests upon the deep profound principles
embodied in the moral constitution of the divine nature, the
holiness of God, the irreconcilable difference between right and
wrong, good and evil; the sense of sin, not merely as a disease, but
as a wilful act of disobedience to the eternal law of right, so different
from the laxity of pagan sentiment. " In the many disquisitions
which Epictetus and others have left us, concerning the proper frame
of mind in which men should approach death, repentance for past
sin has absolutely no place, nor do the ancients appear to have
realised the purifying and spiritual influence it exercises upon the
character; and while the reality of moral disease was fully recognised,
while an ideal of lofty, and indeed unattainable, excellence was con-
tinually proposed, no one doubted the essential excellency of human
nature, and very few doubted the possibility of man acquiring by his
own will a high degree of virtue."1 In Christianity the spiritual
procedure was simply " Repentance towards God and faith towards
our Lord Jesus Christ," while the leading dogmas, as in the Apostles'
Creed, are included within a few lines. The first converts were
mainly Hellenists and the literature Greek. When the learned
began to formulate a theology and a moral philosophy, differences
of opinion naturally arose. It ought to have been evident, from the
writings of the New Testament, that Christian believers were bound
by one common central truth, beyond which difference of opinion
was to be tolerated as the natural result of the activity, the weakness
and the strength of the human mind. Where the divine lawgiver
had not imposed restriction, man had no right to call for a sub-
missive uniformity. Differences of opinion, warm controversies
were the natural results of attempts to explain beyond the letter of
revelation, the great truths connected with the divine relations
and purpose of mercy to the human race. Outside the Christian
1 Lecky, «' History of European Morals," vol. i. p. 205.
To the Final Division of the
Church, there were influences exercised upon Christian opinion by
Judaism, the Greek philosophy, and the mysticism of the Oriental
theosophy. (i) There was an attempt to subordinate Christianity
to Judaism, and to mix up the practices and ritual of Judaism with
Christianity, by the Ebionites and Nazarenes. This violation of
Christian liberty was powerfully opposed by St. Paul, the Apostle of
the Gentiles. (2) Another class endeavoured to engraft into
Christian theology the speculations of the Oriental Manichaeanism and
of the Neo-Platonic sects ; hence the Gnostic heresies. These began
with a sincere attempt to reconcile revelation with the speculations
of the Oriental philosophy (i Tim. vi. 20). Among the various
forms of the Gnostic theory three principles may be observed :
(a) the opposition of spirit and matter; (ft) a demiurgos as
Creator of the world different from the Supreme God ; (c) the
denial of the true humanity of Christ, whose body they held to be
a mere phantom (hence they were called Docetes). All the early
heresies partook more or less of this character. (3) Asceticism,
as in the case of the Montanists, by some regarded as the Puritans,
by others as the fanatics of the early Church. (4) Some, attempt-
ing to simplify that which is necessarily incomprehensible in the
revelation of the divine nature, were led to entertain views similar
to those of Arius, and to ascribe a measure of inferiority to the
nature of our Lord, and then, step by step, to see nothing except the
humanity in the nature of Christ. We may rejoice that the theo-
logians of the early Church were able to withstand their rationalising
opponents, even when supported by the imperial government. It
is much to be regretted that the laity of the Christian Church are
apt to neglect the study of its early struggles in the defence of its
truths. Surely some acquaintance with the history of the Christian
" dogma," the accepted teaching of the Christian Church, is neces-
sary to every educated man. " The Arian controversy differed from
all modern controversies on like subjects by the extremely abstract
region within which it was confined. Arius was led to adopt his
peculiar theory from a fancied necessity arising out of the terms
Father and Son, as if these terms, used through the imperfection of
language to designate distinctions in the unity of the divine nature,
implied what is implied when used in relation to man. It was the
excess of dogmatism founded upon the most abstract words, in the
most abstract reign of human thought." The fears of the orthodox
party were deepened by the danger lest the Arian view should lead
to a recognition of two Gods, and thus lead to the revival of the old
polytheism. In this fierce and long-continued controversy the great
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A. D. 161
Athanasius, fighting for the truth " contra mundum," has extorted
the admiration of Gibbon. Dr. Newman remarks that " Athanasius
stands out more grandly in Gibbon than in the pages of the orthodox
ecclesiastical historians .... and, as if to show how much insight
depends upon sympathy, Gibbon is immediately more just and open to
the merits of the Christian community than he has been hitherto. He
now sees that the privileges of the Church had already revived a sense of
order and freedom in the Roman government." l There have been
men in high places who in the Houses of Parliament have unneces-
sarily exposed their ignorance of history in their ridicule of the
phraseology of the Nicene Creed and the words used in this contro-
versy homoousian and homoiousian, the catch-words, the one of the
orthodox, the other of the Arian party, as if the question in dispute
were " the mere theology of a syllable." It is a pleasure to quote
from a high authority the deserved rebuke, "This technical language
of theology has not been a gratuitous invention of ingenious divines,
but a necessary development of thought. Each phrase is a record
of some fierce controversy which had to be fought, if dogmatic
truth was to be preserved." 2 The heresy of Arius was the occasion
of the convening the first general council by Constantine at Nice,
325 A.D., in which the views of Arius were condemned. These
general councils were "the pitched battles of ecclesiastical history;"
that of Nice consisted of above three hundred bishops from every
province of the Roman world, a full and fair representation of the
theological learning of the age and of the ability of the clergy.
The second general council (the first of Constantinople), called by
Theodosius the Great, condemned the opinions of those who
impugned the divinity of the Holy Spirit, 380 A.D. The persecu-
tions of the Christian Church by the heathen emperors had called
forth "the Noble Army of Martyrs," whose existence and noble
self-sacrifice would remain unnoticed and forgotten except for the
reference to them in the Te Deum in the service of the Anglican
Church. It is very singular that most Christians shrink from the
contemplation of the sufferings endured by men and women of old
for Christ's sake. Perhaps their sacrifices are felt as a reproach to
our ease and slothfulness. It is, however, well to remember, that
among the thousands who faced death in the amphitheatre, by wild
beasts or by the sword of the executioner, or by lingering tortures,
there are to be found ladies of refinement and high family, as Perpetua
and her companions in Africa in the reign of Caracalla. Justin
1 Morison's " Life of Gibbon," p. 127. 2 Spectator. 8 Stanley.
If
1 62 To the Final Division of the
Martyr (the philosopher) died for Christ 150 A.D. ; Polycarp, 166
A.D. The massacres at Lyons and Vienne took place under the
philosophic and humane Marcus Aurelius ; and Cyprian, the Bishop
of Carthage, suffered 257 A.D., under Valerian. The highly-coloured
statements and fables, which in the course of time have been per-
mitted to disguise the history of these honoured martyrs, should not
be allowed to lessen our reverence for the memory of the men and
women who died for Christ. The persecution under Decius, 249
A.D., drove Paul the Hermit with others into the deserts of Thebais.
After this, Anthony, Pachomius, and others, 305 A.D. An anchoret
or monastic life arose, and was favoured in the East by the genial
taste for a dreary contemplative existence. Hilarion established
monasteries in Palestine, 328 A.D., and so by degrees over Europe.
However useful monastic institutions may have been in the troublous
times which accompanied the decline and fall of the empire, the
experience of centuries led to their discouragement in Europe by
Catholic sovereigns as well as by Protestant legislation. Many of the
corruptions of Christianity and the absurd monstrosities of men like
Symon the Stylite are traceable to the idiotic fancies of monks.
Many of the monastic institutions in Europe were, however, for a
time, the sanctuaries of learning and the vanguards of Christian
civilisation, examples of learning and of labour in agricultural
improvements — to them be all honour. In the East they have not
been remarkable for their literary utility, or, in fact, for anything
except a lazy, ignorant indolence ; and their existence at this time is
one of the hindrances in the way of the resurrection of genuine
Christianity in Turkey and the East.
9. The outward form of the churches, as represented in their
ministers and congregations, was at first of necessity congregational,
the pastor being the bishop ; but there was no isolation from the
corporate body, the Church of Christ. Meetings of ministers
naturally required a chairman. When some minister, from the
superior importance of the Church over which he presided or from
the possession of special talent, acquired a superior position as a
centre of union, he became the bishop, and the title, at first common
to all ministers, was confined to the perpetual president. These
bishops became powers in their respective cities. "Thus there
shaped itself a hierarchy of patriarchs, metropolitans, and bishops
(after the model of the imperial arrangements in the provinces),
their jurisdiction, although spiritual, enforced by the law of the
state, their provinces and dioceses usually corresponding to the
administrative divisions of the empire. As no patriarch yet enjoyed
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A.D. 163
more than an honorary supremacy, the head of the Church, so
far as she could be said to have a head, was virtually the emperor
himself. The clergy .... were well pleased to see him preside in
councils, issue edicts against heresy, and testify, even by arbitrary
measures, his zeal for the advancement of the faith and the over-
throw of pagan rites. But, though the tone of the Church remained
humble, her strength waxed greater ; nor were there occasions want-
ing which revealed the future that was in store for her. The
resistance and final triumph of Athanasius proved that the new society
could put forth a power of opinion such as had never been known
before ; the abasement of Theodosius before Ambrose, the Arch-
bishop of Milan, admitted the supremacy of spiritual authority.
In the decrepitude of old institutions, it was to the Church that the
life and feelings of the people sought more and more to attach
themselves ; and when, in the fifth century, the horizon grew black
with clouds of ruin, those who watched with despair and apathy the
approach of irresistible foes, fled for comfort to the shrine of a
religion which even those foes revered." l A work, entitled " The
Teaching of the Twelve Apostles," has been discovered by the Greek
Bishop of Constantinople in 1883. It is referred to by Eusebius,
Clement of Alexandria, Athanasius, &c. The date of its composition is
fixed at 100 or 1 10 A.D. The light thrown on the poverty and simple
arrangement of the early Church, especially in remote and poor dis-
tricts, is very interesting. The evangelists, called also prophets
(teachers), seem to have exercised as itinerant overseers the power,
given to Titus to set in order the affairs of the Churches and to
ordain elders. To these evangelists the title of apostles was given ; the
elders were called bishops, who, with their deacons, were the chosen
of their several congregations. " The tone of the directions implies
an age of poverty and simplicity, when a man was to be regarded as
a false prophet if he asked for money, or if, being a wandering
missionary, he stayed in hospitable quarters on the second day." a
In Rome, the reputed see of St. Peter, the bishop held a position
of peculiar dignity, through the grandeur of Rome itself. So
desirable was the position, that in the contest for the elections of
Damascus, 366 A.D., a fight occurred between the excited partisans
in which 137 lives were lost; the luxury and outward state of the
bishop and others called forth the severe criticism and sarcasm of
pagan critics, who forget that these disasters originated in the
1 Bryce, pp. n, 12.
2 "Expositor," second series, No. xli. pp. 374-392, by Canon Farrar.
M 2
1 64 To the Final Division of the
interference of the Arian emperor with the elections. But the
claim of the Popes to a superior position over the Church at large,
indirectly made by Victor 196 A.D., and by Julius, 347 A.D., were
quietly but effectually checked for the time. By the interference of the
secular power the first capital punishment for heresy was inflicted on
Priscillian, in Gaul, under the rule of the usurper Maximus, at
Treves, 385 A.D. This act was strongly condemned by St. Martin
of Tours, and the two persecutors were deprived of their bishoprics.
Notions of the sanctity of celibacy, especially among the clergy,
gradually grew. The Montanists are said to have professed a
peculiar sanctity, and the possession of a large amount of spiritual
insight and power. They were, probably, for the most part sincere,
but strict, professors of Christianity, though some of them may have
yielded to fanatical impulses. The Donatist schism in north Africa,
which commenced 311 A.D., and lasted two hundred years, arose out
-of the violent attempts to enforce a rigorous discipline towards such
.as had been compromised in times of persecution. By both ot
these sects the peace and prosperity of the Church was interrupted ;
as also by the Meletian schism, which lasted from 325 A.D. to the
end of the century. It is to be feared that the superstition and
laxity regarding truth, which lingered among many of the Christian
-converts, exercised too great an influence over many of the bishops
and clergy. The histories handed down to us of the discovery
of the remains of martyrs in Milan lessen our confidence in St.
Ambrose, the brave bishop of Milan. This feeling influenced
Helvidius, Jovinian, and Vigilantius to oppose these superstitions,
together with the false notions of peculiar purity attached to celibacy,
which the Council of Illiberis, 303 A.D., had countenanced. Pope
Siricius, the successor of Damasus, denied the validity of clerical
marriages, though up to the eleventh century the clergy were
generally refractory on this point, and St. Jerome is violent in his
attacks upon Vigilantius and others. The toleration of paganism
was not likely to continue, when professed Christians had no tolera-
tion for each other. In 384 A.D., they refused any outward mark
of respect to the altar and statue of Victory in spite of the pleadings
of Symmachus ; and this refusal of any signs of respect to the
tutelary divinities in the public ceremonies marked the abandon-
ment of all connexion with paganism on the part of the government
of the Roman empire.
10. THE LITERATURE OF THIS PERIOD was the Latin and Greek of
the old paganism, and the new Christian literature, for the most part
Greek. After the Augustan age there was a great decline in the
Roman Empire by TJieodcsius, 395 A.D. 165
literature of the age, especially between the rule of Marcus Aurelius,
161 A.D., and Valerian, 253 A.D. There is not a single writer in this
period who can be called a poet, but many lawyers, antiquarians,
and rhetoricians. Latin literature had almost ceased to exist ; even
the meditations of an emperor are in Greek. Athens, Tarsus in
Cilicia, and Marseilles were favourite places of study for the youth
of the higher classes. Books were generally accessible, being com-
paratively cheap from the facilities afforded by cheap educated slave
labour, through which copies could be multiplied by dictation to a
large extent. In Rome there was a sheet circulated — the "Acta
Diurna" — a sort of government gazette. In Spain, Gaul, and
Britain, Latin literature was eagerly cultivated. In the East, though
the Latin was the language of the officials, yet neither the language
nor the literature of Rome found much acceptance. Even in Rome,
Greek was more generally spoken than Latin. The names of the
leading authors are all that can be given in this brief compendium,
(i) The poets : Ovid, 14 A.D. ; Phasdrus, 14 A.D. ; Lucan, Persius,
Silius Italicus, 54-68 A.D. ; Martial, 66-104 A.D. ; Statius, 81-96 A.D. ;
Juvenal, 98-117 A.D. ; Petronius, 161-180 A.D. ; Ausonius and
Claudian, 380 A.D. (2) The historians : Livy, 14 A.D. ; Valerius Pater-
culus and Valerius Maximus, 14-17 A.D. ; Tacitus and Suetonius,
Floras, 98-117 A.D. ; Josephus the Jew, 38-97 A.D. ; Plutarch,
105-140 A.D. ; Arrian, 103-150 A.D. ; Pausanias, 125-176 A.D. ;
Justin, Quintus Curtius, 138-161 A.D. ; Appian, 130-147 A.D. ;
Herodian and Dio Cassius, 180-238 A.D.; Diogenes Laertius,
200-222 A.D. ; ^Elian, 222-250 A.D. ; Aurelius Victor and Eutropius,
360 A.D. ; Ammianus Marcellinus, 390 A.D. ; besides the Augustan
Memoirs and others. (3) The geographers and scientific writers:
Strabo, 21-25 A-D- '> Pomponius Mela and Columella (agriculture),
41-54 A.D. ; Pliny the Elder (an encyclopsediac work), 60-79 A>D- >
Ptolemy (the founder of the Ptolemian astronomical system, which
ruled until superseded by Copernicus in the fifteenth century),
126-161 A.D. ; add to these Celsus (the opponent of Christianity
who introduced the writings of the ancient Hippocrates into Rome),
15-20 A.D. ; and Galen, the celebrated physician, 150 A.D. (4) The
legalists and jurisprudents: Capito, 14 A.D. ; Labeo, 14-42 A.D. ;
Sabinus, 25-50 A.D. ; Scsevola, 138-161 A.D. ; Salvius Julianus,
130-148 A.D. ; Gaius, 150 A.D. ; Papinian, 180-212 A.D. ; Ulpian,
210-228 A.D. ; there was a legal school at Berytus until the sixth
century. (5) The orators, and sophists, and satirists: Quintilian,
69-118 A.D. ; Dion Chrysostom, 50-117 A.D. ; Apuleius (satirist and
romancer), 161-180 A.D. ; Lucian (satirist), 165-182 A.D. ; Longinus
1 66 To the Final Division of the
(orator), 213-273 A.D. ; Philostratus (sophist), 182-237 A.D. ; Libanius
(sophist), 346-395 A.D. ; Symmachus (orator), 380 A.D. (6) The
moralists, &c. : L. Annseus Seneca (Stoic), 41-65 A.D. ; M. Annseus
Seneca (rhetorician), 14-37 A.D. ; Epictetus, 90-125 A.D. ; Marcus
Aurelius, 161-180 A.D. ; Babrius (^Esop's fables) in the first century;
Pliny, junior, 98-117 A.D. ; Lettus and Aulus Gellius (miscellaneous),
138-161 A.D. ; (7) The philosophic writers: Philo the Jew and
Apion, 20-40 A.D. ; Apuleius (a Platonic), 150 A.D. ; Ammonius
Saccus (eclectic), 175-250^0. ; Plotinus, 230-270 A.D. ; lamblichus,
309-329 A.D. ; Porphyry, 249-305 A.D. ; were of the new Platonic
school. The Emperor Julian, 363 A.D. Both heathen and Christian
literature were influenced more or less by the fashionable eclectic
Neo-Platonic philosophy. It traced all things back to the Absolute
One (not a theistical, but a pantheistical, deity) ; it rejected all
objective revelation. Man could only be brought to a saving know-
ledge of God by a subjective intuition, called the ecstasy wherein
man's soul (the subject) and the absolute (the object) are so united
as to lose their personal identity. This state is attainable by
asceticism and contemplation (to which was added later magic rites).
The Neo-Platonic trinity consisted of the reason, the soul, and
the Absolute One, inexpressible and inconceivable, from whom all
things are derived by radiation, &c., &c. Neo-Platonism accepted
the religious conceptions of all nations as far as suited its system.
It was the creed of philosophers lifted in their conceit above the
vulgar crowd and despising the illiterate. It is obvious how such a
system, which imposed no obligations, and which had no proof but
a man's own fancies, would suit the minds dissatisfied with the vulgar
polytheism, and not disposed to accept the teachings and respon-
sibilities of Christianity. Neo-Platonism represents a mode of
thought which may be traced through various creeds and ages,
resting on a deeply-seated belief that we possess foundations of know-
ledge beyond the mere senses. Lecky thinks that the philosophical
systems, as modified by the Platonic and the Egyptian Oriental
schools, helped to effect a great religious reform among many in the
pagan world by the revival of religious reverence, the inculcation of
humility, prayer, and purity of thought, and by accustoming men to
associate their moral ideals with the deity rather than with them-
selves.1 Its philosophy " affirmed that to know is to be, and the
Neo-Platonists maintained the potential omniscience of mind ....
and at length the virtual omniscience of spirits. Thus was taught
1 Lecky, " History of Christian Morals," vol. i. p. 396.
Roman Empire by Theodosius, 395 A.D. 167
by Plotinus, says M. Matter, the learned historian of the Alexandrian
school, * the famous system of the identity of being and thought,
the greatest temerity of our age ; ' thus was the Platonic realism
carried to its utmost height, and as thus developed it stood forth,
like its modem duplicate, the * German realism,' as either a naked
absurdity, or express and complete pantheism. Plotinus thought
that the reason, of which each man is conscious, is not a faculty of
the individual soul, but a ray or flash of the universal reason ....
at once common and particular ; diffused through the universe, and
yet entire in each soul, in each life, in each impulse, in each act." l
The leading Christian writers were the early apostolical fathers,
Clement, Ignatius, Polycarp ; also Justin Martyr, Tatian, Irenseus
(140-180 A.D.), Tertullian (167-180 A.D.) in the second century;
Clement of Alexandria, Origen (whose " Hexapla " remain in
part a proof of his learning and piety), Hippolytus of Portus, Cyprian
of Carthage, in the third century ; with Arnobius, Lactantius, Hilary
of Poitiers, Eusebius of Csesarea, Gregory of Nazianzen (355-390 A.D.),
Basil of Csesarea, Cappadocia (355-380 A.D.), Athanasius of
Alexandria, Ambrose of Milan, Ephrem Syrus, in the fourth century.
The literary merit of the writings of the Christian fathers is, at least,
fully equal to that of their Greek and Latin contemporaries in the
second, third, and fourth centuries. In learning and research there
are no pagan writers of their age equal to Irenaeus, Eusebius,
Hippolytus, and Origen ; Donatus, the grammarian (about 333 A.D.),
and Servius, grammarian (390-400 A.D.).
State of the World, 395 A.D.
EUROPE.
THE ROMAN EMPIRE contained all of Europe bounded on the east
by the Rhine and south of the Danube, also England, Wales,
and the south of Scotland. Ireland and the north of Scotland
- remained in their primitive state.
THE BARBARIAN world, east of the Rhine, consisted of Germanic
and Sclavonian tribes, the Germans especially pressing into
the Roman territories in Gaul, Rhaetia, and Pannonia ; and
1 London Quarterly Revieiv, vol. xv. pp. 589, 590, by Dr. Rigg.
1 68 To the Final Division of the Roman Empire by Thedosius.
south of the Danube the Goths, driven by the Huns,
occupied Mcesia. Beyond, in the far east, were a large
number of barbarian tribes, Huns — Bulgarians, Alani, Avars,
Magyars, &c. — ready to follow in the wake of the Sclavonians
and the Huns.
SCANDINAVIA was occupied by the Gothic races, the ancestors of the
present Swedes, Norwegians, and Danes.
ASIA.
ASIA MINOR to the Euphrates and Syria were under the Roman
empire.
THE PERSIANS overturned the Parthian power 226 A.D., and founded
the dynasty of the Sassanidse, which occupied the place of
the old Persian empire, of which it professed to be a revival.
INDIA troubled and divided by the Brahmin and Buddhist contests.
CHINA divided into several independent states.
JAPAN under the Mikados rapidly driving the Aionos northward.
AFRICA.
EGYPT and North Africa under the Roman empire.
ETHIOPIA and Abyssinia under petty barbarous chiefs of whom
nothing is known. Christianity was introduced into Abyssinia
by Frumentius about 330 A.D.
SIXTH PERIOD,
From the Division of the Empire to the
Revival of the Empire of the West by
Charlemagne, 800 A .D.
FOR the sake of perspicuity the narrative follows the history (i) of
the Western Empire to its end in 476 A.D., then (2) the settlement of
the barbarous conquerors in the new nationalities — Gaul, Spain,
Britain, North Africa, and lastly in Italy itself; (3) the nature and
character of these barbarian invasions ; (4) the affairs of the Eastern-
Empire up to the Saracenic invasion; (5) the rise and progress of the
Mahometan Saracens ; (6) the rise of the empire of the German
Franks under Charlemagne ; (7) the Eastern Empire to the time of
Charlemagne; (8) Scandinavia and the eastern plains north and
west of the Black Sea and the Danube; (9) the ecclesiastical history;
(10) the literary history of this period.
2. (i) The Western Empire lingered outwardly for eighty-one
years. Stilicho, a Vandal, married to Serena, a niece of Theodosius,,
ably governed under the child Honorius (aged eleven years), who
remained all his life " a crowned nothingness." The rivalries of
Stilicho with Rufinus, the guardian of Arcadius (Emperor of the
East), led to an estrangement on the part of the two empires, which
lasted to 408 A.D., though Rufinus himself fell by a conspiracy in
395 A.D. The first step which led to the dissolution of the Western
Empire was taken by Alaric, the commander of the Visigothic feder-
ate troops (" fcedorati," holding lands on military tenure), under the
late Theodosius, who, knowing the feebleness of the two successors,
of Theodosius and the comparative inefficiency of their military forces,,
and proud of the willing allegiance of a nation of warriors, disdained
to remain in a subordinate position. In accordance with the usages
170 From tJu Division of the Empire to the
of his forefathers, the Visigothic warriors raised him upon a buckler
and held him aloft in the sight of all men as their newly-chosen king,
395 A.D. Alaric and his people had already adopted the Arian form
of the Christian faith, and, with all the faults as well as the virtues of a
semi-civilised people, were the first to begin to lay the foundation of
the new nationalities which were to raise their heads above " the
level waste of the Oriental despotism and effete civilisation of the
Roman empire." The new king, taking counsel with his people,
decided to carve out for themselves new kingdoms rather than
through " sloth to continue the subjects of others." l In one or two
expeditions Alaric first plundered Greece and the Peloponnesus; but,
when the united armies of the East and West under Stilicho were
about to attack him, the Eastern emperor, fearing the power of
Stilicho more than that of Alaric, commanded Stilicho to desist from
the further prosecution of the war, and to withdraw with the legions
of the West within the boundaries of the Western Empire, 395 A.D.
Next year, however, Stilicho cleared Greece from its Gothic invaders,
but permitted Alaric and his army to escape from Arcadia and to
retire with his plunder northward, through Epirus, 396 A.D. " There
was danger for Rome in driving Alaric to desperation. There was
danger privately for Stilicho if the dead Alaric should render him no
longer indispensable." 2 The " sublime cowardice " of the Eastern
emperor rewarded the rebellion of Alaric, by appointing him
" Master-general of Illyricum," and for four years " the Visigothic
king was using the forms of Roman law, the machinery of Roman taxa-
tion, the almost unbounded authority of a Roman provincial governor,
to prepare the weapon which was one day to pierce the heart of Rome
itself."3 In the year 400 A.D., Alaric appears to have formed an
alliance with Radagasius, supposed to have been an Ostrogoth chief,
a recent emigrant from the Euxine, a savage idolater filled with
special hatred towards Roman civilisation. Radagasius invaded
Rhsetia, while Alaric besieged the Emperor Honorius in Milan.
Stilicho drove back Radagasius and then defeated Alaric at Pollentia
(near Turin), 402 A.D., prudently, however, entering into a treaty
with him ; for such was the necessity of the empire that Stilicho was
compelled to withdraw some of the legions from Britain and the
Rhine, and thus left the frontier too weak to resist the barbarians
who were ready to enter Gaul. Radagasius, with 200,000 men,
again invaded Italy, passing through Lombardy into Tuscany by the
1 Jornandes, quoted by Hodgkin, vol. i. p. 251.
2 Hodgkin, " History of Italy," vol. i. p. 257. 3 Ibid., vol. i. p. 259.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 171
route of the Apennines, where he was defeated, his army dispersed,
and himself beheaded by Stilicho, 405-6 A.D. Court intrigues and
the jealousy of Stilicho's alliance with Alaric led to the murder
of Stilicho at Ravenna, by order of Honorius, 23 Aug., 408 A.D.
This jealousy of Stilicho was probably increased by the great bar-
barian irruption across the Rhine into Gaul, 31 December, 406 A.D.,
the beginning of the permanent settlement of the barbarians in West
Europe and North Africa. Though opposed by the Franks (on the
north-east frontier), who were the friends and allies of the empire,
the Vandals, the Alani, and Suevi over-ran Gaul. The Vandals and
others passed through, after three years, across the Pyrenees into
Spain, while the Burgundians, 60,000 in number, were permitted to
occupy Eastern Gaul. The brutal conduct of the Roman legionaries
towards the Gothic auxiliaries immediately after the death of Stilicho
deprived the empire of the help of 30,000 brave soldiers who,
maddened by the massacre of their wives and children, repaired to
Alaric, crying for vengeance on their assassins, 408 A.D. Alaric
crossed the Julian Alps, passed on towards Rome. Thrice Rome
was threatened, and at length (24 Aug., 410 A.D.) was captured
and plundered with great slaughter. In their alarm the Romans had
put to death Serena, the widow of Stilicho, and the pagan party had
partially renewed pagan rites and worship ; but in the great carnage
the influence of Christianity over the conqueror was displayed — the
churches were places of refuge, and the city was not materially injured.
The news of this event spread alarm and terror through the Roman
world. St. Jerome, in his cell at Bethlehem, was busied with his
Commentary on Ezekiel, when suddenly " a terrible rumour from the
West was brought to him," which filled him with grief and conster-
nation. St. Augustine, in North Africa, " aroused by the mistakes
of some, and the blasphemies of others," began his great work on the
" City of God," as a vindication of Christianity from the charge of hav-
ing caused the fall of Rome. Within a week after the capture of the
city, Alaric, with the spoil and a long train of captives, passed through
Campania and Calabria, intending to sail from Reggio to attack Africa,
the granary of Rome ; he died, however, at Cosenza, from the effects
of the climate, and was buried in the bed of a river, Basento.
3. Adolphus (Ataulfus), the successor of Alaric, was attached
to the Roman civilisation, and in love with Galla Placidia, the
daughter of the great Theodosius, and therefore disposed to act in
unison with the court of Honorius. In 412 A.D. he left Italy and
took possession of Southern Gaul, putting down several usurpers who
aimed at the power of the empire, five in number, and then earned
172 From the Division of the Empire to the
the hand of Galla Placidia, in 414 A.D. His murder by a servant
restored Galla Placidia to her family, by whom she was married to
Constantius, the favourite and colleague of Honorius, 417 A.D.
Constantius died 421 A.D., Honorius 422 AD. Valentinian III., the
son of Constantius and Galla Placidia, succeeded, under the guardian-
ship of his mother. The rivalry of ^Etius and Boniface, men who were
the support of the empire, which was the result of the envy of a fac-
tion in the court, led to the loss of North Africa, through the invasion
of the Vandals from Spain, invited by Boniface, 429 A.D. Placidia
died 450 A.D. " Her love for Ataulfus, her grief at his death, &c.,
point her out as the one sweetest and purest figure of that dreary
time."1 The year after her death Italy and the West had to suffer
the calamity, of all the greatest, the ravages of the Huns. These
barbarians, having occupied the territory in which the Goths had
formerly settled, along the Euxine to the Danube, had established
their rule to the north-east over Hungary and the neighbourhood,
and over all the Teutonic and Sclavonic tribes from the Elbe to the
Wolga, the chief seat of their ruler being at Tokay or Buda.
They had made occasional inroads upon the Eastern Empire,
and had received from Theodosius II. an annual payment of
;£ 1 4,000 sterling. Large numbers had served as auxiliaries in the
armies of the empire, and had profited by their discipline. But in
447 A.D. Attila, sole monarch of the Huns, ravaged the country to
the south of the Danube up to the walls of Constantinople, exacted
^£240,000 as the arrears of tribute, and tripled the amount of the annual
payment to ^84,000. Unable, however, to make any impression on
the strongly-fortified and all but impregnable city of Constantinople,
Attila contemplated the invasion of the West, sending first to each of
the two emperors a Gothic messenger with the insulting order,
" Attila, thy master and mine, bids thee to prepare a palace for his re-
ception." Thus for several years the great Hun remained " hovering
like a hawk over the fluttered dovecots of Byzantium and Ravenna,
and enjoying the terror of the Eastern and Western Augustus alter-
nately." z By an alliance with Genseric, king of the Vandals, Attila
hoped to attack the empire on the south in the Mediterranean, while,
by one of the Frankish chiefs, he expected Prankish assistance in his
invasion of Gaul. Genseric, however, was not ready, and Attila was
left to his own resources. In 451 A.D. his huge army of Huns, of
Sclavonic tribes from the East of Russia, and of the Teutonic tribes in
Germany, moved onward. It is very probable that the inroads of this
1 Hodgkin, "History of Italy," vol. i. p. 468. 2 Ibid., vol. ii. p. ill.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 173
army upon North Germany hastened the emigration of the Anglo-
Saxon tribes to England. Metz was taken and burnt, Paris was
threatened, but, by the wisdom of JEtius, the governor of Roman
Gaul, who had conciliated the Franks, the Visigoths, the Burgundians,
and the Armoricians, all these warlike barbarians united with the
Roman forces in opposition to Attila. A great battle was fought at
Chalons (or rather at Mery-sur-Seine) in which, after the slaughter ot
162,000, Attila was checked, and found it expedient to retreat through
Germany towards Hungary. Europe was saved from the degradation
of a Hunnish Calmuck settlement, and secured for the permanent
occupation of a Teutonic race. This victory was the last that adorned
the annals of Rome. "If the empire of the Huns had spread over Gaul
and the temperate regions of Europe, the Huns might have adopted
the agricultural life, but the vices of the race, stamped upon it by
servitude, would have been perpetuated as they have been in Russia,
as they have been wherever Tartars have ruled. It is indeed with
wonder and admiration that we contemplate the most formidable
power which ever affrighted the world dashed to pieces against the
last ruins of an ancient civilisation." * But Attila soon recovered
from the losses of his Gallic invasion, and in 452 A.D. invaded Italy,
destroyed the city of Aquileia, and caused that emigration from the
cities of the Po which led to the foundation of Venice, near the
mouth of the Po. The consternation of Rome and Ravenna was
extreme. Even ^Etius despaired. The Romans in Italy had hoped
that the dissensions of their barbarian invaders would sooner or later
bring them to submit to the imperial rule ; and now to find an Alaric
followed by an Attila was to them a severe disappointment. To the
site now occupied by Peschiara an embassy was sent from Valen-
tinian III. and the people of Rome, headed by Pope Leo I.
Attila was shaken in his determination to attack Rome — the fear
lest, succeeding as Alaric, his success might, as in Alaric's case, be
followed by his death. He contemplated also the possibility of the
arrival of the armies which yEtius on the one hand, and Marcian, the
Eastern Emperor, on the other, were preparing to lead against him,
so that he yielded to the intercession of Leo, and Rome was saved.
Attila visited Ravenna as a friend, and soon after died suddenly in
his Pannonian home, 453 A.D. His empire fell to pieces after the
Battle of Netad, 454 A.D., in which the Teutonic races were con-
querors, and free to act on their own account against the empire.
^Etius was now no longer necessary to Valentinian III., and he
1 Sismondi, " Fall of the Roman Empire," vol. i. p. 170.
From the Division of the Empire to the
was accordingly assassinated in the palace (as Stilicho had been),
at the close of the year 454 A.D. He was called " the last of the
Romans," and had retarded the extinction of Roman rule for thirty
years. In March, 455 A.D., the emperor was assassinated in the
campus martius, and the family of Theodosius the Great was extinct.
Maximus, an elder senator, succeeded, and forced the widow of
Valentinian to marry him. She invited the Vandals under Genseric.
On the day the Vandal fleet appeared off Ostia, 2 1 June, Maximus
was murdered by the domestics of the palace. On the third day
after the death of Maximus, Genseric and his yellow-haired Vandal
giants appeared at the gates of Rome, ready, as he said, " to destroy
the city with which God was angry." Through the intercession of
Pope Leo I., Genseric was content with being allowed without resist-
ance to plunder the city fourteen days. The gold, the silver, and
the copper were taken from the palaces and the churches, and all
the treasures that could be discovered in the possession of the inhabit-
ants were taken away, but Rome itself was uninjured. The empress
and her daughters, with a large number of captives (sixty thousand),
were carried to Africa.
4. The history of the nominal emperors from this time is a very
pitiful one. Raised, ruled, and deposed by the generals of the bar-
barian mercenaries, they were the mere puppets of the day. The
patrician Ricimer, a Swabian (Suevian) by birth, son of the daughter
of Wallia, King of the Visigoths, not daring himself to assume the
purple, was the creator of these " phantom emperors," and, disdain-
ing to obey those whom he considered as his own creatures, displaced
them before they were well seated on the throne. Avitus, a noble
Roman of Auvergne, succeeded Maximus. " He was the key-stone
of a great and important political combination (which, had it endured,
would certainly have changed the face of Europe, and might have
anticipated the empire of Charles the Great) in favour of a nobler
nature than the Frank, and without the interposition of three centuries
of barbarism."1 This was to be accomplished by an alliance with the
Burgundians, and the Visigoths of Gaul and Spain, by which the Suevi
of Spain should be subdued, and the influence and territory of the
Goths and Burgundians should be largely extended in Gaul. This
scheme was naturally opposed to the views of Ricimer (a Suevian\
and Avitus was deposed 456 A.D. Majorianus, his successor displayed
some warlike activity, but was deposed 460 A.D. Libius Servius died
465 A.D. Authenius, son-in-law of the Emperor Marcian, and the
1 Hodgkin, " History of Italy," vol. ii. p. 395.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 175
father-in-law of Ricimer, was beheaded, after a brief civil war, by
Gundobad, the brother of Ricimer. Five months after, Ricimer him-
self died, 472 A.D. Gundobad appointed Olybius, who died
472 A.D., then Glycerins, who was dethroned by Nepos, supported
by the power of the Eastern Empire, Gundobad retiring to Bur-
gundy, 474 A.D. Orestes, a Roman who had been employed by
Attila in embassies to the empire, had become influential enough
with the soldiery to dethrone Nepos, and place his son Augustulus, a
child, on the throne by the name of Romulus Augustulus, 476 A.D.
The Vandal foedorati, who had long served in the Roman armies,
which now were filled with barbarians of all nations, demanded of
Orestes one-third of the land of Italy. This demand being refused,
Odoaker, the Herulian, was proclaimed king. Orestes was taken
prisoner at Placentia, and beheaded, 28 August, 476 A.D. The child
Augustulus was spared, and spent his life in comfort in Campania,
with a pension of ,£3,600 a year. So ended the Western Empire,
acknowledged as such, up to the last day of its existence, by Gaul,
Spain, Britain, North Africa, and Italy. We must keep in mind the
fact that since the time of Alexander Severus and Probus, 222 to
276 A.D., there had been large accessions of a barbarian population
into the empire, and that the armies of the empire were mainly com-
posed of them. "The question is whether Rome was conquered by
the barbarians in the ordinary sense of the word conquered ? We
know it was not .... the fact that the struggle lay between bar-
barians who were within and friendly to the empire, and barbarians
who were without it, and hostile rather to their more fortunate
brethren than to the empire which employed them, is implicitly
involved in Gibbon's narrative, but it is not explicitly brought out.
Romanised Goths, Vandals, and Franks, were the only defenders of
the empire against other tribes and nations who were not
Romanised." x The Burgundians, before their entrance into Gaul,
had made themselves masters of the more useful arts of civilised
life, and when settled in their territory behaved kindly and liberally
to the Romanised Gauls.
5. (2) The settlement of the barbarians in the new nationalities,
GAUL was the first of the western provinces occupied by the Teutonic
hordes from Germany. The great migration (31 December, 406 A.D.)
of the Alans, Suevi, and Vandals, though opposed by the FRANKISH
tribes already (as the allies of Rome) settled in the north-east of
Gaul, was a successful one. These savage tribes never returned
1 Morison "Gibbon," p. 132.
176 From the Division of tlie Empire to the
beyond the Rhine, but ravaged Gaul for more than three years, and
then passed the Pyrenees into Spain. Meanwhile, as already related,
the BURGUNDIANS, by permission, settled in the east of Gaul, sixty
thousand in number, occupying from the lake of Geneva to the
junction of the Moselle and the Rhine, their chief towns being
Lyons, Geneva, Basle, and Autun. After this, Ataulfus, king of the
VISIGOTHS, by the good-will of the Western Empire, took possession
of southern Gaul, as already related. After the defeat of Attila at
Chalons 451 A.D., in which the Franks took their share, as allies of
the Roman ^Etius, with the Burgundians and Visigoths, the Franks
appear to have occupied the territory of Gaul to the Seine. The
Roman Syagrius, after the assassination of ^Etius, governed the
districts around the Oise, Somme, Marne, and Seine. The Armo-
ricians (ancient Gauls) occupied Bretagne. The union of Gaul was
at last effected by the FRANKS under Clovis and his successors,
Syagrius was conquered 486 A.D. The Armoricians became tribu-
tary 497 A.D. The Gothic territory was much limited, and in 534 A.D.
Burgundy was added to the Frankish kingdom, as was the rest of
Gothic Gaul, 538 A.D. All what is now called France was then
nominally united under the Franks of the Merovingian dynasty.
The kings of this dynasty divided France among their children six
times between the years 511-687 A.D., when the defeat of the
Neustrian (western) Franks by the Austrasians under Pepin d'Heristal,
mayor of the palace, gave the preponderance to Teutonic (Austrasian)
over Roman (Neustrian) Gaul. These divisions appear to have been
based on military considerations. The race of Clovis had become
so physically and morally degraded that all the powers of govern-
ment were exercised by Pepin and his descendants. Pepin esta-
blished the seat of government at He'ristal on the Meuse or at
Cologne, and re-established the ancient national institutions, espe-
cially the Malluna, the annual assembly of the nobles in the spring.
At this meeting the Merovingian king presided in person, being con-
veyed in a car drawn by oxen. He was clothed in regal robes, his
long hair and beard floating to the wind, and opened the assembly
on a throne of gold. He received ambassadors, and gave the
answers as directed by the real king, the maire du palais. This
being done, the king (roi faineant) was re-conveyed to his villa of
Maumagues (between Compiegne and Noyon), to be there guarded
as a dignified but secluded king. In the civil wars, which had
ended in the battle of Testry 687 A.D., the Germanic Frisians, the
Alemanni and Suevians in Suabia, and other minor peoples, had
made themselves independent of Frankish authority, but were soon
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 177
compelled to submit to the authority of Pepin. To this family it
is owing that Central Europe is German, and not Romanised or
Sclavonicised.
SPAIN. — The barbarian Vandals, Alani and Suevi, after desolating
Gaul about three years, passed the Pyrenees into Spain, 409, 4ioA.D.
Their ravages were dreadful, towns pillaged and burnt, the country
laid waste, the peaceable inhabitants massacred without distinction
of age or sex: these were but the beginning of evils, as they were
followed by famine and pestilence; the very wild beasts, starved in
their forests, made war on the human race, and the famine compelled
the survivors to feed on the bodies of the dead. These statements,
must be received with great allowance, as generalisations drawn from
a few special facts; but, after making every deduction, they leave
.the impression of the infliction of a more than ordinary degree of
misery upon the population of Spain. The Visigoths settled in
southern Gaul took possession of Catalonia, and aimed at the con-
quest of Spain. The Alani and Suevi were in due time united to
the Visigoths; the former in 418, the latter in 487 A.D. The Vandals
passed over into Africa 427 A.D., and all Spain became entirely
Visigothic. From 511-522 A.D. the two Gothic kingdoms of Spain
and of Italy (the Ostrogoth) were united for a long period under
Theodoric as regent for his grandchild. The Spanish Goths re-
nounced Arianism 585 A.D. The portion of Gaul which was
governed by the Visigoths was wisely relinquished to the Franks in
538 A.D., and in 629 A.D. all the points occupied by the Eastern
Empire in Spain were in possession of the Gothic kings.
BRITAIN was abandoned by the Romans 409 A.D. For forty years
the British petty kings held out against the Picts, but at length they
invited the aid of a Saxon tribe from Jutland, commanded by
Hengist and Horsa, 449 A.D., who landed at Ebbsfleet in the Isle
of Thanet (Kent). The Picts were defeated, but the Saxon allies
remained, and, aided by fresh and continued accessions of their
countrymen, began the conquest of the land. The Britons made a
stubborn resistance. In Gaul and Italy, the conquering barbarians with
little difficulty quartered themselves on subjects who were glad to
buy peace by obedience and tribute; but in Britain the Saxons (i.e.,
the English) had to make every inch of Britain their own by hard
fighting. " In the forest belts, which stretched over vast spaces of
country, they found barriers which in all cases checked their advance,
and, in some cases, finally stopped it It is only by realising
in this way the physical as well as the moral circumstances of Britain
that we can understand the character of its earlier conquest. Field
N
178 From the Division of the Empire to the
by field, town by town, forest by forest the land was won
There is no need to believe that the clearing of the land meant so
impossible a thing as the general slaughter of the men who held it.
Slaughter there was no doubt on the battlefield, or in towns like
Anderida, whose resistance woke wrath in their besiegers. But, for
the most part, the Britons were not slaughtered, they were defeated
and drew back. Such a withdrawal was only possible by the slow-
ness of the conquest It took nearly thirty years to win Kent,
and sixty to complete the conquest of southern Britain And
the conquest of the bulk of the island was only wrought out after
two centuries of bitter warfare What strikes us at once in
the New England is this, that it was the one purely German nation
that rose upon the wreck of Rome Roman Britain was
almost the only province of the empire where Rome died into a
vague tradition of the past Its law, its literature, its manners,
its faith went with it The New England was a heathen
country ; homestead and boundary, the very days of the week bore
the names of the new gods of the conquerors."1 The following
kingdoms were established, each of which had to make good its
hold upon the land by a vigorous contest with the Britons : — Kent,
455 A-D-> Sussex, 477 A.D., Wessex, 495 A.D., Essex, 527 A.D.,
Bernecia, 547 A.D., and Deira, 560 A.D., were united in 590 A.D.
as the kingdom of Northumberland ; East Anglia, 575 A.D. ; Mercia,
586 A.D. This heptarchy sometimes elected a temporary chief.
Christianity was first introduced into Kent by St. Augustine 596 A.D.
The Britons were left in possession of Cornwall, of Wales, and ot
the western land of the island stretching through Cheshire and Lan-
cashire, Westmoreland and Cumberland, &c., but this latter part of
the territory north of Wales was in due time lost to them.
NORTH AFRICA, including the present Tunis, Algeria, and Morocco.
— This long, narrow tract, from Tangiers to Tripoli, was extremely
populous and rich. So great was its export of wheat that " it
deserved the name of the common granary of Rome and mankind."
(Gibbon). It was filled with monuments of Roman art and mag-
nificence. Count Boniface, in a fit of anger, occasioned by the
insults of the court of Placidia, the regent of Valentinian III.,
invited Genseric the Vandal, conqueror of Spain, to pass over into
Africa, offering him an advantageous settlement there. Genseric,
accompanied by fifty thousand effective men, landed in Africa, where
he found allies in the Donatist sectarians, who regarded him as a
1 Green's " History of the English People," vol. i. pp. 30-33.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 179
deliverer from the tyranny of the orthodox Catholics, and also in
the Moors and the independent tribes, 429 A.D. The Vandals, where
they found resistance, gave no quarter ; the cities which opposed
them were destroyed; every species of indignity and torture was
employed to force from the captives the discovery of their hidden
wealth. Count Boniface, when too late, repented, and saved
Carthage and Hippo for a brief period from the power of Genseric,
but in 539 A.D. Carthage was captured, and the Vandal conquest
was all but complete. The moral benefit of this capture is described
by contemporary chroniclers. " In this city, rich in all the appli-
ances of the highest civilisation, in schools of art, of rhetoric, and
philosophy, .... houses of ill-fame were swarming in every street,
haunted by men of the highest rank the darker sins of Sodom
and Gomorrah practised, avowed, gloried in Into this city
of sin marched the Vandal army, one might say when one reads the
history of their doings, the army of the Puritans. With all their
cruelty, with all their greed, they kept themselves unspotted from
the licentiousness of the splendid city. They banished the men
who earned their living by ministering to the vilest lusts, they rooted
out prostitution with a wise yet not a cruel hand. In short, Carthage
under the rule of the Vandals was a city transformed, barbarous but
moral."1 The conquest of North Africa by the Vandals proves that
the barbarities ascribed to them have been (as Gibbon suspected)
much exaggerated. They appear, on the whole, to have been no
worse than the other barbarians.
ITALY. — The Roman Empire in the west had fallen, not by an
invasion of the Heruli, but by a mutiny of its own mercenary troops.
The Germans had become not mere auxiliaries in the wings of the
army, but were the backbone of the legion itself.3 " A deputation
from the senate of Rome proceeded to Constantinople to lay the
insignia of royalty at the feet of the Eastern emperor, Zeno. The
West, they declared, no longer required an emperor of its own, one
monarch sufficed for the world. Odoaker was qualified by his
wisdom and courage to be the protector of their state, and Zeno
was entreated to confer upon him the title of patrician and the
administration of the Italian provinces Odoaker, taking the
title of king, not of Italy but of his own people, continued the con-
sular office, respected the civil and ecclesiastical institutions of his
subjects, and ruled for fourteen years as the nominal vicar of the
1 Hodgkin, " History of Italy," ,-ol. i. pp. 518-520.
2 Ibid., vol. ii. pp. 513-521.
N 2
i8o From the Division of the Empire to the
Eastern Empire There was thus, legally, no extinction of the
Western Empire, but only a reunion of East and West." 1 This is
Bryce's favourite theory; practically, however, it appeared obvious
to all that the Western Empire was quite extinct. Odoaker had been
compelled, by the necessities of his position, to satisfy his barbarian
soldiers by the grant of one-third of the lands of Italy, a measure
which probably inflicted little misery, owing to the large extent of
waste and uninhabited territory at that time. "All the country
north of the Alps to the Danube and Italy itself had been reduced
to the condition of a desert, the race of its Roman inhabitants
nearly extinct. In Italy the existence of the people for a century
past had been entirely artificial, principally supported by largesses
of corn which the emperors had continued at Rome, Milan, and
other large towns. With the loss of Africa and the ruin of Sicily by
the Vandals these supplies ceased, and Odoaker did not attempt to
renew them. The desolation of Italy is frequently expressed in the
contemporary letters of the bishops and clergy. Pope Gelasius
(496 A.D.) speaks of Emilia, Tuscany, and other provinces in which
the human race was almost extinct ; St. Ambrose of the towns of
Bologna, Modena, Reggio, Piacenza, which remained deserted,
together with the adjacent country. Those who have seen the
Campagna di Roma in our own days have witnessed the desolation
of a country ruined by bad laws even more than by foreign aggres-
sion. Let them imagine the gloomy scenery which now surrounds
the capital extended over every part of Italy, and they will have
some idea of the kingdom of Odoaker."2 The rule of Odoaker
continued until, by the treachery of the Byzantine court, the Ostro-
goths in Pannonia were incited to take possession of Italy under
their leader Theodoric, 489-493 A.D. This monarch, whose rule at
one time extended from Illyricum to Spain, over Italy and southern
Gaul, seemed likely to place Italy in a high position among the new
nationalities. He brought with him an addition of about a million
of people into a country which had been so fearfully devastated, and
to these people one-third of the land was given. The Roman towns
retained their municipal institutions and were governed by their own
laws. Theodoric, deservedly called the Great, desired to found a
dynasty ; his government was alike tolerant to the Catholics and the
Arians ; he anticipated Charlemagne in his ability as a governor ;
he found Italy a desert and left it a garden. Boetius, Symmachus,
and Cassiodorus were his ministers. Unfortunately, the enemies
; Eryce, p. 36. 2 Sismondi, "Fall of the Roman Empire," vol. i. pp. I7I-I73-
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 1 8 1
of Boetius and Symmachus, by false accusations, procured their
condemnation and death, and the last days of Theodoric were
embittered by remorse. After his death, 526 A.D., all was disorder
and ruin. The Emperor of the East sent Belisarius, 536 A.D., and
in 552 A.D. Narses with armies to re-conquer Italy. In these sixteen
years, ending in 553 A.D., great destruction of life and of cities took
place. At one time the Goths appeared likely to preserve their
position. The king Totila besieged Rome (then held by the troops
of the Eastern Empire), and took it iyth December, 546 A.D., and
razed its walls, and forced the population to leave, so that for six
weeks Rome was without an inhabitant. The re-union of Italy to
the Eastern Empire, which had cost so many lives and so much of
the treasure which the Eastern Empire could ill spare, lasted only the
brief period of fifteen years. The Lombards, having conquered the
Gepidae by the assistance of the Avars (566 A.D.), abandoned
Noricum and Pannonia to the Avars and moved towards the Italian
Alps. It was not an army, but an entire nation which descended
the Alps at Friuli in the years 568-571 under Alboin. The exarch
at Ravenna, who governed Italy for the empire, made no resistance.
In the towns and country under the Lombard government the
Roman population were allowed to be governed by their own laws,
as under the Ostrogoths. Pavia and the towns generally resisted.
Some towns accustomed to self-government and defence as muni-
cipalities, maintained their independence. Genoa, Pisa, Rome,
Gaeta, Naples, Amain, Bari, were filled by crowds of fugitives. So
also the islets on which stood Venice. Meanwhile, in Rome itself,
the titular consulship was abolished (541 A.D.) to save the cost of
^80,000, which custom had enforced upon each of the elect to pay
for the games, &c., expected by the people. Soon after the senate
ceased to exist. The cities which maintained their independence
had their curia and municipal institutions. The Eastern Empire
placed in its Italian possessions a duke over each curia, who became
a mere republican magistrate, commanding a mere republican
militia, " reviving in the breasts of the Italians virtues which had
been extinct for centuries."1 "It is to this era that we owe the
origin or revival of many among the renowned cities of mediaeval
times. Then also Venice, Ferrara, Aquileia, Chiusa, and Sienna —
then also Florence, Pisa, Genoa, Bologna, and Milan first gathered
within their walls the means of wealth."2
1 Sismondi, "Fall of the Roman Empire," vol. i. p. 241.
2 Shephard, p. 302.
1 82 From tJi£ Division of tJie Empire to tJie
6. — (3). The nature and character of these barbaric invasions of
the Western Empire requires to be studied in order to be understood.
We must consider the chronic misery of the middle and lower
classes of the old empire : the middle classes possessing small pro-
perties, the comparatively few of the citizen class who were free, and
the great majority living in the condition of agricultural serfs, or slaves
held by their owners in cities, all of them ground down by a taxation
which for generations past had been consuming the capital of each
proprietor, diminishing every year his means of support and increas-
ing his inability to meet the demands of the tax-gatherer. The first
outbreak of the barbarians was, no doubt, accompanied by great loss
of property and of life, the desolation and misery of all classes of
the population, and the overthrow for a time of all law and order.
But it would be some consolation to the majority of the middle and
higher classes, that the onerous obligations of Roman citizenship
and liability to fiscal exactions had departed for ever, while the
labourer and the serf simply changed their masters. Robertson has
given a laboured rhetorical declamation, ending with a very strong
assertion : "If man were called to fix upon a period in the history
of the world, during which the condition of the human race was
most calamitous and afflicted, he would, without hesitation, name
that which elapsed from the death of Theodosius the Great to the
establishment of the Lombards in Italy," 395 A. D. to 571 A.D.
There was no doubt much suffering, but it was not all caused by the
barbaric invaders. The runaway slaves, the brigand Bagaudae of
Gaul, the criminal classes liberated by the flight of the imperial
authorities, did their fair share, and probably more, in the work of
murder and plunder. The barbarians were comparatively few in
number compared with the Romans and the Romanised population,
and we find them in a very brief period of time living together in
peace, each under their own laws, and each party* hi possession of
warlike weapons as well as the other, which makes it more than
probable that the change from the imperial ruler to the barbarian
had not been accompanied by such atrocious barbarities, the
memory of which would have stood in the way of friendly union.
The barbarians in their warfare seldom equalled the atrocities of
Count Tilly in the Thirty Years War, or the yet more cruel devasta-
tions of the Palatinate by Louis XV. Smyth, in his " Lectures on
Modern History," i. pp. 33, 34, makes some pertinent remarks, which
deserve consideration. He supposes a thoughtful observer, cognisant
of the ruin around him, speculating on the situation and fortunes of
the human race. "The civilised world is sinking before these
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 183
endless tribes of savages from the north What can be the
consequence ? Will the world be lost in the darkness of ignorance
and ferocity ? Or will the wrecks of literature and the arts that
may survive the storm, be fitted to strike the attention of these rude
conquerors, or sufficient to enrich their minds with the seeds of
future improvement? or, lastly, on the other hand, may not this
extended and dreadful convulsion of Europe be, after all, favourable
to the human race ? Some change is necessary ; the civilised world
is no longer to be respected ; its manners are corrupted, its literature
has long declined, its religion is lost in controversy or debased by
superstition. There is no genius, no liberty, no virtue ; surely the
human race will be improved by the renewal which it will receive
from the influence of these free-born warriors .... and, regenerated
by this new infusion of youth and vigour, will no longer exhibit the
vices and the weakness of this decrepitude of humanity." Now, if the
subsequent history of the world could have been revealed to him,
could he have realised the diffused humanity and knowledge, the
political freedom, the social advancement and happiness of man-
kind, the general triumph of law, reason, and benevolence in our
modern civilisation (in spite of its manifold deficiencies) ? would he
not have rejoiced in that gracious providential government of the
Great Ruler of nations, through which the evils and sufferings of
the barbarian settlement in Europe had been overruled for the
benefit of the highest interests of the human race ? One benefit
has been acknowledged by Hume : "If our part of the world main-
tains sentiments of liberty, honour, equity, and valour superior to
the rest of mankind, it owes these advantages to the seeds implanted
by those generous barbarians"; the moral gain has been great.
Milman remarks: " In one important respect, the Teutonic tempera-
ment coincided in raising the moral tone. In all that relates to
sexual intercourse, the Roman society was corrupt to its core, and the
contagion had spread to the provinces .... Whether as a reminis-
cence of some older civilisation or as a peculiarity in their national
character, the Teutons had always paid the highest respect to their
females, a feeling which cannot exist without high notions of personal
purity, which it generates, and which in its turn tends to generate.1
In one respect especially the barbarian revolutions favoured sim-
plicity of manners and personal industry ; they threw the population
upon the land. The conquerors at once took a certain portion of
the soil for themselves : the Heruli, Ostrogoths, and Lombards one-
1 Milman, vol. i. pp. 282-284.
1 84 From the Division of the Empire to the
third; the Burgundians and Visigoths two-thirds; the Anglo-Saxons, the
old English, took all, and drove the Britons before them into Wales ;
the provincials, from their ability to be useful, were generally well
treated by the barbarian rulers, and, in a country where the land
was far more extensive than the needs of the population, the loss of
a portion of an estate would not involve absolute ruin to its pro-
prietor. The king or chief took the public lands for himself, and as
suzerain apportioned it as fiefs to be held subject to military service.
So also the subordinate chiefs. By this means the land was occupied
by a free population, and the possession of land became an object
of solicitude. Under the Greeks and Romans the cities were every-
thing ; the small landholders and working farmers, nothing. Now,
the chieftains of all ranks and the great chief, the suzerain, the
sovereign, the king, the emperor, were compelled to live chiefly in
their own domains, from whence they drew their means of support.
Meanwhile the Roman provincials, improved by the admixture of
the barbarian races, became accustomed to defend themselves and
their country. The new condition of affairs produced in time a new
people. Every new conquest brought to the conquered country a
number of vigorous soldiers ready to take up the plough or the
spade. Unfortunately the temptations to the large landholders of
dispensing with the free agricultural tenants and replacing them by
slaves returned more or less in intervals of security from invasion.
Thus the free men, if not rich enough to hold slaves, began to look
upon labour as degrading, and sold their small holdings, resuming
their position in the armed band of some powerful chief. For-
tunately the large proprietors were compelled to live on their pro-
perties as there only could they be supported by the produce ; and
they were soon taught by the ravages of barbarian tribes, Teutons,
Slavs, or Northern, the necessity of having free men settled on their
estates, on terms of military tenure. In due time the feudal
system, which was at first the great consolidator and defence of the
population, was fully established in Europe.
7. — (4). The Eastern Empire up to the Saracen invasion. — This
empire is also called by historians the Lower Empire, the Greek
Empire, the Byzantine Empire, by which names its identity with the
old Roman Empire is kept in the background. Until our day
there seems to have been a most unphilosophical contempt exhi-
bited by historians for the annals of an empire which connects
modern history with antiquity. Gibbon speaks of them as " one
uniform tale of weakness and misery," related by "servile historians."
Even Lecky has fallen into the same error. Voltaire, from pure
ignorance, regards them as " a worthless repertory of declamation
Revival of tJie Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 185
and miracles disgraceful to the human mind." Within the last half-
century the writings of both Finlay and of Freeman have en-
lightened our ignorance, and it is not likely that henceforth the
sneers of literary prejudice will be adopted by our historians on the
authority of Gibbon. It is only fair to quote largely the eloquent
and powerfully convincing remarks of Freeman, in which irony and
sarcasm are made the vehicles conveying truths which cannot be
gainsaid. " The popular belief is .... that from the fifth to the
fifteenth century an empire of some kind maintained itself in Con-
stantinople, though during the whole of that time it remained in a
dying state. It was ruled, by common consent, that a power, which
bore up for a thousand years against greater difficulties and fiercer
assaults than any other power ever had to strive against, must
necessarily have been weak and contemptible — in the favourite
slang, ' effete ' — from the beginning." In reference to the past
history of the empire, " the result has often been only to throw
fresh scorn upon some of the most wonderful pages in the history
of the world." . ..." It was ruled that the men who preserved
the fabric of Roman administration through so many ages, the men
who beat back the attacks of the most dangerous enemies through
so many ages, who after each period of decay brought back a fresh
period of renewed power and glory, must all of them have been
fools and cowards, given up only to luxury and sloth." .... This
shows " how little they knew of that mighty empire which for so
many ages cherished the flame of civilisation and literature when it
was well-nigh extinct in Western Europe ; which preserved the
language of Thucydides and Aristotle, and the political power of
Augustus and Constantine, till the nations of the West were once
more prepared to receive the gift — and despise the giver." The
general historian was content to pass by the uninteresting revolutions
" of that worthless and decrepit power which survived every surround-
ing state, whose legions in one century restored the imperial sway
from the Euphrates to the ocean, and in the next planted the
Roman eagles upon the palaces of the Great King — the power which
endured the first onslaught of the victorious Saracen, which defended
its frontiers for three glorious centuries, which won back province
after province, and made the successor of the Prophet tremble before
the arms of the triumphant Caesar." * " Because the empire of the
Paleologi was an utterly worn-out state, people forget the interval of
six centuries, and leap to the conclusion that the mighty monarch of
the Iconoclast and Macedonian Dynasties from 717-1056 A.D., was
1 Freeman, "Essays," third series, pp. 232-234.
1 86 From the Division of the Empire to the
the same Never did any power hold up so long as this
despised Lower Empire against such ceaseless and restless attacks.
Never had any power so vast a frontier to guard and such countless
and restless foes to guard it against .... but men were never
lacking to defend her .... to drive back her foes, and to win back
her lost provinces." It was " a conservative power, producing a never-
failing succession of able men .... but few great men, and not
above one or two of the heroic type, for there was no scope for
founders or creators .... The government went on without any
definite rule of succession Every soldier in the army, every
official might, either by his crimes or his merits, take his place on
the Byzantine throne."1 This, however, was a source of weakness.
Its strength was the common Christianity of the Greek Church, and
the attachment of the Greek people to the political and religious
ruling power of their race, the status of the emperor.
8. Arcadius, who succeeded Theodosius in the East, was all his
life under the tutelage of favourites or women ; but the Isaurian
rebels were subdued and the Bulgarians repulsed. The family
of Theodosius the Great ended with Pulcheria, the daughter of
Theodosius the Younger, who married, 450 A.D., Marcian, who died
457 A.D. Leo the Thracian was then raised to the throne, through
the influence of the patrician Asper j he has been called the Great,
and is the first sovereign who was crowned by the clergy, a precedent
from which the inference was drawn that this rite was necessary as
an expression of the will of deity. Justin, a Thracian peasant,
began a new dynasty, and reigned from 518-527 A.D., and after him
his nephew, Justinian the Great, more remarkable for his legislative
Pandects, for the erection of the Chyrch of St. Sophia in Constanti-
nople, and for the victories of his generals by which Italy was
re-united to the empire and north Africa also. Italy soon reverted
to the Lombards, but north Africa remained until conquered by the
Saracens in the seventh century. Belisarius is called by Freeman
"the greatest of generals," yet he admits that "all Justinian's
conquests were, beyond all doubt, an anachronism in themselves,
and a deadly blow to the empire .... when he sent his armies
forth to subdue Italy, and allowed every wandering tribe from the
north to insult him with impunity in his capital," 254-7 A.D. " Each
of the thirty-eight years of his reign was marked by an invasion of
the barbarians, and it has been said .... that each invasion cost
200,000 subjects to the empire .... earthquakes overturned many
1 Freeman, "Essays," third series, pp. 235-264.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 187
cities, one of which, May 26, 516, overthrew Antioch with 250,000
persons. The plague, received from Pelusium, raged from 542 to
594 A.D. with more or less destructiveness." a Sclavonic tribes
occupied the north-west provinces, and Greece received a large body
of Sclavonic invaders, who held Peloponnesus for two hundred and
fifty years. Heraclius, the governor of north Africa, relieved Con-
stantinople from the tyrant Phocas, 610 A.D. Such was the weakness
of the government that the Avars and the Sclavs from the north and
the Persians from the east encamped near the Bosphorus for ten
years. By a great effort Heraclius carried the war into Persia itself ;
his campaigns are worthy of a place beside those of Hannibal." ~
Suddenly, however, a new power, the most formidable of all the
enemies of the Eastern Empire, made its appearance. Arabia, united
under the successors of Mahomet, began the Saracenic conquests in
Asia and Africa.
9. — (5) The rise and progress of the Mohametan Saracens (from
Arabia). — From time immemorial, the bulk of the Arabian popula-
tions have been nomads, as the Bedouins of our day — warlike and
restless, their hand against every man, and every man's hand against
them. In some fertile oasis, especially in the south, we read of
kingdoms, as Yemen, &c., and a few towns, as Mecca, Medina, &c.
The care of cattle, &c., was their chief employment, with the
exception of predatory excursions into the territory of their neigh-
bours and tribal wars among themselves. They had never been
united as one people, under one government, until they came under
the influence of their great reformer, Mahomet, who claimed to be a
prophet from God, sent to supply the deficiencies of the Jewish and
Christian revelations, and to compel by force submission to the
simple creed of the new dispensation — " There is one God, and
Mahomet is His prophet." It is impossible to doubt the sincerity
and honesty of the new reformer in the beginning of his mission,
and it is painful to notice the gradual deepening of his zeal into a
wild, narrow fanaticism, and the gradual deterioration of his once
pure, self-denying life by a course of sensuality and cruelty. He
was probably self-deceived, and fancied, during his epileptic attacks,
those visions of the eternal world and of his personal intercourse
with heaven which we find implied in the Koran. His success was
easy and natural after once he had obtained the help of a warlike
tribe. After his flight from Mecca, 622 A.D. (the date of the era the
1 Sismondi, "Fall of the Roman Empire," vol. i. pp. 214-216.
2 Freeman, " Essays," third series, p. 237.
1 88 From the Division of the Empire to the
Hegira), the converts had simply to relinquish idolatry. Polygamy
was regulated, not proscribed, and the duty of a continuous war in
order to propagate the new faith, with the prospect of a present
reward in the shape of dominions, wealth, and luxury, was eagerly
embraced. In fact, so unsettled and so disunited in feeling were
the Arab tribes in the time of the prophet, and after his death, that
foreign war was absolutely necessary to prevent internal wars. Their
union was maintained under the victorious khalifs, the successors of
Mahomet. The Eastern world was invitingly open. Persia was at
its lowest ebb after the victories of Heraclius, and the provinces of
the Eastern Empire outside of Asia Minor, with Egypt, were, and
had been for generations, in a state of chronic discontent with the
dominations of the Greek Church, to which a large proportion of
the population, though Christians, but of sects such as Nestorians,
Monophysites, Jacobites, Copts, &c., were opposed. The rapid
extent of the Mahometan conquests is thus easily explained, when, in
addition to the distracted state of the Byzantine and Persian empires,
we take into consideration the policy of the early khalifs to enlist the
avarice of the Arab tribes, as well as their fanaticism, on the side of
war and conquest. The armies were held together by a species of
political communism ; the surplus revenues were divided among all
the Moslem community. In Omar's time a census was taken of the
Arab tribes and families, and a fixed yearly sum paid to each tribe.
A number of the lowest class received a thousand dirrhems, about
forty pounds sterling. The great object was to maintain and increase
the pure Arab race, and to bind it, by the enjoyment of the plunder
of the conquered nations, to the faith and obedience of the ruling
power. The cry of plunder and conquest reverberated through the
land. Whole tribes, with their wives and children, issued forth to
battle, and even as the tale of cities captured, of booty rich beyond
compute, of fair captives distributed on the. field, and, above all, at
the sight of the royal fifth of the spoil, and of the slaves sent to
Medina, fresh tribes took their arms and went."1 In the early
battles, the spoil to each horseman was equal to ^40, besides arms,
&c., and sometimes to ^60. Of the spoils of battle, four parts
were at once divided among the warriors and one-fifth reserved for
the Treasury ; pensions were paid to the widows and children of the
soldiery— in fact, the whole Arab nation was subsidised. Large
numbers left Arabia and settled in the conquered territory, estimated
at 500,000 before the death of Omar.2 Under Abu-Bekr, Omar,
1 See Van Kreuser's History, &c., "Under the Kaliphs," Edinburgh Review,
No. civ. p. 38. a M,,ir>s « Anna|s of the ear]y Khalifs.»
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 1 89
Othman, Ali, and their successors, all Asia, from the Mediterranean
to the Indus, with Egypt, 636-640 A.D. < North Africa was not
subdued until after a resistance of sixty years, 704 A.D. The Gothic
kingdom of Spain was partly conquered 711 A.D. Dissensions as to
the true succession in the Khalifat to some extent impeded the
action of the warlike generals. The Shiites regard Ali as the true
successor of Mahomet, and execrate the three who preceded him as
usurpers. On the death of Ali, 660 A.D., his son Hassan was set
aside in favour of Moawiya, who began the dynasty of the
Ommiyades, who ruled until 750 A.D., when supplanted by Saffah,.
the founder of the Abbasside dynasty. The seat of the khalif was
first at Mecca, then at Damascus, then at Kufa, but was removed by
Al-Mansor to his new city of Bagdad, 762 A.D. Haron Al-Rashid,
famous for his magnificence and love of the arts and of literature,
began his reign in 786 A.D., and was the contemporary of Charlemagne.
In our day full justice has been done to the favourable side of the
character of Mahomet and of his system. Some of the Mahometans,
who, by the liberality of a Christian government in India, have been
enabled to acquire a knowledge of modern history (outside the
Mahometan world), have made their pretensions ridiculous by such
tirades as the following: — "Three great evils have befallen the
human race, three great disasters which have materially retarded the
progress of the world, and put back the hour-hand of time for
centuries. The first is the failure of the Persians in Greece ; the
second is the unsuccessful siege of Constantinople in the eighth
century by the Saracens ; and the third is the unfortunate result of
the Battle of Tours between the Moslems and Charles Martel." 1
Syed Ameer Ali had a predecessor in his literary speculations.
Anacharsis Cloots, " the representative of the human race," whose
vagaries furnished amusement and disgust during the French Revolu-
tion of 1789 A.D., £c., wrote a work entitled "Certitude des Preuves
du Mahometan," 1 780 A.D. Historians charitably suppose that he was
mad ; the excuse for Syed Ameer Ali is simply ignorance — sheer,
"incorrigible ignorance." The remarks of R. Bosworth Smith, though
far too exaggerated, and unsupported by some of the facts of the
history of Mahomet, are a little nearer the truth. They exhibit, too,
the striking difference between the incapability of the Eastern mind
to generalise from any one fact of Western history, compared with
the calm judgment of the educated mind of a Western scholar
friendly to his hero. " The religion that he taught is indeed below
1 Syed Ameer Ali, " Life of Mahomet," I2mo., 1873, p. 341.
190 From the Division of the Empire to the
the purest form of our own .... there is the protest against
polytheism in all its shapes ; there is the absolute equality of man
before God ; there is the sense of the dignity of human nature ;
there is the simplicity of life, the vivid belief in God's providence,
the entire submission to His will ; and last, not least, there is the
courage of their convictions, the fearless avowal before men of their
belief in God, and their pride in its possession as the one thing
needful If Christians generally were as ready to confess
Christ, and to be proud of being His servant, as Mahometans are
of being followers of Mahomet, one chief obstacle to the spread of
Christianity would be removed."1 Sismondi remarks that "alms-
giving is a most important duty enforced by Mahomet, but the rule
has been substituted for the sentiment. The man who has scrupu-
lously performed the duty of almsgiving is not the less hard and
cruel to his fellow men." 2 Muir's " Life of Mahomet " is the fullest
and fairest account of the prophet and his times.3 Bishop Thirl wall
thinks better of the prophet than of his system, observing that
" Mahomet was not a Mahometan, any more than Wilkes was a
Wilkite." 4 The revival of the military spirit among the Christian
nations was one result of the aggressive character of Mahometanism.
10. — (6). The rise of the Empire of the German Franks under
Karl der Grosse (Charlemagne). — The family of Pepin (the mayor of
the palace under the Merovingian Austrasian kings, happily for
Europe, governed France with a vigorous hand. Already the
Saracens, having conquered North Africa, had also conquered the
Gothic kingdom of Spain, with the exception of the petty region of
Asturias, still held by Don Pelayo and his successors, 710-11 A.D.,
they then claimed Septimania as part of the Spanish monarchy, but
were defeated at Thoulouse in a great battle by Eudes, Count of
Acquitaine, 718-721 A.D. In 731, under Abder-rabman, they had
advanced as far as Sens with three hundred and seventy-five thou-
sand men, intending to settle in France, had defeatecf Elides,
destroying his army, and were marching towards Poitiers. Charles
Martel, the son of Pepin, encountered them at the junction of the
Clain and Vienne ; after six days the battle commenced. The
Saracens were defeated ; three hundred thousand said to be slain ;
the survivors fled. Charles Martel (the hammerer) had truly ham-
mered the infidels. Several campaigns followed, in which they were
' " Mahomet and Mahometans," pp. 231, 232.
2 Sismondi, "Fall of the Roman Empire," vol. i. p. 292.
3 Muir, 4th edition, 8vo.
4 Bishop Thirlwall, " Letters to a Friend," p. 106.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 191
gradually driven southward, but Septimania was not finally wrested
from them till 759 A.D. by Pepin the Short. Had not Charles Martel
won this battle, it appears impossible for France to have avoided
subjugation. With her (Sismondi thinks) that Europe probably
would have been conquered, for there were no people in the rear of
the Franks in a condition for war. No other Christian people ; none
other that had made any progress toward civilisation ; none, in short,
which either by its valour, its policy, its means of defence, or the
number of its troops, could indulge any hope of victory if the
French were conquered.1 This notion, though supported by Gibbon
as well as Sismondi, seems to be questionable. The temporary
success of the Saracen hordes might have delayed the consolidation
of Gaul, but the Frank and the German armies and leaders were
fully equal to the duty of defending their nationality and their
Christianity. It is, however, very singular that, twice in Gaul, the
battle in defence of European civilisation has been fought (first by
yEtius and his barbarian allies near Chalons, 451 A.D., against Attila ;
and again by Charles Martel, at Poitiers, 732 A.D.). The title, as well
as the power of the king, were conferred upon Pepin, the son of
Charles Martel, 752 A.D. This was not merely a transfer of the
royalty from the Merovingian to the Carlovingian dynasty. It was a
real revolution, a national one, on the part of the Frankish trans-
Rhenan aristocracy and population • a final carrying out out of the
German influence, and practically a re-conquest of Gaul (according
to Sismondi) and an effectual check to the influence of Romanising
effeminency. By this event the power of the clergy was largely
increased, as they and the Pope had a large share in the change of
dynasty. No one then, nor any historian since, has expressed any
regret for the Merovingian race of kings. The most wretched speci-
men of barbarians without any redeeming feature, exhibiting all the
vices of gross sensuality accompanied by cruelty, and followed by
degrading superstition. From Clovis we see in them the utmost
degradation to which the human race can be brought. The last of
the race, the " rois faineants," were so brutalised by vice as to be
without memory or forethought, or will of their own.
Pepin made two expeditions into Italy at the request of Pope
Stephen, who came over the Alps to invite him, 753 A.D., and defeated
Astolphe, the King of the Lombards, who had just taken the
exarchate (Ravenna) from the Eastern Empire. This exarchate
Pepin gave to the Pope ; this was the beginning of the Pope's
1 Sismondi, " Fall of the Roman Empire," vol.ii. p. 48. " Ibid., vol. i. p. 132.
1 92 From the Division of the Empire to the
temporal power, 754-756 A.D. The opposition of the Popes to the
Lombards was not merely to Lombards, but to any rule in Italy
which overshadowed their own influences. From the time of the
Carlovingians to that of Victor Emmanuel, a period of more than
eleven hundred years, the pontiffs were ever consistently opposed to
any powerful Italian kingdom. At present Italy is united and the
Pope simply the head of the Church, but this always has been
effected in spite of the opposition of the Pope and clergy. Charle-
magne (Karl der Grosse) succeeded Pepin 768 A.D. His dominions
extended from the Pyrenees to the lower Rhine, including Holland,
and from the Channel to the Enns (beyond Saltzburg in Austria).
The Alemanni, Bavarians, and Thuringians, in Germany were, and
had been, subject to the Franks. Beyond these were Saxons and
other German tribes, sundry Sclavonic tribes, and the brutal Avars
(Hungary). Charlemagne's great work was the securing the peace of
his German dominions, by the thirty years' war with the barbarous
and warlike Saxons, and by the humbling of the yet more barbarous
Avars on the south and east. He had also to check the Arabs of
Spain, and established a new province, " the Spanish March,"
for the security of his south-western frontier. During the forty-
three years of his reign the aspect of affairs changed, not only
through Germany, but through all Europe. With him the ancient
history of Germany ends ; except for his interference, the uncivilised
Sclavonians would have checked the growth of the civilisa-
tion of the West, and these barbarians must have yielded to
the Huns (Avars), who would probably have renewed the savage
times of Attila. How great was the danger to the small civilised
portion of Europe from the warlike and savage hordes to the East,
may be inferred from the long and severe contests which Charle-
magne's successors had to carry on with the Hungarian and
Sclavonic tribes, although their power had been most broken by his
victories over them. The beginning of the civilisation of Germany
and of Central Europe was the work of this great man. His first
expedition beyond the Alps in 772 A.D. was followed by the conquest
of the Lombard kingdom. These Lombards, a Teutonic people,
much abused by the historians of the Papacy, were the most likely
of any of the barbarians since Theodoric to have established a
settled government in Italy. But the war, with the barbarian tribes
on the Eastern frontier were the main occupation of Charlemagne.
Though aggressive, they were in fact defensive. " He felt that, if he
did not succeed in destroying the barbarians, they would destroy
him. He did not propose to them the terrible choice, ' submit or
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 193
die,' until they had stubbornly and fiercely rejected the milder term,
* Be quiet and live.' " In 772 A.D. the war with the Saxons had
already commenced which lasted thirty-two years. These Saxons
lived after the fashion of their ancestors, without any supreme
chief, except in war. They were a community of free men in free
dwellings, on the whole rather troublesome by their predatory
excursions than dangerous ; their impunity amid their forests and
morasses, in which they had erected powerful defences, rendered it
difficult to obtain redress by these who had suffered from their
lawlessness, so that their subjugation was essential to the consolida-
tion of Germany and the safety of Western Europe. There was no
mercy on either side in these wars. On one occasion four thousand
five hundred warriors were beheaded by Charlemagne, and ten
thousand distributed as slaves in Gaul and Italy. From more than
one canton as many as one-third of the inhabitants were driven
southward and westward and settled amid a population hostile to
them. " The final success of Charlemagne's long war against the
Saxons afforded the first example since Julius Caesar of the
superiority of the military discipline, which cannot exist without
some civilisation, over the ruder valour of savage tribes. He
carried his victorious arms into the countries which had for centuries
poured their destroying bands over the prostrate south, and from
that moment the progress of improvement in Europe, though occa-
sionally disturbed, was never interrupted by the irruptions of northern
invaders." * In 786 A.D. the Lombard duchy of Benevento sub-
mitted to Charlemagne. The wars with the AVARS began soon after,
and lasted until 803 A.D. The power of this people was, from
their position, dangerous to the peace of the west and south. Being
a nomad race, they built no cities, but intrenched themselves in
camps or rings in the marshes of Hungary. Their leading ring,
near Buda-Pest, was a huge village or wood covering a large district,
encircled by hedges of trees with their branches interlaced, in circum-
ference about thirty-six or forty-five miles. The Avars were a tall,
handsome race, excellent archers, all clothed, with their horses,
in complete chain armour. Though ingenious in metal-work,
&c., they were faithless, avaricious, and remarkably cruel. From
their position at Buda they were able at any time to plunder and
ravage, eastward to Constantinople or westward to the Rhine. By
the persevering vigour of Charlemagne they were driven further east,
and in 796 A.D. the head ring at Buda-Pest, the capital residence of
1 Edinbiirgh Review, vol. xxxv. p. 502.
O
194 From the Division of the Empire to the
the Chagan, which they had deemed impregnable, was taken, and
the whole nation driven beyond the Raab, which Charlemagne made
the eastern boundary of his empire. After repeated rebellions,
requiring fresh expeditions, they ceased to disturb the empire,
803 A.D. These successes secured the admiration of the Khalif
Haroun-al-Raschid, who began a friendly exchange of presents,
798 A.D.
In order to secure his eastern boundary, Charlemagne established
a line of posts ; marquisates, under marquises or margraves, from the
Adriatic to the Elbe, were formed, each margrave dwelling in a
strongly fortified burg peopled by German settlers. An attempt
was made to unite the Maine and the Danube by a canal, but failed
from defective skill in the engineers. It was well that the unsettled
state of Germany prevented Charlemagne from pursuing his conquests
over the Avari to the gates of Constantinople. In 799 A.D. Leo III.,
the Pope, came to Paderborn to solicit help from Charlemagne
against the rebellious citizens of Rome. This help was given in
800 A.D., and on Christmas Day Charlemagne was crowned by the
Pope " Emperor of the Romans." This Roman title thus assumed
by a Germanic-Frankish king is a proof of the deep feeling of
attachment to the legality of the old imperial government by even
the partially Romanised barbarian tribes, whose chiefs desired to
govern by imperial titles. The general feeling is expressed by
Lactantius, " When Rome, the head of the world, shall have fallen,
who can doubt that the end is come of human things, ay, of the
•earth itself? " How the King of the Franks obtained the supplies of
men to fill and keep up the ranks of his armies is a difficult point
to determine, considering the then state of Frankish Gaul. In
the centre, the Frank and the Roman Gallic population was but
thinly scattered ; the nobles occupied whole provinces which they
used as grazing farms ; the freemen, in their small hereditary pro-
perties bordering on these vast estates, felt themselves in an
inferior position, and were tempted to renounce their allodial farms
and submit voluntarily to their powerful neighbour, receiving in
return protection. In southern Gaul the population was numerous
but unwarlike, being mainly Roman Gallic. They were regarded
with distrust, and were not largely employed in the armies or in
offices of trust. But in the provinces on the Rhine the Teutonic
population had preserved their language, had retained their allodial
possessions, and possessed but few slaves. There were among them
a few great lords and their dependent feudes or feudatory vassals.
War, however, was to these Teutons a great burden ; it took away the
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 195
freeman and the vassal. Pepin and Charles Martel had to grapple
with this difficulty ; they introduced fresh supplies of free settlers,
but the drain upon the population was far too great. Already five
thousand proprietors constituted a gentry, which, by the absorption
of the small properties, monopolised the land of Frankish (Roman)
Gaul. The supplies which kept up the armies of Charlemagne
must have been drawn largely from wandering barbarians seeking
employment as soldiers as the only occupation suited to them, and
from the conquered barbarians themselves, who, from their love of
war, were generally as ready to fight for their conquerors as they had
been to fight against them.
ii. — (7) The Eastern Empire from the time of the Saracenic in-
vasion to Charlemagne. — The loss of territory through the Saracens
has been already stated. Nothing but the impregnable position of
Constantinople, defended by the Greek fire, inextinguishable except
by vinegar and salt, and the loyalty of the Greek population in Asia
Minor, saved the empire and gave it the opportunity of recovering
its losses, as far as recovery was desirable. Constantinople was
besieged three times — 669, 717, 719 A.D. Italy, Syria, Egypt, North
Africa were well lost, and the loss was gain. " The work of the
seventh and eighth centuries was to lop away .... the outlying
provinces (Italy, Syria, &c.), and to make the empire far more
nearly coexistent than before with the lands where the Greek
tongue and Greek civilisation had really established themselves.''1
.... " these losses were distinct gains to the empire as
a power. They changed the unwieldy empire of Justinian into the
empire of Leo the Isaurian, still vast, still scattered .... but com
paratively compact, incomparably stronger, and gradually becoming
identified with the leading nations within its borders." The settlement
of the Slavi in Servia and Croatia, 640 A.D., and the kingdom of the
Bulgarians, founded south of the Danube, 680 A.D., did not affect
the strength of the empire : they occupied 'territories already wasted,
except when Greece was ravaged and possessed by Slavic tribes.
Leo III., the Isaurian (the Iconoclast), 718-741 A.D., defended the
empire, and Constantinople especially, against the attack of the
Saracens, with 120,000 men and 1,800 ships. The ships were burnt
and the walls defended by the use of the Greek fire. Freeman
regards him as "the highest type of the conservative politician." 3
In his age the empire was not yet Greek, but becoming so. From
that time it became a Byzantine empire, with its Roman polity and
Freeman's "Essays," third series, p. 254. 2 Ibid., p. 236.
O 2
ig6 From the Division of the Empire to the
its Greek intellect. Under the regency of Irene (Constantine VI. )y
Haroun-al-Raschid, the Arabian khalif, penetrated as far as Nico-
media, but, despairing of taking Constantinople, he received tribute
and retired. Constantine VI. was set aside by his mother, who
was the reigning ruler of Constantinople contemporary with Charle-
magne.
12. — (8) Scandinavia and the Eastern Plains north and west
of the Black Sea and the Danube. — (a) SCANDINAVIA was regarded
by the ancient geographers as a large island separated from
the continent of Europe by the Baltic Sea. The earliest in-
habitants are supposed to have been Kelts (in Jutland at least,
whence the Cimbri, known to the Romans, but by some these
are regarded as Teutons). Gothic races at an early period
settled in Jutland, the Islands, and in Norway and Sweden.
They did not find the Finns and Lapps already settled, as was
once supposed. It is now discovered that these Finns and Lapps
reached the north of Europe by the high north route from
Siberia, and that they and the Teuton Goths first came in contact
near the Arctic circle. The Gothic migration from the fabulous
Ars-Gard in Asia to Sweden was headed by Odin at some period
very remote, though some think so low as between 300 B.C. and
50 B.C., in which probably a series of migrations took place from the
south-east. All the old royal races of Norway, Sweden^ and Den-
mark claim descent from Odin. The coast of Norway, abounding
in deep secure inlets (fiords), was especially suited to a sea-going
people, and the land, rugged and hemmed in by lofty mountains,
was only to a small extent fit for agriculture. Sweden was covered
with dense forests and morasses ; and the provinces of Scania and
Gothland, on the whole fertile, were apparently first cleared by
settlers from Denmark, and naturally attached to the Danish king-
dom. It was composed of Swethiod (on both sides of Lake Malar)
and of Gauthiod (on both sides of Lake Wettern). There are two
lines of kings, those of the Swedes and those of the Goths, which
occasions great confusion in its early history. The territory of
Sweden gradually increased, but it did not occupy the east of the
Gulf of Bothnia till the twelfth century. The Yngling Dynasty
reigned in Sweden ; the Skiolding in Denmark ; the Sczmage in
Norway, at Drontheim : that is to say, some one chief of the royal
race was regarded as superior nominally. In or about 630 A.D.,
Ivar Vidfadme, king of Denmark, reigning at Lethra, conquered the
Yngling Dynasty, at Upsala, and it is said that his family reigned
over both countries until about 803 A.D. The Battle of Brarella,
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 197
between Sigurd and Harald Hildetand, 794 A.D., closes the mythic
age of Scandinavian history, 613 A.D. (Olaf Traetelia, driven from
Upsala, passed on to the west of the Lake Weneren, cleared the forests,
and founded a kingdom which embraced part of Norway, but was after-
wards absorbed by Norway and Sweden.) At that time Sweden
beyond Upsala was all forest and morass. The Scandinavian his-
torians speak of regular government under the Odin dynasties, and
glow over the Temple priestly court, first at Sigtuna, then at
Upsala, in Sweden. Of this regular government we see no trace :
petty kings innumerable, powerful enough to rob and fight, but
unable to command obedience and enforce law. Denmark, " the
darkly wooded land," was the most civilised, through its vicinity to Ger-
many ; generally, elsewhere, a legalised anarchy. The safety-valve for
the pent-up warlike energies of such a people was to be found in the
piratical expeditions of the Vikings or Northmen, which were a terror
and misery to civilised Europe for more than two hundred years.
Norway alone could send out of its fiords 336 ships, each carrying 60
to 70 armed men. ($) The Venedi and other Sclavonic tribes dwelling
east of the Oder occupied North Germany and Poland; (c) the Avars,
who had partly taken the place of the Huns, had been curtailed of their
territory west of the Danube by Charlemagne ; (d) a kindred tribe,
the Magyars, were dwelling from Transylvania to the Euxine ; (e) to
the south of these, on both sides of the Danube, was the Bulgarian
kingdom, founded 634 A.D.; (/) Sclavish tribes occupied Servia and
all the coasts and mountains of Illyria down to the Morea, practi-
cally independent of the Eastern Empire. The breaking up of Attila's
Hunnish empire, and the departure of the Ostrogoths, Gepidae, and
Lombards had left the Avars as the leading tribe, until humbled by
Charlemagne ; (g) far to the north of the Euxine were the Khazars
(a Calmuck tribe) and the Patzinacites; (/i) the Russians (a Sclavonic
tribe driven to the north by the Khazars) had founded Novogorod on
the Ilmen, and Kieef on the Dnieper. The wars of Charlemagne,
by breaking the charm of Avarian superiority, had prepared the way
for the nationality of Bohemia, Moravia, Poland, Lithuania, the
Croats, the Serbs, &c. We read of one Samo, a Frankish warlike
merchant, who, nearly two centuries before Charlemagne, opposed
the Avars, and controlled the trade path between Constantinople and
the West, and who was regarded as king by the Bohemians and
Carinthians, 630 A.D. All these details are as near the truth as can
be gathered from the obscure and conflicting accounts of the anna-
lists of this age ; ( /) there was also a kingdom of Biarmeland to the
north of the Russians, extending from Lake Onega to the Ural
198 From the Division of the Empire to the
Mountains, and from Perm to Archangel. The people were a
Finnish race, to some extent civilised, as they lived in towns, and
cultivated the ground. Traders came in the summer, not only for
peltry, but also for the productions of India and China, received
through the Khazars by the Caspian Sea. This territory was
united to Russia in the twelfth century. (/) Beyond these, on the
east side of the Uralian range, were the Igours, or Issedones, who
from a remote period had been acquainted with letters and astro-
nomy. They had been conquered by the Huns, and part of them
settled in Biarmeland, at Perm ; the rest were conquered by the
Keraites, a dominant race in Central Asia (125 A.D.), ruling at
Karakorum.
India. — Three Dynasties in North- West India are distinguished
by their opposition to Scythian invasions — the Sahs, of Surashtra,
from 60 to 70 B.C. to 235 A.D. ; the Guptos, of Kanauj, from
319 A.D. to 450 A.D. • the Valabhi (in Cutch and Malwa), from 480
to 722 A.D. All these were engaged in wars with the barbarian
tribes from the north-west. The state religion generally in India was
Buddhism ; but by the year 800 A.D. the Brahmins obtained the
ascendancy, and the Buddhists were expelled.
China.) after centuries of civil war and rival kingdoms, was par-
tially united by the Suy Dynasty, 590 A.D., under Yang Keen, who
established a library of 15,000 volumes. The Tang Dynasty began
618 A.D., under Tai-tsung, who over-ran Tartary, and extended his
power to Khoten, and Kashgar, to East Persia and the Caspian
Sea. A Nestorian priest introduced Christianity 635 A.D. After
this, alternate able and weak emperors destroyed the imperial
prestige, and prepared the way for a new dynasty.
13. — (9) THE ECCLESIASTIAL HISTORY of this period. — Amid the
calamities which accompanied the fall of the Empire in the West
Christianity remained uninjured, the major part of the barbarians
having accepted Christianity previously, and the others soon after their
settlement in the empire. The dignity and influence of the bishops of
the Christian Church were greatly increased. In the loss of all rule
and authority, and the absence of all confidence in the local magis-
tracy during the last years of the empire, and after its dissolution, the
Christian bishop remained the sole representative of law, the only
one respected and trusted by the people. His position was indepen-
dent of political changes : his sympathies were with the people, with
whose social condition he was well acquainted, and who recognised
in him a friend and benefactor. Especially was this the case of the
Bishop of Rome, upon whom the absence of the emperors placed no
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 199
small share of the burden and responsibility for the peace of that
city. The dignity of the see arose out of its associations with the
supposed primacy of Peter and with the seat of the imperial govern-
ment, which, in the absence of the emperor, was best represented by
the bishop — the Pope. The precedence voluntarily yielded and
recognised was soon claimed as a right. Innocent I. was Pope
402-417 A.D. Upon his mind "appears first distinctly to have
dawned the vast conception of Rome's ecclesiastical supremacy, dim
as yet and shadowy, yet full and comprehensive in its outline.
While Honorius was losing the provinces of the empire. Innocent
was asserting his almost despotic spiritual authority over them : his-
influence was felt in the Eastern Church, and it is to his credit
that he supported the cause of the eloquent Chrysostom against the
corrupt imperial court of Constantinople, 403-407 A.D. The secret
of the power of the Roman bishops lay in their complete identifica-
tion with the spirit of the age. This sympathy with the general
mind of Christendom constituted their strength. They became the
masters of the Western Church by being the representatives, the
centre of its feelings and opinions." J Following the example of
Innocent, one of the greatest of the popes, LEO I., THE GREAT (so called
justly), obtained from Valentinian III. an edict, 445 A.D., in which
he admits " the primacy of the Apostolic See of Rome," and com-
mands the whole world to acknowledge it as " its director andi
governor"; adding that the papal decisions (in Church affairs)
" have the force of law, and are to be enforced by the secular
authorities,"2 as "thereby only can the peace of the Church be
preserved." Leo I. was the real founder of the papacy. " It is in this-
spontaneous chieftainship that we recognise one of the most effective
elements of the subsequent political greatness of the Romish Bishops.
The decaying mass of civil institutions became as manure at the
root of the papacy." After the success of Leo's interview with Attila,.
we need not wonder that, having saved the existence of Rome, men>
regarded him as its rightful governor. " He stood equally alone
and superior in the Christian world." 3 Other popes persevered in
carrying out the policy of Leo. Gelasius (452-498 A.D.) maintained
with vigour the same policy, the key-note of which was the superiority
of the spiritual over the secular power. GREGORY L, THE GREAT
(590-604 A.D.), relieved from all control of the emperors of the
1 Milman, "History of Christianity," vol. i. pp. 87-121.
2 Evremond, vol. i.
3 Milman, " History of Christianity," vol. i. p. 178. ,
200 From the Division of the Empire to the
East by the Lombard conquest of Italy, opposed the title of
" Universal Patriarch," assumed by the Bishop of Constantinople,
and at the same time defended the independence of the city of
Rome from the attacks of the Lombards. Gregory III. (726-737
A.D.), annoyed by the iconoclastic policy of the emperors of
Constantinople, repudiated the jurisdiction of that court, on the
ground that " the Pontiff of Rome is the only arbiter and judge of
the Christian community, both in the East and in the West," and,
in the name of St. Peter, " whom every region in the world wor-
shipped as God upon earth." Under Gregory the Great the ritual of
the Church assumed a more perfect and magnificent form, which
was increased by following pontiffs. At this time the Church of
Rome possessed large estates in Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Dal-
matia, Illyria, Gaul, and even in Africa and the East, of which Gregory
was a faithful administrator. From the papal estates in Sicily came
the chief supplies of corn which fed the diminishing, yet still vast,
poor population of Rome. In the great controversies which agitated
the Eastern Church the popes up to Gregory II. (715 A.D.) were
subject to some severe and unjust treatment from the emperors at
Constantinople. Gregory II. began the contest with Leo the
Isaurian, 729 A.D., which was carried on by his successors.
Gregory III., by his resolute action, "marks the period of transition
from the old to the new political system of Europe : they proclaimed
the severance of all connexion with the East .... Latin Christen-
dom is forming into a separate realm, of which the Pope is the head.
Henceforth the Pope, if not a temporal sovereign, is a temporal
potentate." l But the next point, territorial sovereignty -, was soon
achieved. Ever since the extinction of the Western Empire had eman-
cipated the ecclesiastical potentate from secular control, the first and
•most abiding object of his scheme and prayer had been the acqui-
sition of territorial wealth in the neighbourhood of his capital. He
had, indeed, a sort of justification, for Rome, a city without either
trade or industry, was crowded with- poor, for whom it devolved on
>the bishop to provide. Yet the pursuit was one which could not
fail to pervert the purposes of the popes, and give a sinister character
to all they did." 3 By the help of the Franks the popes were freed
from the Lombards and the Eastern Emperors. This help was most
pertinaciously sought, and backed by argments suited to the end de-
signed. Stephen II., 754A.D.,in his letter toPepinand his sons, reminds
1 Milman, i. 217.
2 Bryce, " History of the Roman Empire," pp. 42, 43.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 201
them of " the promise which they made to St. Peter, the doorkeeper
of heaven, to restore the exarchate to St. Peter." In 755 A.D., in a
letter sent " by the order of the Apostle Peter," both St. Peter and
the Virgin Mary are represented as conjuring Pepin, &c., to imme-
diate action on pain of eternal punishment. Pepin compelled the
King of the Lombards to give up Ravenna, Emilia, Pentapolis, to the
papacy (755 A.D.), which claimed all that had been held by the
Eastern Emperors. In Rome itself we still read of a republic and
senate, yet always in connexion with the pontificate, which was
supreme. Pope Stephen assumed that Pepin, having accepted the
crown at his hand (at St. Denis, 754 A.D.), had sworn fealty to the
pontiff. In 774 A.D. Charlemagne ratified the donations of his
father Pepin. " The diploma which contained the solemn gift was
placed upon the altar of St. Peter .... the original has long
perished. It is said to have comprehended the whole of Italy, the
exarchate of Ravenna, from Istria to the frontiers of Naples, including
the island of Corsica."1 Pope Honorius I., in 776 A.D., was tempted
for the first time to put forth the claims to an extensive dominion,
supposed to have been granted by Constantine to Pope Sylvester,
together with "supreme power over all the regions of the West."3
There can be no doubt that the great sovereigns connected with
these grants thought it desirable to admit and further the papal
power in all ecclesiastical affairs, and were also anxious to secure a
territorial status for the Pope, by whom alone the clergy could be
protected in the independent discharge of their clerical duties. No
one at that time could foresee the evils ultimately arising out of this
papal supremacy, while the present advantages were so obvious, that
whatever public opinion existed was in its favour. Pope Leo III.
designed the new suburb on the left bank of the Tiber, which was
afterwards carried out by Leo IV., 847-855 A.D., and called "the
Leonine City."
14. The Western Church was fully employed in the task of im-
parting the rudiments of Christian truth to the pagan population of
the old empire, increased by addition of a large pagan population,
which entered along with the Christian Burgundians and Visigoths.
It had also to grapple with the Arianism of these Burgundians and
Goths, and to bring them to the orthodox faith. Missions to the
German tribes were carried on by Boniface and others 715-755 A.D.
Boniface founded the monastery at Fulda, and was murdered by the
heathen at Dockheim in Frisia 755 A.D. St. Columban, a British
1 Milman, i. 261. 2 Greenwood, iii. 24-32.
2O2 From the Division of the Empire to the
missionary, also laboured in Germany 573-615 A.D. He founded
the Abbey of Bobbio in Lombardy 612 A.D. This British Church
was actively engaged in missionary labour ; it had missions in Scot-
land and Ireland. Ninian (410-432 A.D.) was the apostle of the
Picts. Palladius and Patrick laboured in Ireland in the fifth century;
St. Columba founded the monastery of lona 520-596 A.D. ; he was
the leading spirit among the CULDEES (i.e., cultores Dei) of the old
British Church, which had been established before the Saxon con-
quest of England. Pope Gregory the Great sent Augustine on a
mission to the Anglo-Saxon King of Kent, 596 A.D., which, in the
long run, was successful. It is said the Nestorians had a mission in
North China so early as 630 A.D.
The doctrinal controversies chiefly arose in the Eastern Church,
though the Pelagian controversy was, for the most part, confined to
the West. Pelagius endeavoured, sometimes unguardedly, to vin-
dicate freewill as against absolute predestination. By the influence
of St. Augustine (of Hippo) and of St. Jerome, the decision of the
Church was in favour of the Augustinian theory, which we now call
Calvinism, 390-400 A.D. In the East the controversies had special
reference to the divine nature and the relation of the three persons
in the Trinity. The third general council at Ephesits, 431 A.D.,
condemned Pelagius and the speculations of the Nestorians on the
relations and conditions of the divine and human nature in Christ.
In the fourth general council at Chalcedon, 451 A.D., the Monophysite
heresy of Eutychius, which confounded the godhead and man-
hood of Christ into one nature, and the opposite heresy of
Nestorius, which appeared to divide the godhead and manhood of
Christ, were alike condemned. This council admitted the supre-
macy of the Bishop of Rome, and asserted an equal position for the
Bishop of Constantinople. The fifth general council (the second
of Constantinople), 553 A.D., confirmed the acts of Justinian the
emperor on some points of doctrine. The Emperor Zeno endea-
voured to moderate extreme opinions by his edict of union (the
Henoticon), 482 A.D. The sixth general council, 680 A.D. (the third
of Constantinople), condemned the Monothelite heresy, and declared
the faith of the Church to be that "there were two wills and modes
of operation in Christ, corresponding to his two natures ; that these
were without division, and without opposition or confusion, the
human will being always subordinate to that which is divine and
almighty." Gibbon sneers at the topics discussed in these councils,
regards the disputes "alike scandalous to the Church, alike per-
nicious to the state " (chap, xlvii.). So also Sismondi (the able Pro-
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 203
testant rationalist) speaks of " the theological subtleties .... the
examination of them fatigues the reason, and appears a sort of
blasphemy against that inscrutable Being, who is thus submitted to
a kind of moral dissection."1 The points in discussion are here
misstated. They did not refer to the essence of the divine nature,
but to the exact meaning of the Holy Scripture as to the person of
the Christ. The councils give their reply to the question, "What
readest thou ? " They set on one side as altogether irrelevant all
a priori assumptions drawn from the name of father and son as used
to express human relations, and confined themselves to the language
and teaching of Scripture. These questions were forced upon the
Church by individual speculators. Possibly, as Gibbon remarks,
that all parties " were more solicitous to explore the nature than
practise the laws of their founder": but this human infirmity is no
reason why trie combined wisdom of the ruling minds of the Church
should not labour to clear away the fogs and mists by which subtle
minds had darkened the simplicity of the Christian creed. Their
decisions are founded on the teachings of the gospels and the
epistles, and as such, and not merely because so ruled by the
councils, they have been received almost universally by the Christian
Churches. We have reason to be thankful for this timely exercise
of the acuteness of the great theologians of the fourth up to the
seventh century, by which the plain declarations of Scripture have
been cleared from the obscurities of a philosophy falsely so called.
The seventh general council (the second of Nicea), held 787 A.D.,
permitted the religious veneration of images, and declared that the
elements in the Lord's Supper are not figures, but the very body
and blood of our Lord. This decision settled the long dispute
begun by the Emperor Leo the Isaurian, 717-726 A.D., who had
forbidden the adoration of images, though opposed by John of
Damascus. This worship was also opposed by the Emperor
Charlemagne, in a council at Frankfort and in a treatise put out by
his authority ; but the mass of the population both in the east and
the west preferred the use of sensible objects in worship,2 and being
supported by the Roman pontiffs, through an undue sympathy with
the weakness of the great majority of Christians, carried out the
decision of the seventh general council, a council not acknowledged
by Protestant Churches. The Paulirian heresy, which appears to
have grafted upon a very imperfect Christian theology some Oriental
1 " History of the Fall of the Roman Empire," i. 271.
2 Exodus xxxii. 9.
204 From the Division of the Empire to the
notions of the eternity of matter, a duality of deities, the rejection
of the sacraments, 660 A.D., spread through Asia Minor and beyond,
and gave some trouble to the Eastern Empire. The seceders from
the Eastern Greek Church, whose views had been condemned by
the councils, the Nestorians, Monophysites, Jacobites, Armenians,
Copts, &c., were chiefly found in the districts which, in the seventh
century, had been conquered by the Mahometans. They were thus
left free to hold and spread their views unmolested. In this period
" will worship," pure human inventions in the shape of self-mor-
tifications, were fostered by the superstition of the people ; the
ridiculous shape it sometimes assumed was no hindrance to its
popularity. St. Symeon (Stylites) was the first of the pillar saints;
he lived thirty-six years on the summit of a pillar (forty miles from
Antioch), and was regarded as " an ornament and honour to re-
ligion " by Theodoret the historian. He died 459 A.D. Monachism,
which had obtained a complete domination over public opinion in
the East, was spread in the West by St. Martin of Tours, who died
400 A.D. ; and by John Cassian, who died 432 A.D. ; also by St.
Honoratus, Bishop of Aries, 426 A.D. ; and by St. Vincent of Lerius,
who died 450 A.D. St. Vincent is the author of the great test ot
Catholic truth, accepted by the early Church — namely, " antiquity,
universality, and common consent." The monastic institution
derived fresh importance among the barbarous kingdoms. St.
Benedict of Nursia (Umbria), 480-543 A.D., founded the famous
monasteries of Subiaco and Monte Casino (Calabria), and carried out
great reforms, which gave increased influence to the Benedictine
order. This order, by its literary labours, has maintained the high
character of its founder. Pictures began to be objects of more than
ordinary reverence in the Church, and the Virgin Mary began to be
invoked as a mediator; relics and holy places were much praised
and honoured. The use of liturgies in public worship and the
adoption of the creeds — the Nicene, that of the Apostles, and the
(so-called) Athanasian Creed — were universal. The Apostles' Creed
followed the Nicene. The Athanasian probably originated in the
school of St. Augustine. It first appeared in Gaul about the middle
of the fifth century. Waterland ascribes it to St. Hilary, Bishop of
Aries, 430 A.D., others to Vigilius of Thapsus (Africa), 484 A.D. A
remarkable reform in the monasteries was carried out by Benedict
of Aniane, 774-784 A.D., who adopted the great reform of his
predecessor, St. Benedict of Nursia. In the east the Nestorians
laboured with great zeal to extend Christianity in Persia, India, and
China. A monument found in Sigan (China) proves that Chris-
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 205
tianity was introduced there in 636 A.D., and that a Christian
community existed until 780 A.D., when they were stamped out by
persecution.1
15. — (10) LITERARY HISTORY from 395-800 A.D. Literature was
checked by the troubles and unsettlement of the barbarian invasion
of the empire. The Latin language became gradually corrupted,
though mainly used in the courts, the tribunals, and in the churches
in west Europe and Italy. It was maintained and preserved in the
Christian Church by the use of the old Italic version, and then by
the Vulgate of St. Jerome, and the Latin liturgies and service.
" Jerome's translation is a wonderful work It almost created
a new language The Vulgate was, even more than the papal
power, the foundation of Latin Christianity." 3 In the seventh
century the sermons were in the Latin language. In or about
750 A.D., the rustic patois in Gaul was rapidly superseding the Latin
as the language of common life, and in 816 A.D. a council at Tours
directed that the homilies should be explained in the rustic dialects,
and in the language of the Franks. Thus, by degrees, the founda-
tion was laid for the modern languages of France, Italy, Spain, as
well as in England and Germany. Schools were established by the
clergy in common with the churches and monasteries; the education
was framed on the old " trivium and quadrivium," a course of
seven sciences — viz., "grammar, logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry,
music, and astronomy." This was the curriculum of the schools
from the sixth century. In Ireland, through the labours of
the missionaries, there were some glimpses of light in the sixth and
seventh centuries, also in England and Scotland. Theodore, the
Archbishop of Canterbury, a Greek of Tarsus, with his friend
Adrian, 668 A.D., did much to keep up the knowledge of Latin, and
perhaps of Greek, from which Bede of Yarrow, " the venerable "
historian, 622-735 A.D., and Alcuin of York, the friend of Charle-
magne, 735-804 A.D., probably profited. Among the Lombards in
Italy and the Merovingians of France literature declined. Some
think the fifth and sixth centuries to have been the very darkest ot
the dark ages.
But in spite of this decline some few adorned literature. St.
JEROME who, in 386 A.D., left Rome, after revising the old Italic
Bible; while at Bethlehem he made his new translation "The
Vulgate," 405 A.D. ; he died September 30, 420 A.D. Vincent of
Lerius, already referred to as the author of " The Commonitorium," in
1 Mosheim, Soames, ii. 61, 62. * Milman, i. 24.
206 From the Division of the Empire to the
which he laid down the rule, " Teneamus quod ubique, quod semper,
quod ab omnibus creditum est," a valuable, but not infallible, test of
truth, 434 A.D. ST. AUGUSTINE, the great theologian of the West,
became Bishop of Hippo, 395 A.D., and died about 430 A.D., during
the siege of the city by the Vandals ; " he organised Latin theology,
brought Christianity into the minds and hearts of men by his
impassioned autobiography, and finally, under the name of ' the City
of God,' established [the idea of] that new and undefined kingdom
at the head of which the Bishop of Rome was hereafter to place
himself as sovereign." The treatise itself contemplated no such
external or visible autocracy, but it prepared the way for it in the
minds of men.1 Then followed the writings of one who, from his
high position and personal influence, was listened to. Pope Leo
the Great, in 451 A.D., wrote his treatise on the Incarnation. "It
may be admitted that a clearer and more logical analysis of Scripture,
and of Scripture only, could hardly have been penned," equally
hostile to the theories of the Nestorians and Eutychians.3 Pope
Gregory I. (the Great), 590-604 A.D., a sincere but narrow theologian,
jealous of secular literature, thought that images, &c., in the churches
were, in the absence of books, a valuable means in popular in-
struction, and that relics of saints and martyrs ought to be honoured ;
he thought that there were sins which might be forgiven in the life
to come, and that masses on earth might lessen the amount of
punishment in the intermediate state. The sacramental ritual of
the Romish Church was established by him, and now remains ; his
superstitious tendencies have proved most injurious to the spirituality
of the Latin Church. BOETIUS the philosopher and, for a time, the
friend of Theodoric, the King of the Goths, in Italy, when in prison,
while awaiting his death on a charge of treason, 524 A.D., wrote his
famous work " De Consolatione," &c., in which he collects all the
comfort that philosophy can give to one in his trying position. By
his use of Plato, Zeno, and Aristotle, he helped to recommend
their philosophical studies to the clergy and scholars of his day.
Besides these leading names, there were, in Gaul, Sidonius
Apollinaris, the poet, 438-468 A.D. ; Gregory of Tours, historian
and theologian, 540 A.D. ; Hilary of Aries, the opponent of Leo I.
on questions of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, 429-449 A.D. In Britain,
Gildas, 500 A.D. ; Caedmon, 600 A.D. ; Sampson Nennius, 600 A.D. ;
Bede, historian, 673-735 A-D- In Spain, Orosius of Tarragona,
historian and theologian, and a friend of St. Augustine and St.
1 Milman, i. 79. 2 Greenwood, vol. i. 365.
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 207
Jerome, 390-417 A.D. ; Isidore of Seville, theologian and historian,
the greatest luminary of the Visigothic court, 595-636 A.D. ; St. Ilde-
fonzo, theologian, 600-667 A.D. ; St. Julian of Toledo, theologian and
historian, 667-691 A.D. That these, with many others of less note,
were able in that distracted period to engage in literary pursuits,
while surrounded by barbarian influences, is remarkable.
In the East the Neo-Platonic Philosophy had ceased to be taught
in Athens, 529 A.D. Synesius, the philosophic Bishop of Ptolemais
(Cyrene), who claimed to be a descendant of Hercules, used his
powers as bishop to put down the oppression of the Governor of
Libya, 410 A.D. Warburton calls him "a no small fool .... a
platitude as extravagant and absurd as any." Being scarcely even a
nominal Christian, he is a great favourite with Gibbon, who says that
" the philosophic bishop supported with dignity the character
which he had assumed with reluctance." With more reason he is
applauded by Kingsley as a noble muscular Christian bishop.
ST. CHRYSOSTOM, of Antioch and Constantinople (400-438 A.D.), the
great and eloquent theologian, had to combat and suffer for faithful-
ness to his office; Theophylact (602-628 A.D.) and Syncellus
(700 A.D.) are the historians of the Eastern Church; Cyril of
Alexandria (412-444 A.D.) with John of Damascus (700-750 A.D.)
are. with Chrysostom, great authorities in the Greek Church. One
grammarian at Constantinople may be noticed, Priscian, who lived
468 or 525 A.D., whose name is often used as the representative of
" grammar."
From the accession of the Abasside dynasty of khalifs in Bagdad
the cultivation of science was assisted by the patronage of the
khalifs. Translations of all the scientific books of the Greeks were
made into Arabic. The dynasty was remarkable for its free and
liberal notions, so different from those of the early khalifs, and
has been charged with a secret sceptical indifference towards the
teachings of orthodox Mahometanism.
State of the World at the close of this Period.
EUROPE.
SCANDINAVIA. Denmark and Sweden — i.e., south of Lake Malar —
united under the King of Denmark. Norway a separate
kingdom.
BRITISH ISLES. England was rapidly approaching to the union
2O8 From the Division of the Empire to the
of its heptarchy under Egbert. Scotland had (i) the Picts
(Caledonians) on the north and east ; the seat of their king was
either Inverness or on the Tay ; they are supposed to have been
partly Teutons and partly Kelts. (2) The Scots (Irish Gaels)
who came from Ireland and settled in Argyleshire, 250 A.D.,
and began the kingdom of Dalreada, 500 A.D. (3) The
Strathclyde Welsh occupied all the west of England, north
of Chester, and west of Scotland ; their capital, Dumbarton.
(4) Lothian, the south-eastern portion of Scotland, was
occupied by northern tribes connected with the Saxon kingdom
of Northumbria ; chief town, Edinburgh on the Forth.
Ireland, at a very remote period, appears to have had settlers
of a highly civilised character, quite different from any popu-
lation known in historic times, probably Carthaginian. The
present race appear to have been Kelts and Berbers from
Spain, afterwards mixed up with a few Teutons ; they were
called Scots, and Ireland was known as Scotia until the
eleventh century. The Irish were always, with few excep-
tions, a wild and lawless people, nominally under the rule of
four principal and a large number of petty chiefs. St. Patrick
was their first Christian missionary in the fifth century.
GERMANY, west of the Oder, under Charlemagne ; eastward, the
Slavons, the Avars, &c.
GAUL, the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, under Charle-
magne.
ITALY : North Italy, the Duchy of Benevento, the Exarchate.
Corsica, under Charlemagne ; by grant to the Pope, Rome,
&c. ; Duchy of Benevento, a fief under Charlemagne ; much
of the south of Italy, Sicily, and Sardinia under the Eastern
empire, besides the Exarchate.
SPAIN : Gallicia, the Asturias under the successor of the Gothic
Don Pelayo from 714 A.D. ; there was also a small Christian
kingdom in Murcia, but it was absorbed by the Mahometans,
756 A.D. Charlemagne had possession of a strip of territory
south of the Pyrenees which was called the Spanish march (as
a check on the Mahometans). Abderahman, of the family of
the Ommiyade dynasty, which had been supplanted, 750A.D.y
by the Abassides, took refuge in Spain and founded the
khalifat of Cordova, which ruled over two-thirds of Spain.
THE EASTERN EMPIRE still possessed the territory from the
Revival of the Empire of the West by Charlemagne. 209
Adriatic, south of the Danube to the Black Sea ; but Illyria
and Greece were partly occupied by Sclavonic tribes only
nominally subject to the empire. The north-west corner was
Servia, a Sclavonic state also nominally bound to the empire.
The Bulgarians north of the Danube revolted from the Avars,
619 A.D., and crossed the Danube, and founded an inde-
pendent kingdom in Moesia in 678 A.D. ; in 815 A.D.,
re-crossed the Danube, and founded the South Bulgarian
empire, north of the Danube.
NORTH and WEST of the Black Sea were the Avars in Hungary,
&c. (much humbled by Charlemagne), the Magyars (Transyl-
vania), the Khazars extending to the Caspian, the Patzinacites,
the Russians to the north of these, the kingdom of Biarindan
beyond and further north than the Russians ; but all these
barbarous races were more or less nomads, and their positions
and their very names are continually changing, so that it is
difficult to identify them.
ASIA.
ASIA MINOR and Crete still part of the Eastern Empire.
ALL ASIA, from the Mediterranean to the Indus, under the
Khalifs of Bagdad (the Abassides).
INDIA. Buddhism in the ascendant, 600-800 A.D.
CHINA. After great discord, the Suy Dynasty, 590 A.D. ; much
troubled by the barbarians. The Tang Dynasty, 618 A.D.
AFRICA.
EGYPT under the Khalifs of Bagdad.
NORTH AFRICA to the far west, as yet under the Khalifs of Bagdad ;
very soon to be separated. The Edrisites in Fez, 782 A.D. ;
the Aghabites in Tunis at Kairwoon, 800 A.D.
SEVENTH PERIOD,
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the
Crusades, 1096 A.D.
I. — The Empire of Charlemagne.
i. THE revival of the Roman Empire in the West was not intended
to be a mere continuation of the line which ended with Romulus Augus-
tulus. The new empire was that which was supposed to be identified
with the great power to which the western nationalities had always
been accustomed to look with respect and deference. Constanti-
nople and the Eastern Emperors were to a great extent outside of the
sphere of practical action in the West. Rome, in its dangers and
trials from Alaric, Attila, and others, had received no help from
Constantinople. The interference of Justinian had destroyed the
Gothic monarchy, which had bid fair to identify itself with the
nation, and had thus prepared the way for the Lombard rule, which
had proved more annoying than any other barbarian government.
A woman, too, was governing in Constantinople ; her character
commanded no respect, and she could afford no protection. The
feeling of the day is represented by the "Old Annals" of Lauresheim,
quoted by Bryce, p. 53 : "And because the name of emperor had
now ceased among the Greeks, and their empire was possessed by a
woman, it then seemed both to Leo, the Pope himself, and to
all the holy fathers who were present in the selfsame council, as
well as the rest of the Christian people, that they ought to take to
be emperor Charles, King of the Franks, who held Rome itself, where
the Caesars had always been wont to sit." There were other reasons ;
one assigned by Hallam, i. 123, was the investing Charlemagne's
dignity with the character of sacredness in the eyes of his barbarian
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 211
subjects, who had been accustomed to hear of emperors as superior
to kings • his rule was thereby changed at once from a dominion of
force to a dominion of law.1 Another, given by Maine, in his work
on Ancient Law, pp. 103, 107, "The barbarians knew nothing of
territorial sovereignty ; their kings ruled over Franks, Burgundians,
Lombards, £c. To be something more than this there was only
one precedent in the title of Emperor of Rome ; the moment a
monarch departed from the special relation of chief to clansmen, he
must take the full prerogative of the Roman emperor, or he had no
political status whatever."2 The power and rights of the new
emperor were differently interpreted by the two parties foremost in
the transfer of the imperial dignity. Charles, no doubt, considered
his power over Rome the same as that which he exercised over his
other conquests. The Pope supposed the emperor to stand simply
as the defender of the papacy in the exercise of the Pope's spiritual
and temporal rule. Charles, as Roman emperor, and his German
successors claimed and exercised for ages great privileges, implying
a primacy over the sovereigns of Europe until the year 1806 A.D.,
when Francis II. of Austria announced to the German Diet his
resignation of the imperial crown. "If the name of the Roman
empire still presented to the inhabitants of Europe, after so long an
interruption, ideas of greatness and superior power, it was not a
vain flattery which caused the title of emperor to be renewed, in
order to bestow it upon Charlemagne. Since Diocletian .... none
of his successors could be compared to the King of the Franks,
either for the extent of his states or for the strength of his armies.
The new Empire of the West was not, however, composed of the
same provinces as the old : the Saracen had despoiled Christianity
of Africa and Spain, and Charles had only re-conquered a small
part of the latter. But to make amends he had regained on the
north a territory nearly equal to that which the empire had lost in
the south. All Germany obeyed him as far as the mouths of the
Elbe and the Oder ; and that half-savage country furnished Charles-
more valiant soldiers than the ancient emperors could have drawn
from Numidia or Mauritania."3 "No claim can be more ground-
less than that which the modern French, the sons of the Latinised
Kelt, set up to the Teutonic Charles."4 " French history, as it is
commonly presented to Englishmen, exists only through a systematic
1 Freeman's " Essays," p. 175. 2 Student's " History of France," pp. 83, 84.
3 Sismondi, " History of the Fall of the Roman Empire," vol. i. pp. 268, 269,
4 Bryce, p. 71.
212 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
misrepresentation of imperial history. Till all French influences are
wholly cast aside and trampled under foot, the true history of the
'holy Roman empire can never be understood.'"1 The empire of
Karl der Grosse (Charlemagne) was the Teutonic empire which stands
between two long periods of tumult and disorder, the empire to
which the France, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Belgium, and
Holland of our day may trace their origin. Of all the Teutonic
races which occupied north-eastern Gaul, east and west of the Rhine,
the Austrasian Teutons were " the true-born Rhenish Franks," and
with them the Thuringians, the Alemanni, the Bavarians, and the
Burgundians ; to these Karl der Grosse was most intimately allied.
The Neustrian Teutons were to a large extent already Romanised.
The seat of the new empire was at Aix-la-Chapelle, in Germany, the
most convenient position as the head-quarters of a ruler whose whole
life was spent in defending and extending his northern and eastern
frontiers. " The unity of the empire was a boon required by the
exigency of the time, and that by means of it Charlemagne preserved
Christendom from the encroachments of paganism, at that time still
prevailing in the east, and from those of the Mahomedans equally
powerful in the south, besides refining the barbarian manners of the
age, by the introduction of the arts of civilisation and of scholastic
learning, form his great and all-sufficing exculpation."2 The grand
idea of the holy Roman empire, re-established by Germans, though
never realised fully, was for ages dear to the German people (the
noble families). The power of CHARLEMAGNE, by which this idea
was for a long period partially realised, was the result of extra-
ordinary labour. In the course of his life he had made fifty-three
campaigns, of which eighteen were against the Saxons, one against
the Thuringians, one against the Bavarians, one against the Acqui-
tanians, five against the Lombards, five against the Saracens in Italy,
seven against the Saracens in Spain, two against the Avars, four
against the Slavi beyond the Elbe, three against the Danes, and two
against the Greek empire in Italy. Germany gained by Charle-
magne to Christianity and civilisation, and proved in her day to be
the most powerful bulwark against the barbarians of the north and
east, is the greatest result of his labours. It may yet be to our, or
to a future, age the great barrier in the way of Sclavonic aggression,
headed by Russia.
2. The empire of Charlemagne consisted of (i) Austrasia (the
north-west of Gaul and part of Germany), on both sides of the
1 Freeman, " Essays," first series, p. 301. 2 Menzel, vol. i. p. 231.
From the Empire of CJiarlemagne to the Crusades. 213
Rhine : chief towns, Aix-la-Chapelle ; Metz on the Moselle ; Duilia
(Diiren on the Rhine); Landen (west of the Meuse); Heristal on
the Meuse (the estate and residence of the elder Pepin); Treves;
Magontia (Mayence) ; Ingleheim on the Rhine, where the emperor
had his favourite palace ; Frankfort ; Wurtzburg ; Theodoris Villa
(Thionville) on the Moselle; Laon; and Wormatia (Worms). (2)
Neustria, bounded by the Meuse, the Loire, and the ocean to the
west of Austrasia ; it included Brittany, which was under control of
the empire : the chief towns were Paris (the favourite capital of the
Merovingians) ; Sithin (S. Omer) ; Bononia (Boulogne) ; Soissons,
and Tours on the Loire. (3) Burgundy, including part of east Gaul
and all Switzerland : chief towns, Lyons and Geneva. (4) Aquitania,
including Vasconia (Gascony) ; Septimania, the Spanish Marches ;
Corsica and the Balearic Isles : chief towns, Tolosa (Toulouse) ;
Bordeaux; Barcelona; Nimes ; Narbonne. (5) Frizia : Deventer,
on the Yssel, the chief town. (6) Saxony (to the borders of Denmark) :
chief towns, Buckholz; Badenfield; Paderborn; Bremen; Hamburg.
(7) Alsatia, Alsace : chief town, Strasburg. (8) Alemannia (Baden),
Wurtemberg, and part of Switzerland : chief towns, Constance, St.
Gall, Chur. (9) Bavaria: chief towns, Ratisbon ; Saltzburg. (10)
Karinthia : chief town, Villack. (n) Avaria, north-east of Karin-
thia, between Ems, skirting the Danube to the Theiss, called the
Austrian frontier, now Austria. (12) Italy, with the subject
Duchy of Beneventum. (13) Friuli (Istria, Liburnia, Dalmatia),
Friuli, now Udine, Capo dTstria, belonging to the Eastern Empire.
(14) The Croats, as far as the river Celtina, near Spalatro; Venice,
though independent, did homage to Charlemagne, 806 A.D. The
SCLAVONIC tribes beyond the Elbe were controlled by the establish-
ment of the Eastern Marches, or border districts, which extended
from the Elbe all along the Bohemian and Carpathian Mountains to
the Theiss, the lower Danube, the Save, and the Dalmatian moun-
tains on the Mediterranean. But this vast empire, in which so large
an amount of warlike, unsettled, discontented barbarians had been
incorporated, had within itself the seeds of its dissolution. The
conquerors were even more exhausted than the conquered, for the
diminution of the able-bodied warrior population increased yearly
the difficulty of recruiting the armies, and the consequent inability
to maintain powerful armies at once in the south, the east, and the
north. The Danes, the Slavi, the northern pirates in the mouth of
every navigable river, the Saracens in Italy and the south of France,
the Bretons, and the Avars troubled the empire on every side, and,
though repulsed, were not fully repressed. We gather from the
214 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
monkish and other contemporary chroniclers that the forced union of
Gaul was a discordant one, as the amalgamation of the races had
not as yet welded them into one people. Charlemagne himself
could not always bring the forces of the empire to the particular
point where immediate action was needed, nor could he more than
for a time repress the tendency to localise the present resources of
the empire, regardless of the claims and necessities of the outlying
and exposed frontiers. The idea of an empire something beyond a
mere mass of subject tribes ; an idea that amalgamated the masses
into a state T ; an idea not Teutonic but Roman, was premature.
Society was averse to it. To some extent, however, all the practical
advantages of orderly government, the partial rule of law, the
growth of a middle class and of a strong free population, as well
as safety from barbarian inroads, were realised in the nations which
arose out of the dismemberment of the Carlovingian empire. In
the internal government of this large empire, Charlemagne could do
little but watch the administration of the laws already existing among
the various nations. He republished, with a few corrections and
additions, their ancient laws ; and his capitularies, while they bear
testimony to a savage and cruel state of feeling, prove the anxiety of
the emperor to ameliorate the condition of society. Slavery was on
the increase in the shape of serfdom. Some estates, one especially
given to the learned Alcuin, had attached to it twenty thousand of
these bondmen. In the interior of the empire, the security from
war and from barbarian invasions had led to the discouragement of
the free proprietors ; their necessity, as soldiers ready on the spot
to defend the territory, being less evident, the great landholders
purchased the small properties and managed their estates by serfs
or slaves. By royal judges, called Missi Dominici, the emperor
endeavoured to amend the administration of the law and to put
down local oppressors. In the territories belonging to the crown
there was a strict economical management enforced. All the serfs
and slaves, and those who rented farms, were placed under a
manager, who regulated minutely the care of the cattle and the
poultry-yard \ the exercise of the mechanical arts by the men and
the spinning and weaving of the women : these regulations affected
one fourth of France, and were, no doubt, followed by all the great
proprietors in the remaining three-fourths of the territory. Sismondi *
remarks : " How hard must have been the condition of the renters,
and the slaves and serfs, while thus ruled in all the details of
1 Bryce, pp. 73, 74. * "History of France."
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 215
domestic life, and thus deprived of all free will and hope." It is,
however, very probable, that in practice these minute regulations
would be modified, and that the serf and the slaves had compensa-
tions which made life tolerable to them; and it is all but certain that
this class gradually rose, step by step, to the position of small pro-
prietors, and became what in French are called " the peasantry " (a
word which has no right to be used in English history). Charle-
magne was a patron and friend of learned men and of literature.
He encouraged trade, opened out roads, protected the Jews and
the foreign merchants, and was an admirer of the fine arts, especially
architecture and music ; he died 814 A.D., reverenced by all civilised
and even barbarian Europe. His character grows in the estimation
of our modern philosophical historians, who have studied his posi-
tion and actions from a higher and more comprehensive position
than the historians of the eighteenth century, who attribute his
conquests to his ambition and bigotry, and regard the ravages of the
Normans as carried on by way of revenge for his conduct towards
the Saxons.1 Lecky does justice to this great man. " Of all the
great rulers of men there has probably been no other who was so truly
many-sided, whose influence pervaded so completely all the religious,
intellectual, and political modes of thought existing in his time.
Rising in one of the darkest periods of European history, this great
emperor resuscitated with a brief but dazzling splendour the faded
glories of the Empire of the West ; conducted for the most part in
person numerous expeditions against the barbarous nations around
him; promulgated a vast system of legislation; reformed the dis-
cipline of every order of the Church ; reduced all classes of the
clergy to subservience to his will ; while, by legalising tithes, he greatly
increased their material prosperity, contributing in a measure to check
the intellectual decadence by founding schools and libraries, and
drawing around him all the scattered learning of Europe ; reformed
the coinage ; extended the commerce ; influenced religious contro-
versies, and created great representative assemblies, which ultimately
contributed largely to the organisation of feudalism. In all these
spheres the traces of his vast organising and far-seeing genius may
be detected, and the influence which he exercised over the imagina-
tions of men is shown by the numerous legends of which he is the
hero. In the preceding ages the supreme ideal had been the
ascetic .... in the romances of Charlemagne and of Arthur we
may trace the dawning of another type of greatness ; the hero of the
1 Hume, vol. i. pp. 67, 68.
216 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
imagination of Europe was no longer a hermit, but a king, a warrior,
or a knight .... the age of the ascetics began to fade. The age
of the Crusades and of chivalry succeeded it." J J. C. Morrison, in his
" Life of Gibbon," remarks : " Gibbon's account of Charlemagne is
strangely inadequate He did not realise the greatness of the
man, of his age, or of his work. Properly considered, the eighth
century is the most important and memorable which Europe has
ever seen. During its course, the geographical limits, the ecclesi-
astical polity, and the feudal system, within and under which our
western group of nations was destined to live for five or six centuries,
were provisionally settled and determined. The wonderful house of
the Carolings, which provided no less than five successive rulers of
genius, of whom two had extraordinary genius — Charles Martel and
Charlemagne — were the human instruments of this great work.
The Frankish monarchy was hastening to ruin when they saved it.
Saxons in the east and Saracens in the south were on the point of
extinguishing the few surviving embers of civilisation which still
existed Charles and his ancestors prevented this evil . . . .
the struggle and the care of the hero to master in some degree the
wide welter of barbarism surging around him, he (Gibbon) never
recognised" (p. 164).
II. — The Decline of the Carlovingian Empire.
3. The death of Charlemagne was followed by the succession
of his son, Louis the Pious, a man of saint-like disposition,
utterly unfit to rule over the empire. He was twice deposed
by his unnatural sons, and again restored. On his death, 840
A.D., Louis the Germanic and Charles the Bald allied against
their brother Lothaire, who claimed the position of suzerain.
The Battle of Fontenoy, 841 A.D., was decided against Lothaire,
who retreated. By the Treaty of Verdun, 843 A.D., Italy,
with Lotharingia, Burgundy Transjurane, and Burgundy Cisjurane,
were given to Lothaire, France to Charles the Bald, and Germany
to Louis II. In 855 A.D. Lothaire died, and his territory was
divided into Italy, Lorraine, and the Burgundies. Lorraine and the
Burgundies, 863 and 869 A.D., were reunited to Italy, which was, in
875 A.D., annexed to France by Charles the Bald. On the death of
Charles the Fat, 888 A.D., France, Germany, and Italy became
distinct and separate states. Lorraine, which had been for a time
separated from Germany, was reunited, 900-959 A.D. Cisjurane
1 Lecky, " History of European Morals," pp. 288, 289.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 2 1 7
Burgundy, with Aries, &c., formed a separate kingdom under Boson,
while Transjurane Burgundy became a kingdom under Rudolf,
Both these Burgundies were united in 934 A.D. as the kingdom of
Aries, and in a few years, 1016-1033, were absorbed, partly by
Germany and partly by France. The petty kingdom of Navarre,
partly in French and partly in Spanish territory, was, after 831 A.D.T
attached to Spain. After 963 A.D., Italy became practically a fief of
the German empire. In reviewing the wars and calamities which
desolated the empire of Charlemagne from 814-888 A.D. (a period
of seventy-four years), it is difficult to find words to express our
detestation of the unnatural paricidal and fratricidal conduct of the
family of Charlemagne. The civil wars were undoubtedly the result
partly of a determination on the part of the nationalities to realise
a separate national existence, a desire which might have been peace-
ably carried out; but these unnatural sons and brothers managed
to destroy the family of Charlemagne. They that used the sword
so readily perished by the sword, and the vast territories composing
the late empire of Charlemagne were inherited and ruled over by
strangers to his blood and race. This period of seventy-four years
" was indeed the nadir of order and civilisation. From all sides
the torrent of barbarism, which Charles the Great had stemmed, was
rushing down upon his empire. The Saracen wasted the Mediter-
ranean coasts and sacked Rome itself; the Dane and Norsemen
swept the Atlantic and the North Sea, pierced France and Germany
by their rivers, burning, slaying, carrying off the population into
captivity; pouring through the Straits of Gibraltar, they fell upon
Provence and Italy. By land, while Wends, and Czecks, and
Obo tribes threw off the German yoke and threatened the borders, the
wild Hungarian bands, pressing in from the steppes of the Caspian,,
dashed over Germany like the flying spray of a new wave of
barbarism, and carried the terror of their battle-axes to the Appe-
nines and the ocean. Under such strokes the already-loosened
fabric swiftly dissolved. No one thought of common defence or
wide organisation ; the strong built castles, the weak became their
bondsmen, or took shelter under the cowl. The governor, count,,
abbot, or bishop tightened his grasp, turned a delegated into an
independent, a personal into a territorial authority, and hardly
owned a distant and feeble suzerain. The grand vision of a
universal Christian empire was utterly lost in the isolation, the
antagonism, the increasing localisation of all powers."1 The
1 Bryce, pp. 78, 79.
218 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
tendency towards resident localised authorities for administration
and defence was irresistible, as was evident from the divisions and
subdivisions of the Merovingian and the Carlovingian dynasties. It
was, unfortunately, the necessity of the age. Fiefs had become
virtually hereditary under the Merovingians, when the possessor was
strong enough to hold his fiefs, and wise and prudent enough to
abstain from open rebellion. Charles the Bald, in an assembly of
the States of France, June 14, 877 A.D.., at Kiersey, published a
capitulary, in which he engaged to give always to the son of a count,
£c., &c., and as a legal heritage, the position of his father, reserving
to himself, however, the right of appointing in case the deceased
had left no son. By this means the rights of those holding fiefs
direct from the Crown were fully established ; and also the same rule
was to be applied to all who held land or office under counts, or
bishops and abbots. " The nobles began to see that their strength
was based on law." x By the end of the eighth century (900 A.D.)
there were twenty-nine such fiefs held in France. In the course of
the tenth century (up to 1000 A.D.) there were fifty-five. The
advantages connected with a local government were obvious ; the
danger of weakening the authority of the central power was not
so easily seen. One good followed, the increased settlement of the
land by free tenants bound only to military service.
III.— The Feudal System.
4. Thus, in the decline of the Carlovingian empire, that
which is called the feudal system of tenure and rule became
fully established in western, southern, and central Europe. In
principle, the essential conditions of this system, the existence of
a suzerain, and under him dependent holders of land subject to
military service, are observable in the early history of most nations.
The application of the system, carried out fully and maintained for
centuries, arose out of the position of our barbarian ancestors.
They found themselves an army of conquerors, encamped on hostile
ground, exposed to the revolt of the conquered, and to the rivalry of
powerful tribes as warlike as themselves. It was the one condition
of their existence that they should be always prepared as soldiers to
repress their subjects, and to defend their conquests from competitive
tribes ; and yet it was also necessary that the land appropriated by
the conquerors should be settled and cultivated by responsible
owners. While many of the barbarians held their land direct from
1 " Encyc. Brit." (France), p. 533.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 219
the chief, the great landholders, holding direct from the same chief,
were obliged, by the extent of their possessions, to grant to their
dependants land in fiefs, to be held by them on conditions of
military service. The term fief is supposed to be an abbreviation of
the word used in the Roman imperial law (emphyteusis) to describe
an estate granted to be held not absolutely, the use only being given
to the grantee as a mere tenant. Such tenants under the feudal law
were called vassals, from the Keltic word gways or the Teutonic
word gesell, meaning a subordinate helper. Words as feum and
•fevum occur in charters of the tenth century, the word feudum in
the eleventh century. The vassal was invested in his position and
rights over the property bestowed upon him by solemn forms, which
appealed to men's religious and moral feelings, and which it was
deemed impious and infamous to violate. The relation took the
shape, and was in reality a mutual interchange, of benefits, of bounty
and protection on the one hand, of gratitude and service due on the
other. The obligations thus arising were so powerful that the
ties of relationship were looked upon as inferior to the claims of
vassal and suzerain upon each other. These fiefs, at first granted
during good-will, then for life, then hereditary — practically, though
not legally or formally — in the direct male line, then hereditary in
collateral branches of the original grantee, then hereditary in the
female line. In France the fiefs became formally hereditary in the
reign of the first Capets ; in Germany, under the Emperor Conrad II. ,
1024 A.D. The system became more complicated when the granting
of fiefs, at first confined to the supreme power, the sovereign of the
state, began to be granted by the holders of fiefs to their dependants.
This was called subinfeudation, and was virtually an alienation of a
portion of the original fief, by which the vassal of the suzerain
became himself the mesne lord of others called arrere vassals. This
arrangement sometimes placed men in difficulty and contrary
positions. A lord might become the vassal of his own vassal, and
a vassal lord over his own lord. " While the feudal system lasted,
everybody, except a few exalted persons, had a suzerain ; even the
highest in one capacity might be a vassal in another. The world
was used to a universal overlapping and interlacing of rights and
obligations." x But there remained for many years lands held by
proprietors independent of feudal lords. These were the lands
which remained to the conquered in the original partition enforced
by the conquerors, and other lands, the possession of great chiefs,
1 Daily News.
220 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
held by them as their share of the conquest, and not received from
the suzerain. These were the allodial lands. An allodial proprietor
was without a lord, but was also without any claim for protection.
But so necessary was this protection from a near and superior
protector in the middle ages, that the larger number of the allodial
properties were transformed into fiefs by the tenth and eleventh
centuries. Society consisted of slaves belonging to landed estates,
vassals holding lands on military tenure, with other minor obligations,
and lords holding from the suzerain and owing military service to
him. The lord had his right of military service from his vassals, a
right of wardship over his vassals who were minors, the giving female
heirs in marriage, payments when his son was knighted or his
eldest daughter married, or for his redemption if taken captive ; he
held courts of law and administered legal and criminal jurisdiction.
In England, William the Conqueror divided the whole land into
sixty thousand knight-fees, each bound to serve in the field forty days
at their own expense. Such was the feudal system, to which our
European civilisation is so highly indebted. We have been able to
dispense with it, and no one desires to revive it, even if it were
possible. The man has outlived the guardianship and the restrictions
of the nursery and the pedagogue, but he does not revile the
necessary restrictions imposed upon his childhood and youth.
Feudality had its uses, and to be able to recognise these, and to do
justice to their efficiency and results, is just the difference which
distinguishes the well-informed historical student from the partial
and prejudiced literary men of the last century. We now give some
sober judgments of great men to help our readers to a right appre-
hension of the good and the evil of this system.
"The notions of loyalty, of honour, of nobility, and of the
importance, socially and politically, of landed over other property
are the most striking of the feelings which may be considered to
have taken their birth from the feudal system. These notions are
opposed to the tendency of the commercial and manufacturing spirit
which has been the great moving power of the world since the
decline of strict feudalism ; but that power has not yet been able to
destroy, or perhaps even materially to weaken, the opinions above
mentioned in the minds of the masses. We are not, however, to pass
judgment upon feudalism, as the originating and shaping principle
of a particular form into which human society has run, simply
according to our estimate of the value of these, its relics at the
present day. The true question is, if this particular organisation
had not been given to European society, after the dissolution of the
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 221
ancient civilisation, what other order of things would in all likelihood
have arisen ? — a better or a worse than that which did result ? Some
assistance in settling this question might, perhaps, be obtained by
comparing the history of society from this date in the feudal
countries with its history in those parts of Europe to which feudalism
never reached — France or England, for instance, with Denmark,
Sweden, and Hungary. As for the state of society during the actual
prevalence of the feudal system, it was, without doubt, in many
respects exceedingly defective and barbarous. But the system, with
all its imperfections, still combined the two essential qualities of
being both a system of stability and a system of progression. It
did not fall to pieces, neither did it stand still. Notwithstanding all
its rudeness, it was, what every right system of polity is, at once
conservative and productive. And perhaps it is to be most fairly
appreciated by being considered, not in what it actually was, but in
what it preserved from destruction and in what it produced." 1
"It is the previous state of society under the grand-children of
Charlemagne which we must always keep in mind if we would
appreciate the effects of the feudal system upon the welfare of
mankind. The institutions of the eleventh century must be com-
pared with those of the ninth, not with the advanced civilisation of
modern times. If the view which I have taken of those dark ages
is correct, the state of anarchy which we usually term feudal was the
natural result of a vast and barbarous empire feebly administered,
and the cause, rather than the effect, of the general establishment of
feudal tenures. These, by preserving the mutual relations of the
whole, kept alive the feeling of a common country and commodities,
and settled, after the lapse of ages, into the free constitution of
England, the firm monarchy of France, and the federal union of
Germany. The utility of any form of polity may be estimated by
its effect upon national greatness and security, upon civil liberty and
private rights, upon the tranquillity and order of society, upon the
increase and diffusion of wealth, or upon the general tone of moral
sentiment and energy. The feudal constitution was certainly, as
has been observed already, little adapted for the defence of a
mighty kingdom, far less for schemes of conquest. But, as it pre-
vailed alike in several adjacent countries, none had anything to fear
from the military superiority of its neighbours. It was this in-
efficiency of the feudal militia, perhaps, that saved Europe during
the middle ages from the danger of universal monarchy. In times
1 "Feudal System," Penny Encyc., vol. x. pp. 243-248.
222 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
when princes had little notion of confederacies for mutual pro-
tection, it is hard to say what might not have been the successes of
an Otho the Great, a Frederic Barbarossa, or a Philip Augustus, if
they could have wielded the whole force of their subjects whenever
their ambition required. If an empire equally extensive with that
of Charlemagne, and supported by military despotism, had been
formed about the twelfth or thirteenth centuries, the seeds of com-
merce and liberty, just then beginning to shoot, would have perished,
and Europe, reduced to a barbarous servitude, might have fallen
before the free barbarians of Tartary. If we look at the feudal
polity as a scheme of civil freedom, it bears a noble countenance.
To the feudal law it is owing that the very names of right and
privilege were not swept away as in Asia by the desolating hand of
power. The tyranny which, on every favourable moment, was
breaking through all barriers, would have rioted without control
if, when the people were poor and disunited, the nobility had not
been brave and free. So far as the sphere of feudality extended, it
diffused the spirit of liberty and the notions of private right
But, as a school of moral discipline, the feudal institutions were most
to be valued. Society had sunk, for several centuries after the dis-
solution of the Roman Empire, into a condition of utter depravity,
where, if any vices could be selected as more eminently charac-
teristic than others, they were falsehood, treachery, and ingratitude.
In slowly purging off the lees of this extreme corruption the feudal
spirit exerted its ameliorating influence. Violation of faith stood
first in the catalogue of crimes most repugnant to the very essence of
a feudal tenure, most severely and promptly avenged, most branded
by general infamy. The feudal law books breathe throughout a
spirit of honourable obligation. . ... In the reciprocal services
of lord and vassal there was ample scope for every magnanimous and
disinterested energy From these feelings, engendered by the
feudal relations, has sprung up the peculiar sentiment of personal
reverence and attachment towards a sovereign which we denominate
loyalty ; alike distinguishable from the stupid devotion of Eastern
slaves and from the abstract respect with which free citizens regard
their chief magistrate In ages when the rights of the com-
munity were unfelt, this sentiment was one great preservative of
society, and, though collateral or even subservient to more en-
lightened principles, it is still indispensable to the tranquillity and
permanence of every monarchy. In a moral view, loyalty has
scarcely, perhaps, less tendency to refine and elevate the heart than
patriotism itself, and holds a middle place in the scale of human
From the Empire of CJiarlemagne to the Crusades. 223
motives, as they ascend from the grosser inducement of self-interest
to the furtherance of general happiness and conformity to the
purposes of infinite wisdom."1
" The introduction of the feudal regime .... altered the dis-
tribution of the populations over the face of the country. Until that
time the masters of the soil, the sovereign class, lived collected in
masses, more or less numerous, either sedentary in the towns or
wandering in bands over the country. In the feudal state these
same persons lived insulated, each in his own habitation, at great
distances from one another Internal life, domestic society
are certain here to acquire a great preponderance Was it not
in the feudal family that the importance of women took its rise ?
.... Feudalism was a necessity, because society was incapable of
a better polity It declined when the state of society had
become compatible with extensive government."2 One evil traceable
to the feudal system is the tendency "to enhance every unsocial and
unchristian sentiment involved in the exclusive respect for birth." 3
It looked down upon all citizens and the mercantile and trading
classes. In our day the aristocracy have ceased to be the military
prop of the nation, and the main support of our country now rests
upon the agricultural, mercantile, manufacturing, and trading classes
of society, who have become the dispensers of political power in
the elections for the House of Commons.
IV. — The Ravages of the Normans, Huns, and Saracens.
5. The lamentable condition of all classes of society in Western
Europe, arising partly out of the exhaustion of the free population in
the necessary aggressive wars of Charlemagne, and in the fratricidal
wars of his children and grand-children, helps to explain the other-
wise unaccountable success and continuance of the invasions of the
Normans, the Hungarians, and the Saracens in the ninth, tenth, and
eleventh centuries. In reading the details of these barbarian
ravages, which met with so little resistance, we naturally inquire
where is the king or emperor ? where the great nobles ? where the
feudal militia of armed men, who hold their lands by military
tenure ? They are never found when their presence is needed.
Here and there a brave noble or the citizens of a walled town offer
resistance, but generally victory was with the assailants, and then
1 Hallam's "Middle Ages," eleventh edition, vol. i. pp. 269-272.
" Abridged from Guizot's "History of Civilisation in France."
3 Hallam's " Middle Ages," vol. i. p. 321.
224 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
a great slaughter ; the plunder, consisting of slaves, bullion, and
cattle, being carried safely away. The rapid extinction of the free
rural population laid open the empire to these brigands. The great
lords, at first, generally consulted their own safety by abiding in
their castles, safe from the attacks of the invader, having no forces
sufficient to cope with the enemy, " while in the towns and villages
there was not a place unpolluted by dead bodies." Those who
submitted as well as those who resisted were massacred, and their
houses and churches burnt. So jealous were the kings, the suc-
cessors of Charlemagne in Gaul, of voluntary unions and leagues of
the peasantry even for protection against the Northmen, that penalties
of scourging, mutilation, and banishment were inflicted upon the
parties thus leagued. But these ravagers were soon subdued when
the feudal organisation was complete; then the marauders were
encountered by an armed population led by their nobles. The
feudal lord, though he might be selfish and stern, and inclined to rule
over his serfs with a high hand, was generally faithful to his duties
of military defence against these and all invaders of his territory.
(i) The Normans. — The whole coasts of the Baltic, of the Atlantic,
and of the islands in the northern ocean were, in the ninth and
tenth centuries, infested by pirates, the Vi-kings issuing forth from
Norway, Sweden, and Denmark in search of plunder, and, in due
time, of settlement for their families and followers, for whom there
appeared to them to be no room in their native lands. Charle-
magne had planned the building and maintaining a powerful fleet,
and strong forts at the mouths of the rivers, as defences against
marauders by sea ; but these had been neglected by his successors,
who had not a single armed ship on the seas, nor anywhere a
standing troop of soldiers. The whole extent of coast from the
Eyder to the Adour, as well as the rivers of France and Germany,
afforded facilities for sudden attacks and plunder, which were gladly
embraced. There were three principal positions occupied by them :
(a) on the Scheldt and the Rhine, from which they devastated
Flanders, Lower Louvain, and Friesland ; (b) on the Loire, from
which Hastings carried his merciless inroads as far as Italy; (c)
on the Seine, from which they burnt Rouen and Paris. The latter
city was besieged in 886 A.D., and was only saved by the courage
of its bishop and Count Eudes. Rollo took possession of part
of Neustria, and received what was then called Normandy as a
fief from Charles the Simple, 912 A.D. The number and extensive
area occupied by these inroads is thus depictured by Sir F. Palgrave :
" Take the map, and cover with vermilion the provinces, districts,
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 225
and shores which the Northmen visited, as a record of each invasion ;
the colouring will have to be repeated more than ninety times suc-
cessively before you arrive at the conclusion of the dynasty of
Charles the Great. Furthermore, mark by the usual symbol of war
(two crossed swords) the localities where battles were fought by the
pirates, where they were defeated or triumphant, or where they
pillaged, burnt, or destroyed ; and the valleys and banks of the Elbe,
the Rhine, and Moselle, the Scheldt, the Meuse, Somme, and
Seine, Loire, Garonne, and Adour, and all the coasts and coast-
lands between estuary and estuary, all the countries between rivers
and streams will appear bristling as with chevaux-de-frise." * In
England they eventually established a dynasty, as also in Naples and
Sicily, Ireland and the west islands were their regularly visited
homes, and Scotland did not quite escape their ravages. The
inroads of the Northmen ceased about the end of the tenth century,
as soon as the full consolidation of the feudal system had placed
local authorities in the persons of chiefs interested in the localities
they governed, and able to call together the armed population to
resist. (2) The Hungarians (Magyars), originally from the Uralian
Mountains, driven from the Wolga by the Petchenegans, and from
the Ukraine by people afterwards called the Russians, arrived in
Dacia 889 A.D. For about seventy years they carried rapine and
desolation from the Danube to the German Ocean, to the Maes and
the Moselle, and even to the Po. Mounted on swift, small horses,
they passed quickly away when defeated; and their savage habits
gave them, with their quickness, the reputation of being possessed
with supernatural power (from 884-955 A.D.). All Europe, espe-
cially southern France and Spain, were terrified at their progress,
anticipating their attacks, which were followed by indiscriminate
massacre. The German emperor and nobles did their duty to
Germany and civilisation. Very important and destructive battles
were fought at Ems and at Vienna 900 A.D., in Thuringia 907 A.D.,
in Franconia 909 A.D., and at Merseburg, 934 A.D., by Henry the
Fowler. In 955 A.D. Otho I. defeated them with great slaughter
at Augsburg, and thus put an end to their invasions of Germany.
In Italy they burnt Pavia, and thence entered Provence and pillaged
Nimes and Toulouse, 924 A.D., but after the loss at Augsburg they
ceased to trouble Germany, Italy, and France. (3) The Saracens
were chiefly hurtful in the south of Europe (the southern and eastern
shores of the Mediterranean being in the possession of their friends
1 A. H. Johnson's " The Normans," p. 15.
Q
226 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
the Khalifs of Bagdad and Egypt), they ravaged the coasts of Italy,
conquered Sicily, 827-962 A.D., and Crete, plundering the coasts
of Asia Minor; in southern Gaul they attempted by force to settle
at Frejus, from which they took possession of the Pass of St.
Maurienne, exacting payment from travellers, 950 A.D., but could
not maintain possession beyond forty years. In Italy they attempted
to form colonies in Campagnia, Puglia, Bari, Tarentum, Mount Gar-
gano, Beneventum, and Salerno; many of the petty independent
dukes and nobles leagued with them, among these the Bishop-
Duke of Naples, took part in their devastations and destruction of
towns and churches. Rome itself, under Pope John VIII., paid
tribute to them, 878 A.D. Rome was saved by the courage and
activity of Pope Leo IV., 847-855 A.D., and by the defeat of their
forces, 916 A. D., by Pope John X. on the banks of the Garigliano.
From Spain they troubled southern France and the Balearic Isles.
One good effect of the ravages of the Normans, Hungarians, and
Saracens was, that they led to the fortification of the cities of
Germany and Italy by the citizens, and the raising of city militias
for self-defence, from which self-government in due time followed.
V. — The three kingdoms offshoots oj the Carlovingian Empire.
6. In the ninth and tenth centuries western Europe began to take
the shape which its political organisations have preserved to our day.
Eastern Europe also, though less clearly, foreshadowed the particular
races which since then have formed powerful nations. From this
period the history of the European world is that of the beginnings
and the progress of the nationalities existing in our day. Three king-
doms, which arose out of the division of the empire of Charlemagne,
naturally claim the first place in the narration.
FRANCE had ten kings of the Carlovingian Dynasty up to the
beginning of the Capetian line (Hugh Capet), 987 A.D. In this
transition period, in which the power of the king or suzerain gradu-
ally diminished, and. before the full consolidation of the power given
to the great lords by the operation of the feudal system, France
appeared to be helpless, and without the organisation necessary for
its defence, the Normans ravaging from north to south. Paris was
thrice besieged by them, and ransomed by the payment of tribute, .
while Normandy was yielded to Rollo, 911 A.D., and Aquitania,
Septimania, and Brittany were virtually independent. Forty great
barons, under various titles, of whom Hugh, Duke of France and
Count of Paris, was the most powerful, overshadowed the king, whose
actual territory was confined to a small district round Laon. There
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Cmsades. 227
were six lay peerages besides the royal domains, Flanders, Normandy,
Aquitaine, Toulouse, Burgundy (the duchy), and Champagne.
HUGH CAPET, son of the Duke of France, was raised to the
throne 987 A.D. He thus annexed the crown of France to one of
the most extensive and powerful fiefs, and became the legal head of
a confederate aristocracy, with the great advantage of being strong
enough, in his own territories and by his own resources, to govern
independently. He was the representative of the new nationality of
France, distinguished from the old Teutonic element, that is to say,
the " foreign " dominion of the Carlovingians. This was not, how-
ever, felt at the time, as the Germanised barons were foremost in
raising Hugh Capet to the throne. But the real France now began.
Before this it had been a divided country of eastern and western
nations. " It was indeed a natural crystallisation of the confused
elements of ruined Gaul, mingled with all that the Teutonic race had
brought to renew it, but which had also fallen into premature disso-
lution."1 The crown derived real power from the fief of Hugh
Capet. Paris, the capital of Hugh, was a fixed centre, and united
Neustria and Austrasia. " The mere change of the royal city was
an event of the highest importance. The rock of Laon could never
have won the same position as the island city of the Seine. It might
have remained a royal fortress, it could never have become a national
capital." 2 And under this dynasty the langue d' ceil became the court
language, displacing the German dialect of the Carlovingians. In
the reign of Henry I., 1032-4 A.D., there was a terrible famine, no
harvest for three years, but that of 1034 A.D. was equal to the pro-
duce of three years. Softened by this trial and relief, the clergy had
influence to procure, in 1035 A.D., a proclamation of the " Peace of
God " against private wars. But this restraint was found too much
to be endured, and it was altered into " the Truce of God," by which
private war was much limited. Philip I. began to reign 1060 A.D.,
and was king at the beginning of the Crusades. At this time " the
demesne royal " of the kings of France consisted of Paris, Melun,
Etampes, Orleans, and Sens, equal to the modern departments ot
Seine, Seine and Oise, Seine and Marne, and Loiret.
GERMANY, -as an independent state, the bulwark of the west and
of the south of Europe against the northern and eastern barbarians,
is the creation of Charlemagne. It was his legacy towards the con-
solidation and preservation of civilisation in Europe. On the death
of Charles the Fat, 888 A.D., Arnulf, of the Carlovingian family,
1 Crowe, vol. i. p. 71. 2 Freeman's "Essays," first series, p. 91.
Q 2
228 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
became, as king, the ruler of Germany. He defeated the Normans
with great slaughter near Lyons, and again near Louvain, 891 A.D.,
after which they ceased to trouble Germany. Then followed wars
against the Slavi, and the Prince of Moravia (Suatopolk), and the
first contact of Germany with the barbarous Huns (called at that
time Bulgarians), 894 A.D. After this Arnulf made two expeditions
into Italy, 894-896 A.D., to assert the imperial authority over Rome.
A legal fiction supposes that the emperor rules over four kingdoms —
(i) The Franks (Romans and Germans), (2) Lombardy, (3) Bur-
gundy, (4) the double crown of the Roman Empire at Rome. Louis
the Child, his son, succeeded 899 A.D. The Moravian kingdom was
broken up by the Bohemians and Hungarians. These latter ravaged
Germany, where they met with stout resistance, till, at last, Louis
agreed to a ten years' truce, and to pay tribute. This last of the
Carlo vingians died before he had reigned, in 911 A.D. Conrad
of Franconia was elected emperor by the dukes of the five powerful
nations, the Franks, the Suabians, Bavarians, Saxons, and Lorrainers.
He had to contend with some of his great and powerful nobles, and
with the Slavi and the Hungarians, and died of a wound received
in battle with the Hungarians, 918 A.D. Henry the Fowler, Duke
of Saxony, succeeded, and before 921 A.D. had established his
authority over Suabia, Bavaria, and Lorraine. He resisted the Hun-
garians, but was obliged for a time to temporise, A.D. 924-926.
Henry, having taken prisoner Zoldan their king, concluded with
him a truce of nine years, and agreed to pay a yearly tribute. This
period of comparative rest from Hungarian inroads was spent in
consolidating and increasing the defences of the empire (i) by the
establishment of the Margravates of Misnia, Schleswig, Wenden, and
Brandenburg, and the restoration of that of Styria (Austria) ; (2) he
increased the number of the cities, and secured their safety by walls
and other fortifications ; garrisoned them with the free men, obliging
a certain portion of these to reside in the cities. The others held
their farms as near the cities as possible, and, after a while, mainly
resided in them. These garrison towns were under the command
of the emperor's officers, independent of the grafs, dukes, and abbots.
The towns became the head-quarters of the industrial classes, manu-
facturers, artificers, &c., while the fairs, markets, and public assem-
blies of the citizens led to the increase of trade and the beginning
and perfecting of municipal institutions. He also improved the
military organisation, by enrolling and training the free men in each
locality into a regular corps of infantry. By this means he carried
on successful wars with the Slavic tribes, the Obotrites, the Serbians,
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 229
the Hevelli, and other barbarous tribes, with the Bohemians, and
was strong enough to refuse tribute to the Hungarians, 933 A.D.
Two armies of the Hungarians, one near Sonderhausen and another
at Saal, near Merseburg, were defeated with great slaughter. Next
year he repulsed the Danes, and obliged King Gorm to abolish the
annual national sacrifice, in which ninety-nine men were slain on the
pagan altars. He died 935 A.D. Otho /., the Great > had to repress
the insurrection of the Slavi and the invasions of the Hungarians,
and to subdue some of his rebellious nobles. A great victory
at Merseburg, 955 A.D., over the Hungarians, prevented any further
attack by these barbarians. The three expeditions into Italy divided
his attention from the far more important work of consolidating the
power of the empire over the Slavi, Bohemians, and Hungarians.
The first expedition took place 951-2 A.D. ; the second 961-5 A.D. ;
the third 966-972 A.D. He was crowned emperor there 962 A.D.,
and the Romans and the clergy promised to elect no Pope without
his sanction. To us these Italian transactions appear to be what
they were, a serious evil to the empire ; but they were in accordance
with German feeling as the enforcement of a right of the imperial
prerogative transmitted from Charlemagne to his successor, the
emperor of " the Holy Roman Empire." The German emperors sup-
posed themselves to be the true successors of the Roman emperor.
As such they claimed a precedency, with the peculiar right of
appointing rulers to the kingly dignity. Christendom was viewed as
a great republic, the religious head being the Pope, the secular head
the emperor. The emperor claimed the right of confirming the
election of the Pope ; and all the popes from Otho to Henry IV.
were thus confirmed by the emperors. It was also considered highly
desirable for the emperor to receive the imperial crown at the hands
of the Pope. Otho was thus the restorer, or rather the second
founder, of this empire. " Why a revival of the empire should have
laid hold of the imaginations of the leading minds of the tenth and
following centuries is an enigma to us. Probably the disorders which
accompanied the fall of the old empire, and which again followed the
death of Charlemagne, impressed men with a craving for orderly rule
by a strong hand, and ruling by a title universally acknowledged.
The notions of free government administered in parliamentary
assemblies were cast into the shade by the power of two great ideas,
which expiring antiquity had bequeathed to the ages that followed —
a world monarchy, and a world religion. As the men of that day
could not imagine .... a community of saints without its expression
in a visible Church, so, in matters temporal, they recognised no
230 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
brotherhood of spirit without the bonds of forms; no universal
humanity save in the image of a universal state. In this, and in
much else, the men of the middle ages were the slaves of the letter,
unable, with all their associations, to rise out of the concrete, and
prevented by the very grandeur and boldness of their conceptions
from carrying them out in practice against the enormous obstacles
that met them. Under Otho I. the Germans became not only a
united nation, but were at once raised on a pinnacle among European
peoples as the imperial race, the possessors of Rome and of Roman
authority." x Otho II. had a short and troubled reign, 973-983 A.D.,
having to repress the Slavi, the Danes, the Greeks of Lower Italy,
and to defend Lorraine against the French. He died at Rome in
his twenty-eighth year, 983 A.D. Otho III. (aged three years) suc-
ceeded under the regency of his mother, Theophania (a Greek
princess), who had to contend with the rebellious nobles, the Slavi,
the Poles, the Bohemians, and with France, which desired to conquer
Lorraine. This able lady died 991 A.D. Otho III. made three
expeditions into Italy, and in 998 A.D. put down the republic of
Rome, which had been created by the patrician Crescentius. The
resistance of Crescentius had been pardoned the preceding year, but
on this occasion he was publicly beheaded on the battlements of
Rome, in view of the army and of the people. In 999 A.D. Otho
placed his tutor Gerbert in the papal chair as Sylvester II. The
tutor and the emperor were in advance of their age. The former
had gleaned from Saracen translations from the Greek, as well as
from Latin literature, and was master of the science of the day. It
is supposed that they had planned to remove the seat of empire to
Rome — a project which, had he lived, he would not have been able
to carry out, for the centre of political power had long moved north-
ward : he died at the early age of twenty-two, 1002 A.D. Henry II.
(the Holy), Duke of Bavaria, was elected emperor, and had to battle,
like his predecessors, with rebellious nobles, with the Poles, and
Bohemians, and the Slavi. He was thrice in Italy, and died
1024 A.D. "Perhaps, with the single exception of St. Louis IX.,
there was no other prince of the middle ages so uniformly swayed by
justice." 2 Conrad II. (the Salic) of Franconia was elected emperor
in a diet in the plains between Mentz and Worms, near Oppenheim,
which was attended by princes, nobles, and 50,000 people altogether.
His reign was remarkable for the justice and mercy which he always
1 Abridged from Bryce, vol. i. pp. 90-145.
s Dunham's "Germany," vol. i. p. 117.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 231
kept in view. The kingdom of Aries and Burgundy was united to
the empire, 1033 A.D. He checked the Poles, the Hungarians, and
the Lombards, and gave Schleswick to Denmark as a fief. In 1037 A.D.
he granted to the lower vassals of the empire the hereditary succession
to their orifices and estates, and so extended the privileges of the
great nobles, as to make them almost independent of the crown.
Henry III. succeeded, 1039 A.D., and established the imperial power
with a high hand. Henry IV., his son, succeeded at the early age
of six years, 1056 A.D. His reign was distinguished by the disputes
about the regency, and also by the rebellion of the Saxons, and by
his long struggle with the claims of the popes in Germany and Italy.
Two great changes were going on in Germany in this reign : on the
one hand, the citizens of the towns began to exercise no small amount
of self-government • on the other hand, the free men, the holders of
allodial estates, free by their position as holding direct from the
empire, had to resist the attempts of the nobles to reduce them to
vassalage. The Eastern Frisians, in their seven petty republics,
resisted these attempts successfully. " Radabat, the founder of
the Hapsburg line, may be said to have inoculated his race with
hatred to freedom by the violent reduction of his free peasantry
to a state of vassalage." Germany was already gradually becoming
a confused mass of dukes, margraves, princes, bishops, abbots, and
free cities, nominally acknowledging the empire, but seldom obedient
to the emperor.
ITALY. — Eight kings of the Carlovingian race were acknowledged
in Italy from 814 A.D. to the last, Charles the Fat, who was deposed,
and died 838 A.D. Afterwards ten kings until 962 A.D., when
Otho I., the Great, claimed Italy as a fief of the empire, 962 A.D.
At this time the Lombard Duchy of Benevento had lost in territory,
Capua and Salerno having become independent principalities. The
Eastern Empire ruled over "the theme of Lombardy," which in-
cluded Apulia and Calabria, by its Catapans. The Saracens had
made the conquest of Sicily between 827 A.D. and 962 A.D. They
had also established themselves in various important positions in
Italy, and took part in the petty wars of the Duchy of Benevento.
Naples, Amalfi, and Gaeta, while nominally acknowledging the
Eastern Empire, were, in fact, self-governed republics, like Venice.
Fortunately for southern Italy, NORMAN adventurers took possession
of Apulia and Calabria, and having defeated Pope Leo IX., who
had bravely led an army against them (1053 A.D.), received from
Pope Nicholas II. (1059 A.D.) the investiture of these provinces as
fiefs of the Holy See, together with the city of Naples, and the rest
232 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades
of the Greek territory subsequently conquered. This new power
was the kingdom of NAPLES, increased in 1060-1090 A.D. by the
conquest of Sicily from the Saracens. ROME, the seat of the
papacy, had fallen very low. After the death of Pope Nicholas I., in
867 A.D., the low character of some of the popes and contested
elections to the papal chair enabled the Counts of Tuscany to-
exercise an undue influence in the appointment of the popes. Three
ladies of this family, the two Theodoras and Marozia, regarded as
courtesans by their enemies, were the real rulers over their nominee
Popes. Alberic of Spoleto, of this family, assumed the consulship
and governed Rome as a republic from 931 A.D. to 954 A.D. After
his death Rome was governed by a prefect and two consuls, and
tribunes elected annually. By the interference of Otho L, 962-973
A.D., the popes were relieved from this bondage, and in 999 A.D.
Otho III. placed the learned Gerbert (Sylvester II.) in the papal
chair. At this time Otho repudiated two forged charters ascribed
to Louis the Pious, by which large accessions of territory were
granted to the popes. These interferences of the Emperors Otho I.
and the succeeding Otho II. and III., purified the papacy, but it
was left to HILDEBRAND (Gregory VII.) the monk of Savona, the son
of a carpenter, who became Pope 1075 A.D., to raise the power ot
the popedom above all powers, even the imperial. His disputes
with the emperor, Henry IV., respecting investitures, involved Italy
and Germany in civil war for many years. Meanwhile the popu-
lations of the large towns of northern Italy, which had been
exposed to pillage by the Huns, and those of the cities of the west
and of the south, who had suffered from the Saracens, enclosed
and fortified their cities, and enrolled and disciplined their male
population in self-defence. Herbert, the Archbishop of Milan, was
foremost in promoting these organisations, in which Milan took the
lead. Genoa, Pisa, and the cities of the north followed the example
of Milan. The Duchy of SAVOY, under the Counts of Maurienne :
the founder, Beroald, died 1027 A.D. Humbert I. succeeded; then
in 1072 A.D. Humbert II., who obtained from Henry TV. five
bishoprics, and acquired also the Marches of Susa and Turin,
1098 A.D. The CROAT kingdom, independent of Italy 970 A.D., was
governed by its Zupans, who could lead one hundred and fifty
thousand horse and foot into the field. The people of the
isles of VENICE, at the mouth of the Po, met and chose their first
duke, 697 A.D., and in 809 A.D. fixed their capital on the island of
Rialto. In 997 A.D. they allied with the towns in Istria and
Dalmatia, and by their help conquered the pirates of Narente and
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades, 233
Croatia, and from that time the Doge took the title of Duke of
Venice and Dalmatia.
VI. — Other Contemporary European States.
(7) Beyond the boundaries of the empire of Charles der Grosse,
Spain and the British islands, by their position removed from
the great battle-fields of central Europe, seemed as if they were
distinct and separate worlds, which came only occasionally in contact
with their neighbours.
SPAIN. — The Christian kingdom of ASTURIAS and Leon maintained
its ground and gradually gained more territory from the Moors.
Navarre, in the Pyrenees, originally occupying part of France, had
for its chieftain Pampeluna, while at Jaca there was a small republic,
which became the nucleus of the kingdom of ARRAGON. Sancho,
King of Navarre, incorporated Castile from the kingdom of Asturias ;
at his death his dominions were divided into CASTILE, ARRAGON, and
NAVARRE, 1035 A>D- > Asturias and Leon were united to Castile 1037
A.D. ; were separated in 1065 A.D., and reunited 1072 A.D. Arragon
absorbed Navarre 1076 A.D. Thus at the beginning of the Crusades
there were two Christian kingdoms in Spain; (I)CASTILE; (2) ARRAGON
(including Navarre and the country of Barcelona). In all these
kingdoms the nobles and the great cities exercised great influence
over their respective governments and limited the power of their
kings. In Mahometan Spain, the khalifat of CORDOVA was, in 1031
A.D., divided into a number of petty states. Some of these Khalifs
of Cordova had patronised literature, and we read of libraries con-
taining six hundred thousand MSS. In 1085 A.D. the Almoravide
Dynasty was established from Africa, which prolonged the existence
of the Mahometan power, in spite of the growing strength of the
Christian kingdoms. PORTUGAL, wrested from the Moors by Henry
of Burgundy, was held as a fief of Spain, 1085 A.D.
The BRITISH ISLANDS were for a time a separate world, not closely
connected with the Continent until the Norman conquest. England
was nominally united by Egbert, the west Saxon, 827 A.D. The
invasions of the Danes called forth the military and civil talents of
ALFRED the Great, 871-901 A.D. Athelstan was the first King of all
England, 924 A.D. The Danes conquered and ruled over England,
under Canute and his son, 1017-1042 A.D. The old line was
retained in the person of Edward the Confessor, but on his death
WILLIAM, Duke of Normandy, who claims as the heir of Edward,,
conquered Harold, his opponent, at Senlac (Hastings, 1066 A.D.);
this was the beginning of a great change in the civil and political
234 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
condition of England. " It is to the stern discipline of foreign con-
querors that we owe not merely England's wealth and England's
freedom, but England herself." 1 None of the great barons in Eng-
land, though powerful to oppose the king occasionally, had the power
to make their fiefs independent as in France and Germany. William
Rufus, the son of the Conqueror, succeeded 1087 A.D., and was
living when the Crusades commenced. SCOTLAND was united by the
conquest of the Picts by Kenneth, 842 A.D., but all west Scotland,
the Orkneys and the western isles were overrun and held by the
Northmen. IRELAND was divided into petty kingdoms while its
eastern coasts were partially occupied by the Danes.
SCANDINAVIAN nations form a class of nationalities separate from
the rest of Europe, and best known by their piratical ravages over
western and southern Europe ; their navigators discovered Iceland
860 A.D.; then Greenland, 982 A.D. ; and Labrador and New
England, 994 A.D.; thus they were the first discoverers of America,
five centuries before Columbus. The twelve petty kings of NOR-
WAY were first subdued by Harold Haarfrager, 875-938 A.D. In
SWEDEN the nineteen kingdoms were probably united by Olaf,
the Lapp king, 993-1024 A.D. ; in DENMARK, the ten kingdoms
by Gorm, 860-936 A.D., whose wife, Thyra, built the Dannewerke
wall, eight miles long, 45 to 75 feet high (across Jutland). Under
Canute, for a brief period, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, England,
and Scotland were united. Christianity was first introduced into
Jutland so early as 823 A.D., by Ebbo, of Rheims, but was soon lost;
Anscar, in 830 A.D. and 853 A.D., first entered Sweden as a missionary
and with some success. The first professedly Christian king of
Norway was St. Olaf, 1015-1030 A.D. In Sweden, Olaf (the Lapp-
king), 893-1024; and, in Denmark, Harold Blaabund, 936-985
A.D., were the first Christian kings, but the bulk of the population
for several generations remained pagan. Soon after the beginning
of the eleventh century the piratical inroads of the Northmen
decreased, and shortly came to an end. In Denmark the Estriden
line began to reign, 1047 A.D.; from females of this line the
sovereigns of England are descended. In Sweden, the Stenkil line
of kings began, 1055 A.D.
The plains to the east of Germany, after the defeat of the Avars
by Charlemagne, were gradually settled by the Slavic nations (the
original occupiers) into distinct states: as BOHEMIA, under Borrevi,
890 A.D.; HUNGARY, under Arpad, 888 A.D.; POLAND, under Piast,
1 Green, "History of Europe," vol. i. pp. 124, 125.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 235
842 A.D. ; and Lithuania. These Sclavonic rulers exercised des-
potic power over their people ; the greater part of them were serfs,
the property of their masters ; the public sale of slaves was common;
cattle were the most valuable property, and in this property they
usually paid their tribute (when it was paid) to the Emperors of
Germany. The vast plains, extending from the White Sea on the
north to the Euxine (Black Sea) on the south, were those in which
all the barbarian races from Asia had found a temporary resting-
place. It was the land through which the whole trade of India
with the north was carried, from the Caspian up the Wolga, and then
direct to a semi-civilised Sclavonic settlement on Lake Ilmen,
NOVOGOROD. The president and people of this trading republic,
exposed to the ravages of the Northmen, invited a Varangarian
(Northmen) tribe to take the government of their city. The name of
RUSSIANS was given to these Scandinavian adventurers, because they
thus identified themselves with certain Slavic tribes to which this name
had been applied from time immemorial. RURIC is the first of these
rulers, and the founder of the Russian nationality, 862 A.D. His
successors, Oleg and Igor, conquered the Khazars, and in 900-901
A.D. attacked Constantinople in large fleets, sailing down the Dnieper
to the Black Sea. So early did the instinctive yearning of this
nation for an outlet towards the south manifest itself. Wladimar
embraced Christianity (from the Greek Church) and married a Greek
princess, Olga, 988 A.D. On his death, 1015 A.D., Russia was
divided among his sons ; and this practice was continued for many
generations, to the great injury of the empire. At that time the
Russian dominions extended eastward to the Carpathian Mountains
and the confines of Hungary and Moravia. Kiev, on the Dwina,
was the capital ; one of the sons of Wladimar, Jaroslav (Grand
Duke of Moscow) was a legislator, who founded a public school in
Novogorod and translated Greek books into Russian ; his daughter
Anne married Henry I. of France, 1051 A.D. Biarmeland remained
independent of Russia till the eleventh century.
VII. — The Eastern Empire, the Mahometan States, and India
and China.
8. The Eastern Empire (sometimes called the Greek and Byzan-
tine Empire), through the position of its impregnable capital, Con-
stantinople, and also by the amount of its internal resources and
superior fiscal administrations, maintained itself free from bar-
barian conquest. The iconoclastic controversy had been settled
by the restoration of image-worship by Theodora, 842 A.D. The
236 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
wealth of the empire astonished visitors from the West. The
treasures accumulated by the Emperor Theophilus, 829-842 A.D.,
amounted to five and a quarter millions sterling. In 963 A.D. the
revenue paid to the emperor was calculated at 20,000 Ib. of gold
daily, and the middle class, the trading and manufacturing class, was
able to bear a heavy taxation, impossible to be borne at that time by
any Western nations. No doubt these traders and manufacturers
received the gold in exchange for the products of their own industry
from Western Europe, which, producing little that was exchangeable
in return, was thus drained of its specie. The army was composed
of the Varangarian (Norman) guard, and of the native army of 132
legions, each 1000 to 1500 men, the best of them Slavs, Wallachians,
Bulgarians, and Albanians. Arms were largely manufactured, and
were of a superior character. The possession of the secret of the
composition of an article, " the Greek fire," added greatly to the
defensive power of Constantinople. The navy consisted of 60
vessels, each holding 300 men (70 of whom were fighters). Basil
the Macedonian began a new dynasty, 867 A.D. Freeman calls
him " the skilful groom, the obsequious courtier, the reforming
emperor, in whom we behold a versatility worthy of Alcibiades him-
self." a Basil II. conquered the Bulgarians, 1019 A. D., and exter-
minated the Sclavonians in Greece. The accession of Isaac Comnenus,
in 1057 A.D., was a change for the worse in the whole system of
government. SERVIA threw off its dependence on the empire under
its Zupa, Stephen Boistlaf, 1043 A.D. The Asiatic provinces of the
empire in Asia Minor were conquered by the Seljuk Turks, who
established themselves at Iconium, 1073 A.D. ; and what was left of
Southern Italy and Sicily was formed into an independent kingdom
by the Normans.
The MAHOMETAN KHALIFAT of Bagdad had begun its downward
progress. The establishment of independent kingdoms, nominally
acknowledging the Khalif of Bagdad, proclaimed the weakness of
the central power. The Taherites established a dynasty in Kho-
rassan, 820 A.D. ; the Suffarees succeeded them, 872 A.D. ; then the
Samanians, 902 A.D.; the Buyid, or Delamites, in South Persia,
913 A.D.; the Hamadans in Syria; the Okatids in North Syria; while
the Karamatians, a warlike sect of reformers, desolated Arabia and
Syria, and plundered Mecca, 903 A.D. At Bagdad, the Emir Al
Omra, the prime minister, 945 A.D., exercised the whole power of
the khalif, and governed in his name The Toolonite Dynasty took
1 Freeman, "Essays," third series, p. 236.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 237
Egypt and Syria from the khalif in 868 A.D. All these Asiatic
dynasties were subjected by the SELJUK Turks, a barbarous but
numerous and warlike race from the vast plains to the north of
Khorassan, the khalif being left in nominal rule of Bagdad, 1037 A.D.
The first ruler of these Seljuks was Togul Bey. Under his successors,
Alp Arslan and Malek Shah, they took possession of the whole
khalifat : but, on the death of Malek Shah, 1092 A.D., the Seljuk
empire was divided into (i) the sultany of Iconium (Roum), (2)
Kerman, (3) Iran, (4) Khorassan, (5) North Syria and part of
Mesopotamia, under the Arab Attabeks, who had partially supplanted
the Okatids. Meanwhile the new sultany of GHIZNI was founded by
a slave of the ruler of Khorassan, 961 A.D. Mahmoud of Ghizni
made twelve expeditions into India, 1001-1024 A.D. ; conquered
Kashmere, 1014 A.D., and Lahore, 1022 A.D.
INDIA. — The Ghizni Sultan established a dynasty at Lahore, in
India, 1001—1024 A.D.
CHINA was troubled by the inroads of the barbarians. In 763-
780 A.D., Tai-tsung was obliged to give a Chinese princess as wife to
the Khan of the Onigours in order to obtain help against the invaders.
The Emperor Woo-tsung endeavoured to put down all the monas-
teries and ecclesiastical establishments of Christians, Buddhists, and
others, but without effect, 841-847 A.D. Buddhism revived under
Etsung, 860-874 A.D. In 907 A.D., the Tang Dynasty, the Golden
Age of China, came to an end. Up to 960 A.D. five dynasties passed
away during a period of great internal disorganisation and invasions
of the Khitan Tartars, to whom China paid tribute up to the end of
the eleventh century.
JAPAN had been, since 603 A.D., divided into eight large depart-
ments, the heads of which became the real rulers of the land. The
Shogun (Tykoon), the commander-in-chief, took practically the
position of sovereign, while the Mikado was the spiritual emperor,
secluded from all direction of public business. In 794 A.D. Kioto
became the capital of the Mikado and his court.
In North Africa, west of Egypt, the Aglabite Dynasty in Tunis
was superseded by the FATEMITES, 908 A.D. These conquered Fez
on the west, and then the Toolonite Dynasty in Egypt, 970 A.D.—
became thus lords of all North Africa and Syria. But this extent of
empire was lessened by the revolt of the Zerides, in Tunis and
Algiers, 993 A.D., and then by the establishment of the Almoravides
Dynasty which, in 1052 A.D., founded Morocco, and in 1094 A.D.
re-established the declining Mahometan kingdom in Spain. The
ruthless barbarism of the Seljuks and of the Fatemites in Syria,
238 From the Empire of Charlemagne to tJte Crusades.
so different from the more friendly rule of the khalifs, was felt by the
numerous pilgrims from Christian Europe in their visits to Jerusalem
and the holy places. Their complaints called forth the zeal and the
preaching of Peter the Hermit, and eventually led to the Crusades
for the recovery of the Holy Land.
9. THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY of this period is very important, but
the limits of this history oblige us to use great brevity, and make the
narrative a mere index of the matters referred to. Three controversies
relating to theology were carried on in 'the Churches : — (i) The
worship of images. The iconoclastic* Byzantine emperor, Leo III.,
718 A.D., had put down the superstitious adoration paid to images
and pictures, but the mass of ignorance and superstition existing
among the clergy and the populace rendered the efforts of the
government inoperative. Irene restored the images, 792 A.D.; and
they were fully established in 842 A.D. Charlemagne, in the
West, and the Council of Frankfort were opposed to their super-
stitious use, and their views were fully expressed in the Carolinian
books, 790-794 A.D. But the papacy favoured the popular super-
stition, which became general in the Christian Church, in the use of
images in the West and of pictures in the East ; (2) the nature of
the spiritual presence in the bread and wine used in the administra-
tion of the Lord's Supper. In 831 A.D. Paschasius Radbert taught
the doctrine of transubstantiation (the fatal term which too strictly
defined what had hitherto remained indefinite), that the bread and
wine were actually changed into the body and blood of the human
body of Christ, and as such were actually partaken of by the com-
municants, and not merely spiritually discerned. This was for a
time an open question in the Romish Church. It was opposed by
John Scotius Erigena on philosophical principles, 850-884 A.D., and
by Berenger, 1045-1088 A.D., but supported by Lanfranc. In
993 A.D., Gerbert (afterwards Pope Sylvester) maintained that it was
best to say simply that the bread and wine are the body and blood
of Christ, but to be only apprehended by faith. The rage of the day
was for a sensible object of worship, and this the wafer (the host)
supplied; (3) the doctrine of predestination, taken from St. Augus-
tine, was revived by Gottschalk, 848 A.D., was opposed by Hincman
and others, 845-882 A.D., but exercised no small influence over the
leading minds of the day. It seemed to simplify a difficult problem
by cutting the knot. The notions of & purgatory after death, a period
of terminable suffering for sin, for which masses, prayer, and alms-
giving could afford relief, was generally prevalent, and naturally led
to a reliance upon the offices of the Church, and upon penances and
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 239
pilgrimages, all of which increased the influence and the wealth of
the clergy. There were no important heresies in addition to those
already existing. The Paulicians having raised a rebellion in Asia
Minor, 100,000 of them were slain in battle, and the sect dispersed
over Europe, 844-871 A.D., and known as Patarini, Cathari, Albi-
genses, Brethren of Orleans. They are charged with Gnostic and
Manichsean errors, and were persecuted and put to death in the tenth
and eleventh centuries. The increasing superstition of the age was
opposed by Agobard, Archbishop of Lyons, 816-846 A.D.J by Claude,
Archbishop of Turin, 804-825 A.D. ; who probably were protected in
their teaching by Carlovingian influence, and by Elfric, an Anglo-
Saxon, 990-1051 A.D., whose views nearly approached those held by
the first Protestant reformers. In the ninth and tenth centuries
Christianity had been nominally established in the Scandinavian
kingdoms, by Anscar, 830-853 A.D., also in Hungary and in Russia.
The formal separation of the Greek Church from the Latin Church
was hastened by the rash excommunication of the Greek Church by
the Romish legates at Constantinople, 1054 A.D.1 Monastic insti-
tutions of a high character and under strict rule were established in
the tenth and eleventh centuries. Berno founded Clugny, 912 A.D.,
which, in the twelfth century, had 2,000 monasteries in connexion
with it. Romuald founded Camalduli, in the Apennines, 1012 A.D.
Gualbert founded Vallombrosa, a society of hermits, 1039-1093 A.D.
Bruno founded the Grand Chartreuse, for the order of the Carthusians,
1084-1086. Robertof Molesme founded, at Citeaux, the Cistercians,
1092 A.D. Such a number of institutions of this character excite the
wonder of this age. There must have existed in the middle ages a
more than ordinary number of persons whose tastes were opposed to
the clerical and civil and military professions as then exercised, and to
whom no other employments were open. To such, the society of their
equals, which these monasteries offered, and the consolation afforded
by religious duties and literary studies, made these institutions desir-
able retreats, while to the lower classes the position of a monk was
superior to that of the agricultural serf. The influence of the Bishop
of Rome (the Pope] was much increased during this period. The
Church of Rome having received from the Carlovingian kings large
territorial possessions and secular power, the popes were placed in a
position to enforce the submission of the episcopate in all western
Europe; and the exaction of submission from the bishops was
facilitated by the publication of certain documents, called the " 1st-
1 Mosheim, " Century XI. ;" Milman, " Latin Christianity," book vi. chap. 3.
240 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
dorian Decretals? said to have been discovered in Spain, 836 A.D.
These consisted of a series of letters up to 385 A.D., which made
plain to the readers that from the very first the Bishops of Rome
exercised jurisdiction over all bishops as the rightful successors of
St Peter. Metropolitans and bishops, though supreme in their
respective jurisdictions, were yet subject to the decisions of the Pope.
These barefaced forgeries were received as genuine by Pope Nicho-
las I., 858-867 A.D., of whom Greenwood remarks, "Now the true
path of the papacy, however overgrown with weeds and briars of a
century's growth, lay clearly revealed before the vigorous intellect of
the reigning pontiff; and he once more felt himself at liberty to deal
with the powers of the world as the spiritual monarch, ' the true lord
and king,' as he stood entitled upon the pseudo-apostolic charter
{the Decretals) so lately lodged in the sacred archives of his Church.
With the Decretals, genuine or fictitious, of his sainted predecessors
for his cue, the world's confusion for his friend and ally, the example
of his renowned precursors for his stimulus, and his clear under-
standing and resolute will for his guide, Nicholas plunged into the
labyrinth of mundane affairs without hesitation or misgiving." x Dean
Milman remarks, " The immediate, if somewhat cautious, adoption
of the fiction, unquestionably not the forgery, by Pope Nicholas,
appears to me less capable of charitable palliation than the original
invention .... It is impossible to suppose that Nicholas himself
believed their validity, on account of their acknowledged absence
from the Rome archives .... It is impossible to deny that, at
least by citing without reserve or hesitation, the Roman pontiffs gave
their deliberate sanction to this great historic fraud." 2 After the
death of Nicholas, the authority of the papacy in the city of Rome
was so far reduced by the low character of some of the popes, and
by double elections, and by the bondage in which it was held by
the family of the Dukes of Tuscany, and by certain ladies of high
rank and corrupt morals (Theodora and her daughters — Theodora
and Marozia), that it was near extinction. To repeat the crimes and
excesses committed by the popes and by their opponents would be
tedious and disgusting. Sergius III., a paramour of Theodora,
occupied the chair, 904-911 A.D. John X., 914-928, A.D., a lover of
Theodora, but a man of ability and courage, defeated the Saracens
at the Gragliano ; he was murdered by Marozia, 928 A.D. John XI.,
the son of Pope Sergius III. and Marozia, reigned from 931 to
936 A.D. Alberic, a son of Marozia, ruled the Church by appointing
1 Vol. iii. p. 243. » Milman's " Latin Christianity," book v. chap. 6.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 241
four popes in succession. On his death, 953 A.D., his son Octavius,
a youth of eighteen, took possession of the popedom as John XII.,
955 A.D. These gross irregularities were reformed by the interference
of the Emperors of Germany, Otho L, II., and III., 963-998 A.D.
John XII. was deposed 963 A.D. In opposition to the imperial
power, Crescentius, the grandson of John X. and of Theodora,
governed Rome, and revived the old titles of consul, tribune, and
prefect. Otho III. caused Crescentius to be executed, and made
the learned Gilbert pope, as Sylvester II., 999 A.D. After Otho's
death, 1002 A.D., Crescentius, the son of the preceding Crescentius,
was the ruler of Rome as patrician, but his power was supplanted by
the Counts of Tusculum, who, by great bribery, appointed a series of
popes, from Benedict VIII. to XII. ; after him, John XIX., then
Benedict IX., a licentious youth (whom one of his successors, Vic-
tor III., describes as foul and execrable); then Gregory VI., with
whom two other popes claimed the popedom. The Emperor
Henry III., in 1046 A.D., appointed the Bishop of Bamberg
Clement II., and thus set aside the line of Tusculan popes, the
Germans declaring " that in the whole Church there was scarcely
one who was not disqualified, either as illiterate, or as tainted with
simony, or as living in notorious concubinage."1 Leo IX., the friend
of Peter Damiani, was appointed 1053 A.D. He was defeated and
taken prisoner by the Normans, 1054 A.D., with whom Nicholas II.,
in 1059 A.D., made a profitable settlement. This Pope caused the
election of the future popes to be in the suffrages of the cardinals,
that is to say, the bishops presiding over the parishes of the city of
Rome. These were the cardinal deacons in charge of the hospitals.
Afterwards the title was given to the seven bishops of Ostia, Porto,
Santa Rufino, Sabina, Palestrino, and Frascati. Nicholas II. left,
however, the right of the clergy and people of Rome to appeal to the
emperor, and to the emperor the right of confirmation. Both these
privileges soon fell into disuse. In 1059 A.D. the Normans accepted
Naples as a fief of the Holy See, and became the most useful
auxiliaries of the Pope. On the election of the monk Hilde-
brand as Gregory VII., 1073 A.D. (who had been the real ruler
of the preceding popes from Leo IX.), the papacy was invigorated.
He endeavoured with great energy to place the popedom in a posi-
tion superior to all earthly rulers, and to subordinate the clergy under
the sole jurisdiction of the Pope, free from the interference of the
civil power. In 1075 A.D. he abolished the right of investiture to
1 Milman, " Latin Christianity," book vi. chapter i.
R
242 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
spiritual offices by any temporal sovereign, at the same time
carrying out large reforms among the clergy themselves. Hence
arose the contest with the Emperor Henry IV. and his successor
respecting investitures, ending for a while in the affected sub-
mission of Henry IV., at Canossa, 1077 A.D., which, on the part of
the emperor, was a mere expedient arising out of present necessities.
A reaction followed. A general feeling began to express itself in
favour of " the plain principles of right and equity .... If the
clergy would persist in holding large temporalities, they must hold
them liable to the obligations and subordinate to the authority
of the state."1 By the death of the Countess Matilda the papacy
received large additions to its wealth. Amid all Gregory's struggles
against the emperor and refractory clergy, he nourished the hope of
leading a crusade against the Mahometans in Palestine. Christianity
was first introduced into Scandinavia by Anscar, 830-853 A.D.
LEARNING AND EDUCATION were not neglected in this period.
Charlemagne, a warm friend and patron of learned men, promoted
the establishment of schools in cathedrals and monasteries. There
appears to have been a fair number of educated men who could
read, speak, and write Latin, and were acquainted with the curriculum
at the schools ; they were " the conservators and propagators of the
old traditional learning, the Augustinian theology, the Boethian
science, the grammar, the dry logic and meagre rhetoric, the Church
music, the astronomy mostly confined to the calculations of Easter,
of the trivium and quadrivium .... The revival of letters under
Charlemagne was, however, as insulated, as premature, and as
transitory as the unity of his empire." 2 A large number of writers
are found reported in the historians of this period both in the Greek
and in the Latin Churches, but they are chiefly theological or mere
chroniclers. In the Greek Church we may mention Photius, historian
and theologian 850-886 A.D. ; Suidas, the lexicographer, 900 A.D. ;
Theophylact, the historian, 1077 A.D. In the Latin Church, John
Scotus Erigena, the philosopher, 850-884 A.D. ; Egenhard, historian,
840 A.D. ; Rabanus Maurus, politician and theologist, 800-856 A.D. ;
Asser, biographer of Alfred, 890 A.D. ; Sylvester II., the learned
Pope; Dunstan, the theologian and monkish reformer, 990-1003 A.D. ;
Peter Damien, cardinal, whose letters are full of information,
1040-1072 A.D. ; LANFRANC (1040-1080 A.D.) and ANSELM
(1063-1109 A.D.), both of them great theologians and Archbishops
of Canterbury; Fulbert, theologian, 1001-1028 A.D. ; Ingulphus,
1 Milman, "Latin Christianity," vol. iii. p. 283. 2 Ibid., vol. iii. p. 104.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 243
theologian and historian^ 1051-1100 A.D. ; the names of Hincmar
(809-832 A.D.) and Berenger (1050-1088 A.D.) have already been
noticed in connexion with the controversies of their day. The great
physician of the Arabs, Avicenna (Ibn-Sina), of Bokhara and Bagdad,
lived 996-1037 A.D., but his voluminous works contain treatises on
metaphysics and morals. Two great names in this list are connected
with the philosophy of this and the period following, John Scotus
Erigena and Anselm. In the year 827 A.D., the Emperor Michael
sent from Constantinople to Louis the Pious a work ascribed to
Dionysius the Areopagite ; which John Scotus Erigena translated. It
was evidently the work of an Alexandrian monk, in which the
pantheistic doctrine of emanation — the evolution of the universe
through successive orders of existence, beginning with the primordial
essence called God, and the general teaching of the Neo-Platonists —
are all reproduced without any material alterations. This work led
John Scotus Erigena to compose his work " De Divisione Naturae,"
a strange attempt to reconcile Christianity with Neo-Platonism. His
whole theological teaching is a system pantheistic in its basis with a
Biblical terminology ; he threw off Augustinianism and defended
free-will. In this work Erigena laid also the foundation for the long-
contested dispute of the schoolmen on Nominalism and Realism.
He taught the realistic doctrine that universals exist before and in
the individual object. Alfred, king of England, cultivated literature,
^71-901 A.D., and translated Orosius's " History of the World,"
Bede's " Ecclesiastical History," and Boetius on " Consolation."
Anselm, in his " Cur Deus Homo," discusses the doctrine of the
Atonement. Sir J. Stephens1 has some interesting remarks on
Anselm : " The boundless realm of thought over which, in the
solitude of his library, he enjoyed a princely but unenvied dominance
were, in his eyes, of incomparably a higher value than either his
Primacy over the Church of England or his triumph in maintaining
the prerogatives of the Church of Rome. In our days, indeed, his
speculations are forgotten, and the very subjects of them have fallen
into disesteem " [this was true when Sir J. Stephens wrote, but is far
from being the case now] ; " yet, except, perhaps, the writings of
Erigena, those of Anselm on the 'Will of God,' on 'Truth,' on
*Free Will,' and on the 'Divine Presence,' are not only in point of
time the earliest examples, but in the order of invention the earliest
models of those scholastic works which exhibit in such intimate and
curious union the prostration and the aspirings of the mind of man,
1 " Biog. Essays," I2mo. p. 245.
R 2
244 From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades.
prostrating itself to the most absurd of human dogmas, aspiring to
penetrate the loftiest and most obscure of the divine attributes."
It is probable that from the ninth to the eleventh century
inclusive there were found a few laymen who could read and write,
there was no doubt an increase in learning, but mainly among the
clergy. The Benedictines, from their monastery at Clugny, 910 A.D.,
and the Carthusians, 1098 A.D., did much to advance the education
of clerics. Latin was still spoken as vernacular among the better
class in Italy so late as 924 A.D., but had long before ceased to be
vernacular in Spain and Gaul. Already in France the difference
between the dialects of the north and south had become apparent.
We hear of superior schools at Paris, Toulon, Bologna, Paderborn,
Oxford, and Cambridge, and a medical school at Salerno-. In the
East, the khalifat of Al Mamon, 813-833 A.D.,. is regarded as the
Augustan age of Arabian literature ; and in Mahometan Spain, in
the tenth and eleventh centuries, there were universities in the
capitals of each province and a college in each district, and in the
whole territory seventy libraries. In some of the schools of learning
the mathematics and philosophy of the Greeks were taught, and
some scholars from France and Italy profited^ from their teaching ;
Pope Gerbert (Sylvester), for instance. The tenth century was not
a literary one in Italy and England, but it was one of progress in
France and Germany. The whole period was one of remarkable
absence of ability, and, with some exceptions, the literature was one
of mere compilation, destitute of originality. " Truth requires us to
say that the Saracens or Arabs, particularly of Spain, were the
principal source and fountain of whatever knowledge of medicine,
philosophy, astronomy, and mathematics there was in Europe from
the tenth century." *
NAVIGATION AND DISCOVERY. — Already the Scandinavians were
making extensive voyages. Wolfstene from Jutland visited Esthonia
on the east of the Baltic. Other, from Heligoland, sailed northward,
doubled Cape North, and advanced as far as Biarmia at the mouth
of the Dwina. They both of them describe thier voyages to King
Alfred, who made use of them in his Anglo-Saxon translation of
Orosius.
1 Mosheim (Soames), vol. ii. p. 276.
From the Empire of Charlemagne to the Crusades. 245
State of the World, 1096 A.D
EUROPE.
SCANDINAVIA. Norway, Sweden, Denmark, sometimes tempo-
rarily united, but generally separate. From Norway and
Denmark the piratical invasions of Western Europe
originated. Sweden was engaged in subduing the Lapps and
the Finns.
BRITISH ISLANDS. England had come under Norman rule, 1066
A.D., by the conquest of William, Duke of Normandy.
Scotland, by the union of the Scots and Picts under Kenneth,
843 A.D., became one kingdom. Ireland, nominally divided
into four kingdoms, with numerous smaller chieftainships ;
Danish settlements on the eastern coasts, principally at Water-
ford and Wexford, and on the west at Limerick.
THE VAST PLAINS TO THE EAST OF THE BALTIC AND GERMANY
now began to approach a more settled political condition.
Russia, under the successors of Ruric, became the great
power of the north-east of Europe ; the division of the empire
in 10 1 6 A.D. was followed by wars between the several dukes,
by which the power of the empire was greatly diminished.
Biarmeland, to which the Finnish tribes retreated before the
Swedes and Russians, was subject to Russia in the eleventh
century. There had been for some time regular intercourse
between Scandinavia and the Eastern Empire, through
Russia, by which the northerns were benefited. Poland
partly consolidated under its first Duke Piast, 842 A.D. ;
Boleslaus II. was the first king, 1077 A.D. Bohemia had its
first Christian duke, 890 A.D., and was raised to the dignity
of a kingdom, 1806 A.D., under Wratislaus. Moravia was
Incorporated with Bohemia, 1029 A.D. Hungary \ after the
expulsion of the Avas, settled by Arpad, chief of the Magyars ;
Duke Geysa received Christianity, 972-997 A.D. ; Stephen I.,
the first Christian king, 1000 A.D. The Lithuanians, Prussians,
and the Vendes (Sclavonic tribes) are spread south of the
Baltic from the Elbe to the Gulf of Finland ; these Sclavs
were constantly at war with their neighbours, fomsburg, on
246 State of the World y 1096 A.D.
the island of Wollin, at the mouth of the Oder, founded by
the piratical Scandinavians, 850-960 A.D., was next to Novo-
gorod, in Russia, the principal seat of trade, and also the
stronghold of the pirates.
GERMAN EMPIRE, including the Netherlands, Lorraine, Burgundy,
and Aries, with Switzerland, thus occupied not only
modern Germany, but Holland, Belgium, Switzerland, and
the east of France down to the Mediterranean. Its emperor
was the generally acknowledged suzerain of the Baltic states
(Poland, Hungary, and Bohemia) and of Italy, and claimed
a priority of rank over all the European powers.
FRANCE, under the Capetian kings, step by step advancing towards
the union of all its provinces under one king.
SPAIN. The two Christian kingdoms of Castile and Arragon in
the north ; the African Moravides ruling over the Mahom-
etans in the south. Portugal, a new kingdom, a fief of
Castile, conquered from the Moors, 1085 A.D.
ITALY. All northern and central Italy nominally part of the
Holy Roman (German) Empire, but governed by dukes,
counts, and other nobles, the large cities, independent
municipalities, acknowledging the empire. Rome was mainly
governed by the Pope, who had to contend with the local
republican feeling of the people and nobles. The Duchy of
Savoy in the north-west, under the Counts of Maurienne, the
first of whom died, 1027 A.D. Venice, a republic, affected
to belong to the Eastern Empire, while Naples, Bari, and
Amalfi had to submit to the Norman kings of Naples and
Sicily, by whom the Greeks of the Eastern Empire had been
expelled, 1080 A.D. Most of the large cities in Lombardy
became independent republics during the contests between
the popes and the emperors. Croatia, under its zupan,
970 A.D. Dalmatia independent, 1052 A.D. ; but both
Croatia and Dalmatia were conquered by Hungary in the
twelfth century. Servia was an [independent state, under its
zupans, 1043 A-D-
THE EASTERN GREEK EMPIRE included a large portion of the
present Turkey in Europe, south of the Danube. Servia
had become an independent state, 1043 A.D.
The barbarous tribes to the south of Russia were the Patzinaciten
beyond the Danube and along the north coast of the Black
State of the World, 1096 A.D. 247
Sea ; beyond these, the Khazars and the Kumani extended
to the Caspian Sea, always at war with the Russians and the
Eastern Empire.
ASIA.
ASIA MINOR; the western portion to the Eastern Empire. The
centre and the west occupied by the Seljukian sultanie of
Iconium.
SYRIA under the rule of the Fatemite khalifs of Egypt.
IRAN (Persia), KERMAN, and KHORASSAN are Seljukian sultanies.
The khalifs of Bagdad, the successors of Mahomet, confined
to that city, which was under the control of the sultans of
Iran.
GHIZNI, under its sultans, who occupy Afghanistan, Cashmere,
and Lahore in India.
CHINA troubled by Tartar invasions.
JAPAN under the Mikado, whose power was gradually absorbed
by the Shogung (Tyakun).
ARABIA under the nominal rule of the khalifs of Bagdad, but in
reality left to its own tribes and petty states.
AFRICA.
EGYPT. The Toolonite dynasty, established 868 A.D., followed
by the Fatemite dynasty, which ruled over Fez, 908 A.D., and
over the Aglabites of Tunis, 941 A.D.
TUNIS and ALGIERS governed by the Zerides under the Fatemites.
FEZ and MOROCCO under the Almoravides, whose chief was called
Emir-al-Mulmein, from 1069 A,D.
EIGHTH PERIOD,
From the Cmsades, 1096 A.D., to the Reign
of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D.
i. FIVE great events of general importance fall within this period :
(i) The Crusades ; (2) the contest between the popes and the emperors
respecting Investitures, which led to the independence of the Italian
Republics ; (3) the rise of an order of Burgesses and Citizens and the
formation of municipalities in Europe; (4) the predominant influence
of the papacy in Europe ; (5) the irruption of the Mogul Tartars into
Southern and Western Asia and Eastern Europe ; (6) the leading
nations and people in this period.
(i) The Crusades were military expeditions from Christian Europe
sent to deliver the Holy Land (Palestine) from the power of the
Mahometan SELJUK Turks, who had destroyed the temporal power
of the khalifs of Bagdad and had subjugated the various sub-
ordinate kingdoms nominally subject to his rule. Under the
khalifs the pilgrims from Christian countries had been protected and
even respected as persons under a religious impulse, and as useful
purchasers of local products ; but the rough and fanatical Seljuk
Turks, recent converts .to Mahometanism, treated the pilgrims with
barbarity and contempt. PETER the Hermit, an eyewitness and
sufferer, by his indefatigable exertions roused all Europe to listen
to his complaints, and to recognise the necessity of redress. The
propriety of an armed interference on the part of the Christian
nations had been for some time discussed by a few of the leading
minds of the age; first, byGerbert (afterwards Pope Sylvester) 999 A.D.,
and by others influenced by the prevailing notion that the end of the
world would take place in the year 1000 A.D. ; but it was the
From the Crusades to Rudolph of Hapsburg. 249
intensity and vehemence of the genuine feeling of Peter which
roused the active spirits of the age to take immediate action. At
the council held at Clermont, 1095 A.D., over which the Pope,
Urban II., presided, the enthusiasm of a large concourse of all
ranks and ages could not be restrained. The war-cry, " It is the
will of God," was adopted by those who took the mark of the
cross as their distinctive badge, and from which they received
the name of Crusaders. These expeditions, nine in number,
lasted nearly two hundred years ; but, besides the regular expedi-
tions, there were numerous companies, and even individual Crusaders,
and parties of children, perfectly ignorant of the necessary precau-
tions and preparations for such a warfare, and consequently exposed
to all the evils arising from destitution, fatigue, and disease, and
unable to resist the weakest body of the enemy, by whom they were
either slaughtered or reduced to slavery. The general enthusiasm
which pervaded all ranks has been derided, and the Crusades con-
demned by the materialistic philosophical historians of the eighteenth
century ; but their character and utility have been vindicated by the
more liberal and enlarged views of modern writers. The remarks of
Maurice are to the point : " The struggle of Christendom and the
Saracens had been the struggle of the middle ages .... the best
and holiest of men, the recluses who lived only for the unseen
world, like Bernard of Clairvaux — righteous kings who cared for the
well-being of their subjects and would not willingly spill their blood
like St. Louis, yet felt that wars for the sepulchre were the bonds of
Christian faith and fellowship, the securities against the indifference
which would cause all moral energies to rust. That day was passed." *
As a matter of fact, Mahometanism, professedly and without any
equivocation, purposed to propagate its creed by the sword. This
declaration, carried out with zealous valour by its followers, rendered
Christianity (as then understood) warlike in self-defence. " The
Church must become militant in its popular and secular sense ; it
must protect itself by other arms than those of patient endurance
. . . . resigned and submissive martyrdom."2 Briefly we give a
sketch of each expedition. The first Crusade was begun by Peter
the Hermit and Walter the Penniless, who led a host of undis-
ciplined men through Hungary and by way of Constantinople into
Asia Minor, which was at once destroyed by the Sultan of Iconium.
Godfrey of Boulogne, with his brothers Baldwin and Eustace, Hugh
1 " Mediaeval Philosophy," chap. v. p. 113.
2 Milman's "Latin Christianity," vol. ii. p. 221.
250 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
of Vermondois (brother of Philip I. of France), Robert of Nor-
mandy (brother of William Rufus of England), Robert of Flanders,
Stephen of Chartres, Aymer, Bishop of Puy, Raymond of Thou-
louse, Bohemund (the Norman) son of Robert Guiscard and Prince of
Tarentum, Tancred (the cousin of Bohemund and son of the Marquis
Odo), the celebrated perfect knight in Tasso, were the leaders of the
main body. Godfrey led his party through Hungary to Constanti-
nople, where he was joined by Hugh and his party, who had come
through Italy, and by Raymond, who had come through Lombardy
and Dalmatia. They were annoyed by the equivocal conduct of
Alexis, the Eastern Emperor, who was alarmed at the number of the
Crusaders. He had hoped to see a moderately numerous army,
sufficient to aid the Eastern Empire by the recovery of Asia Minor
from the Seljuk Turks, but the arrival of host upon host alarmed him.
It seemed to him that " Europe, uptorn from its roots, had precipi-
tated itself upon Asia." After a while his fears were quieted, or he
deemed it prudent to conceal them. Nice was taken by the
Crusaders and left in the hands of Alexis, 1097 A.D. Antioch was
captured 1098 A.D., and Jerusalem 1099 A.D., of which Godfrey was
made king. Edessa was made a separate dominion for Baldwin, and
Antioch for Bohemund. The Second Crusade was provoked by the
fall of Edessa, conquered by the Seljuk princes of Aleppo, 1145
A.D. Of this Crusade ST. BERNARD was the main supporter by his
eloquence, but Louis VII., of France, and Conrad III., of Germany,
1147-9 A-D-> failed to retake Edessa or to make themselves masters
of Damascus. The Third Crusade, 1189-1193, was taken to
recover Jerusalem, which had been captured by Saladin, the ruler
of Egypt and Syria, 1187 A.D. Fulk, of Neuilly, was a worthy
successor of Peter the Hermit and of St. Bernard in his advocacy
of the Crusades, 1189-1202 A.D. Its leaders were Frederick I,
(Barbarossa), of Germany, now in his seventieth year; Philip
Augustus, King of France; Richard Cceur de Lion, King of England.
Barbarossa first entered Asia Minor, took Iconium, but was
drowned in the river Calycadnos, in Cilicia. His army had been
impeded by Isaac (Emperor of the East), whom he had to compel
to aid him to pass the Hellespont ; after this, this Emperor of the East
was the ally of the Seljuk Turks against the Crusaders. Frederick,
Duke of Swabia, led the German army to Acre, and instituted the
order of the Teutonic knights, and died of the plague, 1191 A.D.,
while besieging Acre. Soon after, the city surrendered to the kings
of France and of England. Here the King of England quarrelled
with Leopold, Duke of Austria, and with Philip of France. Philip
Reign of Riidolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 251
abandoned the Crusade. Richard, after relieving the siege of Jaffa7
concluded an armistice with Saladin, by which the whole line of
coast from Jaffa to Acre remained in the hands of the Christians,
free access to Jerusalem and the Holy Places being also secured ta
them. The island of Cyprus, which Richard had conquered, was
sold by him to Guy, the titular King of Jerusalem. Richard, on
his return to England, was seized by the Austrian duke and kept
a prisoner by Henry VI. of Germany for two years, until ransomed.
The Fourth Crusade, 1197 A.D., consisted of bands sent out by the
EmperorHenry VI., which, reaching Syria by Constantinople, regained
possession of Sidon, Tyre, and Beyrout ; but the emperor himself
died in Sicily. The Fifth Crusade, 1202-4, under the patronage of
Pope Innocent III., was undertaken by the preachers of Fulk of
Neuilly, by the Franks and Venetians headed by Theobald of
Champagne, Louis Simon Montford, Walter of Brienne, Geoffry
of Villehardouin, Baldwin of Flanders, Hugh of St. Pol, and
others from France and Italy. They sailed from Venice, and, being
unable to pay in money the cost of the hire of the ships, agreed
to besiege and take Zara, in Dalmatla, for the Venetians, 1202-
A.D., on their way to Constantinople. Here they remained to
restore Isaac Anglus, who had been deposed by his brother Alexis.
On the death of Isaac, his son, Alexis, could not fulfil the promise
made to them; the Crusaders took possession of Constantinople,
and placed Baldwin, Count of Flanders, on the throne with one-
fourth of the empire, as feudal suzerain over the rest. The
VENETIANS obtained the shores of the Adriatic, ^Egean, and Black
Seas, with most of the Greek islands. The French and Lombard
nobles, one of whom, the Marquis of Mountserrat, received the
whole of Macedonia, &c., which has been named the kingdom of
Thessalonica. A Greek empire was established at Nicea by
Theodore Lascaris, and another at Trebizond. The Sixth Crusade
was undertaken by Andrew II., of Hungary, 1216 A.D., and by
Frederick II., grandson of Barbarossa, 1227-8 A.D., and ended
with the cession of all Jerusalem (except the temple), with
Jaffa, Bethlehem, and Nazareth, to the Christians by the Sultan of
Egypt. The Seventh Crusade, by Richard, Earl of Cornwall, and
some French nobles (opposed by the Pope and the emperor),
1236-40 A.D., obtained from the Sultan of Egypt most favourable
terms. After this the Karismians, who had been driven from
Khorassan by the Moguls, took Jerusalem, but were driven out by
the Sultan of Egypt. This led to the Eighth Crusade, in which St.
Louis IX., King of France, took Damietta, but was defeated and
252 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to tJu
made a prisoner at Mansourah, and released on ransom, 1250 A.D.;
he lingered awhile at Acre and returned to France, 1254 A. D. The
Ninth Crusade. St. Louis IX. besieged Tunis, where he died, 1270
A.D. Prince Edward, of England (afterwards Edward I.) 1271 A.D.,
took Nazareth and returned to England 1272 A.D. The loss of
Acre, 1291 A.D., put a stop to the Crusades. Attempts were made
by Gregory X. to induce the Emperor Rudolph to join another
Crusade, but in vain, 1274 A.D. The KNIGHTS TEMPLARS, defeated at
Acre, being deserted by Henry II., King of Cyprus, titular King of
Jerusalem, left Acre, being only seven in number. Thus Palestine
was lost, as Thermopylae was lost, to save Greece. All the outlay
of wealth and blood, freely shed for two centuries, had been
apparently wasted ; but the conquest of Palestine and the repeated
expeditions and valorous fights to hold it, though not finally success-
ful, were the protection of Europe from the attempt of a Mahometan
Seljuk conquest. Unknown to themselves, the Crusaders anticipated
and prevented an invasion of Europe by the Seljuk hordes, backed
by the fanaticism of Mahometan Asia, and thus prolonged the
existence of that feeble bulwark (but yet a bulwark) of Christendom,
the Eastern Empire, for a period of three hundred and fifty years.
The Crusaders were in this respect the worthy successors on a
larger scale of the Roman ^Etius, of Charles Martel, and of Charle-
magne, and the early Emperors of Germany, who successfully
repelled and threw back the invasion of the Huns, the Saracens, the
Saxons, the Slavs, and the Hungarian barbarians. They saved
Western and Central Europe from the repetition of the ravages and
misery consequent upon a barbaric invasion, such as had over-
whelmed the old empire of Rome. Our gain by the Crusades is
obvious, when we contrast the intelligence, the civilisation, the
liberty, the security, and the progress of the Europe of our day with
the ignorance, the barbarity, the despotism, the insecurity, and the
stagnation everywhere observable in that " geographical expression,"
the Turkish Empire. The Crusades were not national enterprises ;
kings and emperors joined in them, not as representatives of their
people, but simply as soldiers of the cross. The movement was an
impulse felt by all the European population of all ranks, not even
excluding the serf or the slave. It was, no doubt, greatly helped
by the notion which prevailed in the preceding century, that the end
of the world was approaching. It had no definite political object
beyond that openly avowed. Prudent statesmen, whose views were
limited by mere local interests, discouraged what they deemed a
mania. The Crusade was the practical reply of the religious feeling
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 253
and the self-respect of Christian Europe to the hated paynim who
had desecrated its sacred localities and maltreated its pilgrims.
These wars were for an idea, a mere unpractical idea, as it then
appeared. To us, in the retrospect, we recognise a method and an
end in the enthusiastic action of the Crusaders, in the breakwater
which rolled back the flood which otherwise might have overwhelmed
the Christianity and civilisation of Europe. Beyond this great work
there were great incidental benefits arising out of these expeditions.
They prepared the way for the gradual extinction of the feudal
system, which, however necessary for the security and perpetuity of
the barbarian conquerors and rulers of Europe, had become an
obstacle to further progress, when its work had been accomplished
in the occupation of the land by a warlike homogeneous population.
The great nobles parted with their lands to defray the costs of their
expeditions, and thus fiefs, which had as independent sovereignties
checked the rule of law, were absorbed by the feudal suzerain,
the king, whose policy it was to enforce the law and to favour the
emancipation of the masses from the control of their lords. The
cities, stimulated by the increased expenditure required for the
military outfits, had full employment for an increasing industrial
population. This was especially the case in Italy. Continued
intercourse with the East stimulated the enterprise of the com-
mercial cities of Southern Europe, as Venice, Genoa, Pisa, Florence,
Milan, Marseilles, and opened out new markets for commerce.
Agriculture was benefited by the breaking up of large properties
and the increase of small farms. A yeomanry class began to take
the place of the serf, and the foundation of a middle class, the
balance and stability of modern states, was laid. The higher classes
imbibed something of that high regard for honour and the peculiar
reverence for the sex, whence all chivalry. But it was, perhaps,
in the diversion of the current of the evils which afflicted mediaeval
society that we may trace the most important of the incidental
benefits accruing to the world from the Crusades. A host of wild,
untamed, and untamable spirits eagerly accepted the prospect of
warlike activity with the prospect of plunder. The terms held out
by the Church, a general pardon of sins, had, no doubt, great in-
fluence with all classes. The indigent, the wretched, the slave and
the serf had the prospect of change and a hope of improvement.
The stream flowed on, and with it passed away an immense load of
potential evil and^ mischief to society. Among the two million of
Europeans said to have perished in these Crusades, a large number
consisted either of the dangerous and unsettled class, or of the
254 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
ambitious and adventurous class, whose presence at home would
have helped to perpetuate and increase the predominant evils of
mediaeval society. In confirmation of these views, we may quote
from one of our latest historical critics : " The Crusades contributed
directly and indirectly, in many ways, to generate and diffuse the
feeling of a common Christendom, and even of a common
humanity. They united in a common sentiment Norman, Saxon,
and Kelt, Frenchman and Austrian, Norwegian and Italian. They
were the first events of universal European significance which
rested on a European public opinion. They softened in some
measure the antipathies of the races and people which gathered
themselves together to combat for a common cause. They made
the Baron feel more dependent upon his vassals, and raised the serf
in his own estimation and in that of others. They strengthened
the power of the crown .... they widened the range of men's
ideas, tastes, and desires ; they gave an impulse to science and art,
and a still greater impulse to commerce j and thus, although they
had their origin in fanaticism and were accompanied with unspeak-
able horrors and followed by numerous and most serious evils which
do not require to be mentioned, they also undoubtedly helped in no
slight degree to emancipate the human mind and educate the
human heart."1 Antiquarians trace the origin of surnames and the
use of armorial bearings, and all the mysteries of heraldry to the
period of the Crusades ; but there were no coats of armour before the
twelfth century ; the first fleurs de Us on the crown and robe of the
French kings appeared in the reign of Louis VII., 1164 A.D.
Another fact is connected with the Crusades — the appearance of
leprosy in Europe. Tournaments, and the institution of religious-
military orders also date from this period.
2. — (2) The contest between the papacy and the empire respecting
investitures had for its ultimate object, on the part of the papacy, the
establishment of the popedom as a visible divinity, endowed with
the whole power and majesty of Christ upon earth, kings, princes,
constitutions, and peoples being reduced to the condition of tract-
able instruments in the hand of God's visible representative resident
at Rome. On the part of the empire, the object was to subject the
Church (except in matters purely spiritual), and Church property,
and the persons of the clergy to the secular power. Hildebrand
(Gregory VII.) proclaimed that kingdoms were held as fiefs under
St. Peter. The emperor, on the other hand, desired (as Charle-
1 Flint's " Philosophy of History," vol. i. p. 59-
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 255
magne hoped and intended) to become the master of the popes,
and thus to wield both the secular and the clerical power. Both
extremes were evils, from which, perhaps, this contest helped to
deliver European society. There were great abuses allowed, and,
perhaps, favoured by the secular power, which the Pope did well
to resist. Simony in the purchase of bishops' and other ecclesi-
astical benefices had for long been common and notorious. Attempts
were being made in Germany to render clerical livings, from the
highest to the lowest, hereditary in the children of the clergy,
and to maintain the occupancy of certain bishoprics in particular
families, the celibacy enjoined by the Church being for the most
part evaded or defied. Why should not ecclesiastical fiefs as
bishoprics and abbeys be hereditary as well as the temporal fiefs ?
This tendency was of nearly two hundred years' standing, and was
increasing as it suited the interests of an influential class beyond
the control of the secular power. Here the papacy rightfully
opposed the hereditary transmission of ecclesiastical power and
position, and thus saved Europe from a separate caste of the priest-
hood by the exaction of clerical celibacy (in itself productive of
great evils), checking at the same time the authority exercised by
the emperor over the Church. The all-absorbing question of the
relations of Church and State, implied in the question of investitures,
related to the temporalities of the see which the sovereign was sup-
posed to bestow upon the bishops. By this institution the sovereign
exercised a control over the bishops and an overwhelming influence
in their appointment. On the death of a bishop his ring and staff
were seized, and without these there could be no legal consecration.
Besides the desire to benefit the Church by freeing the nomination
of bishops from imperial control, the popes had reasons of a lower
character in their opposition to investiture by the crown, they
themselves profited by annexing to the Holy See the revenues of
bishoprics and abbeys, and by exactions from the dignified clergy
from time to time. Hildebrand (Pope Gregory VII.) was, no doubt,
above mere temporal considerations ; and, had he confined himself
to the removal of simoniacal contracts, and the introduction of
unsuitable characters into the higher offices of the Church by regu-
lations in which he would be supported in enforcing by the moral
feeling of Europe, he would have accomplished a great work. But,
beyond the suppression of the intolerable abuses which had too
long been tolerated, he aimed at the complete subjection of the
Church in all its orders and degrees, as well as the empire, to the
see of Rome. "It was a magnificent idea, but how was it recon-
256 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
cilable with the genuine sublimity of Christianity, that an order of
men — that one single man — had thrust himself without authority
.... between man and God — had arrayed himself, in fact, in
secondary divinity? .... This monarchical autocracy was un-
deniably taught and maintained, and by none more than Hildebrand,
through means utterly at variance with the essence of Christianity
.... by bloody and desolating wars, by civil wars, with all their
horrors, by every kind of human misery. Allow the utmost privilege
of the age — of a warlike and ferocious age .... yet this demand
of indulgence for the spirit of the times is surely destructive of the
claim to be immutable Christianity; the awful incongruity between
the Churchman and the Christian, between the representative of the
Prince of Peace and the Prince of Peace himself, is fatal to the
whole."1 In this attempt Hildebrand provoked the opposition of a
large portion of the clergy (especially by his enforcement of clerical
celibacy), in addition to that of the emperor and nobility. Had the
Emperor Henry IV. been a man commanding respect by the purity
of his life and the wisdom of his government, the Pope would have
been worsted in the contest. Even as it was, with every advantage
of character on the side of Gregory, and with all the power and
prestige of the popedom, the point in dispute was, after a contest
of fifty years, settled by a compromise, by the treaty or concordat
at Worms 1122 A.D., Calixtus II. being Pope, when both Henry IV.
and Hildebrand had been long removed from the conflict. The right
of investiture by the ring and the pastoral staff was conceded to the
Pope, the spiritual authority coming from him. It was then settled
that bishops should be elected by the capitulary bodies, but ap-
pointed by the emperors by the touch of the sceptre to the pos-
session of their temporal rights and privileges ; but what was implied
by a free election, with other important points, were left undecided.
This compact was ratified by the Lateran Council 1128 A.D. The
conflict had exhausted the energies of all parties. It has continued
more or less to this day, and must continue while Romish religious
establishments are supported by the secular power. In France and
England the conflict was soon re-opened. The wars and distraction
arising out of this contest have not been without some profitable
results in the education of Europe. "The dispute between the
emperor and the popes was the axis on which for more than two
centuries European history revolved. It was productive of many
evils to Germany and Italy, but productive also of great blessings to
1 Dean Milman's " Latin Christianity," book vii. ch iii.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 257
Europe in general. * If it had been possible,' says Gervinus,1 ' for
the emperor and the papacy to have united peaceably ; if that which
had occurred in the Byzantine kingdom of the East could also have
occurred in the Teutonic Roman kingdom of the West, and could
the combined secular and spiritual powers have rested on one head,
the idea of unity would have gained the preponderance over that of
national developments, and in the centre of this quarter of the
world, in Germany or Italy, a monarchical power and single form of
government would have been constructed, which would have thrown
the utmost difficulties in the way of the national and human pro-
gression of the whole of Europe.' Fortunately, a union of the
two powers did not take place. The one saved Europe from entire
slavery to the other. This long struggle favoured the rise and
growth of independent thought, and, by preventing the realising of a
one-sided and external unity, furthered the cause of a full and free
unity."2 In this war of Investitures the prelates, nobles, and cities
of Italy obeyed some the emperor some the Pope, not from a blind
fear but from choice, according as the political or the religious senti-
ment prevailed. The war was general, but everywhere waged with
the local forces. These contests increased the power and political
importance of the municipalities ', in Italy especially. Every city
armed its militia, which, headed by the magistrates, attacked the
neighbouring nobles or towns of a contrary party. While each city
imagined it was fighting either for the Pope or the emperor, it was
habitually impelled exclusively by its own sentiments ; every town
considered itself, as a whole, as an independent state, which had its
own allies and enemies ; each citizen felt an ardent patriotism for
his own city ; each had its bell for calling the citizens to the par-
liament assembled in the great square ; each city had two consuls
annually elected. Between the years 800 and 1200 A.D., the most
prodigious works had been undertaken and accomplished by the towns
of Italy, as ports, quays, canals, public palaces, and temples, which
are to this day objects of admiration. The Lombard cities, Milan,
Pavia, Verona, Padua, Mantua, &c., leagued to preserve their
liberty, and, after a long struggle, from 1155-1183 A.D., the cities
obtained practical independence. This was one result of the contest
between the Pope and the emperors.
3. — (3) The rise of an order of Burgesses and Citizens, and the
formation of Municipalities through Europe generally, with various
degrees of liberty and self-government. The old Roman munici-
1 Gervinus, "Course of History since Napoleon I.," I2mo., 1853.
2 Flint's "Philosophy of History in Europe," vol. i. p. 58.
S
258 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
palities, though for a while thrown into the shade by the barbarian
rulers of the west, gradually recovered their organisation, exercised
gradually their privileges, and engaged in industries which led to
the accumulation of population and wealth. In FRANCE, Marseilles,
Avignon, Aries, Narbonne, Toulouse, Perigueux, Bourges, and others
enjoyed a measure of self-rule. "All that was elevated in the
Gallo-Roman populations .... was found in the cities j the only
constant residents in the country were the half-servile coloni and
the agricultural slaves. On the contrary, the superior class of the
German population established itself in the country, where each
family, independent and proprietary, was maintained on its own
domain by the labour of its own German Lidi whom it had brought
thither, or by the old Keltic coloni. In the tenth century Gaul had
become France, and the serfs were settled in families paying feudal
duties. The cities influenced the rural districts in the twelfth or
thirteenth centuries either by example or by the contagion of ideas." J
Louis VI. encouraged the establishment of corporate towns, and
assisted them in their resistance to their lords, 1135 A.D. Louis VI I.
pursued a similar policy. St. Louis IX. published a code of laws.
Louis X. (Hutin) gave the franchise to the villeins on the royal
domains, and Philip called the representatives of the cities to seats
in the States-General, 1318 A. D. The first patents of nobility were
granted by Philip le Hardi, 1273 A.D. In ITALY, Genoa, Pisa,
Amalfi, and Venice, Florence, Sienna, and others were practically
free cities at an early period as well as the great Lombard cities.
The invasions of the Huns, Saracens, and Hungarians in the pre-
ceding centuries, 900-1200 A.D., had compelled the cities of Italy
and Germany to surround themselves with walls and other fortifica-
tions. After the death of the Emperor Henry IV., 1106 A.D., the
German cities were generally self-governed and independent, and
the formation of the Hanseatic League in the eleventh century raised
up a new power, which, in the thirteenth century, was upheld by
seventy cities, of which Lubeck was the head. The Franconian
emperors enfranchised the cities 1024-1125 A.D., and freed the
villeins in the thirteenth century. In ENGLAND the cities grew up
after the Norman conquest. Magna Charta, extorted by the barons
from John, recognised the liberties of London and the cities, 1215
A.D. In 1265 A-D-> after the barons' war, Simon de Montfort (1265
A.D.), and after him Edward I. (1295 A.D.), called the cities to return
members to the Parliament. Serfdom was gradually abolished in the
1 Aug. Thierry, "History of the Tiers Etat," vol. i.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D, 259
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. In SPAIN the wars between the
Christian kings and the Mahometans led to the acquisition of peculiar
powers by the cities, which in 1118 A.D. sent deputies to the Cortes.
(4) The predominant influence of the Papacy in Europe. — "The
position of the popes at this moment was most lofty and dignified :
the clergy were completely in their hands By the introduction
of celibacy they transformed the whole body of secular clergy into
a sort of monastic order The popes desired to be the only
bishops of the Church. They interfered without hesitation in the
administration of every diocese." With this Henry IV. charged
Gregory VII. : "Thou hast trampled under foot, as if thy servants,
the governors of the holy Church — namely, the archbishops and
bishops " ; admitting, however, that in this the Pope had public
opinion on his side. " As early as the beginning of the twelfth
century Prior Gerohus ventured to say, ' It will come to pass that the
golden pillars of the monarchy will be utterly shattered, and every
great empire will be divided into tetrarchies. Not till then will the
Church be free and unfettered under the protecting care of the great
crowned priest.' .... Almost the only comprehensive, centralising
power was that possessed by the Pope. The mingled spiritual and
temporal character which life had assumed during that period, the
entire course of events inevitably tended to produce such a power,
and to render him the depositary of it." The events thus referred
to were the conquests of the Christian kingdoms in Spain over the
Mahometans, the success of the Teutonic knights in Prussia, the
taking of Constantinople, and the establishment of a hated power
in the East, the Crusades, the humiliation of John of England, his
accepting his kingdom as a fief from the Pope, &c. &c. The burning
of Arnold of Brescia (who had long resisted papal authority) at
Rome by order of the Emperor Frederick I., 1155 A.D., was another
instance of deference to papal claims. Arnold was orthodox,
ascetic, and unimpeachable in his private character. He appealed
to the Gospel against the wealth of the clergy; the whole feudal
imperial system as well as the pontifical was to be set aside j the
sovereign power, endowed with all the wealth of the clergy and laity,
was to be a popular assembly. These were the dreams of in-
experience, pardonable in the twelfth century, but which are now
and then indulged in by philosophical politicians who believe that
nothing is impossible. In this instance, manifesting the contempt
of the feudal emperor for mere burgesses, and the contempt of a
German for Italians, there was obviously a political mistake. But
it would have been well worth the while of the Teutonic emperors
s 2
260 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
to have made the Romans their allies, and " bridled by their help
the temporal ambition of the Pope. The offer was actually made
by them, first to Conrad III., 1138-1162 A.D., and afterwards to
Frederick I., who repelled in the most contumelious fashion the
envoys of the senate." 1 This mistake of the emperors, in throwing
away the attachment of the Italian cities, threw all the influence
of Lombardy and the cities into the hands of the popes. In-
nocent III., whose reign is the culminating period of the pontifical
power, 1198-1216 A.D., was only thirty-seven years old when elected
to the papal chair. The scope and intent of the scheme of the
papacy, as matured in his mind, was opened out in his consecration
sermon. The Pope is declared to be the viceroy of God, " the suc-
cessor of St. Peter, he that standeth in the midst between God and
man ; somewhat lower than God, but above man ; less than God,
but greater than man."2 Although these claims have no foundation
in Scripture and reason, yet one cannot but admire the supremacy
claimed for mind and religion over brute force. Incidentally, the
papal usurpation was in these ages overruled for good. It checked
greater evils. The practice of INNOCENT III. was in full accordance
with his claims, as in the case of John of England, Baldwin of
Flanders, Philip Augustus of France. It is remarkable that this
Pope never recognised the utility of the great Mendicant orders by
which the papal power was strengthened for two centuries. The
papal power pressed hardly on the sects opposed to the Church of
Rome. The Albigenses in the south of France, a sect holding
sundry Gnostic Oriental notions, and opposed especially to the power
and wealth of the clergy, although protected by Raymond, Count
of Toulouse, were persecuted by the Inquisition 1198 A.D., and
were ruthlessly put down by a crusade against them by the popes,
1208-1228 A.D. So extensive was the heresy in Languedoc that
Levaur, the Inquisitor bishop and papal legate, assured the Pope
that the purification of that province was not to be expected " until
the city of Toulouse was razed to the ground and the citizens put
to the sword."3 The Council of Toulouse enforced a decree of
the fourth .Lateran Council (1215 A.D.) directing the appointment of
sworn men in different parts of the diocese to discover heretics.
This is the formal beginning of the Inquisition (1229 A.D.) under the
pontificate of Pope Gregory IX. It had tribunals at Toulouse and
other places, with power to extort confession by torture. This Pope
died 1241 A.D., aged one hundred years. Equal diligence in the
1 Bryce, pp. 277, 278. 2 Greenwood, vol. v. p. 369. 3 Ibid., vol. v. p. 549.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 261
work of destroying all opposition to the teaching of the Church was
shown in other parts of France. At Rheims, in 1239 A.D., about
one hundred and eighty-three Manicheans were burnt in the presence
of one archbishop, seventeen bishops, and one hundred thousand
people. In Germany the first Inquisitor, a Dominican, detested for
his cruelty, was slain by some nobles, 1233 A.D. Meanwhile the
MENDICANT orders, Dominican and Franciscan, by degrees, through
their labours and genuine regard for practical piety (at that period
of their history), brought back the affection of the people to the
Church. These Albigenses, whose principles were really dangerous
to social order and morality, are not to be confounded with the
Waldenses, called also the Vaudois, a very different party, only re-
sembling the Albigenses in their opposition to the Roman hierarchy.
These WALDENSES originated in a society founded by Peter Waldo,
at Lyons, 1170 A.D., which spread over the south of France, North
Italy, and part of Germany. They professed to take the Bible as
their rule, and were opposed to the doctrinal errors and practices of
the Romish Church. An effort was made to bring them, under the
name of " poor Catholics," under the control of the Church — a proof
of the impression made by them on the public mind ; but this effort
failed. The military orders of knighthood were firm supporters of
the papal authority. Of these the Hospitallers of St. John removed
to Malta 1301 A.D. ; the Teutonic order settled first at Marieden,
then at Venice, and finally in North Germany. The Knights
Templar, founded 1120 A.D., became rich enough to provoke the
cupidity of Philip IV. of France, by whom, with the support of the
Pope, they were plundered and murdered, 1307-1314 A.D. The
nfluence of the papacy was much lessened by the shock given to
the higher feelings of Christian men by the merciless persecution of
the Hohenstaufen family in Italy by the popes. The French prince,
Charles of Anjou (brother of St. Louis), invited by the Pope, as the
opponent of the Hohenstaufens in Naples and Sicily, having de-
feated and taken prisoner Conraddin, the last of that family, a youth
of fifteen, had him publicly beheaded at Naples, 1268 A.D. The
first successful rebellion against the papal power was directed by
Philip le Bel early in the fourteenth century.
4. — (5) The Irruptions of the Mogul Tartars under Ghengis Khan
into Southern and Western Asia and Eastern Europe. — 4. These
Moguls or Tartars (called by the Chinese, Tatsis or the Das),
a pastoral people, resembling the Huns and Avars of the fifth
and sixth centuries, were united, after a war of forty years, by
GHENGIS KHAN, 1206 A. D. A general assembly was held on a wide
262 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
plain in Mongolia, near the stupendous range of the Altai, which was
attended by the Mogul nobles and warriors, many of them the
chiefs of tributary hordes. Seated on a high throne formed of
bucklers and shields covered with the skins of foxes and wolves,
Temudschin presided over the meeting, which had been convened
for the election of the provincial governors and the promulgation of
a new code of laws. The appearance of an old hermit, who stated
that he had seen in a vision the God of heaven, and had heard him
give the empire of the world to Temudschin, and had proclaimed
him king of kings, moved the assembly to proclaim Temudschin, by
the title of Ghengis Khan, as sole ruler, on the principle that, as there
was only one sun in heaven, there should be only one king on earth.
In the opinion of this " scourge of God," the greatest pleasure of
man was "to conquer his enemies, to take from them all they
possess, to see the persons dear to their enemies bathed in tears, to
mount their horses and carry away captive their daughters and their
wives."1 The Monguls, in their original state, practised polygamy,
respected nothing but strength and bravery, took no interest in any-
thing in nature except the growth of the grass, the names given to
their months being descriptive of the different aspects of the prairie ;
their food, the flesh and milk of animals, and their clothing from the
skins of the animals used for food. They were horsemen from their
infancy, and had no infantry in war — hence their rapid movements.
A Chinese contemporary describes their mode of warfare : " When
they wish to take a town, they fall on the suburban villages. Each
leader seizes ten men, and every one of these is forced to carry a
certain quantity of wood, stones, and rubbish, which they use for
the filling up of ditches or the formation of trenches. In the
capture of a town the loss of ten thousand was not regarded. No
place could resist them. After a siege, all the population was
massacred, without distinction of old or young, rich or poor,
beautiful or ugly, those who resisted or those who yielded." Ghengis
Khan first conquered China, Korea, Tibet, India, Turkestan,
Bokhara, and all the petty kingdoms in eastern Asia between the
Tigris and the Indus, which had originated in the division of the
Seljuk empire ; his capital horde was at Karakorum. He died on his
way to complete the conquest of China, 1227 A.D. While engaged
in the conquest of Bokhara, the Mogul hordes came in contact with
THE RUSSIANS, then divided into several distinct kingdoms. The
Polovtsi, their nomad enemies, claimed the help of the Russian
1 " History of Tartary," &c.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 263
princes, and, in spite of the appeal of the Mogul ambassadors, this
was granted. The Russians and Polovtsi were beaten at the Kalka,
a small river flowing into the Sea of Azoph. Six princes and seventy
of the chief boyards were left dead on the field ; hardly a tenth of
the army escaped. The Kievians alone left ten thousand dead.
The Grand Prince of Kief capitulated, but his guard were massacred,
and he and his two sons-in-law were stifled under planks, the Tartars
holding a festival over the inanimate bodies, 1224 A.D. In 1237 A.D. ,
Bati invaded central Russia, conquering in his way the Bulgars,
then the princes of Riazan, nearly all of whom fell in battle ; then
the Grand Principality with Moscow, 1238 A.D., and so on for
several years. Bati had an army of 500,000 Turks and Slavs,
besides 160,000 Moguls : the tortures they inflicted are too horrible
to relate. In many parts of Russia they left only one man in fifty
of the population. In the province of Kief 60,000 men, besides
women and children, were destroyed, 1240 A.D. The horrors of this
invasion — all the towns burnt, prisoners massacred, princes as well
as people, churches and places of refuge burnt with all their inmates ;
on one occasion a young prince, a child, was " drowned in blood,"
to revenge the resistance of his people. Hundreds of thousands
were carried captive ; ladies of rank, once adorned with rich garnets
and jewels of gold, reduced to slavery, turning the wheel of the mill
and preparing the coarse food of their masters. The cause of this
great calamity to Russia was the division among the princes ; the
armed population was confined to the princes and the citizens ; the
peasantry, the bulk of the population, were unarmed, while the Moguls
were all soldiers, and Bati had with him 500,000, all cavalry. In
addition, the Moguls carried with them "figures of dragons which
spat fire and vomited an intolerable smoke." POLAND was next
invaded. Miceslaw, the Duke of Upper Silesia, with the Polish
Duke of Bolesland, and multitudes of men, women, and children
fled before them. Breslau was burnt. Henry the Pious, with his
handful of Germans and a few Hospitallers and Poles (30,000),
resisted the Moguls (150,000) at Leignitz for two days. Henry was
killed. The Moguls filled nine sacks with the ears of the Christians ;
but, notwithstanding the victory they had gained, they had learned
to shun " the land of the ironclad men," and, after vainly besieging
Leignitz and Goldberg, they turned southwards. Meanwhile, the
German princes and bishops had assembled at Merseburg, and had
resolved upon a general summons to the field. In Saxony, men,
women, old men, and children, had taken up the sign of the cross,
The Pope had summoned Christendom to arms. Frederick II., the
264 From the Cmsades, 1096 A.D., to the
emperor, wrote to the sovereigns of the west, " This is the moment
to open the eyes of body and soul, now that the brave princes on
whom we reckoned are dead or in slavery." These barbarians,
bearing the head of Henry the Pious and others, crowded the
mountains up to Moravia, and besieged Olmutz, which was despe-
rately and successfully defended by the Bohemians and Moravians.
Besides the fortified cities and the ironclad men, the Moguls feared to
fight in a broken, hilly country, so they ravaged Hungary for three
years on both sides of the Danube, hunting up the fugitives hid
in the woods from their hiding-places, and then murdering them.
All the towns were burnt. Three hundred women of the highest
nobility, who had escaped the general massacre, were executed in
the presence of the Tartar chief.1 Their retreat homeward was
hastened by the news of the death of Oktai, the second emperor of
the Moguls in China. Bati established " the Golden Horde " as
the Khan of Kipshack, from the Caspian to the mouth of the
Danube, absorbing the ancient Patzineks and Polovtsi, and exacting
tribute from the Russian princes. The last of the khalifs of Bagdad
was put to death by Huluku, 1258 A.D., being trod to death by the
horses of the Moguls. This was the last of the Abassides in Bagdad,
but the office was perpetuated for three centuries longer in the house
of Abbas in Egypt. Bagdad was plundered for forty days, and
200,000 people massacred, 1260 A.D. In attempting to conquer
Syria, though they took Aleppo and Damascus and entered Palestine,
they were defeated by the Mameluke Sultan of Egypt, and their
power, crushed in due time, ceased to exist as a terror to Europe or
southern Asia. In consequence of the terror excited in Europe by
the advance of the Moguls, the price of herrings was reduced to a
nominal amount, as the vessels of Gothia and Frizia were not sent
to purchase the usual supplies from the English fisheries. Singular
that barbarians from the frontiers of China, the extreme East,
should influence, by the terror of their name, the markets of the
extreme West. By the Mogul invasion, and continued control
maintained over Russia by the Moguls, the semi-barbarous power
of Russia was kept from exercising any action upon its western
neighbours for about two centuries and a half, until 1481 A.D. Had
the power of Russia been concentrated under one ruler while its
neighbours were comparatively weak and divided, the balance of
power in the East of Europe might have been disturbed, and the
territory of Russia might have been extended not only over Poland,
1 See " Letter of the Emperor " in Greenwood.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 265
but over Hungary and western Germany, to the great injury of
European freedom and civilisation.
(6) The leading Nations during this Period. — Scandinavian
nations : — Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, which in this period
were brought into a somewhat nearer connexion with Europe.
Nonvay. — Magnus II. succeeded Harold Hardrada, 1066 A.D.,
and was followed by Magnus III., whose successor, 1069 A.D., was
Olaf III., the Pacific, who did much to promote civilisation in Nor-
way. He made Bergen a commercial emporium, founded several
guilds or fraternities of the traders and artisans, and introduced glass
windows and chimneys. And besides this he promoted and pressed
the liberty of the serfs, directing that in every district (fylke) one
bondsman was to be set free annually. Magnus ill. (the Barefoot)
invaded the Isle of Man, and was killed in Ireland, 1103 A.D.
Sigurd, before he became king, had carried out a remarkable ex-
pedition into the Mediterranean, 1107-1 in A.D. He sailed with
sixty ships and a large number of followers, wintered in England,
where he was entertained by Henry I., reached Spain in the sum-
mer, destroyed sundry fleets of Saracen pirates, and took and
plundered Cintra, Lisbon, and Alcazer (Saracen cities), visited the
Normans in Sicily (under Count Roger), then to Jerusalem and the
Jordan as a pilgrim, and afterwards assisted at the siege of Sidon by
the King of Jerusalem. Returning by way of Constantinople,
ii 1 1 A.D., he was kindly received by Alexis Comnenus, and passed
through Bulgaria and Hungary to Suabia, where he was entertained
by the Emperor Lothaire, and so through Denmark to Norway. He
reigned from 1122 to 1130 A.D. A period of civil dissensions fol-
lowed for nearly a century. The first Storthing was held 1223 A.D.,
composed of the bishops, and barons, and the great landholders.
Iceland and Greenland were annexed 1261, 1262 A. D. Hako IV.
(1251-1262 A.D.) made himself respected and feared. He was
defeated at Largs by Alexander III. of Scotland, 1261 A.D., and
died in the Orkneys, 1262 A.D. Magnus VI., son of Hako IV.,
ceded the Hebrides (but not the Orkneys) to Scotland, 1263-6 A.D.
The allodial proprietors about this time became vassals, and the old
jarls took the titles of dukes, barons, &c., but the people were free
and armed. Magnus was called Lagabeter (law-mender), 1263 A-D-;
he died 1280 A.D. In 1273 A.D. it was enacted at Bergen that no
laws should be enacted except by the Storthing.
5. Sweden. — Karl Sverkerson, of the Bonder class, established the
Sverker line, and reigned 1135-55 A-D- Erick the Saint endeavoured
to improve the religious condition of the people. He was called " the
266 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
Lawgiver," on account of his law that " every wife should have equal
power with her husband over locks, bolts, and bars, and that she
should enjoy one-third of his substance when a widow ; a compact
made that Charles Sverkerson should succeed Erick, and their
children should succeed alternately." The Finns were conquered in
his reign, 1137 A.D. Charles Swecker, 1161-1167 A.D., united
Gothland to Sweden, and was the first king of the united Swedes
and Goths. The last of the Border dynasty was Erick III., who
died 1250 A.D. Waldemar, a child, son of Birger Jahl, of the
Folkungar family, under the regent, his father, began the Folkungar
line. Birger built Stockholm, and destroyed the rival Folkungar
family. His dominion included Bothnia and Carelia. He fortified
Wyburg, warred with the Esthonians, more or less, to repel their
ravages. In 1260 A.D. the diet of nobles and clergy decreed that
no taxes should be levied without their consent. In 1279 A.D.
Magnus Ladulas succeeded as king of Gothia and Sweden.
Female heirship and hereditary nobility were introduced in his reign.
He caused the seditious race of the Folkungars (his own party) to
be destroyed, and governed with a strong hand. His surname,
Ladulas, was very honourable to him. It arose from the law made
by him to correct the practice of the nobles, &c., claiming free
quarters. He compelled them to pay for their corn, &c., which
they and their cattle consumed when travelling.
Denmark. — There was a double election, 1147-1157 A.D., after
which Waldemar I., the Great, began to reign. In 1169 A.D., he
took and destroyed Arcona, in the Isle of Rugen, a powerful for-
tress held by the pirates, and in 1170 A.D. finally destroyed the
famous stronghold and city of Jomsburg, the piratical capital,
placed on an island at the mouth of the Oder. It had been
destroyed before, by Canute, 1019 A.D., and by Magnus, 1044 A.D.
It never recovered this destruction, but sank into the petty town of
Wollin. Waldemar also reconstructed the old Dannewarke wall
across Jutland. He also made large conquests in Mecklenburg and
Pomerania; founded Dantzig 1165 A.D. Canute VI. conquered
Pomerania, Holstein, and Gothonia, 1182-1202 A.D.; but these con-
quests were not permanent. Waldemar II. colonised Esthonia, &c.,
1202-1241 A.D. Feudal institutions were introduced into Denmark
in the twelfth century, but the cities sent representatives to the par-
liament under King Abel, 1250-1252 A.D., and the deputies of the
peasantry, 1280 A.D., in lieu of the personal attendance of
the armed peasantry. In 1241 A.D. Waldemar II. laid before
the " Thing " of Jutland, at Viborg, and before the Zealand "Thing,"
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 267
in Wordingborg, the general laws of the whole monarchy, as supple-
mentary to provincial customs. The provincial diets were superseded
by a national diet, the " Danehof." A national diet was directed to
be held annually at Nyborg, in judicial matters each province and
city to act independently. King Abel was killed by the Frieslanders
in 1252 A.D. He founded Stralsund and Revel, 1200-1222 A.D.,
but his conquests were lost by his captivity for three years by the
court of Schwerin.
The British Islands. — ENGLAND, ruled by the ducal Norman line
until 1154 A.D., when the Plantagenet, Henry II., ruled over Eng-
land and part of France. This king began the conquest of IRELAND
1167 A.D., which, from the eighth century, had fallen into barbarism
under brutal tribal disorganisations, though nominally divided into
four kingdoms. The island was granted by Pope Hadrian to Henry.
The struggle of this king with Thomas-a-Becket (Archbishop of
Canterbury) in the matter of Church privileges, which had been
limited by the Constitution of Clarendon, 1164 A.D. ; the murder
of Becketj his canonisation, and the penance done by the king, are
important facts in the history of this reign. John, who reigned after
Richard the Crusader, was compelled by his barons to grant Magnet
Charta, 1214 A.D.; for which the Archbishop Langton and the
barons were condemned by the Pope as having interfered with the
rights of the Church, John having yielded the suzerainty of the
kingdom to the legate of the Pope. Under Henry III. the barons,
headed by Simon de Montfort, obtained for a brief period the pre-
dominance, and procured the admission of the representatives of
the cities into parliament, 1258-1265 A.D. WALES was annexed to
England between 1265-1284 A.D., a step necessary for the peace of
the west of England, and desirable as a step towards the civilisation
of Wales. Edward I. returned from the Crusades 1273 A.D., and
was led, through the dispute as to the succession of the last king,
Kenneth, to interfere in the affairs of Scotland.
6. Germany. — Henry V., a bad son but able emperor, the last of the
Salic line, died 1125 A.D. Lothaire III., Duke of Saxony, was elected,
and agreed that the Church should enjoy the right of appointing its
own officers, and that the investiture of bishops should follow their
consecration. He also did homage to the Pope for the lands of
Matilda, Duchess of Tuscany. The Slavi of the north of Germany
were gradually absorbed by German rulers, the founders of duke-
doms and marquisates. Conrad III., Duke of Franconia, the
first of the Hohenstauf en family , succeeded, 1138 A.D. The party
designation of the terms Guelf (Welf) and Ghibelline (Waiblinger)
268 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
arose at the siege of Weinsberg, 1141 A.D., the Guelphs indicating
the party of the Pope, the Ghibellines that of the emperor. Conrad,
after his return from the Crusades, died 1152 A.D. He introduced
the double eagle into the arms of the empire. Frederick Barbarossa
succeeded. His five campaigns in Italy, 1154 to 1178 A.D., ended
in the practical independence of the Lombard city-republics. In his
first campaign he delivered Pope Adrian IV. from the patriot Arnold
of Brescia, who had established a republic in Rome, and whom he
put to death 1155 A.D. After his sixth visit into Italy, he caused
his son Henry to marry Constance, the heiress of Roger II., king of
Apulia (Naples) and Sicily, and died in the Crusade in the river
Calycadnos, 1190 A.D. Henry VI., his son, inherited his father's
energy, but without his nobler qualities. In asserting his claim to
Naples and Sicily, he acted with the most revolting cruelty. Great
disorders ensued, from 1198 to 1218 A.D., in the rivalries of opposing
claimants of the empire. By two pragmatic sanctions, 1220 and
1232 A.D., the nobles and bishops of the empire gained legal
sovereignty over their towns and domains. Frederick //., Bar-
barossa, son of Henry VI., returned from the Crusades 1228 A.D.
His wars in Italy with the Lombard cities, led to his excommunica-
tion by the Pope and the opposition of a rival emperor. He
died 1250 A.D. The enmity of the Pope to Frederick II. and to
the Hohenstaufen family arose mainly from their having united
Naples and Sicily to the empire, by which Italy and the popedom
were in fact placed under the power of the emperor. Frederick II.,
Barbarossa, was a remarkable man, and was called "the wonder
of the world " : learned beyond his age, liberal, or perhaps in-
different or sceptical in his religious views, but quite willing when
on friendly terms with the Pope to persecute all heretics and
schismatics. " He founded nothing, and he sowed the seeds ot
the destruction of many things." Freeman says that " he was the
last real emperor."1 Conrad IV., his son, was driven from Ger-
many to Apulia, and died 1254 A.D., leaving an infant son, Con-
raddin. William, the rival emperor, was killed in a war with the
Frieslanders, 1256 A.D. In these wars of the Hohenstaufens the
grand duchies of Franconia and Suabia were broken up, and
divided among smaller princes. After this, a period of anarchy,
called the "grand interregnum," until the election of Rudolf of
Hapsburg. Some changes had meanwhile been made in the German
principalities by the Hohenstaufen emperor. BAVARIA and SAXONY
1 Freeman, " Essays," first series, p. 306.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 269
had been taken from the Guelph, Henry the Lion, 1180 A.D. Bavaria
(deprived of Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, and the Tyrol) was given
to the Willelbachs, who, in 1215 A.D., obtained the Palatinate of
the Rhine by marriage. SAXONY was given to the Ascanian line,
but confined to a small district, of which Wittenberg was the
capital. POMERANIA, MECKLENBURG, HOLSTEIN, WESTPHALIA were
independent under their several princes. The Archbishop of Cologne
received part of Westphalia. The DUCHY of Saxony given to Otho,
1235 A.D., by Frederick II. : hence the house of BRUNSWICK. On
the fall of the Hohenstaufen, SUABIA and FRANCONIA were broken
up, 1268 A.D., and many cities were made free imperial cities.
Baden, Wurtemberg, Hohenzollern, Fiirstenberg became separate
principalities. On the death of the last landgrave of Thuringia,
1247 A. D., great disputes arose respecting the succession; but, in
1264 A.D., THURINGIA was given to the House of Misnia, and HESSE
to Henry of Brabant : hence the House of Hesse. Two nominal
emperors, Richard of Cornwall, who visited Germany four times,
and died 1272 A.D.; Alphonzo of Spain, who never made his
appearance, was set aside by the electors. At length, through
the influence of the Archbishop of Mainz, 1273 A.D., RUDOLPH OF
HAPSBURG was chosen emperor. At this time the emperors had
become pratically the tools of a princely aristocracy consisting of
six prince-archbishops, thirty-five prince-bishops, besides abbots and
abbesses, and the dukes, princes, counts, &c., who held lands under
the empire. Nearly half the land was held by ecclesiastics, doing,
however, military service for that land, and charged with the adminis-
tration of justice to their vassals. These princes, by whom Germany
was governed in the anarchy which preceded the election of Rudolf
of Hapsburg, were as indifferent to the well-being of the empire as
they were careful in the increase of their own territories and privileges.
They usurped the power and prerogatives of the emperor, in order
to place themselves in a position independent of all law, and by the
help of their feudal vassals, a numerous and strong force, and by the
clergy, laboured to crush civil liberty by a disastrous war with the
cities, in which they were supported by the popes. The people in
the cities, and the small knights holding lands direct from the
empire lamented this internal anarchy, and demanded the election
of an emperor. Meanwhile every petty noble exercised sovereignty,
exacted tolls, plundered travellers ; so also the robber knights on the
Rhine and elsewhere.1 The cities, sensible of their inability to resist
1 Menzel, vol. ii. pp. 24-71.
270 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
individually, formed defensive and offensive leagues — (i) the
Hanseatic League, already mentioned; (2) the Rhenish League, 1254-
1270 A.D., formed against the nobles and robber knights; (3) the
Suabian League of cities followed a little later, and co-operated with
the Rhenish League. The power of the popes and of the Church was
maintained in Germany by the archbishopricks and the large num-
ber of richly-endowed bishopricks. Monasteries and nunneries
rapidly multiplied. Three archbishops, Mayence, Cologne, Treves,
had anciently a precedence in the elections of the emperor. Four
temporal princes united with them as electors; and these seven
claimed the exclusive right of election in the fourteenth centnry — i.e.,
the three archbishops, the Rhenish Palatine, the Duke of Saxon-
Wittenberg, the Margrave of Brandenburg, the King of Bohemia.
Into the diet of the empire, other nobles and bishops, with the repre-
sentatives of the cities, soon forced themselves. There was some
check on the anarchy of these time times by the VEHM-GERICHT, a
secret tribunal which was formed under Engelbert, the regent of the
empire, the utility of which was so generally admitted that in the
fourteenth century it counted already 100,000 members. Its
decisions were at once carried out, to the great terror of the criminals,
and the advantage of society at large. The free peasantry in Suabia
and Saxony, in the Alps, the Tyrol, Wiirtemberg, Friesland, Dit-
marsh, in their several communes, retained for a long time their
liberties, and in Switzerland and Friesland were able to secure them.
But the misery of the peasantry, even when at the sole mercy of
their lords, was by no means so great in the middle ages as it became
after the great Peasant War of 1525 A.D. Such was the con-
dition of Germany when Rudolph was elected emperor in 1273 A.D.
In connexion with Germany were — BOHEMIA, which had become,
under Wratislaus, a kingdom, 1086 A.D., under Ottocar assumed a
high position until humbled by Rudolf of Hapsburg, 1275 A.D.
HUNGARY became a kingdom under Stephen, 1000 A.D. It was
engaged in struggles with Venice for Croatia and Dalmatia, 1085-
1117 A.D., and its kings aimed at the conquest of Bosnia and Bul-
garia. Colonies of Flemings and Saxons were settled in Hungary
and Transylvania, 1114 to 1140 AD. The kings of Hungary exer-
cised great influence over Bulgaria, Servia, and the west of Russia ;
but, by the invasion of the Moguls, all the cities were destroyed
except three, and the populations greatly reduced. POLAND, which
became a kingdom under Boleslaus, 1067-1077 A.D., also suffered
from dissensions of the kingdom, and yet more greatly from the
Moguls. LIVONIA, 1125 A.D., and ESTHONIA, 1220 A.D., were con-
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A. D. 271
quered and colonised by the DANES, assisted by an order of Sword-
bearers in Livonia, 1198-1202 A.D. Riga, founded by the Danes,
1200 A.D. LITHUANIA, which had remained under its native rulers,
began to assume an important position under Ryngold, its first grand-
duke, 1220-1235 A.D. The Teutonic knights were invited by Conrad,
the regent of Poland, 1231 A. D., as a bulwark against the barbarian
Prussians. These knights, with their coadjutors, the Brothers oj
the Sword, 1237 A.D., reduced PRUSSIA to subjection. They held
the land as a fief of Poland. By the destruction of the Kumans and
other barbarous tribes on the Black Sea and the Danube, by the
Mongolian hordes, the MOLDAVIANS and the WALLACHIANS became
independent states. RUSSIA, divided into several independent duke-
doms at war with each other, was unable to resist successfully the
Moguls, by whom the country was fearfully ravaged. The dukes
were reserved as tributaries and vassals of the khans of Kipshak, a
branch of the Mongol empire, 1224-1238 A.D.
7. FRANCE, under its kings, was, during this period, necessarily
engaged in wars to resist the encroachments of its powerful feudal
vassal, the King of England. Louis VI. (the Fat), one of the best
of the French kings, aimed to lessen the power of the nobles by
the gradual abolition of serfdom, and by enfranchising the cities,
1108-1137 A.D., being assisted in these efforts by the Abbot Suger,
his faithful prime minister. Louis VII. (1137-1181 A.D.), by
divorcing his wife, Eleanor, on his return from the Crusades, threw
the whole of western France into the hands of her second husband,
Henry II. of England. Philip II. (Augustus), 1180-1233 A.D., far
exceeded his predecessors, and most of his successors in ability.
He humbled John of England. In his reign the Albigenses in the
south of France, a powerful sect opposed to the Church of Rome,
were mercilessly destroyed by " the Crusaders," called out by Pope
Innocent III. and commanded by Simon de Montfort. Under
Louis VIII. (1223-1226) the Crusaders had fully accomplished their
work. The good ST. Louis IX. (1226-1270) reigned at first under
the regency of his mother, made peace with England, and restored
Guyenne to Henry III. He was unfortunate in his crusade in
Egypt, and died in the expedition against Tunis. Voltaire remarks
of him, " It is not given to man to carry virtue to a higher point."
He was canonised by Pope Boniface VIII. in 1297 A.D. To
St. Louis the conduct of his brother, Charles of Arragon, in
accepting the crown of the Two Sicilies from Pope Urban IV., and
his further conduct in the murder of Conraddin, was highly offensive.
Philip III. (le Hardi), 1271-1285 A.D., succeeded. He withdrew
272 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
from Tunis. His reign began by the interment of five of the royal
family, who had died in the expedition against Tunis. PHILIP IV.
(LE BEL), 1285 A.D., was married to the heiress of Navarre. He was
an able, but cruel, vindictive, and rapacious ruler, who greatly
extended the royal authority, by humbling the great vassals, and
raising the middle classes. His reign is, therefore, a most important
one. The Parkment of Paris became under him the recognised
court of the supreme administration, and the States- General were
convoked in three orders — the nobles, the clergy, and the represen-
tatives of the people, 1302 A.D. There had obviously been a great
material improvement in France in the preceding, and in this, the
thirteenth, century. A clearance of forests and wastes had been
effected ; the old cities grew in population and importance ; new
cities arose, and were peopled by families escaped from serfdom.
The reign of Philip (le Bel} is also remarkable for the first successful
blow at the papal power. It was he who began the overthow of the
mighty system of Hildebrand in the beginning of the fourteenth
century.
THE SPANISH PENINSULA (Spain). — The Christian kingdoms of
ARRAGON and NAVARRE were separated, H34A.D. Navarre was
absorbed by France, 1274 A.D., but Catalonia remained with Arragon.
In this kingdom the popular power made large advances. Citizen
deputies attended the Cortes, 1150 A. D. A new code of laws was
promulgated, 1247 A.D. ; while the barons, on their part, claimed a
legal right to resist the king, 1284 A.D., if, in their opinion, his
conduct was faulty, and this right was not formally repealed till
1346 A.D. LEON and CASTILE were divided, 1157 A.D., until 1233 A.D.,
when they were again reunited. A new kingdom, afterwards called
PORTUGAL, was wrested from the Moors by Henry, a prince of
Burgundy, who had received from his father-in-law, Alphonso VI. of
Castile, a grant of the territory between the Minho and Douro,
1095 A-D- ) his capital was Coimba. Alphonso I., his son, after the
Battle of Ourique, 1139 A.D., assumed the title of king, agreed to
pay tribute to the Pope, and took possession of Lisbon. The
Mahometans in Spain suffered a serious defeat from the kings of
Arragon and Castile at Tolosa, 1212 A.D., and gradually receded,
notwithstanding the help they received from the Almoravides of
Morocco. The Algarves, taken from the Mahometans, were
added to Portugal, 1253 A.D., by Alphonso III.
ITALY. — The wars arising out of the disputes between the emperors
and the popes respecting investitures enabled the northern cities to
assume a practical independence after 1183 A.D. The wars of these
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 273
cities with each other cannot be detailed here. Most of the
seignories, earldoms, and marquisates of Lombardy were conquered
and absorbed by the cities in this period. Pisa and Genoa, Florence
and Pistoia, Milan and Pavia, Venice, with all her varied enterprises,
were often at war, and more or less entangled in the feuds of the
Guelphs (on the Pope's side), or in those of the Ghibellines (for
the emperor). Rome, with a nominal municipality, was completely
in the hands of the Pope since the time of Innocent I. The
Norman conquerors of Naples took possession of the free cities of
Naples, Gaeta, Amalfi, and Bari. The Duchy of Benevento was
broken up by them, 1017-1034 A.D. Robert Guiscard conquered
Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily, 1060 A.D. Roger II. united Naples
and Sicily, 1131 A.D. The Emperor Henry VI. , by his marriage
with the heiress of Naples, united that kingdom to the empire,
1191 A.D. Great hopes were entertained of this emperor, but his
atrocious cruelties ruined the Ghibelline cause in Italy. He died,
1196 A,D. The popes, jealous of the increased power over Italy
which accrued to the emperors from the possession of Naples, soon
raised up a rival able to compete with the House of Hohenstaufen.
Urban IV., 1264 A.D., and Clement IV., 1266 A.D., induced Charles
of Anjou, brother of St. Louis of France, to take possession of
Naples, 1266 A.D. Conraddin, a boy of fifteen years of age, son of
the Emperor Conrad IV., attempted to recover his inheritance, but
was defeated, taken prisoner, and executed publicly in the market-
place of Naples, 1265 A.D. This barbarous murder of a youth, the
last of a renowned race, lowered the character of the popedom.
On the scaffold Conraddin bequeathed his claims to Peter III. of
Arragon ; but, meanwhile, Naples and Sicily were governed by
Charles of Anjou. This wretch, seventeen years afterwards, died by
his own hand at Fciggia, his fleets destroyed and his eldest son a
prisoner in Spain. Venice, — having acquired Dalmatia and Croatia,
established the singular ceremony of the marriage of the Doge with
the Adriatic, which was first celebrated, 1177 A.D., — took part in
the Crusades, and in 1202 A.D., after the conquest of Constantinople
by the Crusaders, acquired a fourth part of the Eastern Empire.
In 1297 A.D., the Grand Council closed, changed to active aris-
tocracy, hence the Council of Ten. The Venetians obtained
Albania, Greece, and the Morea, also the islands of Corfu, Cepha-
lonia, and Crete. Genoa, like the rest of the republics, chose a
Podesta, 1190 A.D., then a Captain of the People, 1257 A.D. Italy
monopolised the trade with the Levant and also up the Black Sea.
Caffa and Azoph belonged to Genoa. Smyrna, suburbs of Pera and
274 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
Galata, Scio, Mitylene, and Tenedos, were also ceded to Genoa. Pisa
was its chief rival, with which it had a war of two hundred years,
ending in 1290 A.D., after the Genoese had conquered Elba, and
destroyed the ports of Pisa and Leghorn. SAVOY, a marquisate in
the north-west, increasing its power gradually.
8. The EASTERN BYZANTINE EMPIRE declined rapidly after the
accession of the Comneni, 1057 A.D. In 1081 A.D., a rebellion of
the army placed Alexius I. on the throne, when the city of Constan-
tinople was sacked by his army and plundered. He acted cautiously
towards the Crusaders, and profited by their victories over the
Seljuk Sultan of Roum (Iconium). His life has been written by
his favourite daughter, Anna Comnena. Andronicus, the last of this
dynasty, was cruelly murdered, 1185 A.D. Isaac Angelus, the
successor of Andronicus, paid tribute to the Seljuk Sultan ot
Iconium. A new Wallachian, or rather a second Bulgarian, kingdom
was formed by a rebellion caused by additional taxation, 1186 A.D,
The Crusaders of the Fifth Crusade restored Isaac Angelus, who
had been deposed by his brother, 1202 A.D. His son, Alexis,
failing to repay these services, the Crusaders took possession
of Constantinople. By so doing, and by the division of the re-
maining territory of the Eastern Empire, they thus broke down
the barrier which that empire presented against the Turks, and
prepared the way for the rise of the Ottoman Turkish power. A
(so-called) LATIN EMPIRE at Constantinople was established
Baldwin, Count of Flanders, on the throne with one-fourth of the
former empire, as already related. The Greek Empire of JVicea,
which was founded by the old Greeks, united with the other
kingdoms of Thessalonia, 1255 A.D., and recovered Constantinople,
1261 A.D. ; so that there remained two Greek Empires, Constan-
tinople under the Palseologi, and Trebizond under another emperor.
THE EMPIRE OF THE SELJUK TURKS, with all its kingdoms, had
been absorbed by the Monguls under the successors of Ghengis
Khan. Only one remained, that of Iconium or Roum, which
lingered on till the beginning of the fourteenth century. Upon its
ruins the petty chiefs of the race were afterwards united under the
energetic rulers of the Ottoman Turks.
THE MONGUL STATES were (i) the Khanate of Kipshack, which
extended north of the Caspian and the Black Sea and inland over
southern and central Russia, and to this Khanate the Russian princes
were vassals; (2) Zagetai from Balk to the north-west; (3) Persia
under the Ilkanian Dynasty,
INDIA. The Ghizniste Dynasty of Lahore yielded, in 1153 A.D.,
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 275
to the Gorians, which, in its turn, was broken again, 1206 A.D. It
was succeeded at Delhi by Khulub-uddin, the slave king, who
conquered Bengal. The Mongolian hordes, though they troubled
India, made there no permanent conquest.
CHINA was, by degrees, conquered by the sons of Ghengis Khan,
Oktai, and the Cublai Khan, 1280 A.D., whose authority was acknow-
ledged "from the Frozen Sea almost to the Straits of Malacca."
Marco Polo visited China in his reign.
JAPAN disturbed by civil wars of the great nobles from 1156 A.D.
EGYPT. The Fatemite Dynasty ended 1171 A.D., when Saladin
the Great founded the Eyobite Dynasty ; he defeated the Christian
princes of Palestine at Hitten, near Tiberias, 1187 A.D., and took
Jerusalem. This was succeeded by the Baharite Dynasty of
Mamelukes, 1250 A.D. All the Fatemites expelled from Syria by
1291 A.D.
NORTH AFRICA. The Almohades in about 1150 A.D. succeeded
the Almoravides. The Merin Dynasty supplanted the Almohades,
1258 A.D., in Fez and Morocco. The Dynasty of Xeriffs established
1520 A.D. The travels of the Jew, Benjamin of Tudela, 1160 A.D.,
contributed very little to the geographical knowledge of the age.
9. THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY of this period has been partly
anticipated in the remarks on the contest between the popes and the
emperors respecting investitures, and also by those on the pre-
dominant influence of the papacy in Europe. St. Bernard, of Clair-
vaux, was the master-spirit of the Church, and, to some extent, of
the sovereigns of Western Europe from 1113-1153 A.D. He was
the great reformer of the monastic orders, with which his sympathies
were identified, from the fact of his having founded one hundred and
sixty of these institutions. In the Council of the Lateran, held by
Pope Innocent III. (1215 A.D.), the doctrine of transubstantiation
was declared to be that of the Church, and that auricular confession
to a priest was absolutely necessary, at least once in the year.
Furious decrees against the Albigenses, a large body of heretics in
the south of France, were passed. In order to combat these
heresies, the Mendicant orders were established as preachers, by
whose zeal and activity the popular feeling against the Church
was checked, 1210-1213 A-D- These were the Dominicans, the
Franciscans, the Carmelites, &c., all of them Mendicant orders.
But, in addition, the power of the sword was called in by Pope
Innocent III., and by Simon de Montfort the Albigenses of
Toulouse, &c., were mercilessly massacred, 1223-1226 A.D. As a
specimen of the hatred of the Church system by certain scholars,
T 2
276 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D.> to the
we may refer to two works in circulation: (i) "An Introduction to
the Eternal Gospel," written by a supposed orthodox Abbot Ivaichius.
It was full of blasphemous ravings, and was condemned by Pope
Alexander IV., 1254-1261 A.D. (2) "The Book of the Three
Impostors," which first appeared in the age of the Hohenstaufen,
1154-1250 A.D. So also "The Commentary on the Apocrypha," by
J. P. Oliva, 1259 A.D., a visionary. A formal reconciliation of the
Greek Church with the Roman was agreed to at a Council held at
.Lyons, 1274 A.D., but it was set aside by the Greek Emperor
Andronicus. There was obviously a growing inclination and pre-
paration for a rebellion against the papal authority. In permitting,
in the thirteenth century, indulgences (for remittance of penances
imposed by the Church) to be sold for money, a way was opened
for great and scandalous moral evils, necessarily connected with a
system by which the Church so greatly profited pecuniarily. Hence
thoughtful men were led to doubt the divine foundation of Church
authority. Some attempts were made in the missionary work of
the Church in the eleventh century. The Nestorians had suc-
ceeded in establishing missions in Tartary. They had bishops in
Kashgar (Turkestan) in connexion with the Nestorian patriarch of
Chaldea.
10. THE LITERARY HISTORY OF THIS PERIOD is marked by the
growth of the modern European languages in England, in France,
in Spain, and Portugal and Italy. The Castilian (Spanish) dates
from 1150 A.D.; the Portuguese and Italian, from 1206 A.D. In
Germany the old national songs were in existence before 1170, and
the Niebelunger lived about 1200 A.D. ; the Meistersingers, 1270
A.D. Latin remained as the language of the Church^ of literature,
and philosophy. An increased desire for learning was manifested
in the eleventh and twelfth centuries ; the universities increased in
number. Paris was called the new Athens 1150 A.D. Endowments
for learning became frequent. Toulouse, Montpellier, Pisa, Sala-
manca, Lisbon, Oxford, and Cambridge, were well supplied with
students. So also, Angers, Montpellier, and Salerno were celebrated
for legal studies ; Bologna for canon law, where Gratian published
his decretals, and died 1150 A.D. ; and lastly, the College of the
Sorbonne at Paris, founded 1251-1253. The Mendicant orders were
particularly active in these educational centres, 1224-1249 A.D.
Friar Roger Bacon was one of them, and wrote his " Opus Majus,"
1267 A.D. ; a work "strangely compounded of almost prophetic
gleams of the future of science, and the best principles of the
inductive philosophy, with a more than usual credulity in the super-
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 277
stitions of his own time." 1 He had paid much attention to natural
science, especially optics, and was acquainted with the explosive
power of gunpowder (already known by the Chinese, Tartars, and
Saracens). Towards the end of the thirteenth century the art of
reading and writing had become common among the higher classes,
though Philip the Bold, King of France, 1272 A.D., could not write.
The great writers were in this period chiefly THEOLOGIANS and
PHILOSOPHERS, generally combining the two. The study of ROMAN
LAW was promoted by Irnerius at Bologna, 1100-1126 A.D. ; the
Canon Law by Gratian, 1150 A.D. The first of a new school of
theologians, the founders, in fact, of the scholastic theology, were
Roscelin, 1090-1100 A.D., and Peter Abelard, 1079-1102 A.D. The
great orthodox theologians were first Peter Lombard, aptly termed
by Milman (vi. 457) the Euclid of his school; his great work, "the
Sentences," was the standard for many years, 1159-1162 A.D. ; then
THOMAS AQUINAS, 1240-1274, A.D., who, by his "Summa Theo-
logiae " fixed the theological status of the day, until then mainly
confined to St. Augustine. In the " Summa " is found the final result
of all that has been decided by popes or councils ; all that was
taught by the Fathers or accepted from traditions, or argued
in the schools, or inculcated in the confessional — it is the authorita-
tive, authentic, acknowledged code of Latin Christianity.2 John
of Salisbury, 1181 A.D.; Peter of Cluny, 1156 A.D.; Robert Pullen,
1150 A.D., were all able and popular theologians in their day.
A remarkable scholar, Albert the Great, of Cologne, 1222-1280
A.D., left twenty-one volumes of theology and general literature, the
"Encyclopaedia of the Middle Ages." "He awed his age by his
immense erudition .... his name, 'the universal doctor,' was
the homage of his all-embracing knowledge .... of his enormous
assemblage of the opinions of the philosophers of all ages ; and his
efforts to harmonise them with Christian theology is a kind of eclec-
ticism— an unreconciled realism, conceptualism, and nominalism,
with many of the difficulties of each."3 At the beginning of the
thirteenth century all the works of Aristotle began to be translated;
before this, his logic alone had been in the possession of the schools.
Stephen Langton, the patriotic Archbishop of Canterbury, 1206-28,
and Robert Grostete, Bishop of Lincoln, deserve to be remembered.
Raymond Martin (Bishop of Barcelona) in the thirteenth century, is
remarkable for his Hebrew and Arabic learning. The Historians are
1 Hallam, vol. i. p. 114. 2 Milman, vol. vi. pp. 459, 460.
8 Milman, vol. vi. p. 437.
278 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
Henry of Huntingdon, 1135-1154 A-D- ; Florence of Worcester,
1060-1118 A.D. ; Geoffry of Monmouth, 1152 A.D. ; Giraldus Cam-
brensis, 1075-1218 A.D.; and other English chroniclers, as William
of Malmesbury, 1100-1142, and Matthew of Paris, 1200-1259.
Among the Greeks Anna Comnena, the historian, 1137-1148;
Eustathius, the Homeric critic, 1185 ; Nicetas, 1206 ; and Logothete,
1258-1308, historians. Also among the Saracens, John Reschid,
(Averrhoes) the physician of Cordova, and philosopher, who identified
the human soul with the universal soul of Deity and of the world,
1149-1245 A.D. Maimonides, the Jew, 1208 A.D., who was the
leader of a latitudinary party in the Jewish Church ; Averrhoes and
Avicenna are placed by Dante among the philosophers who wanted
baptism only to be saved. There was a great alarm raised in the
beginning of the thirteenth century respecting the spread of scepti-
cism. Aristotle was blamed in connexion with Averrhoes; and Pope
John XXII. condemned the Aristotelian philosophy. Law was
studied in England. Glanville (Sir John), Justiciary of England,
wrote a treatise on law, 1165-1190 A.D. ; Bracton also, 1245-1267
A.D., wrote on the law of England, and was followed by his
supplementers, Britton and* Fleta.
The cultivation of letters by the KHALI FS of BAGDAD, EGYPT,
and CORDOVA has already been noticed. Some of these Mahometan
rulers are with reason suspected of encouraging scepticism. Under
the patronage of these men, the Syrian Christians translated into
Arabic the Greek medicinal, mathematical, and philosophical works.
The college at Cordova was frequented by many Christian students
from France and Italy, by whom the study of Hebrew and Arabic
was afterwards promoted in Christendom. The Nestorian Church in
Persia was also instrumental in spreading the knowledge of the
Greek philosophy among the Mahometans.
ii. Before entering upon the SCHOLASTIC PHILOSOPHY, we must
refer to PETER ABELARD, who was the real founder next to Ros-
celin, of that School. Milman has done justice to his philosophy :
"The nature and peculiar philosophy of Abelard .... his con-
ceptualism might, in itself, not merely have been reconciled with the
severest orthodoxy, but might have opened a safe, intermediate
ground between the NOMINALISM of Roscelin and the REALISM of
Anselm and William of Champeaux The conceptualism of
Abelard allowing real existence to universals, but making these
universals only cognisable as mental conceptions to the individual." T
1 Vol. iii. p. 9.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 279
The controversy between Nominalism and Realism was properly
one of philosophy, but it entered into the theology of the day.
The REALISTS with Plato maintained the objective and external
reality of universals, either anterior^ as eternal archetypes in the
divine mind, or in re as forms inherent in matter j the NOMINALISTS
regarded them as having only a subjective existence as ideas con-
ceived by the mind, and have hence in more modern times led to
a kind of compromise between the two extremes, known to the men
of our day by the name of CONCEPTUALISM. Roscelin, the first of
the Nominalists, went farther than this, and denied, as Hobbes and
Berkeley with many others since have denied, all universality except
as to words and propositions. Pope John XXIII. , the University
of Paris, 1339 A.D, and Louis XI., 1473, denounced the Nominalists,
though he afterwards tolerated their writings. The following list of
the fathers of the Scholastic Philosophy may be useful : —
A.D.
Alan of Lyle, the universal doctor noo
William of Champ, the strong doctor noo
Alexander Hales, the irrefragable doctor , 1230
Thomas Aquinas, the angelical doctor 1256
Bonaventura, the seraphic doctor 1260
Roger Bacon, the wonderful (also far advanced in natural
philosophy beyond his age) doctor ... ... ... ... 1240-1289
Albertus Magnus, also called the universal doctor .. ... 1223-1280
Egidius de Columne, the most profound doctor ... ... 1280
John Duns Scotus, the most subtle doctor ... ... ... 1304
Durand, the most resolute doctor ... ... ... ... 1300
William Occham, the invincible doctor ... ... ... 1320
Raymond Lully, the most enlightened doctor... ... ... 1300
Walter Burley, the perspicuous doctor... ... ... ... 1300
John C. Gerson, the most Christian doctor ... ... ... 1392-1429
All these men, of blameless repute, of keen acumen and of pro-
found erudition, have been the object of sarcasm and scorn, not only
from the unthinking parrots who repeat without understanding the
dogmas and sayings of the popularities of the day, but also by men
competent to judge, had they allowed themselves time for inquiry and
due consideration. The merit of these SCHOOLMEN is that they
anticipated the views and positions held by succeeding theologians
and philosophers. All the great questions of speculative theology
relating to predestination, election and reprobation, free knowledge
and contingency, were fought out by these men in the Middle Ages,
and in addition "they were leaders on the side of a wronged
humanity in that firm-set struggle which ranged through long
centuries against a gigantic ecclesiastical despotism, which aimed to
280 From the Crusades, 1096 A.D., to the
be the sole arbiter of man's faith." . . . . " There was never want-
ing a Schoolman to fight on the side of liberty of conscience and
freedom of thought, until the grand result was obtained, the right of
thinking as we will and of speaking as we think."1 In a most
valuable work entitled " the Great Schoolmen of the Middle Ages ""
(from which many extracts have been taken in this narrative), by W.
J. Townend, the testimonies of the great master-minds whose names
are placed in the margin, will be sufficient to counteract the mistakes
of the ill-informed revilers of these great men.
We may add testimonies from two very different authorities as to-
the merits of this philosophy. "There was a vast amount of
genuine thought (nowadays sadly neglected) in the latter scholastics,
such as Albert the Great, the so-called universal doctor ; Thomas
Aquinas, the angelical doctor; Duns Scotus, the subtle doctor;
and of William of Occam, the invincible doctor; these men did
probably all that was possible to harmonise natural and revealed
religion, to preserve the peace between reason and faith. With them
scholasticism wrote itself out." 2 " With all its seeming outward
submission to authority, Scholasticism at last was the tacit universal
insurrection against authority. It was the swelling of the ocean,
before the storm ; it began to assign bounds to that which had been
the universal all-embracing domain of theology. It was a sign of
the re-awakening life of the human mind, that theologians dared
.... to philosophise. There was waste, waste of intellectual
labour, but still // was intellectual labour." 3
12. The Troubadours -, the poets of Provence, in spite of their
worthlessness, must be noticed ; they belong to the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries; their poems and songs in the vernacular
language delighted the refined but somewhat corrupt court of the
rulers of Provence at Aix the capital ; except as useful in the study
of the transition period of the Latin dialects, they are, all of them,
worse than useless.
13. A most important discovery is attributed to this period of the
world's history, that of THE PROPERTIES OF THE MAGNETIC NEEDLE.
It has been attributed to Flavio Gioja, of Amalfi, 1290 A.D., but it
was known long before, being described by Guyot, of Provence, who
lived about 1190 A. D. The Chinese were acquainted with it long
before it was known in Europe. Towards the close of the thirteenth
century its properties were fully known and described. The effect
1 Herren. * Westminster Review, April, 1883, p. 316.
* Milman, vol. vi. p. 475.
Reign of Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D. 281
of this discovery upon the progress of geographical discovery may
be seen in the maritime enterprises of the Portuguese in the begin-
ning of the fifteenth century. Commerce was extended by the
Crusades, which called into action the maritime power of Venice,
Genoa, and all the maritime cities of Italy and Southern Europe,,
through the necessity of the Crusaders for transport of men, war-
like stores, and provisions to the ports of the Levant.
State of the World, 1273 A.D.
EUROPE.
SCANDINAVIA. Norway, Sweden, and Denmark separate king-
doms.
THE BRITISH ISLANDS. ENGLAND and IRELAND under one king,
SCOTLAND and WALES separate kingdoms.
FRANCE. France gradually acquiring unity by the falling in of
the fiefs, but impeded by the wars with England, whose king
was a holder of the most important fiefs.
SPAIN. Two Christian kingdoms Castile and Arragon. The
Mahometan khalifate at Cordova divided among many
petty states. The new kingdom of Portugal increasing its
territory gradually.
ITALY. The cities of Lombardy independent republics, so also
Genoa, Venice, Florence, Pisa, and others. Venice had
acquired some dominion in Dalmatia and other provinces
of the Eastern Empire. Rome and its vicinity under the
popes. Tuscany with Lombardy were nominally fiefs of the
German Empire. Naples under the family of Charles of
Anjou. Sicily under the kings of Arragon.
GERMANY at this time included Burgundy and Aries as fiefs of
the empire. The northern Slavi had been incorporated by
the empire.
To the east of Germany were Hungary, Poland, Bohemia, with
the Teutonic Knights in Prussia. Esthonia and Livonia
were partly under Danish rule. Lithuania, under its dukes,
had begun to assume the dignity of a civilised state and to
aim at political influence. Moldavia and Wallachia were,
282 State of the World, 1273 A.D.
with BULGARIA, a powerful state, formidable to the Eastern
Empire of Constantinople. The irruptions of the Mogul
Tartars, 1220-1230 A.D., had destroyed the barbarous tribes
on the Euxine.
RUSSIA, divided into petty states, controlled by the Mogul khanate
of Kipshack.
The Eastern Empire of Constantinople suffered greatly by the
taking of the city by the Latin Crusaders, 1202 A.D., and by
the division of its territory among the chiefs. Constantinople
and part of Greece formed a separate empire under the
Latins, Trebizond another under the Greeks. Nice, also an
empire under the Greeks, in 1261 A.D. recovered Constan-
tinople, so that there were in 1273 A. D. two empires, Con-
stantinople and Trebizond. SERVIA was a powerful inde-
pendent state.
ASIA.
ASIA MINOR, partly to the emperors of Constantinople and those
of Trebizond, part to the Seljuk sultans of Iconium. (The
Ottoman Turks at this time a small tribe.)
SYRIA under the Egyptian rulers.
PERSIA and the EAST under the Mongolian rulers of Persia,
Zagetai (Balk), Kipschack on the Black and Caspian Seas
territory, Russia was subject (the last of the Abasside khalifs
at Bagdad was murdered by the Mongol Hulaku, 1258 A.D.).
INDIA. The Slave kings over North India to Bengal.
CHINA. Under the descendants of Ghengis Khan.
JAPAN. Disturbed by civil wars.
AFRICA.
EGYPT. Saladin founded the new Dynasty 1173 A.D. Then
the Mameluk Dynasty follows, 1250 A.D. Syria is subject to
Egypt.
MOROCCO. Almoravides superseded by the Almohades 1150
A.D., then the Merin Dynasty 1258 A. D. In TUNIS and
ALGIERS the Lassis, 1206 A.D.
NINTH PERIOD,
From Rudolph of Hapsb^lrg, 1273 A.D., to
the Emperor Charles V. of Germany,
1520 A.D.
i. THIS is the period of transition between the middle ages and
modern Europe. The leading matters are — (i) the consolidation of
the kingdoms of England, France, and Spain ; (2) the continued dis-
integration of Germany, by which the imperial power was reduced to
a mere nullity ; (3) the rise of the House of Austria to the headship
of the empire ; (4) the collision of the interests and claims of France,
Germany, and Spain in Italy ; (5) the extinction of the Eastern Greek
empire in the East(i^^}, and the consequent extension of the power
and territory of the Ottoman Turks in Europe, singularly coincident
with (6) the consolidation of the czarship in Russia after its deliver-
ance from the rule of the Mogul Tartars, 1469-1479 A. D., Russia
being, from its geographical position and natural aspirations, the per-
sistent check upon Turkish aggression; (7) the great advance of
learning and science aided by the invention of printing, 1420-
1467 A. D. ; (8) two inventions of great importance in their uses in
war and navigation established the superiority of the civilised races
over the barbarians ; (9) the maritime discoveries of the Portuguese
along the West Coast of Africa, and around the Cape of Good Hope
to India, 1486-1497 A.D., followed by the discovery of America
by Columbus, 1492 A.D. — great events, the benefits of which belong
to the human race; and (10) progress of trade, agriculture, and of
society in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
284 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
I. — The Consolidation of the kingdoms of England, France,
and Spain.
ENGLAND. — Happily Edward I., though he gained, in the reign of
his father, the victory over Simon de Montfort, 1264 A.D., found it
necessary on his accession to the crown, after his return from the
Crusades, to call together parliaments imperfectly constituted, and at
last, in 1295 A.D., a full parliament representing all classes. He had
learned that by these parliaments the consent of all classes could
more readily be gained for the taxation which was necessary to the
supply of his wants, year by year increasing through the wars in
which he was engaged. Wales was annexed to England 1282 A.D.
A dispute as to the right of succession to Alexander III., king of
Scotland, who died 1286 A.D., and whose daughter also died
1290 A.D., led to the interference of Edward I. as arbitrator. By
him John Baliol was declared to be the lawful heir. But, in
1296 A.D., this king allied with France against his patron, and a war
commenced, which lasted thirty-two years, until 1328 A.D. Edward I.
died 1307 A.D. Scotland under Bruce was, in 1328 A.D., acknow-
ledged as independent of England. Under Edward III. the so-called
" Hundred Years' " War began with France, in 1337 A.D., and was
continued in its first stage till 1360 A.D. It recommenced in
1369 A.D. to the truce of 1396 A.D. Again it began in 1415^0.,
and ended in 1453 A.D. Edward III. gained a sea-fight at Helvoet-
sluys in 1340 A.D., and the land battles of Crecy, in 1346 A.D., and
of Poitiers, in 1356 A.D. Henry V. resumed the war in 1415 A.D.,
and died King of France and England. By the heroic efforts of
Joan of Arc the Maid of Orleans, Charles VII. recovered his king-
dom, 1437 A.D. The failure of the kings of England to conquer
France was a great blessing to both countries, especially as it deprived
England of the territory held in France by the Norman and Plan-
tagenet kings, thus making it a purely insular power ; and the long
contest established and consolidated a national feeling in France
itself. The civil war, that of the Roses, arising out of the contests
between the Houses of York and Lancaster for the crown, com-
menced with the deposition of Richard II. by Henry IV., 1399 A.D.
Actual war began in 1455 A.D. by the battle of St. Albans, and
ended, in 1485 A.D., by the battle of Bosworth Field, in which
Richard III. was killed, and Henry VII., uniting by his marriage
the claims of both Houses, became king, the first of the Tudor
Dynasty. On his accession, the House of Lords had been reduced
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 285
to thirty through deaths in battle or on the scaffold ; Henry VIII.
began to reign 1509 A.D.
FRANCE. — Philip IV. (the Fair) le Bel, 1285-1314 A.D., success-
fully resisted Boniface VIII., and thus led the way to the lowering of
the influence of the papacy. The papal bulls were publicly burnt,
the States-General supporting the king. Boniface himself was seized
and imprisoned. The next Pope but one, Clement V., was elected
through Philip's influence, and removed the seat of the papacy to
Avignon, where it remained from 1305 to 1376. Tempted by the
wealth of the Knights Templars, Philip IV. determined upon the
destruction of the Order, and after a fierce and cruel persecution
he succeeded in his design, and obtained also the confiscation of
their wealth. The Order, consisting of 15,000 knights, was abolished
by the Pope, 1312 A.D., and the Grand Master executed 1314 A.D.
The charges against him were probably false, but the Order had
become useless as a defence of Christendom against the infidels, and
the dissolution of the Order desirable : but there was no reason for
the infliction of death. The conduct of the king, and of the Pope,
and of the judges was disgraceful. Louis X. (le Hutin), 1314-
1316 A.D., enfranchised the serfs, obliging them, however, to pay for
their freedom. Philip V., le Long, 1316-1322 A.D., succeeded. An
insurrection of the peasantry in 1320 A.D., followed by murders of
the lepers and the Jews, disgraced this reign. Charles IV., 1322-
1328 A.D. On his death the direct line from Hugh Capet ended,
and Philip VI., of the collateral line of Valois succeeded 1328 A.D.
(He was the grandson of Philip III.) The claim of Edward III. as
the nearest heir to Charles IV. led to the long war in which the
kings of England attempted to obtain the throne of France.
Philip VI., after uniting Champagne, Dauphiny, and Brie as fiefs of
the crown, 1340-1345 A.D., died 1350 A.D. John the Good, his son,
succeeded. He was taken prisoner by Edward III. of England after
the battle of Poitiers. The country was ravaged by numerous bands
of marauders called Free Companies. Great troubles also followed
from popular risings in Paris under Marcel, the Prevot of the munici-
pality. The first salt tax, 1355 A.D., was most unpopular, and is,
perhaps, connected with the frightful insurrection, THE JACQUERIE,
which arose among the peasantry, 1358 A.D., accompanied by an
attempt at the wholesale extermination of the nobles, the burning of
their chateaux, &c., in all the northern and western districts. They
were at length defeated at Meaux, and 7,000 slain. Peace with Eng-
land was made at Bretigny, 1360 A.D. Soon after, the Black Pesti-
lence ravaged France, carrying off a large number of the population.
286 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
The duchy of Burgundy, which reverted to the crown as a fief in
1361 A.D., was thoughtlessly granted by him to his younger son, Philip
the Bold, and became under the rule of his descendants an important
power. Charles V. (the Wise), 1364-1380 A.D., regained from the
English much that John had lost. Charles VI. had to contend with
popular commotions in Paris and Rouen. He assisted the Count
of Flanders to put down the revolt of the Flemings under Philip van
Artevelde, who, with 25,000 Flemings, perished in the battle of
Rosebecque, 28 Nov., 1382 A.D.— a great triumph of royalty and
feudality over popular rights, which enabled the king to put down
mercilessly the municipal insurrections in Paris and the cities of
Northern France. The king's insanity, 1392 A.D., led to great dis-
orders. Then followed the invasion and successes of Henry V. of
England, who for a brief term was regarded as King of France, 1415-
1420 A.D. Charles VII., 1422-1461 A.D., by the courage of the
Maid of Orleans, and the weakness of Henry VI. of England, was
enabled to regain the throne and expel the English out of France.
In the States-General held at Orleans, 1439 A.D., he established a
permanent military force, by which bands of soldiers, called ecorcheurs,
and the insurrection, the Praguerie, were put down. This was the
origin of a standing army, which began with 6,000 men. In 1453 A.D.
the dream of English rule on the Continent was finally dispelled by
the capture of Bordeaux, and nothing was left to the English after a
war of 120 years except Calais. This result was equally beneficial to
both countries. Charles VII. secured the liberties of the Gallican
Church by solemnly adopting, in the National Council at Bourgesr
several of the decrees of the Council of Basle, which he published
under the title of "Pragmatic Sanctions," 1438 A.D. Louis XL
succeeded. His crafty and most detestable tyranny was useful in
the consolidation of France. Maine, Anjou, Provence, Rousillon,
Cerdagne, Alen£on, Perche, and Guienne were annexed to the
monarchy. By the death of Charles the Bold, the last Duke of
Burgundy, in the attack upon Nancy in Lorraine, January, 1477 A.D.,
the duchy of Burgundy (part of the dominions of Charles) was
annexed to France. The rest of Charles the Bold's dominions, by
the marriage of his daughter Mary to Maximilian of Austria, helped
to the speedy aggrandisement of that family, and became the origin
of a fierce and bloody rivalry between France and the Empire of
Germany for near two hundred years. Louis XI. died, 1483 A.D.
He first assumed the title of "Majesty" and " Most Christian King."
The Dominions of Charles the Bold included (i) the duchy of
which Dijon was the capital ; this was a fief of France granted in
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 287
1361 A.D. ; (2) Flanders, Artois, Rhetel, and Nevers, all fiefs of
France, were obtained by Philip le Hardi by marriage, also the
county palatine of Burgundy, a fief of the empire ; (3) the Nether-
lands a fief of the empire ; (4) the duchy of Brabant and Hanhault
fiefs of the empire with Luxembourg. By the addition of Lorraine
these territories would have formed a large and powerful kingdom,
richer from the industry of the Netherlands than any other kingdom
of that period. Charles's object was to establish this kingdom.
Had he succeeded, he would have been a barrier between Germany
and France, and a much more powerful one than the so-called
kingdom of the Netherlands, established in 1815, after the fall of
Napoleon. " He aimed, in short, as others have aimed before and
since, at the formation of a state which should hold a central
position between France, Germany, and Italy — a state which should
discharge with infinitely greater strength all the duties which our
own age has endeavoured to throw on Switzerland, Belgium, and
Savoy."1
Charles VIII. succeeded Louis XL, and by marriage annexed
Bretagne to the crown, 1491 A.D. His expedition to Italy, at first a
success, was eventually a failure. He died, 1498 A.D. Louis XII.,
called " the father of his people," also made an expedition into Italy
to little purpose, and was engaged in the league of Courtrai against
Venice. He had a war with Henry VIII. of England, and then
married his sister, May, 1514 A.D., and died ist January, 1515 A.D.
Francis I. succeeded, and was, by his claims on Italy, the rival of
Charles V., of Germany and Spain.
SPAIN. — -The wars between the two Christian kingdoms of Spain
saved the Mahometan kingdoms from extinction, and prolonged
their existence for two hundred years. These dissensions among
the Christian kingdoms ended with the union of Castile and Arragon
under Ferdinand and Isabella, 1476 A.D. Then followed the
conquest of Grenada, 1492 A.D., and the subjection of the Moors
and of all Spain (twelve states) to one rule, with the exception of
Portugal, which had been won from the Moors, 1085 A.D., by Henry
of Burgundy, and formed into a distinct kingdom, 1139 A.D. The
marriage of Joanna, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, to
Philip, the son of the Emperor Maximilian and of Mary, the heiress
of Charles the Bold of Burgundy, established the preponderance of
Spain in the Netherlands and Germany. Charles V. of Germany,
and First of Spain, son of Philip and Joanna, began to reign in Spain
1 Freeman's "Essays," first series, p. 338.
288 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
1516 A.D., and was elected Emperor of Germany, 1519 A. D., and
crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle 1520 A.D. At this period Spain, though
united under one king, was a union of kingdoms, each having its
own Cortes (Parliament). CASTILE had in its Cortes representatives
of cities as well as of the nobles and bishops ; but the nobles were
exempt from taxation, and the representatives of the seventeen cities
were, since 1312-1350 A.D., chosen by the magistrates of each town,
seldom exceeding twenty-four in number, and ARRAGON had limited
the power of its elected king, elected by the chief of the nobility,
and confirmed by the Cortes, when strong enough to have a voice,
1133 A.D. The Cortes consisted of the nobles and bishops, the
knights and the deputies of the royal towns ; these were few in
number, but some of them sent ten representatives, and none less
than four. A committee sat between the adjournment of the Cortes
to manage the revenue, and there was a powerful officer, the justicia,
appointed by the king from the knights, exercised extraordinary
powers, assisted by a council of seventeen chosen by the Cortes.
Catalonia and Valencia were free and independent governments, each
having its Cortes composed of three estates. In 1285-1291 A.D.,
they were finally united to Arragon. The insurrection of Padilla
and others in Castile and Arragon, 1520-1522 A.D., against the king
and the nobles failed, and led to the destruction of legislative free-
dom in the course of the century.
II. — The continued Disintegration of Germany ', by which the
Imperial power was reduced to a mere nullity.
2. RUDOLPH of Hapsburg, who began to reign in 1 2 73 A.D., did not
save the empire, but he laid the foundation of the house of Austria,
by which, in due time, the dignity and power of the imperial crown
was upheld. He humbled Ottocar, king of Bohemia, and pre-
pared the way for the incorporation of that kingdom by his own
family at no distant period. Germany remained as before a mere
geographical expression, applied to a country in which German was
spoken, and in which a large number of princes, dukes, electors,
counts, margraves, &c., with certain cities, had acquired and exercised
a practical independence. While Rudolph lived he was respected
and trusted by the Swiss, who were proud of him as their country-
man, but on his death, 1291 A.D., they became the subjects of his
son Albert, the Archduke of Austria, whose rule was offensive to
1 Dyer, vol. i. p. 63.
Emperor diaries V. of Germany, 1520 A. D. 289
them. His object was to found a kingdom in Switzerland for his
son, and to "put down the local independence. Thirty-three dis-
tinguished men formed a plan of resistance at Rutli, 1307 A.D.,
which was carried out in 1308 A.D. Duke Leopold of Austria was
defeated at Morgarten i6th November, 1315, a battle which showed
the power of infantry over cavalry. From that time the Swiss
CANTONS became practically a distinct nation. A Federal Diet was
established by them, 1352 A.D. In the war with the Dukes of
Austria the Swiss gained the battle of Sempach, through the self-
sacrifice of Arnold Winkelreich, Qth July, 1386 A.D. (the Swiss con-
federation was completed 1573 A.D. by the accession of Appenzell,
1573 A.D.). At this period the plague known as the Black Death
spread over Europe, 1348-1356 A.D., carrying off twenty-five millions
in Europe, in Asia thirty millions, accompanied by floods, mists, and
then by droughts, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, singular aerial
phenomena, and unhealthy winds. Rudolf had been succeeded in
the empire by Adolphus of Nassau, then by Albert, son of Rudolf,
1298 A.D.; on his murder, 1308 A.D., by Henry VII. of Luxemburg,
who endeavoured to revive the interests of the empire in Italy, and
died there 1313 A.D. In his reign the cities of the empire appear
as a third order in the Diet of Spires, 1309 A.D. ; the cities were
favoured by the emperor as a check upon the licence of the nobles.
For the same reason the emancipation of the serfs was encouraged
in Germany, as also in France and all over western Europe. The
affairs of Germany were disturbed by the action of the popes, who,
after the death of the Emperor Frederick II. (1256 A.D.), presumed
to claim the right of nominating to the crown of Germany, as well
as the bestowment of the imperial crown upon the ruler when
chosen. This claim the submissive demeanour of Rudolf and his
successors tended to strengthen. Louis IV., 1313-1347 A.D.,
laboured to oppose this usurpation, and had to contend with his
rival Frederick of Austria as well as with the popes, and died, 1347
A.D. Charles IV., 1347-1378 A.D. (of Luxemburg), by a side-blow
relieved the empire from the Pope's claims. He published an edict
called the Golden Bull, which was to be the fundamental law of the
empire for the future. By this the rights and privileges of the seven
electors, the Archbishops of Mentz, Treves, and Cologne, the King of
Bohemia, the Duke of Saxe-Wittenberg, the Margrave of Brandenburg
(Ascanian line), and the Count Palatine of the Rhine, 1356 A.D., were
defined ; the Wittlebacks of Bavaria being excluded. Peace " appears
to be promoted by the institutions of Charles IV but these
seven electoral princes acquired with their extended privileges a
u
2QO From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
marked and dangerous preponderance in Germany Charles IV.
legalised anarchy and called it a constitution."1 " Thus Charles,
bent upon the aggrandisement of his house, united Brandenburg
to the kingdom of Bohemia .... thus ruling over a range of
country from the confines of Austria to Pomerania. Nevertheless,
he was all this time working for strangers. His son Sigismund had
already mortgaged the Margavate of Brandenburg to the family of
Hohenzollern, and by that act laid the foundation for the greatness
of that house, while the greater part of his other lands fell also to
the house of Austria." The confederacies of the cities for mutual
protection increased ; besides the Hanseatic League, the Rhenish
and the Swdbian Leagues, there were now the Friesland League,
the Swabian League of forty-one cities. These cities were repre-
sented in the Diets, and were generally opposed to the nobles. The
princes of the empire also formed distinct leagues. Winceslaus, the
successor of Charles IV., 1378-1400^.0., without power, could only
remain passive in these struggles between the cities, the knights, and
the nobles. After his deposition there was anarchy, until his suc-
cessor in the empire was Sigismund, 1411 A.D., who held the Council
of Constance 1414 AD., to put an end to the schism in the pope-
dom, and caused Martin V. to be received as the true Pope. The
burning of John Huss and Jerome of Prague at this council by his
sanction as heretics, was warmly resented by the Bohemians, and
caused the Hussite War 1420-1436 A.D., and the spread of Hussite
opinion. Peace was made on conditions favourable to the Hussite
demands of the administration of the Lord's Supper in both kinds.
Under Sigismund the Ascanian line of the Electorate of Saxony
became extinct 1423 A.D., and the electorate was given to the Mar-
grave of Messina, whose grandsons, Ernest and Albert, are the
founders of the two lines which divide the Saxony of our days.
The first general tax through the empire was fixed by the Diet of
Nuremburg, 1427, 1428 A.D. Sigismund was succeeded in Bohemia
and Hungary by his son-in-law, Albert II. of Austria, 1438 A.D. By
his election to the office of emperor the House of Austria was
identified with the empire. He was succeeded by Frederick III.,
his cousin, 1440 A.D. In his reign the Turkish Sultan Maho-
met II., with one hundred and sixty thousand men having besieged
Belgrade 1456 A.D., was defeated by the heroic efforts of John
Capistran, the papal legate, and John Hunyades Corvinus, assisted by
Pope Calixtus III. ; twenty thousand Turks were killed, and the
1 Bryce, pp. 236, 237. 2 Kohbrauch, p. 308.
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 291
Turkish power for many years crippled. Bohemia and Hungary
became, for a time, separate kingdoms on the death of Albert II.,
son of Wladislaus Posthumus, 1457 A.D. Bohemia chose George
Podribrad, and the Hungarians Matthias Corvinus. Such was the
weakness of Frederick III,, that with his wife and son Maximilian,
he was besieged in his castle at Vienna by the burghers of that city
in 1462, and only released by the German princes and the King of
Bohemia. The empire was distracted by feuds ; the Palatines of the
Rhine successfully resisted the emperor; but an attempt upon the
city of Nuremburg by seventeen princes, 1449-1456 A.D., was un-
successful. One event, the death of Charles the Bold of Burgundy.
1477 A.D., which led to the union of Maximilian, the son of the
emperor, to Mary the heiress, 1478 A.D., had an important bearing
on the future of Europe. This Maximilian was elected king of the
Romans, 1486 A.D., and emperor, 1493 A.D. In 1495 A-D-> by the
edict of "perpetual public peace," the practice of private war either
of the German princes or states, in towns or individuals, was
forbidden. In the same year, by the erection of the Count of
Wiirtemberg into a Duchy under Eberhard the Elder, the foundation
of the future kingdom of Wiirtemberg was laid. By the Diet of
Augsburg, in 1500 A.D., there was created a permanent council, con-
sisting of those sent by the six circles into which Germany wa;
divided — i.e., Franconia, Bavaria, Swabia, Upper Rhine, Westphalia,
and Lower Saxony. Each circuit sent a count and a bishop. There
were two deputies for Antwerp and the Netherlands, and two for the
chief cities. This council was superseded in 1507 A.D., by a revival
of a reformed imperial chamber originally established by the Diet at
Worms in 1495 A-D- Philip, the son of Maximilian by Mary,
married Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, and their
son, Charles V., became King of Spain 1516 A.D., and Emperor of
Germany 1519, 1520 A.D., having first agreed to certain limitations
by a capitulation to which he swore. In the fifteenth century South
Germany, and especially the commercial cities, as Augsburg, were
rich and prosperous. The local states had a voice in the taxation
in Bavaria, 1425 A.D.; in Saxony, 1478 A.D.; Brandenburg, 1472 A.D.
Imperial fairs at Leipzig were sanctioned by Maximilian, 1497 A.D.
III. — The rise and establishment of the House of Austria tj the
headship of the Empire.
3. The founder of the house, Rudolph of Hapsburg, was one of
the petty knights, owing fealty to the empire, ready to fight on any
side, but, on the whole, inclined to serve the Guelphs. He had
u 2
292 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
rendered a service to Werner, Archbishop of Mayence, by escorting
him safely through the Alps, and had by him been recommended to
the Pope. Having served under Ottocar, King of Bohemia, and
fighting for and against the nobles at war with the cities of Strasburg
and Basle, he was a ready instrument for the purposes required by
the German nobles — the checking the ambition of Ottocar, 1273
A.D. He lost no time in using the opportunity of his position in
order to enrich and exalt his family. In 1282 A.D. he invested his
sons in the sovereignty of the Austrian dukedoms, and thus laid the
foundation of the House of Austria. He could not secure his son's
election to the empire, but in 1438 A.D. Albert of Austria, descended
from his son, was elected emperor. Bohemia and Hungary also
became, at the commencement of the sixteenth century, the posses-
sions of the family, as they remain to this day. It was the extent
of territory already possessed by the Austrian family which secured
their election to the empire. The empire of Germany was renounced
by Francis II. in 1804 A.D., who then assumed the title of Emperor
of Austria. The revenue of Spain and the Netherlands, added to
the prestige of the imperial title, gave the Austrian power a great
advantage in the contests between the Emperor Charles V. and
Francis I., king of France in the sixteenth century.
IV. — The collision of the Interests and Claims of France, Germany,
and Spain in Italy.
When Charles of Anjou was induced by the Pope to take Naples
from the Hohenstaufens, 1266 A.D., he laid the foundation of future
enterprises injurious to the French monarchy. Charles, Count of
Maine and Provence, had transmitted his rights as the heir of the
Anjevin house to the kingdom of Naples to Louis XI. Charles VIII.
entertained the extravagant project of not only conquering Naples
but of re-establishing a Christian empire in the East and re-con-
quering Palestine. The Duke of Milan, Ludovico Sforza, fearing
the interference of the King of Naples to restore his nephew whom
he had deposed, sent an embassy to Charles VIII., inciting him to
make good his claim to Naples. The expedition of Charles was
at first successful. Naples was conquered, 1495 A.D. His success
alarmed the powers of Europe, and a league was formed to cut
off the retreat of the French. Charles had to fight the battle of
Fornovo to secure his retreat to France, 1495 A.D., and Naples and
Sicily remained under Spanish rule. This expedition of Charles
was the beginning of those expeditions distant from their own
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 293
frontiers which compelled the sovereigns of Europe to raise standing
armies, the feudal militia, with its limited period of service, being of
no great value in wars of long continuance and distant from home.
From this time Italy became one of the great battle - fields of
Europe, as the Low Countries (Netherlands) afterwards became.
This rivalry of France and Spain affected the politics of Europe in
the sixteenth and following centuries.
V. — The extinction of the Eastern Greek Empire of the East (1453),
and the consequent extension of the power and territory of t/ie
Ottoman Turks in Europe,
When the Latins in the fifth Crusade, 1202-1204 A-D-? conquered
Constantinople and appointed a Latin emperor, the more warlike
and patriotic party of the Greeks established two empires, that of
Nice and Trebizond. " The Nicene Emperors, Theodore Laskaris
and John Batatres, rank among the best and greatest in Eastern
history. Their throne was supported by the merits of a just
government, and was defended — a new feature in the annals of the
Eastern Empire — by a national and patriotic army. The Emperor
of Nikaia, unable, like his Constantinopolitan predecessors, to hire
the choicest warriors of all nations, was driven to depend on the
valour of his own people But when Constantinople was
recovered, 1261 A.D., and the throne had passed to the dynasty of
Palaeologi, the scene is altogether changed .... on the whole,
during the duration extending over nearly two centuries of the
Second Empire of Constantinople, both empire and city were but
the shadow of their former selves Under the Palaeologi it
(the empire) sunk below the level of Genoa, Venice," ] &c. Mean-
while, the petty Seljukian dynasty of Roum, shaken by the Mogul
invasion, dwindled away, superseded by that of the Ottoman Turks^
a kindred race, who had settled in a body of four hundred families
under the protection of the Sultan of Roum, 1250 A.D. Othman,
their emir, began, in 1307 A.D., to absorb the petty Turkish chief-
tains, and thus established a new power in Asia Minor. Orchan
organised the Janizary troops, 1326-1359 A.D. Either as allies
or as enemies of the Eastern Empire, they made frequent expedi-
tions across the Hellespont into Europe, and in 1356 A.D., Solyman,
the son of Orchan, took possession of Tzympe and Gallipoli in
Europe. In ten years the whole of Roumelia was conquered by
1 Freeman's " Essays," third series, p. 270.
294 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D.t to the
Amurath ; the Bulgarians, Bosnians, Servians, Albanians, and Hun-
garians, were alarmed, and ineffectual (because dissentient) resistance
was offered by them to the progress of the Turks, 1358-1389 A.D.
Much is it to be regretted that the power of SERVIA, which had
existed as an independent kingdom since 1040 A.D., and which,
under Stephen Dushan, 1336-1356 A.D., had comprehended
Macedonia, Albania, Thessaly, and Northern Greece, and had
aspired to the possession of Constantinople, was not maintained
after the death of that hero. We might have had a Servian Eastern
Empire gradually assimilating itself to European civilisation instead
of the barbarous Turk, whose only good quality is brute animal
bravery. Amurath conquered Bulgaria, advanced his territory to
the Danube, 1389 A.D., and defeated the Servians and their allies
at Kassova, 2yth August, 1389. Amurath was assassinated while
the battle was raging, but lived to condemn the captive king of the
Servians to death. Bajazet, his son, immediately put to death his
brother Yacoob, who had fought valiantly in the battle, and thus
prevented any rivalry for the throne. Wallachia submitted, 1391
A.D. A Crusade, headed by Sigismund, King of Hungary (after-
wards emperor), was defeated at Nicopolis, 24th September 1396, with
great slaughter, and three hundred persons of rank, taken prisoners,
were murdered in cold blood. Nothing could surpass the insolence
of Bajazet after this. Greece was conquered, and Constantinople
was summoned to surrender, 1400 A.D. Fortunately the conquests
of Tamerlane, the reviver of the Mogul empire of Ghengis Khan,
saved Constantinople for half a century. In a battle near Angora
in Asia Minor, the army of Bajazet was destroyed and himself taken
prisoner and died 1403 A.D. After this the power of the Turks in
Asia Minor appears to have been checked, until Mahomet I., a son of
Bajazet, 1413-1421 A.D., revived it. Amurath II. , for twenty years,
had to encounter the Servians, Bosnians, and Hungarians. In
I443 A.D., Hunyades led the Hungarians across the Balkans and
conquered an advantageous peace, 1444 A. D., by which Solyman gave
up all claim to Servia, Wallachia, and Hungary. This peace was
broken through the influence of the Pope. The King of Hungary,
Ladislaus, Cardinal Julian, &c, advanced to Varna, where, loth
November, 1444, they were defeated, the king and the cardinal and
a large portion of the army killed ; Bosnia, Servia, and Wallachia
again conquered by the Turks, and even Hunyades was defeated
in a great battle at Kassova, October 1448. G. Castrow Scanderbeg,
the Albanian, by his valiant persistance, held Albania for a time,
from 1443-1 453 A.D. Mahomet II. succeeded and took Constanti-
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 295
nople, 1458 A.D., the last of the Palseologi dying in the breach, 2oth
May, 1453 A.D. For ten days the brutal cruelty of the conquerors
was unchecked. "The Roman empire had run its course, and ....
the Greek nations needed recasting in the furnace of adversity.
Yet the work might perhaps have been done by other hands than
those of the barbarians and the infidels. The dream of a Sclavonic
empire again flashes before our eyes. Had Servian Stephen, like
Bulgarian Samuel in an earlier day, been blessed with the fortune of
Othmar and Orchan, Amurath and Mahomet, the difficulties and com-
plications of our own time might have been avoided. Had the
Servian czar entered Constantinople in the fourteenth century, the
Ottoman sultan might not have entered in the fifteenth." x The news
of the fall of Constantinople filled Europe with shame and indig-
nation, and with fear when Belgrade was besieged in 1456 A.D.,
though unsuccessfully, by Mahomet. The empire (or rather the
town) of Trebizond was soon conquered. Mahomet carried on war
with the Venetians almost in sight of the city, and aimed at the
conquest of Italy, taking Otranto and destroying the opposing army,
1 4th August, 1480. A large army was preparing for another attack,
when suddenly Mahomet died, 3rd May, 1481.
Thus Turkey became a European power. "The earlier emirs and
sultans were the wisest rulers, as well as the most skilful generals of
their time The special vices of Ottoman rule came in only
gradually ; its foul moral corruption begins with Bajazet ; its
devilish cruelty and perfidy begins with Mahomet the Conqueror.
.... The Ottoman conquest spread barbarism and desolation
over the fairest and most historic regions of the world."3
VI. — The Consolidation of the Czarship in Russia after the deliverance
of Russia from the rule of the Mogul Tartars.
4. The Russians were encouraged to throw off the yoke of the
Moguls, under which the habits and national character of the
population had been greatly debased by the victory of Demetrius
Douski over the Lithuanians and Moguls on the plains of Kouli-
Kofi, 8th September, 1380. This hero was afterwards unfortunate;
his capital, Moscow, burnt by the Moguls, 1382 A.D., and he
died broken-hearted in 1388. The power of the "Golden Horde "
of Kipshack was, however, shaken by the conquests of Tamerlane,
and became less formidable to the Russian princes. Ivan III., the
1 Freeman's " Essays," third series, p. 273. 2 Ibid., p. 272.
296 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
Great, began the consolidation of Russia by the conquest of
Novogorod and of several of the independent princes. He
threw off the yoke of the great Horde of Kipshack, 1478 A.D.,
which had been weakened by the division of its power among the
khans of Kazan, Sarai (Astrachan), Crimea, the Nogais, &c., &c.
Already the Czars had begun to revive and cherish ambitious pro-
jects for the occupancy of Constantinople. Thus Ivan III. married
Sophia, the daughter of Thomas Palaeologus, the brother of the last
emperor. Her father died at Rome, and the Pope, by the advice
of Cardinal Bessarin, offered her to Ivan III. Sophia travelled
from Rome to Lubeck, from Lubeck by sea to Revel, and was
received in triumph at Pskof, Novogorod and Moscow, 1472 A.D.
She incited Ivan to throw off the Tartar yoke. With her came
many Greek emigrants from Rome and Constantinople ; they fur-
nished Russia with statesmen, diplomatists, theologians, and artisans,
and with Greek books, which were the beginning of the existing
library of the Patriarchs. From that time the two-headed eagle,
which had been the imperial sign of the emperors of Constantinople,
was assumed by. the Russian sovereign. Vassali Ivanovitch, his son
and successor, 1508 A.D., persevered in the great work, the union of
the empire. This consolidation of the Russian power under one
czar and the decline and fall of the Mogul rule are singularly coinci-
dent with the establishment of the Ottoman Turks in Europe. It
seems probable that directly or indirectly Russia is destined to be
the avenger of Christendom, as the destroyer of the Turkish rule in
Europe. If prevented by the jealousy of the European powers from
possessing itself of Constantinople, the fear of such a conquest will
compel the "Great Powers," sooner or later, to place that city
independent of the Sultan of Turkey. Whatever may be the defects
and evils of Russian rule, the people and government are nominally
Christian, and therefore capable of progressive improvement, of
which the Turks, whatever good qualities they may be supposed to
possess, are incapable.
VII. — The great advance of Learning and Science furthered by the
invention of Printing, which is now somewhat affectedly called the
Renaissance.
" It is to the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries that we are
accustomed to assign that new birth of the human spirit — if it ought
not rather to be called a renewal of its strength and quickening of
its sluggish life — with which the modem time begins But it
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 297
must not be forgotten that for a long time previous there had been
in progress a great revival of learning .... the twelfth century
saw that revival begin with that passionate study of the legislation
of Justinian .... the thirteenth century witnessed the rapid spread
of the scholastic philosophy, a body of systems most alien both in
subject and manner to anything that had arisen among the ancients
.... the spirit of whose reasoning was far more free than the
presumed orthodoxy of its conclusions suffered to appear. In the
fourteenth century there arose in Italy the first great masters of
painting and song .... along with the literary revival, partly
caused by, and partly causing if, there had been also a wonderful
stirring and uprising in the mind of Europe .... the revolt of the
Albigenses, the spread of the Cathari and other so-called heretics,
the excitement created by the writings of Wycliffe and Huss,
witnessed to the fearlessness wherewith it could assail the dominant
theology It took a form more dangerous .... in the
attacks so often repeated from Arnold of Brescia downward, upon
the wealth and corruption of the clergy, and above all of the papal
court Manners were still rude and governments unsettled,
but society was learning to organise itself upon fixed principles — to
recognise, however faintly, the value of order, industry, equality ; t<^
adapt means to ends, and to conceive of the common good as the
proper end of its own existence. In a word, politics had begun to
exist, and with them there had appeared the first of a class of
persons whom friends and enemies may both, though with different
meanings, call ideal politicians — men who, however various have
been the doctrines they have held, however impracticable many of
the plans they have advanced, have been, nevertheless, alike in their
devotions to the highest interests of humanity, and have frequently
been derided as theorists in their own age, to be honoured as the
prophets and teachers of the next." x To these admirable remarks
the following from an eloquent writer of a different class may be
appended : " The period between the fall of the Roman Empire
and the Renaissance was not a mere time of torpor, if we consider
the vast fabric of European civilisation, the foundations of which
were then laid ; there are human qualities which a state of com-
parative barbarism (the Dark Ages, as we call them) encourages, and
which civilisation destroys. Is the architect of Westminster Abbey
less intelligent so as to fear comparison with the architect of the
Parthenon ? The mere fact is, that between the eleventh and four-
1 Bryce, pp. 239-242.
298 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
teenth centuries the cities of Italy developed all the charm and
material conveniences of civilised life, and they had restored the
study of the ancient classics." * The idea of progress as the law of
our nature slowly followed. It was some time before men perceived
that, however desirable it might be to study and profit from the past,
there was also a present and a future with which the interests of
humanity were linked, and for which men must think and labour.
For the first time, it has been said, " men opened their eyes and saw."
The revival of letters was preceded and accompanied by the increase
of schools and universities, and by the larger supply of books in
MSS., through the ample supply of paper made from cotton intro-
duced by the Arabs, which had superseded the papyrus of the old
empire and the parchment of the middle ages. Paper (cotton)
began to be used about the ninth century. Linen paper followed,
supplied first in Germany, where there was a manufactory at Nurem-
burg in 1390 A.D., though there are proofs of the existing linen paper
one hundred years earlier. The INVENTION of PRINTING, 1420-1467
A.D., furnished a supply of books equal to and even beyond the
immediate demand. (i) This invention is ascribed by some
to Gutenberg, of Mentz, who began to print 1450 A.D., and in
^452 A.D., by the help of Schaeffer, of Mentz, completed the work,
1452 A.D. Fust was a partner of Gutenberg in Mentz. By others
to Koster, of Haarlem, 1430 A.D. The first Bible, the Mazarin
Bible, was printed about 1455 A-D-> at Mentz. The grandest and
most celebrated early printing-office was that of Aldus Manutius, in
Venice, 1490-1515 A.D. It is said that the knowledge of the dis-
covery was revealed by the workmen about 1462 A.D., and these
spread abroad. Caxton began printing in England, 1476 A.D., at
AVestminster. But in China printing from tablets was known at the
close of the second century A.D., and block-printed editions of the
Chinese classics were common in the sixth century; thence in the
eighth century printing was introduced into Japan, probably from
Korea. Movable clay types are said to have been used in China
in the eleventh century, and metal types early in the fourteenth
century. Types were first cast in copper by the Koreans early in the
fifteenth century.2 " Instead of speaking of the discovery of the
art of printing, it would be more correct to speak of the application
of the printing-press to the creation of books. The Greek potters
.... imprinted their names upon their sepulchral lamps. Among
the ruins of Herculaneum and Pompeii loaves were found which were
1 J. A. Symonds. 2 Quarteriy Review, January, 1883, p. 198.
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A. D. 299
stamped with the bakers' names But, while the material for
books, whether papyrus or parchment, was dear, and while the
number of readers was small, the cost of printing would have
exceeded the cost of transcribing. I think it is Archbishop Whately
who remarks, that it is to the comparative cheapness of paper,
rather than to any inventive genius on the part of a printer, that we
are indebted for the art of printing books. Cheap paper was the
parent of printing."1 By the fall of Constantinople a large number
of learned men were driven to Italy, and revived by their teaching
the knowledge of the Greek language and of Greek literature ; this
gave an additional stimulus to the demand for copies of the classic
authors. Hallam gives a list of the estimated number of books
printed in Italy to the end of the [fifteenth century, in all 4,987,
besides those printed in fifty other places in Italy ; in Germany and
the Netherlands, 2,924; in Paris, 751; in England 141. It is
certain that 10,000 editions of books or pamphlets were printed in
Europe from 1470 A.D. to 1500 A.D. ; some say 15,000, others
20,000, more than half of which appeared in Italy. The Vulgate
alone passed through 91 editions. The influx of light and the
wide horizon so suddenly opened out were calculated to bewilder
and dazzle even the learned. In this renaissance, this new birth of
humanity, the study of revived antiquity stimulated the desire for
novelties in philosophy and religion, as opposed to orthodoxy. This
feeling, unchecked by experience and practical piety, was encouraged
by the licentiousness of the courts of the princes of Italy, the papal
court not excepted. The new sciolists in philosophy indulged in the
wildest speculations, chiefly pantheistic; they discussed the materiality
of the soul, believing with some of our philosophers " in the
existence of a potency in matter " adequate to the explanation of all
mental phenomena ; some supposed that the universal soul, the one,
was diffused through all nature, and so on, every free thought advocat-
ing using up the shreds and patches of the old eastern theosophies,
as if the product of his own mental powers. "Erasmus expresses his
astonishment at the blasphemies he heard. Luther was scandalised
by the conduct of the officiating priests in the celebration of the
Mass. No one (in a certain court class or literary circle) passed for
an accomplished man who did not entertain heretical opinions
about Christianity Under Leo X., the tone of good society
had become sceptical and anti-Christian, but a reaction took place in
the minds of the most intelligent men — in those who partook of the
1 Dean Hook's "Lives of the Archbishops," vol. v. pp. 361, 362.
300 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
refinement of their age without being corrupted by it .... they
met to the number of fifty or sixty, among whom were four who-
afterwards became cardinals and one who was canonised." * In the
fifteenth century the mystical piety of such men as Tauler, Gerson,
and Kempis, bear witness to the existence of spiritual life and
orthodoxy. The Reformation prepared the way for the full dis-
cussion of all questions respecting the authority of the Scriptures
and the real character and teachings of Christianity.
VIII. — Two Inventions of great importance, though very different in
their Uses, established the Superiority and the Safety of the
Civilised Man over the Barbarian.
5. The discovery of gunpowder, and its introduction into Europe
from the East, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, led to a
great change in the art of war, in its efficiency and in its cost, the
general result being in favour of humanity — wars are fewer, shorter,
and less destructive. Its increased cost acts in favour of peace ; the
burden falling upon the industry of the community arouses opposi-
tion to war itself. Already we see that wars have created a taxation,
even in the richest European communities, which is drawing nearer
and nearer to infringe on the capital, the accumulated wealth of the
community. The modern population of Europe will not submit to
a taxation which devours profits and incomes beyond a certain point,
much less will they permit capital to be touched. Hence the danger
of discontent and the provoking of opposition to governments, in
other respects deserving obedience and support. The other discovery,
that of the mariner's compass from China in the eleventh or twelfth
century, prepared the way and made possible the voyages of the
Portuguese to India and of Columbus to America. The compass is
first alluded to by a satirist, Guyot of Provence, 1190 A.D., and by
Raymond Sully, a magistrate and natural philosopher, in 1286 A.D.
The notion that it was first invented or used by Flavio Gioja of
Amalfi, 1300-1320 A.D., has been repeatedly refuted.
In this period the whole social and political fabric of the Middle Ages,
bastd on military tenure, broke down. The light-armed footmen and
bowmen and the use of artillery, first heard in Western Europe
in the battle of Crecy, 1346 A.D., began a complete change in the
art of war. Infantry began to be regarded as the main strength of
an army. The Swiss were the first organisers of this force. Their
1 Ranke, " History of the Reformation," vol. i. p. 74.
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 301
soldiers, armed with pikes, sabres, and clubs, proved their ability to
compete with the cavalry of Burgundy at Granson and Morat in
1476 A.D. The heavy cavalry, cased in iron, could only fight in an
open plain, and were checked by a fortification or intrenched camp.
Hand-guns (arquebuses) were used in 1432 A.D., and pistols and
muskets with locks in 1517 A.D. Artillery was first used by the
Moors in Spain, about 1312 A.D., and by the Scots in 1339 A.D., and
by the Turks at the first siege of Constantinople, 1422 A.D. The
Hungarians, Poles, and other of the Eastern peoples, as the Russians,
had the means of raising large bodies of cavalry from 40,000 to
150,000. The first standing army was begun by Charles VII. of
France in 1439 and 1448 A.D., but the great cost of supporting and
paying men in times of peace restricted their use to the care of
fortifications. This institution was generally acceptable as a wise
division of labour. Its effect in enabling kings to increase and
preserve their power, even in opposition to the opinion of their
people, was not at once perceived. There is one great evil accom-
panying it, namely, nations fighting by proxy. A large portion of the
population know little practically of the sufferings of war, and are
generally ready to resort to it on occasions in which, if those who
love war had themselves to engage in the fight, might hesitate.
IX. — The Discovery of a Passage to India by the Cape of Good Hope.
6. The discovery of a passage to India by the Cape of Good
Hope, and the discovery and opening out of the western continent of
America, coinciding with the opening of a direct communication
with India and the extreme East, marked the commencement of a
new era in the history of mankind. The Portuguese led the way in
maritime discovery. Prince Henry, son of John I., King of Portugal,
began a series of expeditions of discovery along the West Coast of
Africa. In 1412 A.D., Cape Nun, the extreme point hitherto, was
passed, and Cape Bogador was reached. From Sagrez, near Cape
St. Vincent, his place of retirement and study, Prince Henry first
suggested the use of the compass and calculations of latitude and
longitude in navigation, and how these might be ascertained by
astronomical observations. In the attempt to pass Cape Bogador,
1418 A. D., Puerto Santo and Madeira were discovered. In 1434 A.r.
Cape Bogador was passed. In 1440-1442 A.D., the Rio de Oro, close
to the Tropic, was reached, and ten blacks (negroes) were carried to
Portugal, the first ever seen there! In 1449 A.D., the coast was
explored sixty leagues beyond Cape Verde, and the equinoctial
302 From Rudolph of Hapsbnrg, 1273 A.D., to the
line was passed soon after. These discoveries were arrested for a
while by the death of Prince Henry, 1463 A.D. " He flattered him-
self that he had given a mortal wound to Mahometan! sm, and had
opened a door to the universal propagation of Christianity ; and to
him, as their primary author, are due all the inestimable advantages
which ever have flowed, or will flow, from the discovery of the
greatest part of Africa and of the East and West Indies." * Under
John II. the discoveries were prosecuted with vigour. In 1481 A.D.,
the Gold Coast was taken possession of and a fort erected; in
1484 A.D., a fleet sailed some distance south of the line, and in
1486 A.D., Bartholomew Diaz passed the cape which he named the
Cape of Storms, but to which John, looking forward to the hope of
reaching India, gave the hopeful designation of the Cape of Good
Hope. In 1497 A.D., Vasco de Gama sailed for the express purpose
of reaching India. The night previous to his sailing, July 7, was
spent in prayer by himself and companions in a chapel by the
seaside near Lisbon. Next day the shore of Belem was crowded
with the population of Lisbon, a numerous procession of priests
sang anthems and offered prayers to heaven. The deep sympathies
of the multitude were for the adventurers, as rushing upon certain
death, and they watched until the fleet vanished from their sight.
After encountering the storms west of the Cape, the fleet passed that
promontory, and reached India, April, 1498 A.D. The Cape had
been passed before by the Phoenicians sent by Pharaoh Necho,
606 E.G., who, after a tedious voyage of three years, reached the
Mediterranean and Egypt (eastward from the Red Sea) ; but there
was no special reason to encourage a continuance of this adventure.
It was in the fifteenth century, when access to the East had been
closed to Europeans by the oppressions and fanaticism of the
Mahometans, that the resolution to reach the East by the sea was
carried out. Pope Eugenius IV., 1431-1447 A.D., gave the Portu-
guese a right to all the territory they should discover from Cape Nun
to India. The discovery of America by Christopher Columbus had
been preceded by the enterprise of the Northmen, who reached, first
Greenland, and then New England, at the close of the tenth century.
There is also a tale, not well authenticated, of the discovery of a
great western land by the Welsh prince, Madoc, 1170 A.D. But
these discoveries were very different in their character from the bold
attempts of Columbus to reach India by a western route. " He had
received a learned education, and the study of the geographical
1 Mickle, "Lusiads."
Emperor Charles V., of Germany, 1520 A.D. 303
systems then in vogue impressed him with a strong conviction that
a voyage to India by a course directly westward was quite practicable,
with the degree of nautical science then possessed. From the old
imperfect maps of Ptolemy he was led to believe that the parts
of the globe known to the ancients embraced fifteen hours or
225 degrees of longitude, which exceeds the actual limits by more
than one-third. The discovery of the Azores on the west side had
lengthened the space by one hour, and the accounts gleaned by
Marco Polo in Asia induced him to think that the isles connected
with this continent stretched out so far to the eastward that their
distance from Europe could not be great. Columbus, however, was
without the fortune necessary to fit out ships ; and, when he attempted
to interest some of the princes of those times in his proposals, he
encountered neglects and difficulties which would have exhausted
the patience of any mind less ardent than his own. At length, after
many delays and discouragements, Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain
supplied him with three small vessels, two of them only half-decked,
and in this little armament, accompanied by 120 men, he set sail for
the port of Palos, August 3, 1492 A.D On leaving the
Canary Islands, he entered on a region of ocean where all was
mystery. The Trade wrind, however, bore him steadily along, and
the labours of the ships proceeded cheerfully, till the increasing
length of the voyage .... produced a mutinous spirit, which all
the address and authority of Columbus would not have been able to
quell, had the discovery of land happened one day later than it did.
Columbus, says Humboldt, on sailing westward of the meridian of
the Azores .... sought the east of Asia by the western route, not
as an adventurer, but according to a preconceived and steadfastly
pursued plan. He had on board the sea-chart which the Florentine
astronomer, Toscanelli, had sent him in 1477 A.D. If he had
followed the chart, he wrould have held a more northern course,
along a parallel of latitude from Lisbon. Instead of this, in the
hope of reaching Zipangu (Japan), he sailed for half the distance in
the latitude of Gomera, one of the Canary Isles. Uneasy at not
having discovered Zipangu, which, according to his reckoning, he
should have met with 216 nautical miles more to the east, he, after"
a long debate, yielded to the opinion of M. A. Pinzon, and steered
to the south-west. The effect of this change in his course curiously
exemplifies the influence of small and apparently trivial events on
the world's history. If Columbus .... had kept his original
route, he would have entered the warm current of the Gulf Stream,
have reached Florida, and thence, perhaps, have been carried to
304 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
Cape Hatteras and Virginia. The result would probably have been
to give the present United States a Roman Catholic population
instead of a Protestant English one — a circumstance of unmistakable
importance. Pinzon was difided in the formation of his opinion by
a flight of parrots towards the south-west. ' Never •,' says the
Prussian philosopher, ' had the flight of birds more important con-
sequences' It may be said to have determined the first settlements
on the new continent, and its distribution between the Latin and
Germanic races. It was on October 1 2 that the west world revealed
itself .... Guanahani or Watling Island But he (Columbus)
died ignorant of the real extent and grandeur of his discoveries,
still believing that the countries he had made known to Europe
belonged to that part of eastern Asia which the ancients call India." 1
After Columbus, Magellan the Spaniard is to be celebrated as the first
circumnavigator. He entered the Pacific Ocean by the straits which
are called by his name, November 28, 1520 A.D.. and, though he was
killed in the Philippine Islands, 1521 A.D., his ship had a glimpse of
the west shores of New Holland, and in due time arrived safe in
Seville. A Spanish vessel sailed through Torres Straits, and saw the
north-east coast of New Holland, and gave it the name of New
Guinea, 1545 A.D., sixty years before Torres is said to have discovered
that strait. It is affirmed by Petherick, 1884 A.D., that the Portuguese,
so early as 1510 A.D., had discovered both the east and west coast
of that island continent, though this is doubtful. Pope Alexander VI.
gave to Ferdinand and Isabella all the countries they might discover ;
but, to avoid collision with the grant made by Eugenius IV. to the
Portuguese, 1492-1503 A.D., Alexander traced a line a hundred
leagues west of the Azores, beyond which line to the west all that
could be discovered should be Spanish. It is a remarkable fact that
Cardinal Gasper Contarini, the ambassador of Venice to Charles V.,
arrived in Spain just as the ship Victoria (Magellan's ship) arrived
at Seville. He was the first to explain why she arrived a day later
than her log indicated. Americus Vespuccius, who had visited
America, had his name applied to the continent, 1503-1507 A.D. The
effect of these discoveries was first to astonish the most careless and
unthinking. The knowledge of the vast extent of the globe gave an
enlargement to the mental as well as to the physical horizon. The
full perception of the grand future opening out to the enterprise
of Europe was, however, only by slow degrees recognised. The
ijnorance of the potentates of Europe and their insensibility to the
1 " Encyc. Brit.," ninth edition, vol. i.
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 305
importance of these discoveries are surprising. They could not see,
in these vast fertile regions of the west, the wonderful timely
provision reserved by divine wisdom for the homes of the teeming
millions of the Old World, and only made known to them when tho
progress of the arts of civilised life made it possible for the popula-
tion of Europe to occupy them with advantage. In fact, the advan-
tages of a regulated emigration and settlement of the surplus
labouring and artisan class has not yet been perceived by the more
advanced mind of the nineteenth century. England was happily
not altogether indifferent to the cause of geographical discovery.
Henry VII. was willing to further the plans of Columbus had he
failed in his application to the court of Spain, and he sent Sebastian
Cabot on a voyage which resulted in the exploration of all the east
coast of North America from Labrador to Florida, 1497 A.D.
X. — Progress of Trade, Agriculture, and of Society in the
Foil rtee nth and Fifteenth Centuries.
7. Generally the old channels which from time immemorial had been
used by the ancient Asiatic nations in their commerce with India
and China, continued to be used by the Western Asiatic nations. By
the Arab dhows, Egypt, and Syria, and Persia traded with Ceylon,
and India, and Eastern Africa, and by caravans overland through
Khorassan and the north of India to China. Constantinople and
the Eastern Empire were benefited by this trade, which stimulated
their manufactures and gave them the supply of Europe. There was
also a caravan trade from the towns on the Black Sea, through Russia
and Poland, to Scandinavia and Germany. With the Asiatic ports,
and with Alexandria, the Venetians, Genoese, &c., had direct com-
munication, and became the importers of the luxuries of the East —
the silks, gems, woollen cloths, muslins, spices, and sugar for the
use of Europe. The Hanse Towns, from the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries (Lubeck), monopolised the trade of Scandinavia and
all the lands bordering the Baltic Sea, England, and the west of
Germany. It had four principal factories, at London, Bruges, Bergen,
and Novogorod, and eighty of the most considerable cities were
identified with the League ; the profits of this internal trade, combined
with a small foreign trade, was very large. The interest of money varied
from i2jto 20 per cent, the Jews being the usual capitalists, dealing
mainly in money. In ITALY there were banking establishments in
Venice, Florence, and Genoa, 1400-1407. The bankers of St. George
at Genoa were like the old English East India Company, the lords of
Corsica. Besides Venice, Milan, and Genoa, the old cities, Naples,
x
306 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
Amalfi, Bari, Pisa, and Palermo were manufacturing and trading
towns. The silk manufactory was in Palermo, 1148 A.D., received
from Constantinople (where it had been introduced by Justinian,
530 A.D.) SPAIN had manufactories of cloth, silk, arms, plate, glass,
in Segovia, Toledo, Valentia, Barcelona. GERMANY, besides the
Hanse Towns and their trade, could boast of NUREMBURG, already
noticed for its skilful workers, with Augsburg, Spires, Ratisbon, &c.,
cities which in the comforts and elegancies of life excelled Western
Europe. The NETHERLANDS had carried on linen and woollen
manufactories at Bruges, Ghent, Ypres, helped greatly by the supplies
of English wool, from the tenth and eleventh centuries. Merchants
from seventeen kingdoms had their establishments at Bruges.
Benkels, who died 1447 A.D., had introduced the art of curing her-
rings, from which Holland especially had largely benefited. FRANCE
was prompted by one Jacques Cour to engage in the Levant trade,
1450 A.D. He had three hundred agents employed in distant
regions as his factors. Lyons was a trading centre in the fourteenth
century, greatly increased in following years in importance. The silk
manufactory was acquired for Milan, 1521 A.D. Marseilles, Nar-
bonne, Nimes, and Montpellier were also the seats of manufacture
and trade. In ENGLAND the first great article of export was wool to
the Netherlands. London was a mere staple of the Hanse Towns ;
and the customs were in 1329 A.D. farmed by the Bardi
family of Florence. The woollen manufacture was, to a small extent;
carried on in the twelfth century ; but, in 1331 A.D., Edward III.
invited Flemings to settle in England. Commerce attained sufficient
importance to attract the attention of Richard III. and his parliament.
A council was appointed at Pisa, 1485 A.D., and at Scio, 1513 A.D.
The usual jealousy of foreigners began to be felt by the trades,
and in 1518 A.D. there were riots in London against the foreign
trader. Considering the difficulty in the way of trade, whether by
sea or by land, the wonder is that there was so much of both previous
to the sixteenth century. By SEA, the extent to which piracy was
carried on is remarkable. While the mercantile cities were allowed
to make war with each other, and use their shipping as privateers
against their neighbours on every occasion of difference, unchecked
by the supreme government of their respective countries, there could
be little security at sea for unarmed vessels. There were laws of
navigation, the Consolato, del Mare, in the fourteenth and fifteenth
centuries, which had been preceded by older rules, 1068 A.D., in
Barcelona. The Rules d'Oleron are said to have been known to our
Richard I. in 1197 A.D., but some give 1266 A.D. as the date of their
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A. D. 307
origin. The Ordinances of Wisby, 1450 A.D., are taken from the
Rules d'Oleron. By LAND, the difficulties were yet more numerous
and troublesome. The roads, or rather their absence, but such as
existed, were at times impassable. The tolls levied in every separate
domain, at the passing of every bridge, and at every market, were not
only pecuniarily a loss, but implied delay, loss of time, and continual
friction of temper. Besides these, a large number of the lords of
petty castles, either by themselves or their agents, plundered the
travelling merchants. This was especially the case in Germany.
Yet, in spite of these obstacles, there was, no doubt, a much larger
trade carried on by the countries of Europe with each other than
historians have recorded.
The condition of AGRICULTURE was very low, but occasionally
prosperous. The great difficulty was in the all but impossibility of
the carriage of wheat and other grain from the locality where it was
plentiful to that where it was needed. The comforts of all classes,
even the highest, were far below those now enjoyed by the ordinary
middle class in Europe. The bread for the masses was of barley or
beans, rarely of wheat. In the winter, salt meat or salt fish, the
drink a very inferior beer (without hops). Clothing, mainly leather
(not lined), linen, scarce and costly ; the woollens coarse, household
furniture very scanty, houses chiefly wood, the floors strewed with
rushes, containing the accumulation of refuse and dirt for weeks ;
glass only used in the castle of the lord, and removed when his
residence ceased ; few candles of tallow or wax — a late supper in a
castle would be lighted up by torches held by attendants. Dresses
of.velvet or brocade were heirlooms, even in ducal families. In
most houses the work now done by carpenters, joiners, tanners,
weavers, smiths, was carried on by the servants of the house or the
family. All these trades were, on a small scale, to be found in the
cities, as they had been exercised long before in the old .Roman Em-
pire. Yet, on the whole, in spite of the few luxuries within reach,
life was more easy than in our day. The change in the value of
money may be seen in the incomes possessed in the fourteenth cen-
tury : a yeoman, ^5 yearly; gentlemen, from £10 to -£20 ; a
knight, ^£150 ; a labourer, 3d. per day. These sums may be multi-
plied by twenty or twenty-four to ascertain their purchase power in
our money. The living was all the cheaper, as the multifarious
articles of furniture, and other household conveniences, which are
now deemed necessary, were then out of the question. Chairs,
tables, beds, chimneys, glass windows, table conveniences &c., were
rarely seen.
X 2
308 From Rudolph of Haps burg, 1273 A.D., to the
The Contemporary Histories of the several States now follow.
THE SCANDINAVIAN NATIONS, Norway, Sweden, and Denmark,
remained separate until united under Margaret. Before this was
accomplished, the nobles in SWEDEN had freed themselves from all
burdens of taxation, and a code of laws was confirmed by "the Great
Thing," in 1295 A.D. In DENMARK, under Erick Clipping, the first
charter was granted, 1282 A.D. In 1320 A.D., a new charter, which
provides that no taxes be levied without legal sanction. In 1327 A.D.,
a new code of laws. These movements imply the existence of efforts
towards the settlement of a free constitution ; but the low state of
intelligence, the difficulties attending the meeting of the " Things,"
through the. limited attendance of the members, naturally threw the
administration of affairs into a few families, who had interests separate
from the state. The "Black Death" desolated Scandinavia, 1350 to
1360 A.D. The condition of the three northern kingdoms, suffer-
ing from the dissensions of the nobles and from disunion, led to the
Union of Calmar, under MARGARET, 1397 A.D. "The union was
one of mere form, its elements were too discordant to harmonise.
But if this union was not commensurate with the wishes of its framers
— if, instead of lasting for ever, it was dead in little more than a
century, after an existence continually menaced, the fault is not the
queen's, or that of the bishops, or that of the great secular officers of
state who placed their seals to the document, — it must be traced to
the rival interests, and still more to the prejudices, of the three
peoples ; to the ambition of powerful families, which endeavoured to
throw off their obedience to the supreme authority ; and, in no little
degree, to the incompetency of Margaret's successors." * Margaret
died in her sixtieth year, 1406 A.D. She had ruled by the resources
of her mind. The peace and prosperity of her rule are the best
monuments of her greatness. On the whole, whatever her personal
shortcomings may have been, she may on the whole be pronounced
one of the greatest sovereigns that ever sat on a throne.
DENMARK AND NORWAY continued under one sovereign, Erick of
Pomerania, the nephew of Margaret (married to a daughter of
Henry IV. of England), lost his crown by his incapacity and folly,
1439 A.D. Christopher of Pomerania, his nephew, succeeded, 1439-
1448 A.D. Christian I. of Oldenburg founded the new line of kings.
He,by the female line, was descended from Erick Clipping. Schleswick
1 Dunham, " History of Denmark," vol. iii. pp. 5, 6.
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D. 309
and Holstein were united to Denmark, 1459 A.D., but the Shetlands
and the Orkneys were pawned to Scotland as the dowry of the
Princess Margaret of Denmark, married to James III. of Scotland,
1469. This union of Schleswick and Holstein was accompanied by a
stipulation that the two duchies should never be separated. As
Holstein was a fief of the empire, this union was, in the end, pro-
ductive of great injury to Denmark. Christian is the ancestor of the
kings of Denmark, the old line of Sweden, and of the emperors of
Russia. Hans succeeded, 1481-1513 A.D. ; he put many nobles to
death after the battle of Opeio, 1502. His wars with the Ditmarshers
and the Hanse Towns were unsuccessful. Christian II., 1513-1523
a man of resolution and cruelty. By his " blood bath," November 8,
1520 A.D., in which ninety persons, chiefly nobles, were beheaded in
the market-place of Stockholm as "heretics and rebels," he fairly
dissolved for ever the Union of Calmar, so far as Sweden was con-
cerned, through his cruelties. Six hundred eminent persons fell under
the axe, ninety-four of them under his own eyes. All this wras after a
court festival which lasted three days, in which the victims were treated
with special favour, November 6 : on the 8th, all the gates of Stock-
holm were closed, loaded cannon planted in the market-place, and
guards placed on every point of the intersecting streets. The death-
like silence was broken by the sound of the castle bell, when a long
procession of victims marched forth to the place of martyrdom ....
the bodies of the dead lay for two days exposed in the market-place,
after which they were buried without the city walls. In 1523 A.D.,
Gustavus Vasa, by the help of the Dalecarlian peasantry, drove out
the Danes, and was crowned King of Sweden. Christian II. (when
not mad) had some great qualities ; favoured the trading and working
classes, promoted education, established post-offices and wayside
inns, and equal weights and measures, and obliged the parishes to
keep the roads in repair.
POLAND was united with Lithuania by the marriage of the heiress
of Poland with Jagellon, Duke of Lithuania, 1386 A.D. For a brief
period both HUNGARY and POLAND, 1439-1444 A.D., were under one
.sovereign, and Lithuana was frequently practically independent, but
under Sigismund I., 1509 A.D., Poland, with Lithuania and West
Prussia, Massona and Livonia, extended from the Black to the
Baltic Sea.
PRUSSIA was conquered and its barbarous people placed under
strict tyrannical rule by the TEUTONIC KNIGHTS united with the
Order of the Swords, 1237 A.D., after above fifty years' labour,
1283; they had been invited to assist the Poles. The seat of the
310 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D.y to the
order was at Marienburg, 1309 A.D.; their history is one of wars
with Poland, Denmark, and with their own vassals. In 1410 A.D.
they were routed at Tanneburg, and in 1466 A.D., by the treaty of
Thorn, West Prussia was ceded to Poland, and East Prussia held as
a fief. At the close of the fourteenth century they possessed between
the Oder and the Gulf of Finland fifty-five towns and forty-eight
fortified castles. In their last war with Poland three hundred and
fifty thousand lives are said to have fallen. The seat of the Order
was removed to Konigsberg, 1451-1466 A.D. Albert of Branden-
burg, grand master in 1525 A.D., became a Protestant, and received
Prussia as an hereditary duchy, a fief of Poland.
RUSSIA and TURKEY ; their respective histories have been already
noted. In TURKEY, the Sultan, Bajazet II., succeeded Mahomet II.;
then Selim, 1512-1520 A.D., who conquered Egypt from the Mame-
lukes and was acknowledged as suzerain by all the Mahometan
rulers of North Africa. In Egypt Selim found Mahomet the
twelfth khalif of the house of Abbas, which had found a refuge in
Egypt, and had remained in privacy since the taking of Bagdad by
the Seljuks, 1258 A.D. He induced him solemnly to transfer the
Khalifat to the Sultan of the Ottoman Turks and his successors. At
the same time Selim took possession of the insignia of that office,
which the Abbassides had retained, i.e., the sacred standard, the
sword, and the mantle of the Prophet.1 One half of the Mussul-
man world does not recognise the Turkish Khalif.2 The defeat of
Solymari's attempt to take Vienna, October 14, 1529, "is an epoch
in the history of the world. The tide of Turkish conquest in
Central Europe had now set its mark. The wave once again dashed
so far, but only to be again broken and recede for ever." 3
ITALY expected great things from the reign of Henry VII., the
.Emperor of the House of Luxemburg. His election was a check
to the ambition of Philip le Bel of France ; he was just, pious, and
popular. In a Diet at Spires, 1309 A.D., he had declared his
determination to assist the Ghibelline and assert the Imperial
rights in Italy. He was in a fair way towards accomplishing his
purposes, when he died suddenly at Buonconvento, August 24th,
I3I3- There is an interest connected with this name as the ideal
sovereign of Dante's treatise, " De Monarchia." * To Dante he
was "the Roman law impersonated in the emperor, a monarch
who should leave all the nations, all the free Italian cities, in
1 Creasy, p. 150.
8 See Principal Fairbairn in Contemporary Review, Dec., 1882, pp. 876, 877.
3 Creasy, p. 170. 4 Milman, vol. v. pp. 391-394.
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A. D. 311
possession of their rights and old municipal institutions." On his
death Italy fell back to its old anarchy. Rienzi, an eloquent and
popular leader of the Roman people, endeavoured to establish a
republic and dictatorship, 1347-1349 A.D., and again 1353, 1354,
when he was killed. The Italian republic soon realised the diffi-
culties of all mere municipal governments, free from the restraints
of a common general authority. In all the cities the peace was
disturbed by the feuds and turbulence of the nobles ; the masses of
the population were divided by their guilds and trading corpora-
tions, and by the political rivalries of the Guelf (the Republicans),
and the (Ghibelline), the Imperialists. The cities elected podestas,
(chief magistrates), and formed an armed and disciplined militia. There
was for a time great material prosperity ; agriculture was improved
by the demand for produce from the populous cities ; the cities
enlarged their walls and fortifications ; manufactures nourished ; all
the great buildings which now command the admiration of foreigners
were erected during this period ; canals for irrigation were formed in
Lombardy, 1179-1257 A.D. The merchants of Lombardy and
Tuscany, through Venice and Genoa, traded with different countries
by sea, and by land through Germany and France with the rest of
Europe. Unfortunately all these republics were engaged in almost
continual warfare among themselves, which was generally carried on
by bands of mercenaries, " condottieri," 1339 A.D., headed by able
leaders, who were ready to sell their services to the highest bidder :
the larger republics, Genoa, Pisa, Florence, and Venice, had wars
for rivalry in trade. Venice with Genoa, from 1256-1381 A.D., for
the trade of the Black Sea. Genoa with Pisa, two hundred years,
for the suzerainty of Corsica and Sardinia. The cities were all of
them, from time to time, troubled by the assumption of supreme
power by the podestas, or by noble powerful families. Eccelino di-
Romeno tyrannised over Verona, Vicenza, and Padua, 1250-1226,
until put down by a league of Ferrara, Mantua, and Bologna,
headed by Pope Alexander IV. In 1311, 1312 A.D., the Scala
family were lords of Verona; the Carrara family at Padua,
1380-1406 A.D. ; the D'Este at Ferrara, 1317-1548 A.D. ; the
Gonzanga at Mantua. At Florence, the Duke of Athens, 1342, 1343 ;
then the Medici, 1430-1529 ; the De la Torres and Visconti and
Sforza, in Milan, 1259-1447 A.D. The Marquisate of Montferrat
was under its active rulers. Venice provoked the League of Cambray,
comprising the Pope, the Emperor, France, and Spain, 1508-1511,
through jealousy of her enlarged territory, which she had managed
to acquire between 1404 A.D. and 1453 A.D., on the mainland
312 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
of Italy, which, together with her wealth and maritime power,
excited the jealousy of her neighbours. Venice lost at once her
continental territories, but soon recovered them when the leaguers
broke up the League. Venice had its trials from the treason of
its rulers, and had to execute its Doge, Marino Faliero, guilty of a
conspiracy against the council, 1355 A.D. The nobles in the papal
territory put down by Borgia, 1495 A.D.
In NAPLES and SICILY, Charles of Anjou, after the death of
Conraddin, was master of Naples and Sicily, 1263 A.D. Sicily, by
the revolution, accompanied by the massacre called the Italian
Vespers, 1282 A.D., became a separate kingdom under the heirs of
Conraddin, the kings of Arragon. Alphonso V., of Arragon, united
Naples and Sicily, 1443 A.D. Ferdinand IV. succeeded, 1458 A.D. ;
Alphonso, 1494 A.D.; Ferdinand II., 1496 A.D. Frederick, his
successor, applied to Ferdinand of Arragon and Castile, for help
against Louis XII. of France, but both Ferdinand and Louis agreed
to divide Naples and Sicily between them. Charles VIII. of France,
in his Italian expedition, conquered Naples ; but on his retreat the
Spanish troops, under Gonzalvo de Cordova, conquered Naples and
Sicily, which thus formed part of the inheritance of Charles I. of
Spain and V. of Germany. SAVOY became a duchy under
Amadeus VIII. Piedmont was annexed 1418 A.D. ; and Nice,
1419 A.D.
The second great MONGOLIAN (Tartar) irruption under TAMERLANE,
a descendant of Ghengis Khan, 1369-1405 A.D., swept away a large
portion of the khanate of Kipshack, and thus aided the attempts
of the Russian Czars to throw off the Tartar yoke, while, by the
defeat and captivity of Bajazet, the TURKISH sultan, 1402 A.D., the
GREEK BYZANTINE EMPIRE was saved and its existence prolonged
for about half a century. All the khanates of Zagetai, and that of
Persia under the Ilkanian dynasty, were divided into petty tributary
states ; India also was conquered as far as Delhi, which city was
taken and one hundred thousand persons massacred. The Greek
Empire paid tribute, and Tamerlane's empire extended from the
Irtish and Volga to the Persian Gulf, and from the Ganges to the
Bosphorus and the Mediterranean. On the throne raised at
Samarcand he gave audience and issued his commands to ambassa-
dors from Egypt, Arabia, Russia, Spain, and the remote Khans of
Tartary. Desirous of atoning for the Mahometan blood which had
been shed in his conquests, he determined to destroy the idolatries
of China. Crossing the Jaxertes when frozen (March, 1405 A.D.),
he died, in the seventieth year of his age, at a village seventy-six
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A. D. 313
leagues from Samarcand. His empire fell to pieces in the quarrels
of his sons ; Khorassan to one of his family. The white and
black Turcomans ruled over the eastern provinces of what is now
called Turkey in Asia. Syria fell to its old masters, the Mamelukes
of Egypt, and Asia Minor to the Ottoman Turks under the
successor of Bajazet. The contests between these pastoral tribes
and the Turks and Mamelukes, made Asia, from the Euphrates to
the Indus, the theatre of rapine and murder for nearly a century
after the death of Tamerlane, until the settlement of a government
in Persia.
PERSIA. — In 1502 A.D. Ismael Shah founded the Sefi or Seffanian
J )ynasty. Being the descendant of Ali, the son-in-law of Mahomet,
he was consequently a Shite or Sheah, the heterodox Mahometan
.sect, while the Ottoman Turks were of the Sooni, orthodox sect.
He drove out the Turcoman tribes and founded the modern king-
dom of Persia, 1502 A.D. From the red cap, the distinctive head-
dress of the people, the Persians received the name of Kuzzil-bash
(Red Head). Ishmael Shah was fully employed in reducing the
wandering nomads to subjection, and in wars with the Sultan of
Turkey: he died 1523 A.D., and was succeeded by his son Tamasup.
INDIA. — The last of the Slave Dynasties in Delhi ended 1414 A.D.;
but before this the Moguls under Tamerlane had invaded India
1398 A.D., took and plundered Delhi, followed by the slaughter
already recorded, and advanced as far as the Ganges, and then
.suddenly left the country. After 1414 A.D., there was, from the
quarrels of the petty princes, a very unsettled state of affairs and no
power to resist invasion from without. Shah Baber, a descendant
in the direct line from Ghengis Khan, and by his mother from
Tamerlane, ruled over one of the petty states near Bokhara
and Samarcand. After uniting these under his own government, he
invaded India in five expeditions, in the last of which, 1525 A.D.,
he won the battle of Paniput, 1526 A.D. At that time there were
five Mahometan states, which had arisen out of the preceding
Mahometan dynasties. There were two important native pagan
.states, besides many others, not as yet brought in contact with the
Mahometans. Baber fully established the Mogul Empire in India,
and died at Agra, 1530 A.D.. Before his invasion the Portuguese
made their appearance under Vasco de Gama at Calicut, 28th May,
1498. Albuquerque, 1496-1509 A.D., founded Goa, and began to
establish the Portuguese power in India.
CHINA. — In 1368 A.D., the Mogul dynasty of the race of Ghengis
Khan were expelled from China by Choo Yan Chang, the son of a
3 H From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
labourer, who founded the Ming Dynasty, under which the empire
was in a disturbed condition, though Tartary was subjugated, at least,
nominally. The capital was removed from Nanking to Pekin, pro-
bably to secure the northern frontier more readily from invasion.
Cochin China and Tonquin were conquered and held for a brief
period.
JAPAN was disturbed by civil wars, and from 1336 A.D. had two
dynasties, one in the south, the other in the north. An invasion by
the Mogul Tartars was repelled, 1281 A.D.
THE TRADE with foreign lands in this period was promoted by
embassies from the Pope to China and the Great Khan of
Tartary — one John Corvina, a Franciscan, resided at Pekin as Arch-
bishop, 1300-1328 A.D., and there was a trade overland until the
expulsion of the Moguls from China in 1368 A.D. A Franciscan,
sent by Pope Benedict XII. to the Great Khan, resided at Pekin,
1342-1346 A.D., as legate; the traders reached the remote East vi&
Azoph, Astrachan, Khiva, &C.1 Sir John Mandeville travelled in
Palestine and the East, 1357-1371 A.D. The cities of Italy, the
Hanseatic towns, and those of the Netherlands engrossed the trade
of Europe. The Venetians, Genoese, and the Florentines were
masters of the trade of the Levant. The Italian merchants, known
as Lombards, were most influential in monetary affairs, as banking,
and are supposed to have first invented bills of exchange. Manu-
factures of silk passed from Greece into Sicily, Italy, and at last to
Venice. Ghent, Bruges, Antwerp, and other towns in the Nether-
lands were famous for their manufactures of cloth, camlets, and
drapery. The Hanseatic League declined from the beginning of the
fifteenth century, through the jealousy of the Danes, the English
and the Dutch ; and especially through the increased facilities for
inter-communication which arose in the fifteenth century, and which
allowed more scope for rivalry in trade by Germany, Italy, Holland,
and England.
8. THE ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY of this period is of great in-
terest. It is a chronicle of the attempt at reform in the Romish
Church by the general councils, and of the decline of the papal
power which preceded the open outbreak against the papacy and
the teachings of the papal Church, by Martin Luther, which led to
the Reformation.
The Popes and the Councils. — Boniface VIII., whose quarrel with
Philip le Bel has been narrated, celebrated for the first time the
1 Encyc. Brit,, ninth edition, " China."
Emperor Charles V. of Germany \ 1520 A.D. 315
jubilee for 1300 A.D. at Rome. On this occasion "he showed him-
self to the crowding pilgrims seated on the throne of Constantine,
arrayed with sword, crown, and sceptre, shouting aloud, ' I am
Caesar ! I am Emperor !' ;J1 The States-General, in its three orders,
supported Philip and remonstrated writh the Pope ; the friends of
Philip seized the Pope at Arragon, and held him in prison a shuDrt
time. He died soon after, aged eighty-six. This Pope added a
second crown to the tiara (the first having been added by Hormisdas,
514 (523) A.D. The next Pope but one, Clement V., under the
influence of Philip le Bel, removed the papal Court to Avignon^
where it remained until 1377 A.D. An inquiry into the character of
Boniface VIII., necessitated by a charge of heresy and of sundry
atrocious crimes (preferred by Philip le Bel), was held in Avignon,
1310 A.D., by this Clement. Philip was at length persuaded to drop
the prosecution, to the great relief of Clement. "This Boniface
was a man of learning and capacity, but he was incapable of com-
prehending or allowing for those changes in the state of political
affairs which rendered a corresponding change — at least, in tone
and temper — indispensable to the maintenance of his influence."2
John XX. or XXII., 1316-1344 A.D., added the third crown to the
tiara. Gregory XI., urged by St. Catherine of Sienna, took back
the papal chair to Rome, 1377 A.D., and died, 1378 A.D. Then
began the great schism after the election of Urban VI. at Rome, by
a counter election at Avignon of Clement. Two councils were called
to correct this great evil to Christendom — that of Pisa, 1409 A.D., and
that at Constance, 1414-1418 A.D. In this latter council, the two
rival popes being removed after much negotiation and trickery on
all sides, Pope MARTIN V. was chosen, the sole and only legal occu-
pant of the papal see. But, in choosing a Pope, the intentions of
the council to reform abuses were nullified, as the newly-elected
Pope continued all the evils of which the council had complained.
' " It was Martin V. who established the principle and sowed the
seed which was to be developed into Ultramontanism The
Pope claimed to be the universal ordinary; the bishops of the
national Churches, only acting as his delegates, were to obey his
orders ; hence we shall find from this time the continual appointment
of legates a latere to control the metropolitans."3 The Council of
BASLE, 1431 A.D., which continued by adjournment several years,
1 Bryce. 2 Greenwood, vol. vi. pp. 348, 349.
3 Dr. Hook, "Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury," vol. v. pp. 88-90;
Dean Milman, "Latin Christianity," vol. viii. pp. 312-315.
316 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
was called in the hope of imposing checks on the papal power, and
of establishing the doctrine of the superiority of general councils to
the Pope. In this, as in the previous councils, the opponents of the
papal authority were fairly beaten by the persevering astuteness of
the popes. For a short time there were two councils and two popes
at . once. The Council of Basle, having passed various decrees
asserting its superiority, 1434 A.D., was dissolved by the Pope, but
continued its sittings. In 1437 A.D., the Pope called a new council
at FERRARA, which was removed to FLORENCE in 1439 A-D-> and
to Rome, 1442 A.D. At the Council of Florence the doctrine of
purgatory was declared to be that of the Church. The election of
Nicholas V. gave outward peace to the Church, 1447 A.D. He was
a lover and patron of literature. The Council of BASLE, which had
removed to Lausanne, acknowledged him and dissolved, 1449 A.D.
Nicholas V. died broken-hearted when he heard of the loss of Con-
stantinople to the Turks, 1455 A.D., the only potentate (to his credit
be it recorded) who testified any deep feeling for this disgrace to
Christendom. ^Eneas Sylvius (Piccolomini) was elected Pope under
the title of Pius II., 1458 A.D., having retracted all his liberal
opinions advanced in the Council of Basle. We condone the ter-
giversation of this wily ecclesiastical politician when we read that, in
his deep concern for the interests of Christendom, he was ready to
risk his own person in the crusade against the Turks, and died at
Ancona, 1464 A.D., while superintending the preparations of the
Venetian fleet. Sixtus IV., who began his popedom 1471 A.D.,
scandalised the Church by his nepotism. So also Innocent VIII.,
his successor, 1484-1492 A.D. Alexander VI. (Borgia), 1492-1503,
the most disgraceful of the popes, made the name of Borgia
a byword of infamy. His abominable vices, poisonings, murders,
and treacheries, partly to benefit his illegitimate children, no one
denies. If it be possible to add any additional infamy to his
character, it is found in the fact that he and Alphonso, king ot
Naples, applied to Bajazet II., Sultan of Turkey, for assistance
against the invasion of Naples by Charles VIII. of France, stating
that Charles looked on Naples as a mere stepping-stone towards
Constantinople. He was poisoned by unwittingly partaking of food
which had been prepared for a rich cardinal whose property was
needed for the Borgias, 1503 A.D. We need not wonder that in the
reign of this Pope the monk Savonarola, at Florence, a great reformer,
1 Gascoigne, quoted by Robertson, " History of Christianity," vol. viii. I2mo.
P- 247-
Emperor Charles V of Germany, 1520 A.D. 317
1490-1498 A.D., but was at last burnt alive, 23rd May, 1498 A.U.
Julius II. was more of a general than a Pope. His desire was
to free Italy from all foreign princes and rulers. He took back
Romagna from the Borgias, was engaged in the League of Cambray
against Venice, and held the nineteenth Lateran Council^ which
decided sundry matters of discipline, 1512 A.D. Leo X. (Medici)
was elected in 1513 A. D., through the influence of his family at
Florence. His patronage of literature, his indifference to all religion,
and his love of pleasure, the characteristics of the period of " the
Renaissance," make him, to this day, a favourite of a large class of
literary men who are like-minded. Adrian, his successor, endea-
voured to reform the papal court, and restore decency and the
appearance of morality at least, 1522, 1523 A.D. Clement VII.
succeeded, 1523 A.D., and ruled until 1534 A.D.
The resistance to some of the teachings of the Romish Church
on Scriptural grounds was maintained by the WALDENSES, who, per-
secuted in Spain and the south of France, had found a refuge in
the valleys of Piedmont, 1448-1452 A.D., and there were called the
VAUDOIS. JOHN WYCLIFFE, the English reformer, 1374-1384 A.D.,
had translated the Bible into the English vernacular, and his nume-
rous treatises, in which he opposed the popular teaching of the
Romish Church, had been freely circulated in Germany, and had
been the means of arousing the action of JOHN Huss and JEROME
OF PRAGUE, in resistance to the corruptions of the Church. Although
the Emperor Sigismund had guaranteed the safety of Huss, both
he and Jerome were condemned and burnt by the COUNCIL OF
CONSTANCE, 1415, 1416 A.D. Huss was no heretic in the eccle-
sistical sense of the term. He held all the dogmas of the Roman
Catholic Church, and was unquestionably as orthodox as those who
burnt him. He was a martyr to the power of the hierarchy, pro-
voked by his testimony against ecclesiastical wealth and power. The
friends of Huss and Jerome, enraged at the breach of faith on the
part of Sigismund and the council, raised a rebellion under one
Ziska, which lasted for several years. In England the followers of
WicklifTe were called LOLLARDS. For some time they were protected
by some of the leading barons, as John of Gaunt, &c., but on the
accession of Henry IV., whose interests led him to propitiate the
clergy, they were persecuted. The statute, " de heretico comburendo,"
was passed. William Sawtre, a parish priest, was the first martyr to
Protestantism in England, 1402 A.D. ; and, under Henry V. Sir
John Oldcastle (Lord Cobham) was burnt, in 1418 A.D. In imitation
of the action of the Inquisition in the south of France against the
318 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
Albigenses (in the beginning of the thirteenth century), the Inqui
sition was established in Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella in 1480,
and similar courts under various names in all papal Europe,
though generally viewed with jealousy by the secular power. Yet
there w^s then, and there has ever been, much real piety existing in
the Romish Church, to which various Protestants have delighted to
bear witness, among others John Wesley.1 There was also a strong
feeling of repugnance against the abuses and superstitions of the
Church, especially against the sale of indulgences by papal agents
in Germany. The " MYSTICS," some of whom may be called
"reformers before Luther in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries,"
were men of undoubted and singular piety. The names of Tauler,
Ruysbrock, Gerhard, Groote, John Wessel, Thomas a Kempis, some
of whom were members of the society of " the Brethren of Common
Life " at Deventer, deserve to be remembered by all Christians.
Among every class of the clergy were found men truly Christian,
and fully alive to the evils prevalent in the Church. They were
deterred from open opposition, because of their dread of breaking
the formal unity of the Church under the popedom, which they
regarded as essential to the existence of the Church. The " Imita-
tion of Christ," attributed to Thomas a Kempis, supplied some
imperious want in the Christianity of mankind. ". . . . Its sole,
single, exclusive object is the purification of the individual soul.
.... That which distinguishes Christianity, &c., the love of man,
is entirely left out."3 The dean forgets that the book was intended
as a guide to help the individual to deal faithfully with his own soul
in the work of self-examination. It was not intended to discuss
relative or other duties, but to enable the pious soul to attain that
purity of heart through which such duties can be discharged.
9. LITERARY HISTORY FROM 1273-1520 A.D. Two of the great
scholastic doctors, mentioned in connexion with the scholastic philo-
sophy, properly belong to this period. Duns Scotus, 1275-1308 A.D.,
and William of Ockham, 1270-1350 A.D. The first, Duns Scotus,
" might seem a mere reasoning machine .... logic worship is the
key of his whole philosophy." 3 William Ockham was a political
fanatic, advocating the rights of the state against the Church, and
was excommunicated by Pope John XXII., 1330 A.D. ; "by his
strong, rigid Nominalism .... he may seem to have anticipated
the famous axiom of Leibnitz, that ' there is nothing in the intellect,
which was not from the sense, except the intellect itself,' and to have
1 Works, vol. ii. p. 77 ; iii. p. 342. 2 Milman, vol. vi. p. 484. 3 Ibid., p. 467.
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A. D. 319
taken the same ground as Kant."1 GERSON, the Chancellor of the
University of Paris, 1393-1410 A.D., the great advocate of the rights
of the state and of the councils against the claims of the popes, has
been associated with the later Schoolmen. There are also a few
names which properly belong to the universal literature of the
Church rather than to any particular nation. Cardinal Hugo St.
Cher, 1225-1265 A.D., gave to the Church a Bible with various
readings, a commentary (Postilla), and a concordance of the Latin
Bible. NICHOLAS DE LYRA, 1291-1340 A.D., wrote " Postilla," the
first ever printed, 1472 A.D., from which Martin Luther so largely
profited, that it was said : " Si lyra non lyrasset, Lutherus non
saltasset." Bradwardine, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1325-1348 A.D.,
a strong Augustinian theologian. WYCLTFFE, 1374-1384 A.D., who
translated the Bible into English, and wrote a large number of
treatises which had no small influence in promoting the feeling
against the corruptions of the Church. Laurentius Valla, a great
classical authority, wrote (1465 A.D.) "Annotations on the New
Testament," and Cardinal Ximenes, in Spain, patronised the great
work, the " Complutensian Polyglote," 1482-1517 A.D. The revival
of letters, to which the impulse was at all events accelerated by the
influx of learned Greeks into ITALY, &c., some time before, and
especially after the conquest of Constantinople (1453 A.D.) by the
Turks, was felt at once in the increased study of Greek. Boccaccio
had revived the study, 1350-1370 A.D., and Chrysoloras had taught in
Florence, 1400-1415 A.D. ; LORENZO DE MEDICI founded an academy
for its study, 1470 A.D. ; at Paris it was studied (1458 A.D.) in the
University ; in ENGLAND taught by Linacre and Grocyn at Oxford,
1480-1491 A.D. ; but this study was generally opposed by the
schools and universities, and its introduction and continuance as a
study was owing to the secular authorities. Meanwhile, instead of
one literary language (the Latin) with which the clergy and the
leading laymen were more or less familiar, the vernacular languages
began to be used as vehicles of thought. The ITALIAN, FRENCH,
SPANISH, ENGLISH, GERMAN, DUTCH, and the PORTUGUESE, in all
seven languages, had begun separate national literatures.
ITALY. — PETRARCH, the lover of Laura, celebrated in his sonnets,
1306-1374 A.D. ; DANTE, 1265-1322 A.D., in his "Divine Comedy,"
gave to modern literature a new beginning and fresh starting-point
distinct from the classics (Olifant); BOCCACCIO, 1313-1375 A.D., whose
pure Italian is no excuse for his coarseness and indecency ; Poggio,
1 Milman, vol. vi. p. 474.
320 From Rudolph of Hapsburg, 1273 A.D., to the
1410-1459 A.D. ; Picus of Morandola, 1485-1494 A.D. Under the
patronage of the Medici in Florence, 1470-1492 A.D. and following
year, literature flourished at Florence. Cardinal Bembo, 1490-
1540 A.D. ; Politian, 1480-1490' A.D. ; Pulci, 1481 A.D. ; Boiardo,
1495 A.D. ; ARIOSTO, 1503-1516 A.D. ; were the fruits of the Renais-
sance. Ficennius, in 1482 A.D., published his "Platonic Theology,"
in which the soul, an emanation from God, is taught to be reunited
to him by aesceticism and contemplation. There was also Peter
Martyr (Anghiera), 1427-1500 A.D., the first literary announcer of
the new discoveries of the Spaniards. From the eleventh century
PAINTING began to be pursued in ITALY, and created the Bolognese,
Sienese, Tuscan, Umbrian, Paduan, Roman, Venetian, &c., schools.
LEONARDO DA VINCI, the most celebrated, 1452-1470 A.D. Italian
literature was the favourite foreign literature of the educated nobles
and ladies in England in this period.
FRANCE had writers, but no literature comparable with Italy at
this time. FROISSART, the chronicler, 1401 A.D., and PHILIP DE
COMINES, 1468-1579 A.D., are her leading writers. Raymond
Sebonde wrote a philosophical defence of natural and revealed
religion, 1430 A.D. Budasus, 1467-1540 A.D., belongs to the next
period.
SPAIN could boast of the famous romance " Amadis de Gaul,"
in the fourteenth century, besides many theologians and writers
of mere chronicles. The poem on the Cid was in existence in
the fourteenth century, but was not well known until much later.
Le Brixa became to Spain what Budaeus was to France and Erasmus
to Germany ; he was the reviver of classical and Oriental literature,
1473 A-D' Popular songs were known in Spain and Portugal from
an early period.
ENGLAND. — The English language was taught in the schools,
1350 A.D., and in courts of law, 1368 A.D. It was first used in a
proclamation issued by Henry III. in 1258 A.D. The first English
letter extant is by a lady, 1399 A.D., "proved to be genuine by the
badness of the grammar." The long poem, " Piers Ploughman,"
by Robert Langland, a monk, 1362 A.D. GOWER the poet, 1354-
1398 A.D. ; CHAUCER, whose "Canterbury Tales" (1328-1400 A.D.)
are read now with increasing pleasure; the PASTON Letters, 1420-
1480 A.D., faithfully depict the then state of society. The poet
Lydgate, 1461 A.D. ; Linacre the physician, 1460-1521 A.D., a great
friend and promoter of literature ; Dean COLET of St. Paul's, with
Bishop Fisher, and Sir THOMAS MORE, who wrote "THE UTOPIA,"
1516 A.D., were contemporary with Henry VIII. and Cardinal
Emperor Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A. D. 321
Wolsey. " The Utopia " is an ideal picture of a perfect common-
wealth never to be realised. Hawes, 1515 A.D., and Skelton,
1460-1528 A.D., were later poets. Other chroniclers also, as Thomas
of Walsingham, 1440 A.D., Hardyng, 1450 A.D., and Fabyan,
1500 A.D., with Lord Berners, the translator of Froissart, and the
lawyer, Sir J. Fortesque, 1450 A.D., and Thomas Lyttleton, 1460-
1487 A.D. Scotland had King James I., 1395-1437 A.D. ; Fordun,
1300-1386 A.D. ; Andrew of Wyntown (Chronicler of Scotland),
1400 A.D. ; Harry the Minstrel, at the court of James IV., 1410 A.D.
GERMANY owes much to the school of Deventer (Overyssel,
Holland), planned by Gerhard Groot, but not established until
fifteen years after his death, 1400 A.D. The associates of this school
were called "the Brethren of the Common Life," resembling the
Moravians by their strict life, by a partial community of goods, by
industry in manual labour, and by their fervent devotion ; they were
also distinguished by their love of learning and their efforts to dis-
seminate it. Eichhorn says that " these schools were the first genuine
nurseries of literature in Germany . . . and in them was, first, tauught
the Latin, and, in process of time, the Greek and Eastern tongues."
THOMAS A KEMPIS, the supposed author of " The Imitation of Christ,"
1380-1471 A.D., was of this pious fraternity. It is now thought that
a monk named SCHOMHOVEN, of Zwolle, who lived thirty years before
Kempis, was the author. Rudolf Agricola, Von Langen, Hegius,
Wimpheling, the Abbot Tethem, Dr. J. Eck, the opponent of Luther,
a man of real learning, and many others, were connected in early
life with this college. HANS SACHS, the Nuremburg poet,
1497-1576 A.D., and SEBASTIAN BRANDT, 1454-1521 A.D., in his
" Ship of Fools," appealed to the people. REUCHLIN, the reviver
of Hebrew and Oriental literature, 1455-1520 A.D., was persecuted
by the ignorant clergy and others, but protected by the secular power ;
he defended himself in a publication the most severe and telling of
all satires, judging from its results on the mind and opinions of
Germany. The "Epistolse Obscurorum Virorum," by unknown
hands, " fell among the opponents of Reuchlin like a bombshell,
scattering dismay The enemies of the new literature are
made to represent themselves, and the representation is managed
with a truth of nature only equalled by the absurdity of the posture
in which the actors are exhibited." The result was a radical reform
in the universities of Germany. ULRIC VON HUTTON, Crotus Rabianus,
Hermann Buschius, were the three authors of this effective satire.1
1 Sir William Hamilton's " Essays," 8vo.
Y
322 State of the World A.D. 1520.
. THE NETHERLANDS, HOLLAND. — From an early period the Low
Countries had their national songs. John I., Duke of Brabant, was
the first lyric writer; Jacob von Maerlandt (Bruges), 1263-1270 A.D. ;
the Rhyming Bible, 1270 to 1291 A.D. ; Jan von Boendale, poetry,
1286-1365 A.D. ; Melis Stoke, rhyming chronicler, 1305 A.D. ; Dirk
Potter, poet and diplomatist, 1409-1412 A.D. ; Ruysbrock, a religious
writer, 1294-1310 A.D. Theatrical companies for mysteries and
miracle plays existed in the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, and
preceded the Chamber of Rhetoric in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries. There were also Tournaments of Rhetoric at Antwerp
and Brussels, 1426-1620 A.D.
It is remarkable that the largest library .in Europe in this period
was one in BUDA, HUNGARY, collected by the king, Matthias
Corvinus, 1458-1490 A.D. It contained 50,000 volumes, but it was
dispersed and lost in the conquest of Hungary by the Turks.
State of the World 1520 A.D.
EUROPE.
SCANDINAVIA united by the Union of Calmar. Sweden discontented
and prepared to separate.
BRITISH ISLANDS. England and Ireland, with Wales, form one
kingdom. Scotland under its own king.
FRANCE. All the fiefs reunited to the Crown (Lorraine and part ot
Burgundy excepted, which yet belonged to the German
Empire).
SPAIN. All the peninsula (except Portugal) united under one king,
Charles I. of Spain, the fifth of Germany.
PORTUGAL, distinguished by its maritime discoveries under Prince
Henry, 1412-1463 A.D.
THE NETHERLANDS (Belgium and Holland) attached to the empire
of Charles V. (as the heir of Mary of Burgundy).
ITALY. Savoy and Piedmont form a Duchy — the States of the
Church to the Pope. Florence and Milan under their
respective dukes. Genoa and Venice were under republics.
Venice had 3,300 merchant ships and 25,000 seamen.
State of the World A. D. 1520. 323
Florence had 150,000 inhabitants and a revenue of .£150,000.
Naples and Sicily formed part of the Spanish kingdom under
Charles V.
GERMANY. The empire under Charles V. consisting of a large
number of independent principalities, duchies, electorates,
and free towns.
BOHEMIA to the House of Austria, after the death of King Louis at
Mohacz in the battle with the Turks, 1526 A.D.
HUNGARY united to the House of Austria by Albert II., 1437 A.D. ;
after his death to Ladislaus, King of Poland, who was killed
at Varna by the TURKS, 1443 A.D. It was then governed by
the great Hunyades, 1445-1448 A.D., and then by his son
Matthias Corvinus, 1458-1490 A.D., as regents, who resolutely
defended the country against the TURKS. This was the most
brilliant period of Hungarian history. Ladislaus II. reigned
1490-1516 A.D., and was succeeded by Louis II., 1516 A.D.,
who was, with difficulty, able to resist the TURKISH invasion.
PRUSSIA, under the Teutonic knights, whose master was Albert of
Brandenburg, 1511 A.D., engaged in a war with Poland.
SWITZERLAND. Independent and aristocratic republics, too ready
to hire out their enterprising youth as mercenary troops to
any European power.
POLAND and Lithuania united under the Jagellons since 1386 A.D. ;
wars with Russia until the peace of 1523 A.D.
RUSSIA became independent of the Khan of Kipshack, 1478 A.D. ;
its power was being consolidated and extended, though
occasionally ravaged by the Tartars of Kazan and the
Crimea.
TURKEY. The Ottoman Turks first had a footing in Europe, 1356 A.D.,
and in 1453 A.D. conquered Constantinople and destroyed
the Greek Eastern Empire, absorbing also Servia, Wallachia,
and Moldavia,
ASIA.
ASIA MINOR, SYRIA, and the territory west of the Tigris form part of
the Turkish Empire.
PERSIA, east of the Tigris, &c., under the Sefi rule.
Y 2
324 State of the World A.D. 1520.
INDIA, the beginning of the Mogul Empire by Baber, 1509-1526 A.D.,
which gradually acquired the whole rule of India.
CHINA under the Ming Dynasty.
JAPAN disturbed by civil wars.
AFRICA.
EGYPT under the Mamelukes, 1250 A.D. ; conquered by Selim,
Sultan of Turkey, 1527 A.D.
MOROCCO. The Merins supplanted by the Oatzes, then by the
Xeriffs, 1510-1519 A.D.
TUNIS. The Lazzis submit to Turkey, 1514 A.D. All Barbary
nominally subject to Turkey, except Morocco. Piracy is
specially located at ALGIERS, and troubled the Mediterranean
before the end of the fifteenth century. The Corsairs were
not seen in the Atlantic until the year 1585 A.D.
AMERICA.
Was first discovered 'by Columbus, in the service of Spain, 1492 A.D.
First Spanish colony at Hispaniola, 1493" A-D- J at Cuba,
1511 A.D.
MEXICO conquered by Cortez for Spain, i52ofA.D.
BRAZIL discovered by Cabral, the Portuguese, 1500 A.D.
SOUTH AMERICA. Magellan discovered the Straits called by his
name, and passed 'on to the Philippine Islands; his vessel
made the first circumnavigation of the world, 1520, 1521 A. D.
TENTH PERIOD,
From the Reign of Charles V. of Germany,
1520 A.D., to the English Revolution,
1688 A.D.
1. MODERN HISTORY begins with the sixteenth century. Every
event of importance from this time is more or less connected with
the great questions that agitate Christendom in our day. Following,
as near as possible, the order of time, the narrative will take up — (i)
the rivalry of France, under Francis /., with Germany and Spain
under Charles V. of Germany and I. of Spain ; (2) the Reformation ;
(3) the decline of the Spanish monarchy under Philip II., &c.; (4) the
growth of the power of France and of England ; (5) the Turkish
power at its height under Solyman, and its subsequent decline j (6)
the Thirty Years' War in Germany and Central Europe, with the brief
predominance of Sweden ; (7) the aggressive policy and wars of
Louis XIV. (the Great) of France, and the resistance offered by
England, Germany, and Holland ; (8) the first appearance of Prussia
and Russia in European politics ; after which the contemporary local
histories, and the progress of maritime discovery.
I. — The Rivalry of France with Germany and Spain.
2. The rivalry of France, under Francis I., with Germany and
Spain under Charles V. of Germany, and I. of Spain, led the
European nations to study the great question of the balance of power,
so necessary to the smaller states. At this time, France under
Francis, and Spain and Germany under Charles V,, were undoubtedly
the two great powers of Europe. They were contemporary with the
three greatest events affecting the interests of Christianity and of
326 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
civilisation : — (i) The opening out of the Eastern world to the com-
merce of Europe ; (2) the discovery of a new world, the continent
of America, the most extensive of all fields for the settlement of
a European population, the seed of future powerful Europeanised
nationalities ; (3) the prevalence and force of new ideas, especially
in the western and central nations of Europe, of which the Reforma-
tion in religion, and resistance to the papal authority, temporal and
spiritual, are the most palpable results. At the same time, Christian
Europe was threatened by the Turkish power, which had already
over-run Hungary and Transylvania, and had reached the frontiers
of Germany, and which even threatened Italy and Rome itself. It
was in the power of Charles and of Francis to save Germany and
aly, and to recover Hungary and the territories south of the
Danube from Turkish domination, and perhaps to re-establish a
Christian government in Constantinople. But these men, respectable
as they stood, fully equal to any of their contemporaries, could not
see the grandeur of their position, and the path in which, unitedly,
they might proceed with honour to themselves and with advantage
to the highest interests of humanity. Paltry contests for a few
square miles in Italy and the Low Countries made them rivals,
insensible to all higher objects and claims. The opportunity of medi-
ating in the great struggle of mind, of religious feeling, and of
endangered secular interests, which followed the outbreak of the
Reformation under Luther and his confreres in Germany, was thrown
away. The guilt of the general intolerance of nations in the per-
secutions for heresy, which stereotyped the embittered feelings of both
Protestants and Catholics against each other, and which led at last
to the religious wars in France, the Massacre on St. Bartholomew's
Day, 1572 A.D., and, eventually, to the Thirty Years' calamitous War
in Germany, 1618-1648 A.D., is fairly traceable to the selfish rivalry
of Francis I. (who burned Protestants in France, and tried to league
with them in Germany) and Charles V. These men, great as they
were, had no "understanding of the times," to know and to
recognise their high duties ; and Europe has had to suffer the con-
sequences of their ignorance and selfishness.
There were, however, causes of rivalry, which seemed to justify
the course pursued by the French king and the German emperor.
Neither France nor Germany were satisfied with the portions of
the dukedom of Burgundy obtained by each on the death of Charles
the Bold, 1477 A.D. France had also claims upon Naples and
Sicily, disgracefully inherited from the House of Anjou. These
states were now in the possession of Spain as the heritage of the
EnglisJi Revolution, 1688 A.D. 327
kings of Arragon, derived from the will of the murdered Conraddin.
There was also another claim for the inheritance of the duchy of
Milan, on the death of the last of the Visconti, 1447 A.D., which, by
agreement, was to have fallen to the family of the Duke of Orleans,
a descendant of the daughter of the first Visconti. It was, however,
claimed as a fief of the empire, and had been granted to the Sforza
family, 1494 A.D., by the Emperor Maximilian. Louis XII. had,
for a time, recovered possession of Milan, but it had again reverted
to the Sforzas. Francis I. renewed his claims, and, winning the
battle of Marignano over the Swiss allies of Sforza, Sept. 13, 1515
A.D., recovered Milan, a very distant and precarious possession for
France. Again, the candidature for the empire on the death of
Maximilian, 1519 A.D., on the part of Francis and Charles, resulted
in the election of Charles. The two rivals, each anticipating the
future contests, sought to secure the friendship of Henry VIII.
of England, who then fancied himself arbiter of the peace of
Europe. The military power which each could command was
about equal. The emperor could claim superiority as to territory
and varied resources. The King of France had a compact kingdom,
unhampered by the necessity of consulting German diets and
princes, who regarded themselves as practically the equals of the
emperor. The possessions over which Charles ruled were Spain,
Austria with Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, and the Tyrol : the duchies
of Limburg, Gueldres, Alsace, with Brabant, and the Low Countries.
He had also the nominal control of Bohemia, Lusatia, Silesia, and
Moravia, w\\h Hungary and Transylvania; but the Turkish occupancy
rendered these latter kingdoms a burden rather than a source of
strength. In France all the great fiefs had been absorbed by the
crown. England retained the town of Calais, the sole relic,
happily, of her former large possessions, the inheritance of the Nor-
man and Plantagenet kings. In the first war, Charles defeated
Francis at Pavia and took him prisoner, 1525 A.D., but released him
in 1526 A.D. ; in the second war, the Constable Bourbon, the rebel
subject of Francis, serving under Charles, took Rome and held the
Pope prisoner, 1527 A.D.; the third war lasted from 1536 to 1538
A.D. '3 in the fourth war, 1542-1544 A.D., Francis, the orthodox per-
secutor of Protestantism in France, scandalised Europe by allying
himself with the Turkish Sultan Solyman, the sworn enemy of
Christendom, though in so doing he only followed the example of
Pope Alexander VI. (Borgia), in 1494 A.D. The balance of loss in
these wars was unfavourable to Francis. Though released from
prison in 1526 A.D., he had to pay a heavy ransom for his sons,
328 From Charles V, of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
given as hostages, and had to renounce all claims on Italy, 1529 A.DV
In 1536 A.D., he renewed the war with Charles, having entered into
a league with Sultan Solyman, by which the sultan engaged that the
pirate Barbarossa should land a Turkish army in Apulia, for the
conquest of Naples, while Francis invaded Lombardy. By Bar-
barossa 10,000 persons were carried into slavery from Apulia, after
which he retired. Peace was made in 1538 A.D. Francis died in
1544 A.D. Henry VI IL, the supposed arbiter, died in 1547 A.D. ;
and Charles (after abdicating) in 1558 A.D.
IL— The Reformation.
3. "There is, perhaps, no event in history which has been repre-
sented in so great a variety of lights as the Reformation. It has
been called a revolt of the laity against the clergy, or of the Teutonic
races against the Italians, or the kingdoms of Europe against the
universal monarchy of the popes. Some have seen in it only a burst
of long-repressed anger at the luxury of the prelates and the mani-
fold abuses of the ecclesiastical system. Others, a renewal of the
youth of the Church, by a return to primitive forms of doctrine.
All these, indeed, to some extent, it was ; but it was also some-
thing more profound, and fraught with mightier consequences than
any of them. It was, in its essence, the assertion of the principle of
individuality — that is to say, of true spiritual freedom That
which was external and concrete was, in all things, to be superseded
by that which was inward and spiritual Truth was no longer to
be truth to the soul until it should have been by the soul recognisedr
and, in some measure, even created." J " This great work was
accomplished .... only by the invisible power of ideas and truths^
facilitated by circumstances which Providence had prepared, and by
the energetic genius of some few men who made themselves masters
of these ideas and circumstances. Thus .... the great law of
nature was fulfilled, according to which ideas are stronger than
external power, and according to which excess and abuse of
authority becomes its destruction, and according to which every
power that resists the spirit of the time rests upon a hollow founda-
tion, and accelerates its fall by its resistance." A long-prevailing
unconcealed jealousy of the wealth of the Church influenced many
who cared nothing about the teachings or superstitions of the Church-
Even good Catholics, who, as in England, zealously approved of the
1 Bryce, p. 325.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 329
burning of heretics, at the same time, 1410 A.D., offered to aid
Henry IV. in secularising the whole of the ecclesiastic property of the
kingdom. The sale of indulgences by papal agents had long been
annoying to the moral feeling of sincere Catholics, especially when
carried on by persons of questionable character. There had been gradu-
ally growing up a feeling in favour of the reconsideration of certain
views which had deformed the simplicity of the Catholic creed, and
which did not accord with the writings of the early Fathers. Thus.,
"the Reformation was not, as is commonly supposed, an improvised
revolution, for which men had not been prepared." x The train had
been long preparing, and long laying, when the action of MARTIN
LUTHER caused the explosion. The pious, simple monk, excited by
the vile trade carried on by Tetzel in the disposal of indulgences,,
believed that the Pope had been deceived by his agents, and that, in
protesting against the sale of indulgences, he was serving the interests
of the Church of Rome. In 1517 A.D. he published his ninety-five
propositions against indulgences at Wittenberg. In 1521 A.D. they
were formally condemned by the Council at Worms. Political
reasons, as well as his educational influences, led the Emperor
Charles V. to support the papacy, and the same reasons influenced
the ruling powers of Europe. The cause of reform was injured by
the revolt of the German peasantry, in 1525 A.D., which was ascribed
to the teachings of Luther, though the existence of political secret
societies of the peasantry, for some generations previous, is a fact fully
established by the German historians. This revolt was most cruelly
stamped out, revealing at the same time the oppression under which
the rebels groaned, and the thorough unfitness of their leaders to
establish any practical reforms. At the Diet of Spires, 1526-1529,
all further reforms in the Church were prohibited. The opposite
party protested against this decision, and hence acquired the name of
Protestants. In the Diet of Augsburg, 1530 A.D., the Protestants
produced their confession of faith, which was condemned, and all
attempts at a reconciliation failed. Protestantism then necessarily
assumed a political character. By the formation of the League of
Schmalkaldm, consisting of the Protestant princes, 1531 A.D., the
emperor was compelled to conclude the Peace of Nuremburg, 1532
A.D. In 1546 A.D., through the defection of Prince Maurice, the
League was defeated at Muhlberg, and the cause of Protestantism,
as a political power in the empire, appeared to be lost ; but, in
1552 A.D., Maurice, suspecting the emperor's intention of enforcing
1 Hook, vol. i., new series, p. 24.
33O From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
the decisions of the Council of Trent (then in session), suddenly
advanced against Charles, and compelled him to fly from Innsptuck,
after which the Treaty of Passau was agreed to, by which a general
toleration was established. This was followed by the religious Peace
of Augsburg, which, for a time, gave religious freedom to Germany.
In the course of the Schmalkalden War, Henry IT., king of France,
"the eldest son of the Church," leagued with the Protestant princes,
tookMetz, Toul,z.n& Verdun, and proclaimed himself " the protector of
the liberties of Germany," thus beginning a policy of aggression from
which both Germany and France have so greatly suffered. THE
CAUSE OF THE REFORMATION prospered in NORTH GERMANY, and,
for a time, even in AUSTRIA. It was established in SCANDINAVIA,
part of SWITZERLAND, the SEVEN UNITED PROVINCES. ENGLAND
began its religious reform under Henry VIII. and Edward VI.
Mary was a papist and persecutor, and unwittingly helped Protest-
antism by the hateful impression she made by the fires of Smithfield,
in which at least 288 persons suffered death during her reign. Under
Elizabeth, Protestantism was firmly established. In SCOTLAND, also,
Protestantism was deeply rooted into the national character. The
" Solemn League and Covenant," so remarkable in Scottish history,
proved that the reformer, John Knox, had left his stamp on the
Scottish mind. In FRANCE, up to the death of Henry III., Protest-
antism was alternately tolerated and persecuted. The Catholic
League under the Guises, supported by Spain, for the destruction of
heresy in France, was accompanied by a secret league for the extir-
pation of Protestantism by Spain and France, 1585 A.D. Before
this, the massacre in Paris on St. Bartholomew's Day, 1572 A.D.,
had disgusted all Europe, except Pope Gregory XIII. and Philip II.
of Spain. The accession of Henry IV., in 1589 A.D., and the publi-
cation of the Edict of Nantes, 1598 A.D., gave Protestantism a legal
existence and security in France. In SPAIN, PORTUGAL, and ITALY,
in the SOUTHERN NETHERLANDS, Protestantism was ruthlessly
stamped out. The whole process may be profitably read in McCrie's
history, and in Prescott and Motley. The Inquisition did its work
thoroughly ; and Alva, on a larger scale, put to death, by the hands
of the executioner, eighteen thousand Protestants in the Netherlands,
within the space of six years, with the full approval of his master,
Philip II. of Spain. In POLAND, Protestantism obtained, through
the labours of John A. Lasko, some considerable success from 1552
to 1570 A.D., and following years, until the introduction of the
Socinian element alarmed the orthodox feeling of both Catholics
and Protestants. The Socinians were banished, 1658 A.D., but the
English Revolution, 1688 A. D, 331
reproach of their views affected the progress of the Protestants gener-
ally. In IRELAND, the Keltic population, which hated the English
when Catholic, hated them in their Protestantism the more.
4. The rapid progress of Protestantism was followed by an equally
rapid reaction in certain countries. This has been clearly and
eloquently described by Macaulay. " In the northern parts of
Europe the victory of Protestantism was rapid and decisive. The
dominion of the Papacy was felt by the nations of Teutonic blood,
as the dominion of Italians, of foreigners, of men who were aliens
in language, manners, and intellectual constitution. The large
jurisdiction exercised by the spiritual tribunals of Rome seemed
to be a degrading badge of servitude. The sums which, under
a thousand pretexts, were exacted by a distant court, were regarded
both as a humiliating and as a ruinous tribute. The character
of that court excited the scorn and disgust of a grave, earnest,
sincere, and devout people. The new theology spread with a
rapidity never known before. All ranks, all varieties of character
joined the ranks of the innovators. Sovereigns impatient to appro-
priate to themselves the prerogatives of the Pope; nobles desirous
to have the plunder of abbeys ; suitors exasperated by the extor-
tions of the foreign camera ; patriots impatient of a foreign rule ;
good men scandalised by the corruption of the Church ; bad men
desirous of the licence inseparable from great moral revolutions;
wise men eager in the pursuit of truth ; weak men allured by the
glitter of novelty : all were found on one side Within fifty
years from the day on which Luther publicly renounced com-
munion with the Papacy, and burned the bull of Leo before the
gates of Wittenberg, Protestantism attained its highest ascendancy,
which it soon lost, and which it has never regained In
England, Scotland, Denmark, Sweden, Livonia, Prussia, Saxony,
Hesse, Wurtemburg, the Palatinate, in several Cantons of Switzer-
land, in the Northern Netherlands, the Reformation had completely
triumphed ; and in all the other countries on this side of the Alps
and the Pyrenees it seemed on the point of triumphing. But, while
this mighty work was proceeding in the north of Europe, a revolu-
tion of a very different kind had taken place in the south. The
temper of Italy and Spain was widely different from that of
Germany and England The national feeling of the Italians
impelled them to resist any change which might deprive their
country of the honours and advantages which she enjoyed as the
seat of the government of the Universal Church There was
among the Italians both much piety and much impiety ; but, with
332 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
very few exceptions, neither the i^ety nor the impiety took the turn
of Protestantism. The religious Italians desired a reform of morals
and discipline, but not a reform of doctrine, and least of all a schism.
The irreligious Italians simply disbelieved Christianity without
hating it ..... Neither the spirit of Savonarola, nor the spirit of
Machiavelli had anything in common with the spirit of the religious
or political Protestants of the north. Spain, again, was with respect
to the Catholic Church in a situation very different from that of the
Teutonic nations ..... The attachment of the Castilian to the
faith of his ancestors was peculiarly strong and ardent. With that
faith were inseparably bound up the institutions, the independence,
and the glory of his country ..... The existence of Spain had
been one long crusade. After fighting Mussulmans in the old world,
she began to fight heathens in the new ..... It was with the cry
of 'St. James for Spain,' that they charged armies which out-
numbered them a hundredfold ..... Thus Catholicism, which in the
public mind of northern Europe was associated with spoliation and
oppression, was in the public mind of Spain associated with liberty,
yictory, dominion, wealth, and glory. It is not, therefore, strange
that the effect of the great outbreak of Protestantism in one part of
Christendom should have been to produce an equally violent out-
break of Catholic zeal on the other." 1 .... " About half a century
after the great separation there were throughout the north Protestant
governments and Protestant nations. In the south were governments
and nations actuated by the most intense zeal for the ancient
Church. Between these two hostile regions lay, morally, as well as
geographically, a great debatable land. In France, Belgium, South
Germany, Hungary, and Poland, the contest was still undecided.
The governments of those countries had not renounced their con-
nexion with Rome, but the Protestants were numerous, bold, and
active. In France they formed a commonwealth within the realm,
held fortresses, were able to bring great armies into the field, and
had treated with their sovereign on terms of equality. In Poland
the king was still a Catholic ; but the Protestants had the upper
hand in the diet, filled the chief offices in the administration, and
in the large towns took possession of the parish church .....
In Bavaria the state of things was nearly the same ..... In
Transylvania the house of Austria was unable to prevent the diet
from confiscating, by one sweeping decree, the estates of the Church.
In Austria proper, it was generally said that only one-thirtieth part
*
1 "Essays," vol. ii. pp. 551-554.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 333
of the population could be counted on as good Catholics. In
Belgium the adherents to the new opinions were reckoned by
hundreds of thousands. The history of the two succeeding genera-
tions is the history of the struggle between Protestant possessions of
the north of Europe, and Catholicism possessed of the south for
the doubtful territory which lay between At first the chances
seemed to be decidedly in favour of Protestantism, but the victory
remained with the Church of Rome. On every point she was
successful. If we overleap another half century, we find her
victorious and dominant in France, Belgium, Bavaria, Bohemia,
Austria, Poland, and Hungary. Nor has Protestantism in the course
of two hundred years, been able to reconquer any portion of what
was then lost." * This eloquent summary of the popish reaction,
though substantially true, must be taken with some qualification, as
will be seen in the course of events following. Macaulay has
neglected to state the main cause of the reaction against Protest-
antism on the Continent, in France, South Germany and Austria,
Hungary and Poland. This was the selfish secularity of the major
part of the Protestant nobles and higher classes, whose zeal was too
much the desire to acquire possession of Church property, to rule
over the reformed Churches, and to establish a power in their several
states necessarily opposed to the control of their respective govern-
ments. The greed, and tyranny, and intolerance of these men lost
them the sympathy and support of the people. Gardiner justly
remarks, in reference to the events which led to the revolt in
Bohemia in 162 1 A.D., what is true in respect to Germany and France:
" The dispassionate inquirer, however badly he may think of the
religious systems by which Protestantism was superseded in these
territories, can hardly do otherwise than rejoice at the defeat of the
political system of the men by whom Protestantism was in the main
supported.' We may trace the decline of spiritual religion in
North-Western Germany to the thorough subjection of the churches
to the secular power, by which all freedom of thought in religious
matters was suppressed. This great evil was felt by the reformer
himself when he and Melancthon were betrayed into the great sin
of authorising the Landgrave of Hesse to take a second wife while
his first was living ; a painful fact, which in all fairness cannot be
concealed.
"Essays," vol. i. pp. 561-563.
s Gardiner, "History of England," vol. iii. p. 263.
334 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
HI. The Decline of the Spanish Monarchy under Philip //., and
his Successors.
5. By the abdication of the Emperor Charles V., the kingdom ot
Spain, the Netherlands, Milan, Naples, Sicily, and the recent con-
quests in America came into the possession of his son, Philip II.
The seventeen provinces (the Netherlands), though small in extent
of territory, were the richest of the possessions of the Spanish
crown. They comprised three hundred and fifty cities, six thousand
three hundred towns, besides numerous villages. In agriculture,
manufacture, and commerce, they were unequalled, as well as in
wealth, by any kingdom then existing. They were, in fact, the
main support of Charles V., and, for a time, of his son Philip II.
Each province was a separate state, with separate constitutions and
laws. The states-general, consisting of deputies from each province,
met occasionally; there were states in each province elected as
representative of the people by different processes, and a supreme
tribunal at Mechlin. The King of Spain was in reality the head of
a republican confederation, the people of which were perhaps the
best educated in Europe, and all of them highly attached to their
laws and political constitutions. The possessions of the Austrian
family in Germany, with Bohemia and Hungary, and the imperial
crown, fell to Ferdinand I., the younger brother of Charles V.
Philip II. possessed much of his father's talent and prudence, with
all or more of his conscientious bigotry; his attention to public
affairs intense and without intermission. His revenue was equal to
that of all the other sovereigns of Europe combined. His army
consisted of two hundred and eighty thousand men ; he died in
debt one hundred and forty millions of ducats. PORTUGAL, by
the failure of the royal line, became united to Spain, 1580 A.D.
By the fierce persecution of Protestantism in the NETHERLANDS,
the SEVEN UNITED PROVINCES revolted under the Prince of Orange,
1568 A.D., and secured their independence. The remaining
southern provinces remained under Spain, being intensely Catholic.
In the persecution carried on by the Duke of Alva, some eighteen
thousand persons suffered by the hands of the executioner; fifty
thousand in all were destroyed, and large numbers emigrated,
carrying with them their manufacturing skill, into England especially.
In the administration of his Italian dominions, the troops of Philip
relieved Malta when nearly captured by the Turks, 1565 A.D., and on
7th October, 1571 A.D., the fleets of Spain, Venice, and Rome, com-
manded by Don Juan, of Austria, defeated the Turkish fleet at
English Revolution, 1688 A.D, 335
Lepanto. Thirty thousand of the Turks were killed, ten thousand
made prisoners, and four-fifths of their ships destroyed ; but this
victory was not followed up, and produced no practical results. In
his war with FRANCE, Philip gained the battle of St. Quentin,
1556, and then concluded peace. In the subsequent civil wars in
France, Philip supported the Catholic League and the Guises, and
kept up the disorders which continued until the accession ot
Henry IV. In ENGLAND Philip's marriage with Queen Mary led
her to make war with France, in which Calais was happily lost,
1558 A.D. The grand Armada (one hundred and thirty ships, three
thousand sailors, and twenty thousand troops sent out from Spain
for the conquest of England) was defeated by the navy of Elizabeth.
Thirty-two of the largest ships were destroyed, and one-half of the
troops. An attempt on Ireland in 1596 A.D. was equally unfortunate.
In SPAIN the Morriscos (the Moorish people) revolted, 1568 A.D.,
in consequence of attempts to modify their national usages ; they,
throwing off their profession of Christianity, massacred the priests,
&c., but were finally subdued, 1570 A.D. Don Carlos, the eldest
son of Philip, undoubtedly insane, died, 1568 A.D. Philip was
succeeded by his son, Philip ///., 1598 A.D., of whom and his
immediate successors little can be recalled beyond the reign of
worthless favourites, the profligacy of courts, and the weakness of
the government. " This singular race of submissive penitents, warm
husbands, and mighty hunters, were all hypochondriacal, lethargic,
and superstitious ; incapable of business, exerting no energy except
in bigotry ; no activity but in the chase, and no sensibility but in
that passion for their wives, which was not of the most refined
sort. They submitted to any minister who saved them the trouble
.of government, and whom their consorts suffered or patronised.
The Queen, the confessor, and the huntsman were the only
important persons in the eyes of a Spanish monarch."1 In
1609 the Moors, estimated at the improbable number of six
hundred thousand in number, were expelled, partly owing to their
frequent rebellions and concealed alliances with their African
friends. The loss of so much valuable labour was perhaps made
up by the peace thus secured to the population generally. These
Moors were in Africa treated with " characteristic inhumanity by
the most cruel and perfidious people on earth."2 The Duke of
Lerma,and Rodrigo CalderojWere the favourites in this reign ; but the
duke was disgraced i6i8A.D., andin 1621 A.D.Calderon was executed.
1 Edinburgh Review, vol. xxxi.
8 Durham, "History of Spain," vol. v. p. 88.
336 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Philip IV. succeeded, 1624 A.D. ; his reign is the most disastrous
in the annals of Spain. Portugal, in 1640 A.D., asserted its inde-
pendence under the Duke of Braganza. In 1609 A.D., Spain had
virtually admitted the independence of the Seven United Provinces.
The insurrection of the Catalans led to a war with France, in which
Spain had to cede Rousillon and Conflans to France, 1660 A.D.,
and the privileges of the Catalans confirmed. Naples was troubled
by the revolt of the fisherman Massaniello, which ended in a few
months, 1646 A.D. The Comte de Olivarez was the ruling minister
in this reign. Philip IV. was succeeded, in 1665 A.D., by a child four
years old, Charles II. Don Juan, of Austria, acted as Regent
from 1677, and died 1680 A.D. The imbecility and fatuity of the
king lowered the monarchy in the opinion of all Europe, and the
succession after his death was the topic most interesting to all
politicians. The ruin of the commercial prosperity of Spain began
with Charles V., the Emperor, not only though his exhausting wars
and those of his successors, but by his ignorance and neglect of the
true principles of political economy. In 1552 the export of cloth,
spun and combed wool, corn, cattle, leather, and manufactures of
silk were forbidden ! Heavy duties were levied on the exportation
of Spanish produce, as well as on imported goods. In 1594 A.D.,
the Cortes complained that taxation was equal to the value of one-
third of the capital of the trader. Such was the scarcity of money,
through the wars in France, Germany, and Italy, that even Charles V.
had to tamper with the currency, and his successors followed his
example. Gradually, but rapidly, the agriculture and manufacture
of Spain declined. The trading classes and the cultivators of the
ground were despised, and most of the handicraft trades and the
commercial transactions were in the hands of foreigners, of whom,
in 1 6 10 A.D., one hundred and sixty thousand were settled in
Castile, while the population of some districts had decreased one-
half between 1600 A.D. and 1619 A.D. The general distress was
great, and the commerce of the Mediterranean was lost through the
predominance of the Barbary pirates. Spain, in 1594 A.D., had
eight million two hundred thousand inhabitants, while at that time
the whole of England, Scotland, and Ireland had barely four
millions. The civic list of Philip II. was ^2,400,000. He left a debt
of one hundred millions sterling, borrowed at high interest. There
was in this sixteenth century a rapid decline in the population of the
towns. Under Charles II., who died 1708 A.D., the population of
Spain had fallen to six millions.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 337
IV. — The Growth of thi Power of France and of England :
neighbours and antagonistic in their policies.
6. FRANCE. — The reigns of Henry //., Francis 77. , Charles IX.,
and of Henry III. were injurious to France, characterised by
religious persecutions and civil war. The massacre of the Pro-
testants -in Paris and other towns on St. Bartholomew's Day, August
24, 1572 A.D., had thoroughly alienated the Protestants from the
governing power under the influence of Catherine di Medici, while
the Catholic League, under the Guises, was equally inimical to
the then King Henry III., as not trustworthy, because he had at-
tempted to conciliate the Protestant party by the Edict of Pacifica-
tion, 1576 A.D. This civil war ended in 1589 A.D., when Henry IV.,
the first Bourbon, ascended the throne. In these wars it is
calculated that 300 Catholic and 400 Protestant gentlemen, with
10,000 Catholics and 16,000 Protestants of the middle and lower
classes, were killed ; in all France, a loss of 40,000 lives. As a
specimen of the bigoted feeling of Philip II. of Spain, the leading
evil spirit of these wars, it is said that the only time in his life when
he was known to laugh was when he heard of the Massacre of
St. Bartholomew, in 1572 A.D. At that time the population of
France was about fifteen millions ; about one-third of the land was
in cultivation ; the country parts troubled by thousands of armed
banditti. The territory of France had before this been enlarged by
the acquisition of Metz, Verdun, and Toul, taken by Henry IL
when leagued with the Protestants of Germany against Charles V.
Philip of Spain, the son of Charles V., was the determined enemy
of Protestantism and a supporter of the League against Henry IV.,
who was partially assisted by Elizabeth, Queen of England. By the
Edict of Nantes, 1589 A.D., France was "de-ossified," "for the
Protestants formed the backbone of the country."1 Protestantism
was acknowledged in certain territories, and the Protestants, free from
all disabilities, permitted to hold certain fortified towns for their
protection, a grant injurious to them and to the kingdom. Under
Henry IV. the nation prospered, the debts of the Crown were paid,
and industry revived. Sully, the great minister of Henry IV, paid off
one-third of the debt of three hundred millions of francs, and raised
the net income to sixteen millions of francs. Paris at that time had
450,000 inhabitants. The death of Henry in 1610 was followed
1 Quarterly Review ', vol. clii. p. 4.
Z
333 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
by the reign of Louis XIII., under the regency of his mother,
Mary di Medici. Cardinal Richelieu, who was in this reign the real
governor of France, cared more for France than for the interests of
his Church. He allied France with the Protestants of Germany in
the Thirty Years' War, and procured for France, Alsace, Artois, and
Rousillon. He compelled, not only the nobles generally, but even
the Protestant party in France, which existed as an imperium in
imperiO) and was knowri as the Huguenot party, to submit; took
Rochelle, their stronghold, in 1628 A.D. The Huguenots had, at
that time, 700 parish churches and 200 fortified towns ; about
4,000 of the nobility belonged to their Church, and they could bring
into the field an army of 25,000 men. The death of Richelieu in
1642 A.D., was followed by that of Louis, 1643 A.D. Louis XIV., a
child, succeeded, under the regency of Anne of Austria. Her adminis-
tration was disturbed by the Prince of Conde, Cardinal de Retz,
and other nobles. The local broils and riots in Paris, which have
been ridiculously dignified by the title of " the Wars of the Fronde,"
reveal the levity, vanity, and rapacity of the nobles, and the weakness
of the government, 1648-1653 A.D., and the demoralised condition
of the Parisian mob, as serious a fact as any other (the conduct of
the mob was a rehearsal, on a small scale, of the tragedies of
1793 A.D.). Cardinal Mazarin governed France wisely until his
death in 1661 A.D., after which Louis was his own minister. Already,
however, one great evil affecting French finance had obtained a
footing. In 1664 A.D., there were 50,000 offices purchased, and the
evil, once begun, was increased, as the money received was a present
and immediate relief from financial difficulty. Louis XIV. soon
assumed a high position in Europe. Lord Bolingbroke calls him
"the best actor of majesty that ever filled a throne."1 During this
period France suffered from the ignorance of the true principles of
political economy, first manifested by Rene de Birague, Chancellor
in 1573 A.D., who forbade the importation of manufactured goods,
arid endeavoured to fix by rule the prices of goods, of food, and of
wages, to the manifest injury and decline of the French manufactures
arid trade. The provinces were as separate foreign states to each
other, exacting duties from all commodities entering or departing.
The sole support of France under these restrictions was in its corn,
its wines, its salt, and its hemp and flax.
ENGLAND. — The reign of Henry VIII. is remarkable for his
quarrel with the Pope, and the separation of the English Church
: *!" Study of History."
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 339
from the Roman papacy. His son and successor, Edward VI., was
a minor, and died a minor, 1547-1553 A.D. His reign was that of
a Protestant king, but his ministers, the Dukes of Somerset and
Northumberland, disgraced the Reformation by their inconsistency
and cupidity. Mary, 1553-1558 A.D., the daughter of Henry VIII.,
earned the title of " Bloody Mary," from her fierce persecution of
the Protestants in which more than three hundred suffered, chiefly
at the stake. Her marriage with Philip II. of Spain, and the fear
of Spanish rule, helped to fix the hatred for popery which the fires
of Smithfield had called forth. By the fortunate loss of Calais to
France, England was relieved of her fancied hold on France. On
her death, Elizabeth, her sister, succeeded, 1558 A.D. In her reign,
the Reformation was slowly, and perhaps prudently, carried out by
the establishment of the National Church and by the persecution of
all manifestations of dissent, whether by Papists or Puritans. The
history of her reign is tiresomely full of petty treasons and con-
spiracies in favour of Mary, Queen of Scots, and for the restoration
of popery. She unwillingly assisted the revolted Netherlands against
Spain, and drew on herself the attack of the Spanish Armada, which
was defeated, 1588 A.D., while her interferences in Scotland were not
conducted with much wisdom, and tended to alienate her friends.
Her reign was marked by the increased enterprise of sundry naval
captains, as Drake, and by the general prosperity of the land, and is
considered by some as the most glorious period of England's history.
It certainly was one of the most critical periods of England's history,
through which Elizabeth and her minister Burleigh guided the
national affairs, in fact, a remarkably transition period, in which the
necessities of society called for the Poor Laws, 1601 A.D. On the
death of Elizabeth, 1603 A.D., James VI. of Scotland and first of
England, succeeded. Mary, his mother, was the grand-daughter of
James IV. of Scotland and of Margaret, daughter of Henry VII. of
England. She became Queen of Scotland when a child, and was
educated and married in France to Francis II., king of France, and
on his death returned to Scotland, married Lord Darnley, was
charged with his murder, and by a revolt was driven to England,
where she was kept in custody by Elizabeth, and in 1587 A.D.
executed as a conspirator against the life of Elizabeth. James /., of
the Stuart line, endeavoured to govern England after the fashion of
his Tudor predecessors, but without their tact and discretion. His
reign was one of peace and progress in England, but is regarded as
disgraceful, from the king's pusillanimity in refusing that help to his
son-in-law, the Elector Palatine, 'which it was impossible for him to
z 2
340 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A. D., to the
give. In 1625 A.D., Charles I. succeeded. His differences with his
Parliament respecting the extent of the royal prerogative might have
been peaceably settled even after the war had been carried on for
some time, but the strong feeling of the majority of the soldiery and
of the Parliament, belonging to the large class of the population averse
to episcopacy and clerical rule, deepened during the Civil War,
1643-1649, and rendered all compromise impossible. The Parlia-
ment, suspected of an inclination to peace, was virtually superseded
by the army, and the king executed. The new republic, under
Oliver Cromwell, subdued Scotland and Ireland, and maintained in
Europe the dignity of the English name. The Irish rebellion, in
which many thousands of Protestants were massacred by the savage
natives, who had reason enough to hate the English rule, began
1641 A.D. It was ruthlessly revenged by Oliver Cromwell in
1649 A-D- The fact of the massacre has been disputed by some,
but the substantial credibility of the statements given in detail
seems to be established by Mary Hicksens." * The hatred of the
Irish mobs was, no doubt, aggravated by the difference of religion ;
but the massacre was not a religious, but a national outbreak. The
wild Irish hated his English rulers impartially whether Catholic or
Protestant. On his death, Richard, the son of Oliver, proved in-
competent to rule, and in 1660 A.D. the monarchy was restored in
the person of Charles II. The rule of Charles II. was disgraceful
to himself, and yet more so to the nation which submitted to it.
James II., his successor, attempted to establish arbitrary rule, and
to restore popery. An influential party called in William of Orange
(grandson, by his mother, of Charles I., and, by his marriage with
Mary, the son-in-law of James), the republican chief ruler of Holland.
James was deposed, and William and Mary reigned, 1688 A.D. The
policy of William was that of opposition to the aggressive policy ot
Louis XIV. of France, in which he had the sympathy of Europe, not
excepting the Pope himself. In the year 1657 A.D., the republic,
jealous of the maritime power of the Dutch and irritated by the
remembrance of the massacres of the English in Amboyna, in
1623 A.D., by the Dutch in that island, passed the famous Navigation
Act, by which the importation of all goods into England was for-
bidden, except, when brought in the ships of the country in which
they were produced. This was a serious blow at the Dutch carrying
trade. The national debt of England in 1688 A.D. was ,£1,325,000,
with a floating debt of ^640,000.
1 " Ireland in the Seventeenth Century," 2 vols. 8vo.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 341
V. — The Turkish Power at its Height, under Solyman,
1528-1561 A.D., and its Decline.
7. Had the great powers of Europe, in the beginning of the sixteenth
century, been faithful to the interests of Christendom, the aggression
of the Ottoman Turks would have been avenged, and these bar-
barians would not have been allowed to place themselves among the
civilised nations of Europe. Much to be blamed is the conduct of the
rulers of Austria, the nominal lords also of Bohemia, Hungary, and
Transylvania, whose bigotry threw Hungary and Transylvania into the
hands of the Turkish sultans, the nobles and people preferring the
contemptuous toleration of the Turk to the priestly bigotry of the
Roman Catholic rulers from the time of the death of Albert I. in
1439 A.D. Bohemia, Hungary, with Transylvania, though at times
governed by their own kings in connexion with Austria, were so
distracted by religious differences, and so repelled by the bigotry of
the Austrian monarchs, that there was no disposition to resist the
inroads of the Turks. Their histories are filled with details of
rebellions against Austria, civil wars, the inroads of the Turks, and
the craven submission of the princes and people to that barbarous
power, assisted by the influence of France, ever leagued with
the Turks against Germany. But the great powers of Europe were
engaged in selfish contests for comparatively trivial objects, and the
Ottoman Turks received for their ruler at that time Solyman II., the
son of Selim, in the twenty-sixth year of his age. He had already
acquired experience in administration, and had won the affections
and respect of the people. In 1521 A.D., he took Belgrade, which
Mahomet II. had failed to take. The island of Rhodes, the home
and citadel of the Knights of St. John, was captured, December 25,
1522 A.D. The fame of his character, and the fact that from his
position he was the natural enemy of the Austrian family and of the
German emperor, induced Francis I. of France, when a prisoner at
Madrid in 1525 A.D., to apply to him for help, and from that time
the attacks of the Turks on Germany and Hungary were, to some
extent, a diversion in favour of France. In 1526 A.D., Solyman was
urgently pressed by Francis I. to invade Hungary. His army was
100,000 strong, with 300 pieces of artillery. At Mohacz, August 28,
the battle was fought with Louis of Hungary, in which that king, a
mere youth, with eight bishops, a large number of nobles, and
24,000 others, were slain. After taking Buda-Pest, he retired,
leaving Hungary a desert, with 100,000 slaves — men, women, and
342 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
children — to sell in the Turkish slave-markets. Ferdinand of Austria
claimed Hungary as the successor of Louis, but was opposed by
Zapolya, who, being defeated, applied to Solyman. Ferdinand also
sent ambassadors to Solyman. The arrogance of the Turkish
officials was offensive. The grand vizier told the ambassadors that
" every place where the hoof of the sultan's horse once trod became
at once and for ever part of the sultan's dominions." In 1529 A.D.,
Solyman entered Hungary, took Ofen, and sat down before Vienna
with 250,000 men and 300 cannon, while 400 Turkish barks took
possession of the river frontage. The city was defended by Palgrave
Philip and Count Salm. Luckily for, Vienna, the heavy rains had
prevented the arrival of the most powerful cannon, so that, after
repeated assaults, Solyman was obliged to withdraw from Vienna,
October 14. The disappointed soldiers massacred thousands of
Christian captives; the fairest girls and boys were preserved for
slavery, the rest murdered or burned alive. Either through the
bravery of the defenders, or through the non-arrival of the large
cannons, or through the severity of the climate, which southern
soldiers could not bear, Vienna was saved, and the repulse of
Solyman "is an epoch in the history of the world. The tide of
Turkish conquest in central Europe had now set its mark. The
wave once again dashed as far, but only to be again broken and
then to recede for ever." l The dread of the Turkish power helped
to consolidate the Austrian Empire. " After the terrible defeat of
Mohacz in 1526 A.D., Hungary and Bohemia threw themselves into
the arms of Ferdinand I., and so long as the conflict lasted they
remained, on the whole, faithful to his successors. It was not till
the peace of Sitvatorok, in 1606 A.D., that the terror of the Turkish
conquest abated. And scarcely was the ink dry upon the treaty,
when the commotions, which preceded the deposition of Rudolph II.,
gave an unmistakable sign that the light bond which had held the
various races together for eighty years was being strained to the
utmost."2
8. There was a prospect of a battle between the Emperor
Charles V. and Solyman in 1532 A.D. Solyman had advanced
towards Vienna and had taken Guns. Charles kept his position
near Vienna. Solyman turned aside, ravaged Styria, and returned
to Constantinople. Ferdinand, in 1533 A.D., stooped so low that he
called himself the brother of Ibrahim, Solyman's favourite minister,
1 Creasy, p. 170.
- S. W. Gardiner, " History of England," vol. iii. pp. 261, 262;
English Revolution, *6S8 A.D. 343
and thus placed himself on a level with a slave ! Solyman's wars
with Persia were a relief to the terrified Austrians and Germans.
The ambassador of Ferdinand writes : " 'Tis only the Persian stands
between us and ruin. The Turk would fain be upon us, but he
keeps him back. This war with him affords us only a respite, not a
deliverance." In 1541 A.D., Solyman was again in Hungary, pro-
fessedly as the friend of Zapolya's son, but parcelling out the land
into Turkish sanjaks. A truce for five years was concluded with
Charles V., which left almost all Hungary and Transylvania to the
Turks, Ferdinand binding himself to pay yearly thirty thousand
ducats as tribute. To this treaty not only the Emperor Charles V.,
and Francis I., and the republic of Venice were parties, but the Pope !
The Turkish power by land was aided by the command of the sea.
The Mediterranean swarmed with Turkish ships, and cruisers from
all the ports of North Africa, commanded by men like Barbarossa.
Some of these were large vessels of one thousand to two thousand
tons burden, but the galleys, by which the greatest mischief was
accomplished, were generally mere row-boats, one hundred and sixty-
five feet long and thirty-two feet broad, low and close to the water,
capable of penetrating creeks and rivers, and able to move with great
swiftness. An attack made upon Malta in 1565 A.D. failed, and in
that year Solyman again invaded Hungary to defend Sigismund
Zapolya from the attacks of Maximilian, the successor of Fer-
dinand. Although in his seventy-sixth year, he (Solyman) laid siege
to Szigeth, and died in his tent, 4th September. His death was kept
secret for seven weeks by the Vizier So-kolli, until Selim II. could
be prepared to take possession. SeZim, 1566-1574 A.D., was a very
degenerate successor of Solyman, but the Grand Vizier So-kolli
upheld the empire. In the attempt to conquer Astrachan, the Turks
were brought, for the first time, into an armed collision with the
Russians. The Russians had been engaged in wars with the Crim
Tartars, and the Turks had simply looked on. But So-kolli had a
plan of uniting the rivers Don and Wolga by a canal, through which
the Turkish ships might approach the south border of the Caspian,
and strike at Tabriz and the heart of the Persian power. This
project would have barred the progress of Russia southward. The
Turks found it necessary to besiege Astrachan, which was defended
by the generals of Ivan the Terrible, 1569 A.D., and the Turkish
forces were defeated. The Tartars were not anxious for the success
of the Turks, and the inclemency of the climate inclined the Turks
to refrain from any attempts to carry out the plan of the canal. A
war with Venice ended in the conquest of Cyprus, 1570, 1571 A.D.,
344 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
in which fifty thousand Turks perished. This led to the league of
Spain, Venice, and the Knights of Malta against Turkey. A fleet,
consisting of two hundred and five large galleys, commanded by
Don John of Austria, met (between the Gulf of Patras and the Gulf
of Lepanto, yth October, 1571 A.D.) three hundred Turkish vessels.
The victory was won by the Christians; two hundred and sixty
Turkish vessels were destroyed, thirty thousand Turks slain, and
fifteen thousand Christian slaves captured and restored to liberty.
In this battle the great Spanish author, Cervantes, fought. Through
the jealousies of the confederates, and through the superior skill 01
the Turks in naval war, this great war was without commensurate
results. The Venetians made peace with the Turks by ceding
Cyprus and agreeing to pay the cost of the war, 1573 A.D. Selim
(called the Sot) died, 1574 A.D. Amurath III. succeeded. The
Grand Vizier So-kolli died, 1578 A.D. Queen Elizabeth of England
sought the Turkish alliance in 1579, 1583, 1587, and 1588 A.D.,
when threatened by the Spanish Armada. Mahomet III. succeeded,
1595 A.D., and immediately put his nineteen brothers to death, and
seven female slaves were thrown into the sea. Achmet^ his son,
1603 A.D., made the Peace of Sitvatorok with Austria, 1606 A.D.,
by which the thirty thousand ducats pension was abolished, and the
Austrian sovereign was styled " Padishah." Achmet died, 1617 A.D.
Othman II. had an unhappy reign. He was murdered, 1622 A.D.,
and a lunatic placed on the throne, but in 1623 A.D. Amurath IV.
succeeded, then Ibrahim^ 1640-1648 A.D. In the reign of his suc-
cessor, Mahomet IV.^ the war with Venice for the possession of
Candia commenced, 1645 A-D- Mohammed Kiuprili, the Grand
Vizier, and his son Ahmed, 1661-1676 A.D., governed Turkey. In
the war with Austria, 1663 A.D., the Turks were defeated at St. Gothard,
on the Laufritz and Raab, ist August, 1664 A-D-J by Montecuculi,
with a loss of ten thousand men and fifteen pieces of cannon. After
this a truce for twenty years. Candia was conquered after a siege ot
twenty years, 1665 A.D. In the wars with Poland the Turks had, in
the end, the advantage, and by the peace of 1676 A.D. the Ukraine
was yielded to Turkey, but was not long held, as in 1686 A.D. it was
given up to Russia. A revolt of the Hungarians under Tekeli
against the bigoted tyranny of Leopold led to the expedition under
Kara Mustapha, in 1682 A.D. , which laid siege to Vienna. The
Turkish force consisted of two hundred and seventy-five thousand
men, and, including camp followers, nearly half a million. Vienna
had a garrison of eleven thousand men. The siege lasted from i5th
July to 1 2th September. Sobieski, King of Poland, came to the aid
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 345
of the city with seventy thousand men, including the force of the Duke
of Warsaw and some German commanders. From Mount Kalemberg
the whole army of Kara Mustapha was visible to Sobieski, who per-
ceived the vizier's want of military skill. The attack followed, and
the mass of the Turkish army fled in hopeless rout, i2th September.
The Emperor Leopold, who had humbly begged the help of Sobieski,
displayed on this occasion the stupid pride common to the Spanish
and German branch of his family (both of which now happily extinct
in the direct male lines), — he scarcely noticed his deliverer. " All
.Europe took an interest in the deliverance of Vienna. Louis XIV.
alone was greatly confounded, and none of his ministers had suffi-
cient courage to bear the news to him Credible writers assert
that in the tent of the grand vizier letters were found from the king
containing the entire plan for the siege of Vienna Austria
lost eighty-seven thousand individuals, carried away into slavery, of
which fifty thousand were children and twenty-six thousand women
and young girls. Of the latter alone two hundred and four belonged
to the families of the nobility."1 Louis's character as a traitor to his
professed Catholicism is not saved by his having sent a fleet to help
Candia some twenty years previous. No one supposes that he
desired to increase the power of the Turks, except when that power
was necessary to his ambitious designs. The Duke of Lorraine, the
commander of the Austrian army, reconquered Hungary, defeated
the Turks in the old battle-field of Mohacz, i2th August, 1687 A.D.
Solyman II. succeeded Mahomet IV., in 1687 A.D. He was engaged
in war with Austria at the conclusion of this period, when Turkey
had ceased to be a power dangerous to Europe.
VI. — The Thirty Years' War in Germany and Central Europe
with the brief predominance of Sweden.
9. This war arose out of the religious jealousies of the Romish
and Protestant princes and people ; it was not confined to Germany,
as the points in dispute interested, more or less, France, Spain,
England, and Scandinavia. " It was not, as Protestant writers
delight to affirm, simply the resistance of an oppressed people to
the forcible reimposition of Catholicism ; neither was it, as Catholic
historians assert, the defence of legitimate order against violence
and fraud. It was a mortal struggle between anarchy and despotism.
It was the misfortune of the Protestantism which sprang into ex-
1 Kohlrausch, pp. 526, 527.
346 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
istence in the dominions of the House of Austria that its fate was
intimately united with that of an anarchical aristocracy. Nowhere
in Europe had the Protestant clergy so little influence To
the great feudal families the adoption of the new religion had com-
mended itself as the readiest way of shaking off the supremacy of
the Crown. It gave them upon their own estates all the power
which had been assumed by the German princes within their terri-
tories. It enabled them to seize Church property by force or fraud,
and to trample at pleasure upon the wishes and feelings of their serfs.
It annihilated the authority of the sovereign and of the clergy, to the
sole profit of the landowner. Nor would the evil results of the victory
of the aristocracy have ended here. Entailing, as it would necessarily
have done, the dissolution of the ties which bound German Austria
to Hungary and Bohemia, it would have thrown the whole of Eastern
Europe into confusion, and would have reopened the road into the
heart of Germany to the Mussulman hordes."1 This is an impartial
statement of the case of the two parties, politically, and in its bearing
on the relations of Germany towards its Eastern neighbours and
enemies, but it does not give sufficient weight to the religious feeling
which, if secondary and comparatively little among the nobility and
rulers, was, however, a vital point with a very large body of serious
and thoughtful men. There was sufficient reason for the disquiet
and dissatisfaction of all the parties concerned ; but the solution ot
all the difficuties arising out of the opposite claims of the Churches
and the states of Germany might have been possible, had Germany
possessed at that time an emperor with average ability and a trust-
worthy character. The interference of foreign powers, with sinister
designs upon German territory, which made a peaceable settlement
impossible, was occasioned by the utter distrust of the imperial
court, all but universal in Germany. Matthias, the emperor,
1612-1619 A.D., was undecided, and cramped by his nephew and
successor, Ferdinand II., who was a thorough Romanist, of more
than ordinary energy and activity; both of them equally incapacitated
for the exercise of a moderating influence over the extreme parties
whose religious and political rights were so difficult to reconcile. It
had been decided by the Peace of Passau (1552 A.D.) that the
Protestant princes who had possessed themselves of the eccle-
siastical property in their several states should be freed from any
claim of the Romish Church, but no provision had been made as
to future changes of opinion on the part of the princes, and the con-
1 Gardiner, vol. iii. pp. 262, 263.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 347
sequent action resulting from novel circumstances. The Romanists
were naturally annoyed at the continuance of the process of
secularising Church lands, by which about two hundred monasteries
had been dissolved in the Palatinate and North Germany, while the
Protestants were equally annoyed at the evident design of the
emperor and of the Catholic princes to stamp out Protestantism in
their respective territories. A Protestant union in 1608 A.D. was the
result of the general alarm, and then a Catholic league in opposition
to the Protestant union. Open war began in Prague (Bohemia) on
the 23rd May, 1618 A.D., when the two regents acting for Ferdinand
were thrown out of the window of the great hall in the Castle of
Prague, and the Bohemians chose Frederick the Elector Palatine
(son-in-law of James I., King of England) for their king. In 1620
A.D. Frederick was driven out of Bohemia, placed under the ban of
the empire, and lost his hereditary electorate. To Bohemia the con-
sequences were equally serious ; twenty-four nobles were beheaded ;
the estates of seven hundred and twenty-eight of that class were con-
fiscated ; five hundred noble families and thirty-six thousand of the
burgher class found it expedient to leave Bohemia and settle in
Saxony and the neighbouring Protestant states ; all the Protestant
clergy were banished, and Protestantism forbidden. The bestowal
of the electorate, forfeited by Frederick, upon Maximilian of Bavaria
gave an additional Catholic vote in the diet, and insured a Catholic
majority. Ferdinand looked upon himself as appointed by God to
be the champion of the Catholic Church and the restorer of the
ancient faith. This he openly and honestly avowed. The Pro-
testants of the northern German states, alarmed at the persecutions
in the imperial territories, and unable of themselves to resist a
zealous Catholic emperor supported by the Catholic princes, called
in the help of Christian IV. of Denmark. He was defeated by Tilly
and Wallenstein, and obliged to make peace at Lubeck, 1629 A.D.
This crisis " revealed the incapacity of the Emperor Ferdinand to
become the second founder of the Empire. He might have been
the head of a united Germany, he might have given renewed life to
the old national institutions, and have made the cold and calculating
aggressions of Richelieu and Louis XIV. impossible. Lorraine and
Alsace would still have remained German soil, and, what was of far
greater consequence, two centuries of moral and political anarchy
would have been spared to the noble German nation."1 But the
Emperor Ferdinand, emboldened by these successes, issued the
1 Gardiner, vol. v. p. 166.
348 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Edict of Restitution on the 6th March, 1629 A.D. By this edict
two archbishoprics (Magdeburg and Bremen), twelve bishoprics, and
one hundred and twenty benefices and monasteries were taken from
the Protestants and restored to the Romish Church. The city of
Augsburg and the duchy of Wiirtemberg were compelled to abolish
Protestant worship and restore the monastic institutions. Wallenstein
was opposed to this edict as most impolitic, and was dismissed,
September, 1630 A.D. Meanwhile, the probable reconstruction of
the empire under a powerful emperor was viewed with alarm by
France and by Sweden. To Cardinal Richelieu the interests of
the Romish Church were secondary to the interests of France.
GUSTAVUS ADOLPHUS of Sweden had under his rule part of what is
now Prussian territory, with the German colonies of Ingria, Carelia,
and Livonia. Already the emperor had mortified him by the re-
jection of his intercession in favour of his cousins the Dukes of
Mecklenburg, and by the help which Wallenstein had afforded to
the Poles, his enemies. He naturally feared for the interests of
Protestantism, of which he was a sincere professor. He landed in
Pomerania, and entered into a treaty with France, 23rd January,
1631 A.D., by which he obtained a subsidy, engaging on his part " to
leave unmolested the Catholic religion where he found it established,
and to respect the constitution of the empire as it was before
Ferdinand's victories." On the 20th May Tilly had taken Magde-
burg by storm, the city was destroyed, and the horrors which fol-
lowed baffle description. Men, women, children massacred, babies
taken from the breast and hurled into the flames, and every possible
cruelty and torment continued for a day and a night, twenty thousand
human beings slaughtered, and nothing left of the city but the
cathedral and a convent. This event united all the Protestants
to Gustavus. He defeated Tilly at Breitenfield, lyth September.
Wallenstein from his retreat entered into negotiations with Gustavus,
willing to co-operate with him to unite and strengthen the empire on
the foundation of religious liberty — quite ready, if necessary, to
dethrone the House of Austria ; but these plans were interrupted by
his reinstation in the command of the imperial armies November,
1631 A.D. "The plan of Gustavus was to form a Corpus Evan-
gelicorum, a league of German Protestant cities and princes to stand
up against the renewal of the overpowering tyranny of the emperor.
If his scheme had been carried out, Gustavus would have been a
nobler Napoleon, with a confederation, not of the Rhine, but of the
Baltic, around him The establishment of Protestantism in
Europe as a power safe from attack by reason of its own strength,
English Revolution , 1688 A.D. 349
was the cause for which he found it worth while to live, and for
which, besides and beyond the greatness of his own Swedish nation,
he was ready to die. It may be that, after all, he was happy in the
opportunity of his death."1
Gustavus defeated Wallenstein at Lutzen, Nov. 16, 1632 A.D., but
his death on the field of battle was of itself a victory to the cause for
which Wallenstein fought. Quarrels among the Protestant leaders
ensued. Bernhard of Weimar desired to form a new duchy o;
Franconia, composed of the two bishoprics of Wurtzburg and Barn-
berg. A new league was formed by the cities of Swabia, Franconia,
and the Upper Rhine with Sweden, for mutual support, April 23,
1633 A.D. Soon after, the Elector of Saxony entered into negotia-
tions with Wallenstein, who, on his part, was anxious to dictate
a peace with or without the consent of the emperor. It was
proposed to cancel the offensive Edict of Restitution, to cede a
few places on the Baltic coast to Sweden, and to restore a portion
of the Palatinate to the son of the deposed elector, June 16, 1633
A.D. " Such a peace would, doubtless, have been highly disagree-
able to adventurers like Bernhard of Weimar, but it would have given
the Protestants of Germany all that they could reasonably expect to
gain, and would have given the House of Austria one last chance of
taking up the championship of national interests against foreign
aggression." * Cardinal Richelieu cared chiefly to see Germany too
weak to support Spain, or to oppose in any way the aggrandisement
of France, for which he aimed to procure the left bank of the Rhine.
Wallenstein's plan failed, because no one had any confidence in him.
" It was a strange, Cassandra-like position to be wiser than all the
world, and to be listened to by no one, to suffer the fate of supreme
intelligence, which touches no moral chord and awakens no human
sympathy He had determined to force a reasonable peace
upon Germany ; with the emperor, if it might be so ; without him, if
he refused his support." In Vienna, his equivocal conduct led the
emperor to distrust him as a traitor. His subordinate generals were
gained over by the court, and, on February 25, 1634 A.D., WALLEN-
STEIN was assassinated while labouring under an attack of gout, at
Eger, his favourite residence. " Thus, the attempt to snatch at a
wise and beneficent peace by mingled force and craft failed .... and
is only excusable that there were no national institutions at the head
of which Wallenstein could have placed himself, and not even a
chance of creating such institutions afresh."2 The imperial power
1 S. R. Gardiner, " Thirty Ye us' War," pp. 161, 162. tt Ibid., p. 168.
350 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
seemed for a time to recover itself after the defeat of Bernhard by
the King of Hungary at Nordlingen, Sept. 6, 1634 A.D.; and a peace
was patched up at Prague, May 30, 1635 A.D., between the emperor
and the Elector of Saxony, which was regarded with displeasure by
the other princes and states concerned. The war had now degene-
rated, from a war for great ideas and principles, into a struggle for
territorial acquisitions, in which the rights of the Protestants were little
regarded. It soon became merely a struggle between the Houses
of Austria and Bourbon. Eleven days before the Peace of Prague,
the French herald delivered a declaration of war at Brussels against
the Emperor and Spain. Richelieu desired the possession of Alsace
and Lorraine as a matter of primary importance, " not because, as
in our days, Germany needed a bulwark against France, or France
needed a bulwark against Germany, but because Germany was not
strong enough to prevent these territories from being the high-
way of intercourse between Spain and the Spanish Netherlands. The
command of the sea was in the hands of the Dutch, and the valley
of the Upper Rhine was the artery through which the life-blood of
the Spanish monarchy flowed. If Spain or the emperor, the friend
of Spain, could hold that valley, men and munitions of warfare
would flow freely to the Netherlands to support the Cardinal Infant
in his struggle with the Dutch. If Richelieu could lay his hand
heavily upon it, he had seized his enemy by the throat, and could
choke him as he lay." L So the war continued after the death of the
Emperor Ferdinand, 1637 A.D., and of Richelieu and of his master,
Louis XIII., 1643 A-D-> f°r the most part in favour of France, until
the Peace of Westphalia, Oct. 24, 1648 A.D. (i) The religious diffi-
culty was settled fairly. New Year's Day, 1624 A.D.,was the day from
which all ecclesiastical benefices were to remain as they were then,
whether Catholic or Protestant ; (2) the question of toleration was
left to the rulers of the different territories ; (3) the Upper Palatinate
was united ,to Bavaria, and an eighth Electorate, the Lower Palati-
nate, was created for Charles Louis, the worthless son of the Elector
Frederick; (4) Western Pomerania, with Bremen and VerdHn, were
given to Sweden ; (5) Brandenburg acquired East Pomerania, Camin,
with Halberstadt, Minden, and a large portion of Magdeburg ; (6)
Saxony acquired the rest of Magdeburg and Lusatia; (7) France
retained Alsace (but not Strasburg) ; Philipsburg received a French
garrison. Metz, Toul, and Verdun were formally ceded to France ;
(8) the empire gave up all claim to Switzerland and the Netherlands:;
wl Gardiner, 170, 177, 189. :.v, ;. ;>-;= •• '••• -
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 351
(9) the Imperial Chamber was to consist of twenty-six Catholic and
twenty-four Protestant members. Six Protestants were to have a
place in the Aulic Council, and an equal number of each party in
the diet ; (10) the virtual independence of the various states of the
empire was recognised. The great mistake in this treaty was the
disgraceful contempt for the rights of conscience, in leaving the
question of toleration to the decisions of the sovereign of each state,
so that in the hereditary estates of the emperor Catholicism was
enforced by an edict in 1652 A.D., on pain of death, but Protestants
were allowed to expatriate themselves to Transylvania, a debateable
land of the empire and Turkey. Still, with all its imperfections, the
peace was an absolute necessity. Already one-half or two-thirds of
the population had been killed or dispersed, and the demoralisation
of the remaining population was a still greater evil. As a sample —
on one occasion an army of 40,000 men was followed by no less
than 140,000 men, women, and children, who, without homes, were
dependent on the soldiers, through the gains of immorality, or by
the plunder of the peasantry. No medical assistance or hospitals
were provided, for it cost less to enrol a new soldier than to cure an
old one. The loss of property as reported seems incredible. As a
specimen on a limited scale — in a district in Thuringia, out of 1,717
houses in 19 villages, only 627 were left ; out of 1,773 families only
316 remained ; out of 1,402 oxen, only 244 remained ; of 4,616 sheep
all were gone : the working classes had disappeared, and the manu-
factories had been burned down. Immense provinces, once flourish-
ing and populous, lay waste and uninhabited, and were only by slow
degrees repeopled by foreign emigrants or by the soldiery. In
Wiirtemberg, 354,000 men are said to have perished between 1634
to 1641 A.D.; and the duchy, which had half a million of inhabitants
in 1618 A.D., had, in 1641 A.D., only 48,000. Even six years after
the peace, when many of the scattered people had returned, there were
fifty thousand households less than there were before the battle of
Nordlingen, in 1634 A.D. In Franconia it is said that the Estates
in 1650 A.D. abolished the celibacy of the clergy, and permitted each
man to marry two wives. The depopulation seemed incredible; but
if 'Saxony lost 900,000 in two years, and Bohemia had only one-fourth
of her population left, and if every prominent town had suffered to the
same extent, it cannot be denied, especially as traces of the desolation
of this war remained for 150 years after. The very language had
become adulterated,: foreign dresses generally adopted. The local
Estates had lost their authority, and the people their local -old
liberties. The nobles took service under the princes, and the princes
352 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
no longer cared for the emperor, or regarded German interests,
" Germany had lost all save her hopes for the future." " Properly,
indeed, it was no longer an empire at all, but a confederation, and
that of the lowest sort, for it had no common treasury, no efficient
common tribunals, no means of coercing a refractory member ; its
states were of different religions, were governed according to different
forms, and were administered judicially and financially without any
regard to each other. The traveller in central Germany now is
amused to find every hour or two .... that he has passed out of
one and into another of its miniature kingdoms. Much more sur-
prised and embarrassed would he have been a century ago, when, in-
stead of the present thirty-two [now yet more consolidated under Prussia,
whose king is emperor], there were three hundred petty principalities
between the Alps and the Baltic, each with • its own laws, its own
courts (in which the ceremonious pomp of Versailles was faintly
reproduced), its little armies, its separate coinage, its tolls and cus-
tom-houses on the frontiers, its crowd of meddlesome and pedantic
officials, presided over by a prime minister who was generally the
unworthy favourite of his prince and the pensioner of some foreign
court. This vicious system, which paralysed the trade, the literature,
and the political thought of Germany, had been forming itself for
some time, but did not become fully established until the Peace of
Westphalia, by emancipating the princes from imperial control, had
made them despots in their own territories. The impoverishment
of the inferior nobility and the decline of the commercial cities,
caused by a war that had lasted a whole generation, removed every
counterpoise to the power of the electors and princes, who were
absolutism supreme After 1648 A.D. the provincial estates
or parliaments became obsolete in most of their principalities, and
powerless in the rest. Germany was forced to drink to its very dregs the
cup of feudalism — feudalism from which all the feelings that once
ennobled it had departed The Diet, originally an assembly
of magnates, meeting from time to time like our early English
Parliament, became, in 1654 A.D., a permanent body, at which the
electors, princes, and cities were represented by their envoys. In
other words, it was now not a national council but an international
congress of diplomatists Properly speaking, it (the empire)
has no history after this ; and the history of the particular states of
Germany, which takes its place, is one of the dreariest chapters in
the history of mankind. It would be hard to find, from the Peace of
Westphalia to the French Revolution, a single grand character, or a
single noble enterprise, a single sacrifice made to great public
English Revolution, 1688 A. D. 353
interests, a single instance in which the welfare of nations was pre-
ferred to the selfish passions of their princes When we ask
for an account of the political life of Germany in the eighteenth
century, we hear nothing but the scandals at buzzing courts and the
wrangling of diplomatists at never-ending congresses." x
We may remark that this war was the last of the Religious Wars,
in which the object was the extinction of Protestantism in Europe.
Under Louis XIV. commenced purely political wars, in which the
parties engaged, though not unaffected by a regard to the interests of
their respective creeds, were mainly influenced by political consider-
ations. It is a relief to escape from the history of the Catholic wars
of the Philips, and the Guises, the Alvas, and others, varied by
treasons, assassinations, and massacres. The subsequent wars, though
mostly unjust at well as unnecessary, were caused on purely avowed
political motives, free from all ostensible reference to the interests of
the two great religious divisions of Europe : they were wars of
Protestants and Catholics against Protestants and Catholics.
VII. — The aggressive Policy and Wars of Louis XIV. (the Great}
of France, and the resistance offered by England, Germany,
and Holland.
10. Louis XIV., from the death of Cardinal Mazarin, was his own
prime minister. " He had the most extravagant ideas of the nature
and extent of the royal prerogative. Regarding his authority from
Heaven, he desired to concentrate in himself individually all the
powers and functions of government (L'efat, c'esf moi). Never in
the history of the world was there a more complete, nor, on the
whole, a more favourable or successful specimen of absolute,
irresponsible monarchy than that established by Louis XIV."
(i) He supported Portugal in its struggle against Spain for inde-
pendence, and persuaded Charles 1 1. of England, by his marriage, to
follow his example, the object of Louis being to injure Spain ; (2)
Charles II. of England was his pensioned tool, and held back, as far
as he could, the resistance of England ; (3) Louis supported Holland
against England, from no love of Holland, but from a desire to drive
Charles II. into a participation in his own plans of conquest, 1667 ;
(4) on the death of Philip IV. of Spain, 1665 A.D., he laid claim
to the Spanish Netherlands. This brought upon him the triple
alliance of England, Holland, and Sweden, and which led to a
peace by which Louis was obliged to be satisfied by a portion of
Spanish Flanders (May 2, 1668 A.D.), by the Treaty of Aix-la-
1 Bryce, pp. 342-345-
2 A
354 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Chapelle. This triple alliance was the work of the Grand Pensionary
of Holland, John de Witt, and the English Sir William Temple ;
(5) the war against Holland was preceded by a private treaty with
Charles II., and in 1672 A.D. commenced with the invasion of
Holland by an army of 100,000 men, with Turenne, Conde, and
Luxemburg at their head. The demands of Louis were too degrad-
ing to be listened to. They show the vanity, the insolence, and the
intolerance of the man whom his flatterers called Louis le Grand.
" He required a cession of all the Dutch provinces on the left bank
of the Rhine, and of some towns and districts on the right bank, an
instant payment of twenty millions of livres, a free passage through
the whole territory of the states, by land or water, by highway or
canal, for all his subjects at all times, the abolition of the reformed
religion, and the establishment of Catholicism, and, moreover,
insisted that every year an embassy should be sent to Paris to present
him with a gold medal, the inscription on which should confess that
the Dutch nation held their liberties at his pleasure." 1 Holland was
brought to the brink of ruin. The populace of the Hague murdered
the De Witts, and placed William of Orange in the stadtholdership.
"Moderate, self-commanding, taciturn, firm, bold, indefatigable,
prepared for every great exploit, this young warrior commanded con-
fidence from the commencement of his career .... the love of
independence, and the hatred of foreign dominion broke out nowhere
with so much ardour as in the province of Holland, and in the city
of Amsterdam, where the nobles and the more wealthy citizens were
resolved to emigrate to the East Indies, rather than to submit to
France."2 This desperate measure was proposed to the States-
General by William. "The Hollanders might survive Holland."
.... The dykes were opened — the whole country was one great
lake, from which the cities with their ramparts and steeples rose like
islands. The invaders wrere forced to save themselves from destruction
by a precipitate retreat, 1673 A.D. 3 Luxemberg, in his retreat,
" abandoned Bodegrave and Svammerdam to his soldiers. They
sacked every house, set fire to the towns, and subjected the wretched
inhabitants to every kind of misery. Their barbarity made so deep
an impression on the whole province that, forty years after, Voltaire,
while travelling in Holland, saw spelling-books in which the fate of
these towns was described, that the very children might learn from
their cradles to loathe the name of the merciless French nation." *
1 Yonge, vol. ii. p. 237. 2 Rotteck, vol. iii. p. 205.
3 Macaulay, vol. i. p. 219. 4 Yonge, vol. ii. p. 231.
English Revolution , 1688 A.D. 355
(6) The emperor, Spain, and sundry German powers leagued with
Holland, and the contest was removed to the Rhine and the Spanish
Netherlands. Ruyter fought three great naval battles against the
English and French fleets, June and August, 1673 A.D. The English
Parliament compelled Charles to make peace with Holland, 1674.
In 1678-1679 A.D. Louis was compelled to make peace with
Holland at Nimeguen, then with the emperor, and Sweden, and
Spain, by treaties at Nimeguen and St. Germain-en-Laye^ and
Fontainebleau. By these treaties, though Holland recovered its losses,
Spain gave up to France Franche Comte and portions of the Nether-
lands. Lorraine remained under France j Sweden was protected by
France, and Denmark and Brandenburg compelled to make peace
with it. It was in this war that Turenne (French general), 1674 A.D.,
laid waste the Palatinate, "the whole of the country along the
river Saar, to such an extent, that throughout a space of more
than seventy miles nothing else was to be seen but burning villages
and fields .... the unfortunate inhabitants were obliged to seek
refuge in the forests, where a great number of them perished
through famine and disease Charles Louis, elector-palatine,
who, from his castle of Friedricksburg, beheld the smoking cities
and villages wantonly set in flames by Turenne, sent that com-
mander a challenge, which was refused, Turenne returning his
customary excuse for his conduct, 'These things always happen
in war time.'"1 In 1677 A.D. the French garrisons in Germany
systematically plundered and destroyed all in their vicinity. From
four hundred to five hundred villages were burnt and destroyed.
After the Peace of Nimeguen, in which Louis had reached the height
of his glory, the most shameful times to Germany and Spain
followed. Louis continued to occupy several places which he had
promised to cede. He subjected, contrary to the Peace of West-
phalia, the imperial nobility and imperial cities, and established
" Chambers of re-union " in Metz, Breisach, Besangon, and Tournay,
to search out and recover all that formerly, even in the most
remote times, had formed part of the countries ceded to France.
In this way several districts and towns in Brabant and Flanders
were taken away. In this way the Elector of Treves, and Spain,
and Sweden suffered loss. Louis claimed twenty-two towns, and
Strasburg, which latter he seized, 1681 A.D. The emperor, harassed
by the Turks, and not supported by the princes, agreed to this by
the Treaty of Ratisbon, 1684 A.D. (7) But, in 1685 A.D., followed
1 Kohlrausch and Menzel.
2 A 2
356 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
the revocation of the toleration to Protestantism, granted by the
Edict of Nantes (passed in 1598 A.D., and that of Nimes, 1629 A.D.).
In this Louis not only shocked the feeling of the Protestants of
Europe, but also inflicted an injury on France from which it has
suffered to this day. The public and private exercises of the Pro-
testant religion were forbidden, the churches demolished, the ministers
banished, the children of Protestants compelled to attend Catholic
schools. The Protestants were forbidden to emigrate on pain of the
galleys for men, and imprisonment and confiscation of property for
the women. Dragoons were sent into Protestant districts to convert
the people "by gentle compulsion." About 500,000 Protestants
emigrated to England, Holland, and North Germany, carrying with
them the industries in silk, &c., which up to that time had greatly
flourished in France. In 1686 A.D. the German princes formed the
League of Augsburg (July 9, 1686 A.D.) against France, to resist the
continued insults offered to the empire by Louis XIV., to which
Spain and Sweden were parties. Holland did not then join, as
William was preparing to act as circumstances might require in Eng-
land, and wished not prematurely to rouse Louis to any open breach.
The expedition to England by William, which resulted in the
deposition of James II. and the appointment of William and Mary,
1688, 1689 A.D., might have been prevented had Louis not neglected
" the point on which the fate of the whole civilised world depended,
and had made a great display of power, promptitude, and energy in
a quarter where the most splendid achievements could produce nothing
more than an illumination and a Te JDeum Marshal Melac
received orders to turn one of the fairest regions of Europe into a
wilderness. Fifteen years earlier Turenne had ravaged part of that
fine country .... these ravages were mere sports in comparison with
the horrors of this second devastation. The French commander
announced to near half a million of human beings that he granted
them three days of grace, and that within that time they must shift
for themselves. Soon the roads and fields, which then lay deep in
snow, were blackened by innumerable multitudes of men, women,
and children flying from their homes. Many died of cold and
hunger .... meanwhile the work of destruction had begun. The
flames went up from every market-place, hamlet, every parish
church, every country seat within the devoted provinces. The fields
where the corn had been sown were ploughed up ; the orchards
were hewn down. No promise of a harvest waved over the fertile
plains near what had once been Frankesthal. Not a vine, not an
almond-tree was to be seen on the slopes of the sunny hills round
English Revolution, 1688 A. D. 357
what had once been Heidelberg. No respect was shown to palaces,
to temples, to monasteries, to infirmaries, to beautiful works of art,
to monuments of the illustrious dead. The far-famed castle of the
elector-palatine was turned into a heap of ruins ; the adjoining hos-
pital was sacked ; the provisions, the medicines, the pallets where the
sick lay were destroyed. The very stones of which Mannheim had
been built were flung into the Rhine. The magnificent Cathedral of
Spires perished, and with it the marble sepulchres of eight Caesars.
The cofrins were broken open and the ashes scattered to the winds.
Treves, with its fine bridge, its Roman amphitheatre, its venerable
churches, convents, and colleges, was doomed to the same fate. But,
before this last crime had been perpetrated, Louis was recalled to a
better mind by the execrations of all the neighbouring realms, by
the silence and confusion of his flatterers, and by the expostulations
of his wife."1 This was early in 1689 A.D. — the destruction had
commenced, October, 1688 A.D. Meanwhile William was King of
England, and the life and spirit of the Augsburg League. Such was
the amount of feeling against the ambition of Louis that even the
Pope, Innocent XL, disgusted with the arbitrary conduct of Louis
in maintaining " the right of sanctuary " in Rome, favoured the
enterprise of William, and is believed to have contributed money
towards it. Masses were offered in the chapel of the Romish repre-
sentative at Hague for the success of the expedition, the object of
which was to depose a Catholic king. "There were no less than
4,000 Catholics in the army with which William came over to defend
the Protestantism of England."-
VIII. — The first appearance of Russia and Prussia in European
Politics.
ii. Two new powers, the one nearly the most ancient of the
European monarchies, the other the most recent, not as yet at the
close of this period raised to the dignity of a kingdom, were mean-
while preparing to take important positions in the European family.
RUSSIA had already thrown off the Tartar yoke, and the work of
consolidation begun by Ivan the Great, 1462-1505 A.D., had been
continued by Vasili Ivanovitch, 1505-1533 A.D., who exchanged
embassies with all the sovereigns of the west, and was friendly with
the sultans of Turkey, Selim and Solyman, and with Baber, the Great
Mogul of India. Ivan IV.^ the Terrible^ 1533-1584 A.D., conquered
1 Macaulay, vol. iii. p. 322. 2 Lecky, vol. i. p. 272.
358 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
the khanates of Astrachan and Kasan, instituted the Strelitza 1546
A.D., an imperial body guard. The Don Cossacks were united to
the empire, and Yermak, one of them in his employ, invaded and
added Siberia to the empire ; the peasantry became fixed to the
soil as serfs, 1556 A.D. The Swedes and Poles obtained some
advantages in war. Batory of Transylvania also successfully
attacked him, but in the end he triumphed over all his enemies.
From the cruelty of his administration he received the epithet of
Terrible. The Germans having shut him out from the Baltic, the
English opened the White Sea to him. Sir Hugh Willoughby and
Chancellor entered the unknown White Sea, and from the monastery
of St. Nicholas (where now Archangel stands) learnt that they were
in Russia, 1553 A.D. Chancellor was presented to Ivan, and inter-
course with England at once began, and a trade also with Persia by
the Caspian. Chancellor and Sigismund, King of Poland, "expressed
their forebodings of the peril to which the independence of other
states might be exposed if once those rude masses acquired the arms
and the discipline of civilised war." x It was in this reign that the
first collision with the Turks took place at Astrachan. After a period
of civil war and Polish invasion, Michael Romanof, descendant by
the female side from the Ivans and the Ruricks, was elected Czar,
1613 A.D. Peter the Great, 1682 A.D., first made Europe acquainted
with Russia, and made himself master of the useful arts by which
civilised Europe had been made so superior in civilisation to
Russia and similar barbaric lands. In his own nature as brutal as
his own nobles (boyards), and unchecked by any considerations
which might have interfered with his innovating reforms, he applied
himself to supply the material wants of Russia. His object was
to form a navy, to remodel his army, to introduce artificers as the
teachers of his people ; and, while doing this, he himself remained
the unaltered savage, not going too far ahead of his people, and thus
maintaining his hold upon their sympathies. Emancipating himself
from the control of his sister Sophia, he laboured to extend his
territory to the Baltic, and thus connecting his country more directly
with Western Europe. His first wars were, therefore, with Sweden.
He looked forward to the Black Sea and to access to the Mediter-
ranean ; hence his wars with the Turks.
PRUSSIA. — The electorate of Brandenburg, purchased by Frederick,
Count of Hohenzollern, from the Emperor Sigismund in 1411 A.D.,
for one hundred thousand ducats, was the remote beginning of the
1 Creasy, p. 214.
English Revolution^ 1688 A.D. 359
kingdom of Prussia. In 1511 A.D., Albert, the brother of the
elector, was chosen Grand Master of the Knights Hospitallers. In
1515 A.D. he embraced Protestantism and became Duke of Prussia,
holding it as a fief of Poland. His line was extinct and reverted
to Brandenburg under John Sigismund. The " Great Elector,"
Frederick William, grandson of Sigismund, made Prussia independent
of Poland, 1657 A.D. He began a standing army, gradually increased
to twenty thousand men, so wisely managed the finances as to
avoid debt, encouraged emigrants and discharged soldiers to cultivate
the lands left waste by the Thirty Years' War, received artisans
from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and
thus introduced new manufactures — improved internal communica-
tions by his roads and canals. He died 1688 A.D., having prepared
the way for the assumption of the kingly dignity by his successor.
The contemporary histories of sundry nations now follow.
12. THE SCANDINAVIAN NATIONS, DENMARK AND NORWAY, re-
mained united under the monster Christian II. (brother-in-law of
Charles V.), until he was expelled in 1523 A.D. Nine years after, in
attempting to regain his throne, he was taken prisoner and confined
in a dark dungeon in the Castle Sonderberg, on the island of Alsen,
where he died after seventeen years' confinement, 1532-1549 A.D.
He had been popular among the people at large. The govern-
ment of Denmark, after his deposition and the election of his uncle
Frederick I., Duke of Holstein and Schleswick, was an aristocracy of
the high nobles and clergy, to whom the king was subordinate.
The citizens were degraded, the peasantry were reduced to serfdom.
There was no diet held from 1536 A.D. to 1660 A.D. ; only an
Assembly of the Lords. The reformed religion was established
in the reign of Frederick I. Christian III. completed the union
of Norway and Denmark, abolished episcopacy, and annexed its
property to the crown. With this reign began the complications
respecting the succession to Schleswick and Holstein. In these
duchies there was no law of primogeniture, and hence they had
to be divided among the younger princes of the house of
Holstein-Gottorp, to which the king belonged. By a treaty, 11554
A.D., with his brother, the king annexed the duchies to the king-
dom by a perpetual union, which gave him and his successors a right
of co-administration. Frederick II. made peace with Sweden, 1590
A.D. Christian IV., for a time, took part in the Thirty Years' War,
until beaten and compelled by the Austrian troops to make peac
at Lubeck, 1529. In a war with Sweden he lost Gothland an
Bremen, and Verden ; and the power of Denmark was reduced
360 From Charles V. of Germany, 1530 A.D., to the
very low, 1645 A.D. Though unfortunate, he was a patriotic and
popular king, a patron of science, learning and commerce.
Frederick III., 1648 A.D., successfully repelled the Swedes, and made
peace 1660 A.D. His great triumph was over the aristocracy of his
kingdom. There had been general discontent on the part of the
citizens and peasantry. A general diet of the three orders of
nobles, clergy, and peasants met at Copenhagen, 8th September,
1660 A.D. ; the peasantry were not represented. Stormy discussions
followed on the equalisation of taxation and on the abolition of the
immunities of the nobles. Otto Krag, one of the senators, upbraided
the commoners as " slaves," who ought "to keep within their own
limits." This caused a tumult of indignation ; the two leaders of
the popular party retired from the senate-house, with the deputies
of their orders (Svane, Bishop of Zeeland, and Nusen, a merchant
and burgomaster). They resolved to make the crown hereditary, to
abolish the restrictions on the king. The senate refused to
sanction these proposals. The nobility attempted to retire to their
estates, but were not allowed to leave the city. The senate and the
nobility were obliged to agree to the resolution of the two inferior
orders. The king received a sort of dictatorship, authorising him to
regulate the new constitutional charter as seemed best to him. The
nobility, the clergy, and burgesses, each drew up separate statements
of the franchises they desired to have recognised. The homage of
all classes followed i8th October and i5th November, and the
king was declared absolute, sovereign. This law, though arbitrary
in theory, was in practice greatly modified. Frederick III. exercised
his power with mildness. Nor did the people ever repine at the
sacrifices they had made, conscious as they were that he had by his
valour saved the kingdom from becoming a province of Sweden.
This is the favourable account. His enemies regard his government
and character with detestation. Christian V. succeeded, 1670 A.D. ;
he sought to imitate the state of Louis XIV. He was engaged in
a war with Charles XI., of Sweden, which ended in 1679 A-D- He
created numerous countships and baronies, and incurred con-
siderable debts.
SWEDEN, under the Vasa family, acquired a preponderance in the
north. John VIII., 1569-1592 A.D., was engaged in war with
Russia for the possession of Livonia, Esthonia, and Ingria. Sigismund,
who succeeded him, was already King of Poland and a Catholic.
Charles, his uncle, was made king as Charles IX. His son, the
great Gustavus Adolphus, succeeded, 1611 A.D. His main history
is connected with the Thirty Years' War. On his death, 1644 A.D.,
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 361
Christiana, his daughter, with Oxenstiern as Regent, governed.
Christiana, a frivolous, unsettled woman, abdicated her throne 1654
A.D., and left the country, abjuring Protestantism, and dying in
Rome, 1689 A.D. Charles X., 1656 A.D., was engaged in wars with
Poland, Russia, and Denmark, and died 1660 A.D. Charles XL,
1660 A.D., was a minor until 1675 A-D- Tne diets °^ I68o, 1681,
1686 A.D., manifested great hatred of the nobility, which led to a
change of government in 1680-1693 A.D. The Estates of the
Kingdom gave up the executive power to the king, 1680 A.D., and
in 1693 A.D. declared him absolute.
THE SEVEN UNITED PROVINCES, commonly called Holland,
together with the southern provinces of the Netherlands, revolted
from Spain in 1566 A.D. The attempts of Philip II. of Spain
and of his Viceroy, Alva, to put down heresy and discontent, have
been already stated. The southern provinces, being Catholic, sub-
mitted to Spain ; but the seven northern provinces being Protestant
remained firm under their leader, William (the Silent) of Orange,
and in 1579 A.D., by the famous Act of Union, laid the founda-
tion of the Dutch republic. He was a truly great man, a Protestant,
but tolerant of all forms of Christian belief, looking upon them as
subordinate to the great principles of civil and religious liberty.
He was assassinated at Delft, loth July, 1584, with the consent and
approval of Philip II. of Spain. (By the truce with Spain in 1609
A.D., the independence of the republic was virtually admitted).
In trade Holland was the successful rival of the Hanse Towns, and
became the mart and general merchant, supplying the Baltic States
and Western Germany with the products of other lands. Even in
J586, 1587 A.D., in the time of the severest contest with Spain,
commerce was but partially affected. In that year eight hundred
ships entered Dutch harbours ; new towns were built ; agriculture
flourished ; while in the Netherlands trade and manufacture were
almost destroyed and agriculture neglected, so that much of the
country became desolate, and so remained for some time. In 1594
A.D. the Dutch first sent ships to India, and in 1598 they sent
eighty. In 1602 A.D. the East India Company was formed with great
powers — they occupied Bassorah, Batavia and the Moluccas, and
monopolised the trade of Japan. Maurice, the son of William, as
stadtholder, carried on the war with great ability. In civil affairs he
was unfortunately thrown in collision with one of the truest patriots,
Barneveldt, who suspected Maurice of a design to make himself a
sovereign in name as well as in reality. In addition the two parties
which divided the churches, the Gomarists (Calvinists) and the
362 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Arminians were bitterly opposed to each other, and Barneveldt was
attached with Grotius, &c., to the Arminian party. The Synod of
Dordt, 1618, 1619 A.D., strengthened the Gomarist party, and
deepened the bitter feeling of the religious parties against each other.
The States-General, influenced by Maurice, arrested these men, and
on the 2ist February, 1618 A.D., Barneveldt was condemned and
beheaded, i4th May, 1619 A.D., in spite of the opposition of the
Princess Dowager of Orange and of the French Ambassador.
Prince Maurice died 23rd April, 1625 A.D. Ferdinand, his brother,
endeavoured to calm down the religious differences, and showed
some favour to the Arminians. He died 1647 A'D-> and William II.
succeeded him. By the Treaty of Munster, 1648 A.D., Spain
recognised the independence of the United Provinces, 1648 A.D.
William was an accomplished scholar, and married the daughter of
Charles I. of England. He secretly aspired to the sovereignty, but
died in 1650 A.D., aged 24. His son, William III. (afterwards
King of England), was born a week after his father's death, when
all real power was withheld from the Orange family. The wars with
England, under Cromwell, and again under Charles II. were
impolitic and unjust, as well as injurious to both countries.
The aggressions of Louis XIV. called forth the energies of
William III. The De Witts, the supposed friends of France, the
opponents of the Orange family, were murdered by the mob, 2yth
August, 1672 A.D., and all parties united in placing William at the
head of affairs. In these wars with Louis XIV., 1673-1678 A.D.,
William was prepared, if driven to extremity, to remove with two
hundred thousand families to the Indian settlements ; but the Peace
of Nimeguen gave the republic a breathing-time. William had
married, 23rd October, 1677, Mary, the eldest daughter of James,
King of England, his uncle; and when, in 1688 A.D., the tyranny
and popery of James II. had alarmed the feeling of England, an
invitation from a large and influential party invited him to come
over with an efficient force to save Protestantism and free government.
This act was the beginning of the Revolution of 1688 A.D.
PORTUGAL. — Sebastian, 1557-1578 A.D., through his unsuccessful
attack upon Muley Moloc, Xerif of Morocco, lost his life in the
battle of Alcazar-Seguer, 1578 A.D. Being unsuccessful, the under-
taking has been censured, and deservedly, so far as the absence of
an adequate force, disciplined and well provided, is concerned.
Such a barbarian state as Morocco, within sight of Europe, is an
anomaly and a reproach to Spain. The Mediterranean will not be
European, nor the centre of civilisation, until all the governments
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 363
bordering upon it are under the control of enlightened European
governments, towards which result events are tending. With France
in Algiers and Tunis, and with European control in Egypt, it requires
no gift of prophecy to foretell the end. Philip II. of Spain acted
disinterestedly in endeavouring to moderate the zeal of Sebastian,
and to prevent the attempt to conquer Morocco, for which the
resources of Portugal were not adequate. On the death of Cardinal
Henrique, 1580 A.D., Portugal became the lawful heirloom of
Philip II., who was the son of Isabel, the eldest daughter of Manuel,
whose male line had become extinct in Sebastian. The government
of Philip being that of Spain was hateful to the Portuguese, and in
1640 A.D., by a well-arranged conspiracy, Joam, Duke of Braganza,
whose mother was a younger daughter of Duarte, the youngest son
of Manuel, was placed on the throne. By the friendship of France,
England, Sweden, and Holland, and by the zeal of his people, he
maintained his position against Spain, and by the battle of Villa
Viciosa, 1665 A.D., the independence of Portugal was secured.
Alphonso, the son of Joam, had succeeded in 1656 A.D., but
deposed, on account of his intractable folly, by Pedro II. in
1683 A.D., who had acted as regent since 1668 A.D. (The Infanta
Catherina, daughter of Joam, was married to Charles II. of England,
1662 A.D.) The separation of Portugal has lessened the maritime
power of the Peninsula. Spain acknowledged the independence of
Portugal in 1668 A.D.
SWITZERLAND. — The thirteen Cantons, free from foreign aggres-
sion, were engaged in quarrels with each other. The practice of
hiring out the young men for service as soldiers to France, Austria,
Italy, &c., which began in the fifteenth century, was carried out to a
great extent, and proved unfavourable to the morals and economical
habits of the population. The reformation under Zwtngle, accepted
by Zurich, 1519 A.D., and by Berne, Basle, the Grisons, Coire,
Geneva, Neufchatel, Schaffhausen, St. Gall, &c., was opposed by
Lucerne, Uri, Schuytz, and Unterwalden, Soleure, Friburg. In
Claris and Appenzell the people were divided. As the influence of
the Reformers increased the Catholics became alarmed. Civil wars
ensued. In 1531 A.D., Zurich and Berne (the Protestant party) were
opposed to Lucerne, Uri, Schuytz, Unterwalden, and Zug. On the
field of Cappel, October 1 2, the Catholics had the victory ; Zwingle
himself, the pastor of the army, was killed, with six hundred of his
party. Geneva, in 1536 A.D., became Protestant, through the
influence of John Calvin, the most logical and stern of all Protestant
theologians ; but the religious differences broke out in continual wars
364 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
between the cantons. These disasters were aggravated by Spanish
and French support. In 1620 A.D., the Protestants of the Valteline
were massacred by a banished party leagued with Spain and Austria.
In 1648 A.D., the full independence of Switzerland from any claim
of the Empire was admitted by the Peace of Westphalia. There
was a revolt of the peasantry in 1653 A.D., and a renewal of the
religious wars, 1656 A.D., Catholic cantons against Berne and Zurich,
which the battle of Vilmergen decided in favour of the Catholic
party. But at the end of this period Switzerland remained divided
by religious and local differences.
POLAND. — The progress of the Reformation was accompanied by
contests for tolerance by the one party and for persecution by the
other. Sigismund I. and his successor, Sigismund II., 1548-1572
A.D., were persecutors. On the death of the latter, the race of the
Jagellons was extinct. The crown became elective, and the king's
power limited by the articles of the " Pacta Conventa," 1574 A.D.
From the temporary rule of Henry (afterwards Henry of France) to
the reign of John III. (Sobieski), 1676 A.D., the history of Poland
is made up by wars with Russia, Sweden, the Cossacks, and the
Turks. One reign, however, was specially injurious to Poland, that
of John Casimir, 1648-1668 A.D. To him belongs the origin of the
" Liberum Veto," which allowed the opposition of a single vote to
frustrate the deliberations of the diet. When the Turks, in
1683 A.D., invested Vienna, the Emperor Leopold retreated to Linz,
and dispatched messenger after messenger to hasten the help from
Poland. When, by that help, the siege had been raised and the
Turks discomfited, the proud emperor scarcely deigned to pay the
usual civilities to Sobieski, his benefactor and saviour, but met him
with insulting coolness, to the great annoyance of the Poles. But
Sobieski continued his assistance until most of Hungary was free
from the Turkish invasion. He was, however, compelled to cede
Little Russia, Smolensk, Kiev, &c., to Russia, 1686 A.D. In his
civil administration Sobieski was not successful. The government
of Poland was that of a corrupt aristocracy ; the towns and the
peasantry bore all the taxation and had no share in the government.
Poland was destroyed by its factions.
ITALY had no independent political status ; it was the battlefield
of France, Germany, and Spain. So little direct influence had the
popedom in politics, that, in 1577, Rome was taken by storm by
the army of Charles V. commanded by Constable Bourbon, and
Pope Clement VII. kept a prisoner for some time. Naples and
Sicily, with the duchy of Milan, remained in the hands of Spain.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 365
The duchy of Savoy, with Piedmont, maintained its important
position between France and Lombardy, varying its alliance
according to its supposed interests. Ttiscany was erected into a
grand-duchy for the Medici of Florence, 1569 A.D., Cosmo I. being
the first' grand-duke. Modena remained to the D'Este family
(of the old Guelf race). Parma and Placentia were made into a
duchy by Pope Paul III. for his son Farnese, 1545 A.D. Bologna
in 1506 A.D., and Ferrara in 1598 A.D., were united to the Papal
Territory. Genoa, with the island of Corsica, remained independent ;
so also VENICE. Candia was conquered by the Tur&s, 1669 A.D.,
but the Morea and part of Dalmatia, 1685, 1686 A.D., were some
recompense to Venice, which was to some extent an efficient
opponent of Turkey. The monopoly of the Eastern trade by the
Italians ended by the discovery of the passage to India by the Cape.
VENICE was, unfortunately, one of the first to impose fiscal regula-
tions and restrictions on trade. Foreigners paid double customs ;
could not buy Venetian ships, nor be partners in Venetian firms.
Artificers were enticed to settle in Venice from foreign lands, but no
Venetian artificer was allowed to carry his skill to another country
under the most severe penalties. The island of MALTA, in 1530 A.D.,
was granted by Charles V. to the Knights of St. John, who had
been expelled from Rhodes by Solyman in 1523 A.D.
13. Of TURKEY we have already treated. The BARBARY States,
TUNIS, and ALGIERS, had come under Turkish influence, and by
the example of Barbarossa had continued, with increasing vigour,
their piracies ; their corsairs first entered the Atlantic in 1535 A.D.
MOROCCO and FEZ were under the Xeriffs, the invasion by Sebastian,
King of Portugal, having been repelled, 1578 A.D. In PERSIA, the
Sefi family continued to reign, engaged in wars with Turkey and
with the barbarous northern tribes. Shah Abbas, 1585-1628 A.D.,
was an able and politic ruler. In INDIA, the Mogul Empire reached
its highest point under Akbar the Great, 1532-1604 A.D., when the
revenue was calculated to be thirty millions sterling, and the army
at 600,000. Aurungzebe, who began to reign 1658 A.D., by his craft
and tyranny sustained outwardly the Mogul rule, but the decline
commenced before his death. The Mahrattas, under Malek-Amber,
and Sevajee, had (1600-1646 A.D.) commenced their ravages, and
the Sikhs, in 1675 A.D., began to assert their independent action.
These disturbances were favourable to the settlement of the Portu-
guese, French, and English in India. In CHINA, the Mantchu
Tartars overthrew the Ming Dynasty and established themselves in
power, 1647 A-D- Already the Romish missions in India and China
366 From CJiarles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
had obtained an establishment. The trade with India and China
by sea was one highly valued by the Spanish, French, Dutch, and
English nations, and was rapidly increasing ; so also in JAPAN, in
which the struggles of the aristocratical factions continued.
Christianity in the Roman Catholic form was carried to INDIA by
the Portuguese early in the fourteenth century. Xavier, the Jesuit
missionary — in India, 1542-1546, in Japan, 1549-1551 A.D. — died
on the borders of China, 1552 A.D. Ricci was the most important
of the missionaries in China, 1582-1602 A.D. Great success followed
these labours in China, India, Japan, Siam, Cochin China, and
Tonquin; but in China the dissensions of the Jesuits and the
Franciscans, Dominicans, and other missionaries was very injurious
to their influence. In JAPAN there was a large number of converts,
and it required many years of systematic persecution, ending in a
general massacre, to extinguish Christianity, 1615-1637 A.D.
14. THE EUROPEAN SETTLEMENTS IN AMERICA began at the close
of the fifteenth century, and continued during the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries. SPAIN occupied Mexico in North America,
and claimed the southern portion of what we now call the United
States, with all the West India Islands. In 1513 A.D., Balboa
crossed the Isthmus of Darien, and from the high land first saw the
largest of all oceans, the Pacific. Cortez, in 1519 A. D., discovered
and conquered Mexico, and Pizarro Peru, 1525-1534 A.D., soon
also the whole of South America, except Brazil, which was discovered
and claimed for Portugal by Pingon and Cabral, 1500 A.D.
ENGLAND commenced the settlement of North America in Virginia,
1584-1607 A.D. ; Maryland, 1633 A.D. ; then in New England,
1620 A.D. ; Carolina, 1650 A.D. ; they (the English) conquered
Jamaica from the Spaniards, 1655 A.D., and New York from the
Dutch, 1674 A.D., and occupied several of the West India Islands.
The FRENCH settled Nova Scotia, Cape Breton, and Canada,
1604, 1605 A.D., and Louisiana, 1699 A.D. All South America, except
the Brazils, was claimed by SPAIN. PORTUGAL claimed the Brazils
conquered by Dutch from 1623 to 1654 A.D., when they were expelled
by Portugal ; The ENGLISH, DUTCH, and FRENCH had claims upon
Guiana. The importance of these colonies in America was not
perceived until the middle of the eighteenth century.
15. THE PROGRESS OF MARITIME DISCOVERY and enterprise was
not neglected in the period from 1520-1688 A.D. The share
which each European nation may claim in these labours is easily
apportioned.
Spain. — Saavediara, sent by Cortez from Mexico, discovered New
English Rcvolutiort, 1688 A.D. 367
Guinea, 1526 A.D. Menanda, sailing from Peru, discovered the
Solomon archipelago, 1568 A.D., and the Marquesas, 1596 A.D. Don
Quiros discovered the Society Islands, 1605 A.D., and the New
Hebrides, 1606 A.D. Torres discovered the straits called by his
name, 1606 A.D. ; but this strait had been probably entered and
sailed through by a Spanish vessel in 1546 A.D. Amerigo Vespucci,
an Italian in the service of Spain, is said to have first come in
contact with the mainland of South America (Gulf of Pavia). His
name has been unfairly given to the continent which Columbus
opened out to the European world. The African slave trade (to
some extent created by the humanity of the benevolent Las Casas,
in order to save the Mexican Indians from destructive labour) led
to many African voyages in order to obtain slaves for the Spanish
settlements in Mexico, and for the subsequent settlements in the
West Indian archipelago.
Portugal. — Cabral, in his voyage to the East, discovered Brazil,
1500 A.D. Albuquerque, 1503-1575 A.D., was the founder of the
Portuguese empire in India, of which Goa was the capital. Java,
Ceylon, Malacca, and the Moluccas, with the settlement at Ormuz,
in the Persian Gulf, were Portuguese possessions. Portuguese
navigators discovered the east and west coasts of New Holland in
1510 A.D., but these discoveries were not made known.
England. — Sir Francis Drake was the first English circum-
navigator, 1577-1580 A.D., Sir T. Cavendish the second, 1586-1588
A.D. William Dampier, between 1673-1711 A.D., discovered New
Britain, and touched the west coast of New Holland and the south
coast of New Guinea. Sir J. Hawkins began to carry slaves from
Africa to the Spanish colonies, 1562-1567 A.D. This was then
regarded as a work of mercy, by which slaves in Africa condemned
to death as captives were preserved and brought in contact with
Christianity and civilisation ! The Arctic explorations were conducted
by Frobisher, 1576 A.D., Davis, 1585 A.D., Hudson, 1610 A.D.,
Baffin, 1616 A.D., all of them to the north-west. The names of
these navigators are found on the maps. Willoughby to the north-
east, 1553-1558, which led to the discovery of the White Sea and
the port of Archangel, then the best practicable route to the
dominion of the Czar of Moscovy (Russia). The first English East
India Company was founded 1599, 1600 A.D. ; the new charter,
1657 and 1688 A.D. The first English possession in India was
Bombay, ceded by Portugal as part of the dowry of the queen of
Charles II., 1662 A.D. The Navigation Act, 1657 and 1660 A.D., was
passed to give special protection to the trade and shipping of England.
368 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Holland. — Le Maire and Schouten discovered the Straits of Le
Maire, and doubled Cape Horn, 1616 A.D. The west and north
coast of New Holland was explored by Dutch navigators, and called
by their names. Tasman discovered New Zealand and Tasmania
(Van Diemen's Land), 1642 A.D. Barents attempted the discovery
of the north-east passage, 1594 A.D. The Dutch East India Com-
pany, 1595-1642 A.D., made war on the Portuguese colonies in the
east, and conquered Ceylon and the Moluccas. In 1623 A.D., the
English settlers at Amboyna were put to death on a charge of con-
spiracy, for which Cromwell obtained satisfaction, 1654 A.D. The
Dutch West India Company was established, 1621 A.D.
France. — Cartier discovered the river St. Lawrence, 1534, 1535
A.D. Canada was settled 1535-1604 A.D., by France. Nova Scotia
also. Louisiana was explored, by the Mississippi, by French adven-
turers, and settled 1699 A.D. Sir J. Chardin in 1664-1681 A.D., and
Thevenot, 1665-1667 A.D., were French travellers in the East. A
French East India Company was established, 1664 A.D.
Denmark had an East India Company, 1616 and 1670-1686 A.D.
Early in the eighteenth century the Danes had small factories in
India.
1 6. THE BUCCANEERS. — A singular state of affairs continued for
some time in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in the seas
bordering on South America and Mexico (the Caribbean Sea), arising
out of the exclusive claims of Spain to the navigation and trade of
these seas and of the adjoining continents. In asserting these
claims, the Spanish governors acted with a high hand and with
great cruelty, the sailors and traders if captured were either killed
or sent as slaves to the mines. Hence arose a general feeling of
hatred on the part of the seamen of all nations, which led English,
French, Dutch, and others to lay aside all national jealousies, and
as sailors to support each other in attacks upon Spanish ships
and Spanish settlements as opportunity offered. The Spaniards, to
repress these, employed the guarda costas, the commanders of which
had orders to massacre all their prisoners. A permanent state of
hostility was thus established, independent of peace or war ashore.
These wild, irregular marauders, when not engaged in their ships,
formed temporary settlements on the islands or on the coasts, made
friends with the Indians (always in enmity with the Spaniards), and
spent their time in hunting wild cattle, from the flesh of which they
made their " boccan " — dried meat— hence the name " buccaneers,"
by which they are known. Some became logwood cutters in the
Bay of Campeachy. The names of Peter of Dieppe, Bartolomeo
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 369
Portuguez, Henry Morgan, and others are recorded in an old book,
"The History of the Buccaneers." Dampier, for some time, was
connected with them. The war between England and France, 1688,
led to a separation and opposition of the subjects of these nations,
and thus began to relieve the Spanish settlements, and in 1697 A.D.,
these marauders were settled either in trade or in the plantations.1
17. TRADE AND COMMERCE. — The great increase in the pro-
duction of the precious metals which followed the discovery of
America soon began to manifest itself, even so early as the beginning
of the sixteenth century. By the middle of that century the prices
of almost all commodities had doubled. A great impulse was given
to manufactures and trades, while no small inconvenience was ex-
perienced by those living on fixed incomes and salaries. Industrial
nations were benefited, while SPAIN itself at first enjoyed a great
outward prosperity, able to indulge in splendid buildings and luxu-
rious, extravagant expenditure, yet, neglecting its old agricultural
and manufacturing industries, fell into a rapid decline. In Spain —
and, in fact, in all Europe — the notion of the duty of the respective
governments to protect, extend, and otherwise benefit the commerce
of their several countries, impeded the prosperity of each and of
every one. The old error, that the prosperity of one nation detracted
from the prosperity of others, was uppermost in the minds of all
statesmen, in opposition to the more Christian view (now theoretically
held by all) that the " whole world as to trade is but as one nation
or people, and that therein nations are as persons."2 Another error,
common even now, was the considering gold and silver as con-
stituting the exclusive wealth of a country, which they endeavoured
to retain by enacting penalties against its exportation. The early
Italian writers on commerce devote themselves to expound the
great evil of their day, that of tampering with the currency. ///
England Thomas Munro, in 1621 A.D., exploded the notion that
money exclusively constituted wealth. He compared their exporta-
tion for the purchase of goods for importation with the seed thrown
into the earth, as the necessary step towards a plentiful harvest. Sir
William Petty, in 1667 A.D., was the first to state that "it was the
labour required for the production of commodities which determined
their value." By the trade to the Indies beyond the Cape, the
Indian Islands, China and Japan, and by the new markets opened
1 See "The Buccaneers of America," a thick I2mo. published early in the
eighteenth century.
2 Sir Dudley North, 1661.
2 B
3/O From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D.y to the
and rapidly growing in the English and French settlements in
North America and the West Indies, which required supplies from
the mother countries, the horizon of navigation and trade was largely
widened. A wonderful impulse also was given to maritime dis-
covery. The period of transition from the feudal system to the state
of society distinguished by the growth of a middle class was one of
difficulty to the ruling powers, owing to the pressure of the altered
conditions of life upon the lower classes, the small proprietors, and
the labourers. The trading classes in the cities became purchasers
of land, and the new landlords, needing no retainers to support their
dignity or to protect their interests, looked for higher rent from their
tenantry. This change of proprietorship was the greater after the
Reformation had thrown a large amount of Church property into
the hands of the new landlords — the gentlemen in the place of the
old barons. The high price obtained for wool tempted the pro-
prietors of land to discontinue the cultivation of large tracts of land
on which the small farmers had grown wheat, but which they
devoted to sheep pasture. Thus large numbers of able-bodied men
were deprived of employment; and, at the same time, the extensive
common lands, which, from the earliest times, had been regarded
as the poor man's estate, were gradually lessened by enclosures. All
these changes, followed by the increase of prices after the discovery
of America, produced a great degree of discontent and distress, fol-
lowed by repeated insurrections of the common people. The
Jacqueries of France in the fourteenth century, and the risings in
England, and the insurrections of the peasantry in Germany in the
sixteenth century, are mainly attributable to these causes. In due
time the increase of trade and manufactures remedied these evils.
XVIII. — Ecclesiastical History from 1520/0 1688 A.D.
THE BEGINNING OF THE GREAT SCHISM — the division of Christen-
dom into two distinct Church organisations, the rapid spread of the
Protestant reform, and the after reaction have already been detailed in
Section II., pp. 328-333. The reform of LUTHER differed from that
proposed by the Council of Basle, Constance, &c., which aimed
mainly to correct the worldliness and greed of the clergy of all classes
by a thorough reform in the disciplinary action of the Church, and
especially to check and regulate the absolute power assumed by the
popes, by the practical supremacy of general councils. In this effort,
for centuries past, many Catholics of all ranks and classes had
laboured, and with little effect. Luther's attempt went to the root
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 371
of the matter — the corruption of the pure doctrines of Christianity,
especially in those dogmas which had crept into the Church,
respecting justification and the pardon of sin. The careless priests
taught that, by penance, by masses offered by the priest, by bene-
factions to the poor and to the Church, men might look for pardon.
This naturally appeared to the ignorant to set aside the need of
repentance and amendment of life and the exercise of a true faith
in Christ. It placed the priest also in the position of a mediator, far
above other men, as the sole possessor of the sacrament of the body
and blood of Christ, and with power to bestow or withhold it. All
the evils complained of in the Romish Church are traceable to
this one leading misconception of a human priesthood with power to
offer afresh a divine sacrifice ; and they were intensified in their
bearing upon public morality by the sale of indulgences, which, to
the popular mind, were supposed to save the purchaser, not merely
from Church censures, but from all future punishment.
Against this grand fundamental error Luther protested, and was
led step by step to teach that " repentance towards God, and faith
towards our Lord Jesus Christ," were the sole conditions of the
sinner's justification before God. This admitted, the whole complex
ritualism of the Romish Church was shorn of much of its meaning
as well as of its power. In the generation before Luther such views
had been more or less received by many of the clergy and laity, but
these proto-Protestants, yielding to the morbid dread of schism, and
anxious to maintain the unity of the Church, while hoping for some
change to be effected by a general council, outwardly conformed
to the generally-received doctrines and worship of the Church. A
large class, under the influence of the discussions of the Schoolmen
and the power of the new ideas received in connexion with the revival
of literature, had become sceptical, and, when prudence permitted,
were not afraid to satirise the belief of the Church, while, generally,
they were found among the foremost supporters of the papal power,
and of outward conformity to the ritual. Many homes in secret
cherished hopes of Church reformation, and approximated in their
teachings to the views expressed by Luther. For instance, the
Cardinals Contarini, and Caraffa, and Pole, though afterwards dis-
tinguished as firm Romanists. Juan Valdez, and the learned and
accomplished ladies Vittoria Colonna (the friend of Michael Angelo),
and Giulia Gonzaga sympathised with these views without leaving
the Church of Rome. " On what we may call the philosophy of
Christianity — or Augustinianism — that philosophy which is based
on the grand dogma of justification by faith only — both parties were
2 B 2
372 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
agreed ; and, until the Council of Trent asserted authoritatively the
opposite doctrine, the most determined papist would regard the
subject of justification as an open question."1 THE COUNCIL OF
TRENT, which first assembled December 13, 1542 A.D., was trans-
ferred to Bologna, 1547 A.D., again at Trent, 1550 A.D., and closed
December 4, 1563 A.D., decreed many important reforms, but
established the theology of the Romish Church, especially in the
article on justification, and with respect to the papal supremacy its
decisions were unquestionably confirmatory. The Pope had decreed
that the title of the council should be " The Holy GEcumenical
and General Council of Trent," refusing to admit the following words,
used at the Councils of Constance and Basle — " representing the
Universal Church" The objection was not to these words, but to
what followed in connexion with them — " which derives its power
immediately from Jesus Christ ', and to which every person, of what-
ever dignity, not excepting the Pope, is bound to yield obedience." c
The Greek and Eastern Churches, and the Protestant Churches,
then in their transition state, were not represented. The votes in the
council were not taken by nations which had deliberated separately,
as at Constance and Basle, but by individuals, by which means the
large preponderance of Italian bishops secured decisions according
to directions received from Rome. Thus it was that the Romish
Church lost all claim to Catholicity, and became a sect. The
decision of this council rendered any reconciliation or reunion of
the two opposing parties in the Church impossible. The Church
of Rome, however, reaped much benefit from the reforms of the
Council of Trent, which was one result of the Reformation begun
by Luther's teaching ; and so far it owes its revival to the partial
application of the principles advocated by the first reformers. New
religious orders sprang up ; the most efficient and influential, the Order
of Jesus (the Jesuits}, which has since been the great power in the
Church of Rome. This order was founded by Ignatius Loyola,
I534~I540j and was sanctioned by Paul III. Its one object was
the maintenance of Romish doctrine and of the papal supremacy.
It has so far succeeded that " for the last three centuries the history
of the Jesuit order is the history of the Catholic Church gone into
commission." 3 It was the outbreak of a genuine fanaticism, exceed-
ing in fervour the most striking examples furnished by the experience
of the spiritual life in the writings of Protestant nonconformity. The
1 Dr. Hook, " Lives of the Archbishops," vol. iii. p. 58, new series.
2 Ibid., vol. i. p. 28, new series. 3 The Spectator, igth July, 1884.
English Revolution, 1688 A. D. 373
" Book of Spiritual Exercises " by Loyola is devoted to self-culture
and self-abnegation, founded on a self-anatomisation of the most
minute character. It is in fact Thomas a Kempis intensified. Ranke
seems to think that Jesuitism had availed itself of Protestant
religious experiences. This is not likely, as Augustine's "Confessions "
and the writings of the German Mystics were sufficient to help
Loyola to fathom the nature of his own spiritual emotions, and to
judge those of others.
19. THE PAPACY stood the shock of the Reformation, by which
the attachment of the Catholic sovereigns of Europe to its system
had been tested and established. These Catholic rulers might be
occasionally refractory, but they were fairly committed to the papal
supremacy and Church, and, of necessity, the opponents of the
reformed doctrines and Churches. Paul III. (Farnese), 1534-
1549 A.D., was devoted to the aggrandisement of his family, and
obtained for them the duchy of Parma and Placentia. Paul IV.
(Caraffa), 1555-1559, an aged monk, with the spirit of Hildebrand,
but without his power. Gregory XIII. had intelligence enough to
carry out a reform in the calendar, and bigotry enough to rejoice in
the Massacre of St. Bartholomew at Paris. He was the contempo-
rary of St. Carlo Borromeo, the Milan philanthropist and archbishop.
The institution of the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide was origi-
nated by him. This is the grand Missionary Society of the Romish
Church. He ruled from 1572 to 1585 A.D. SIXTUS V. (Montalto),
a man of strong mind and efficient governor of Rome, who secretly
admired the talent of Henry IV. of France and of Queen Elizabeth
of England, though officially their enemy, 1585-1590 A.D. He
sanctioned the murder of Henry III. of France in full consistory,
1589 A.D. Paul V. (Borghese), 1605-1621 A.D., was engaged in a
dispute with the Republic of Venice respecting certain territorial
claims, priestly privileges and tithes, which amounted to an open
rupture. PAUL SARPI, a monk, was the adviser of the senate of
Venice. Though a monk, his religion was speculative and undefined
except in one point, " irreconcilable hatred towards the secular influ-
ence of the papacy — probably the only passion he ever cherished." x
Paul Sarpi wrote, for the information of the government of Venice,
" Consolations of mind, to quiet the conscience of those who live
well against the terrors of the Interdict of Paul V.," in which the
rights of sovereigns and subjects are fully discussed. This quarrel
ended in 1607 A.D., just in time to prevent the formal separation of
1 Ranke.
374 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Venice from the Church of Rome. Paul Sarpi afterwards wrote a
history of the Council of Trent, which is the great authority on the
Protestant side, and against which Cardinal Pallavicino wrote his
history, expressly in defence of the papacy, 1656 A.D. Gregory XV.,
in 1622 A.D., formally established the Congregatio de Propaganda
Fide. Urban VIII. formed the Mission College at Rome, 1627 A.D.
Already the cardinals had begun to select for popes men of neutral
character, as best adapted to the times, and most calculated to
increase the influence of the curia. Innocent X., 1644-1655, was
elected on the ground that " he had never said much, and had done
less." He did his best to oppose the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 A.D.
Innocent XL, 1676-1682, with great prudence, parried the action
of Louis XIV. of France and his clergy in the four resolutions
of the bishops and clergy in 1688 A.D. Annoyed by the domination
of Louis XIV., he favoured the revolution of 1688 A.D. in England,
in which a Popish king was supplanted by a Protestant one. Masses
were said in the chapel of the Pope's legate at the Hague for a
blessing on the enterprise. The FRENCH Church had been for some
time a source of disquiet to the popedom; beginning in the rise
and popularity of the Jansenist party, which professed to be in full
accordance with St. Augustine, 1640-1713 A.D. Louis XIV. was
much opposed to these opinions, and after a series of conflicts and
controversies the convent of Port Royal, the headquarters of the
Jansenists, was suppressed, 1709 A.D.— the result of the papal bull
" Unigenitus." In these controversies the writings of Quesnel,
Madame Guyon, Archbishop Fenelon, and Bossuet were largely cir-
culated. But the great work of PASCAL, the " Lettres Provinciates,"
1656 A.D., are the only survivals, and, in fact, the main benefit to
the world from these discussions. They remain to this day the
most powerful, keen, witty, and sarcastic exposure of Jesuitical
sophistry. But the most important movement affecting the position
of the papacy was that of Louis XIV., who incited the clergy of France
to establish the liberties of the Gallican Church, 1682 A.D., against
the Pope. In a convention of bishops, four articles, drawn up by
BOSSUET, and confirmed by royal edict, 1682 A.D., were put forth.
The first confined the power of the Pope to spiritual matters ; the
second affirmed the authority of general councils j the third supported
the canons of the Church; \hzfourth subjects the papal judgment
to the assent of the Church. Alexander VIII. (the Pope) declared
these articles invalid, 1689, 1690 A.D., and Louis XIV. had to com-
promise by abolishing the obligation to receive them, but would not
allow any man to be hindered from acknowledging their validity.
But there remained in France an ultramontane and also a Gallican
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 375
party up to the revolution of 1788 A.D. Bossuet, who had composed
the four offensive articles, had to make the most abject apology to
the Pope. But, the more the court was opposed to the power of the
Pope, the more zealously was the persecution against Protestants
carried on. The revocation of the Edict of Nantes, 1685 A.D., was
preceded by edicts against the Protestants who were attempting to
emigrate, for which they were sent to the galleys, and their property
confiscated. Then followed the quartering of troops upon the
Protestant families. These were known as the Dragonades, by
which every species of cruelty and annoyance was inflicted.
Madame Sevigne, with the thoughtlessness of her class, remarks that
" the dragoons have been good missionaries," and, with the bigotry
in which all France sympathised, expressed her opinion that, " the
revocation of the Edict of Nantes was an act alone sufficient to secure
Louis an immortal renown." In 1686 A.D. the Vaudois in Piedmont,
whose case had called forth the interference of Oliver Cromwell in
1655 A.D., were again persecuted and expelled by the Duke of Savoy,
at the instance of Louis, but, in 1689 A.D., were permitted to return,
under the care of Henry Arnaud, their pastor. Great evils resulted
to France from the civil wars in the Cevennes, against the Protestants
called Cameronians, 1703-1705 A.D. As in France, so in Southern
Germany, the Netherlands, and Hungary, and Poland, attempts were
made to expel the Protestants. In England, under Henry VIII. and
Mary, we need but refer to our ordinary histories, which have fixed
upon a poor, nervous, priest-ruled woman the sobriquet of " Bloody
Mary." In Italy and Spain the persecutions were thorough, and
Protestantism was literally stamped out with the full approval of the
population. It is characteristic of the Spanish feeling that the
marriage of Charles II. of Spain, the last of his race, was, in 1679 A-D-J
celebrated by an " auto da fe," in which twenty-two heretics were
burnt.
20. THE PROTESTANT CHURCHES, in their separation from Rome,
asserted the right of the free exercise of the judgment and con-
science on the part of the individual and the community, in oppo-
sition to the dogma and assumed infallibility of the Pope as the
head of the old Church. This opposition to Romanism was, how-
ever, the only point on which they were fully agreed, though we
may regard the Augsburg Confession as the standard of Lutheran
orthodoxy, 1530 A.D. In the attempt to form one united organisa-
tion, with a fixed creed embracing every minutia of doctrine and
with one form of ecclesiastical order and rule, they happily failed.
It is not yet fully understood by the Churches that l\\e flock may
and must necessarily have many folds (John x. 16), and yet belong
3/6 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
to one Shepherd. Meanwhile, Roman Catholicism appeared to
speak with one voice and to act as under one will. " Not only was
there at this time a much more intense zeal among the Catholics
than among the Protestants, but the whole zeal of the Catholics was
directed against the Protestants, while almost the whole zeal of the
Protestants was directed against each other."1 From the first, the
teachings of ZUINGLE, the reformer of Switzerland, differed from
those of LUTHER, especially in regard to the eucharist. CALVIN (in
Geneva) differed from Luther, not only on this point, but also in the
predominance given by him to the views of St. Augustine (im-
properly called Calvinistic) : on these and other questions of minor
importance, in which difference of opinion appears to arise naturally
from the exercise of freedom of thought, the Protestant leaders
wasted their strength in angry, bitter controversies. Mutual tolera-
tion might have made these differences of opinion a useful discipline
to all the Churches, especially as a warning against the assumption
of infallibility. But the truths implied in the language of OUR
LORD (John x. 16) and of ST. PAUL (Philippians i. 15-18 ; iii. 15)
were overlooked, and all parties, Romanist and Protestant, regarding
errors of judgment as mortal sins cognisable by the state, aimed at
the formation of a perfect creed, and an equally perfect Church
order, the reception of which was obligatory, and opposition to
which was punishable. That the state should support a Church
which should be the sole Church of the nation was assumed by all
parties as an indisputable truth, hence nonconformity was naturally
regarded as disloyalty to the state. Great importance was, therefore,
attached to schemes which had for their object the reunion of the
Protestants and Catholics, and especially to the union of all the
Protestant Churches. The desire of reconciliation with Rome was
felt by many of the learned in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. CALIXTUS, 1586-1656 A.D., a Lutheran divine, aimed at
the union of all the Protestant Churches, and advocated a system
(branded by his opponents as Syncretism) which can only be carried
out when religious indifference to dogma has prepared the way.
JOHN DUR^US (Dury) was a fellow-labourer in this work of union
and charity, 1634-1674 A.D. SAMUEL HARTLIB, the friend of Milton,
was another, 1630-1660 A.D. It is pleasant to know that at a
conference of the Protestant Churches held at Cassel, 1661 A.D.,
the common-sense and right feeling of the divines confirmed the
opinion long before given by Martin Luther (in one of his wiser
1 Macaulay.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 377
moods) that " the difference between the Lutheran and other re-
formed Churches does not affect the foundations of the faith."
Some of the controversies which troubled the German Churches
lowered the reputation and lessened the intellectual influence of
Protestantism among the learned. Take, for instance, the names
by which these controversies were known to theologians : the
Adiaphoristic controversy, the Majoristic, the Ossiandrian, the Pre-
destinarian, the Synergistic, the Antinomian, the Crypto-Calvinistic,
the Supralapsarian, the Syncretistic, and the Cocceian controversies.
Great use was made of these differences of opinion by the Romanists
in their attacks on Protestantism. BOSSUET, in his history of the
variations of the Protestant Churches, luxuriates in his description
of these differences, choosing to forget that in the Romish Church
an equally large number of conflicting opinions exist, and have been
advocated from time to time, but have been wisely overlooked by
the Roman curia. In GERMANY, as the result of these contentions,
there was a great decline in the spiritual teaching and practical piety
of the Churches; and during the war, 1618-1648 A.D., there was
almost a complete cessation of the ordinary work of the ministry.
After this war, Spener, Francke, and others, by their labours and the
example of their lives, were the means of reviving religious feeling.
They endeavoured to establish colleges of piety in the towns and
villages, and hence acquired the name of PIETISTS. Their head-
quarters were in the University of Halle. In HOLLAND, the
disputes between the Arminians and the Calvinistic party on the
doctrines of general redemption, free-will, and election were the
occasion of the assembling the SYNOD OF DORDT, 1618, 1619 A.D.,
which aggravated and stereotyped the opposing views of the divines.
The Arminians were afterwards called the Remonstrants ; and many
of them, after the death of their leader Arminius, adopted semi-
Pelagian and Socinian views. In ENGLAND, the success of the Pro-
testant party, on the accession of Elizabeth, was accompanied by
serious divisions of opinion, mainly on the question of Church
government. While in exile, during the reign of Mary, the English
exiles had come in contact with the reformed Churches of Ger-
many, France, and Switzerland. Many of them became anxious
to modify the episcopacy and to simplify the ritual and liturgy
of the reformed Church of England, while the court ecclesiastical
rulers were resolved to maintain substantially the established order
by an Act of Uniformity, 1558 A.D. The HIGH CHURCH party
regarded the Church of England and that of Rome to be true
branches of THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, possessing the true apostolical
378 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
succession handed down through a series of bishops traceable to
the apostles ; they were, therefore, CHURCHES ; all others were mere
SECTS, as, for instance, the Protestant Churches in Scotland, France,
Germany, Holland, which were Presbyterian in their Church govern-
ment. The PURITAN CHURCHMAN was more disposed to trace the
succession of his Church through the Vaudois and other religious
bodies (which had in every age been opposed to the corruptions of
the Church of Rome), and so on to the Eastern Churches, while
regarding the question as of little importance. His view of the
credentials of a Church were expressed in Article XIX. : " The
visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men, in the
which the pure word of God is preached, and the sacraments be duly
ministered" &c. THE SEPARATISTS regarded the true succession to
be found in men whose teaching and whose lives resembled those of
the apostles. The rationale of the constitution and order of worship
in the Anglican Church is fully exhibited in Dr. Hook's life of
Archbishop Parker.1 In 1565 A.D., the Act of Uniformity was
rigidly enforced, as the numbers of the nonconforming party gradu-
ally increased; and, not only so, but, in addition, the SEPARATISTS,
sometimes called Brownists, caused no little disquiet to the heads
of both the civil and ecclesiastical government. Their " principles
were very much those which were afterwards held by the Inde-
pendents, regarding every Christian congregation as a complete
Church, competent to regulate its own government, and opposed to
any interference on the part of any assembly of clergy or of the
government. No other body of men had so clear an idea of the
spiritual nature of religion, and of the evils which resulted from
the dependence of the Church upon the state."2 In 1593 A.D., the
first law imposing penalties on Protestants was passed against these
especially (though others were included) by an English Protestant
government. The death penalty was enforced in some cases. Very
few Churchmen or Nonconformists in our day are aware of these
persecutions in the reign of Elizabeth. It is some comfort to believe
that the bishops who, by their agents, " ferreted " these men out
from their conventicles or homes, would, under changed circum-
stances, have been quite ready to have suffered in like manner for
their opinions ; both parties felt that their opinions were more im-
portant than their lives.3 There was some plausible excuse for the
" History of the Archbishops of Canterbury," vol. v., new series.
2 Gardiner, vol. i. p. 67.
3 "Congregational History," 1567-1700, by John Waddington, D.D., pp.
61-95.
English Revolution, 1688 A. D. 379
persecutors in the fact of the existence of a widespread alarm that
" the multitude would be so distracted by the spread of so many
opinions as to lose faith in all religion." In the list of confessors
who languished in prison I mark with pleasure and pride two bearing
my own name, though I am unable to claim them as ancestors.
The religious irreconcilability which produced the civil war and the
Commonwealth, 1642-1660 A.D., is chargeable both to the High
Anglican party and the Puritan party (as distinct from the Inde-
pendents). Both desired one Established Church, one form of
worship, one dogmatic teaching. " The belief that the state was to
settle a definite Church order, to which all were bound to submit,
was too deeply rooted in the English mind to be easily eradicated."1
There was no reconciliation possible except in unlimited freedom of
thought, preaching, writing, and printing as the right of every in-
dividual, and also for the existence of separate systems of Church
government \ and for these the age was not ripe, though Henry
Burton and Lord Brooke had, to some extent, in their writings thrown
a clear light on this the great difficulty of the state.2 Yet nothing
was more desirable than religious peace to unite all parties in the
great work of evangelising the ignorant and degraded populations
of England and Protestant Germany. Although sixteen universities
had been founded before the Reformation, and almost an equal
number between the Reformation and the close of the seventeenth
century in Germany, the middle and higher classes were so far
influenced by the dread of witchcraft, that we read of hundreds
of women put to death on this charge,3 though this is scarcely
credible. But the desired peace through a mere doctrinal uniformity,
was impossible. It could only be found in TOLERATION. It is the
singular and distinctive honour of the BAPTIST Churches to have
defended, from their earliest histoiy, the rights of conscience. Not
one sentiment in all their writings is to be found inconsistent with
the principles of religious liberty. One Leonard Busher, a Baptist
and citizen of London, was its first advocate in England, 1610 A.D.
Next to the Baptists are the INDEPENDENTS. John Goodwin
(minister of Coleman-street), in 1644 A.D., advocated toleration in
the fullest extent. Milton, in November of that year, published his
" Areopagitica," in defence of the freedom of the press; Jeremy
Taylor his " Liberty of Prophesying," in 1647 A.D. ; after which our
philosopher John Locke, his treatise on "Toleration," in 1689 A.D.
1 Gardiner, vol. x. p. 83.
2 Ibid., pp. 35, 36.
3 See Menzel, " History of Germany," vol. ii. pp. 441-445.
380 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
(written in 1667 A.D.) ; but none of these great men have, in their
advocacy of this important principle, excelled their Independent
forerunner, John Goodwin. His Life, by the Rev. Thomas Jackson,1
is one of the most valuable contributions to the history of the re-
ligious controversies of the seventeenth century. Justice has also
been done to him by Dr. Stoughton in his able, impartial, and
fascinating work.2 We have two remarkable instances of the in-
utility of the attempt to alter the national predilections ; the one is
the failure of the High Anglican party in England to impose
episcopacy and the Prayer-book upon the Scotch in the reign of
Charles I., the other is the failure of the Scotch Presbyterians to
establish their system in England during the rule of the Common-
wealth. But the lesson of non-interference on the part of govern-
ment with the religious prepossessions of the people was a difficult
one to comprehend. After the Restoration the revival of the Act
of Uniformity, 1662 A.D., drove from the English Church two
thousand men whose labours and lives were thus lost to the national
Church. Of these men the names of Baxter, Howe, Owen, Thomas
Goodwin, Bates, Charnock, and Calamy are the best known. The
Anglican Church, though retaining the memory and the influence
of the writings of " the judicious " Hooker, and the labours of such
men as Barrow, Archbishop Leighton, Scott of St. Giles, Bishops
Taylor and Stillingfleet, could ill spare such men. The INDE-
PENDENT, BAPTIST, and PRESBYTERIAN Churches formed a powerful
minority among the middle classes especially. A new sect, the
FRIENDS, called in derision Quakers, commenced in the preaching
of George Fox, and patronised by William Penn and Barclay,
offended many by the eccentricities of its first preachers, but had
fair success. In a second generation the " Friends " exhibited the
grace and practical power of Christianity, and disarmed all oppo-
sition to their peculiarities. Among the BAPTISTS, JOHN BUNYAN
gave to the Churches the "Pilgrim's Progress," which, from the
beginning, circulated largely among the middle and lower classes of
society. In our day it has become a classic. With respect to the
PURITAN party generally, even HUME has been compelled to do
them some scant justice. " The same bold and daring spirit which
accompanied them in their addresses to the Divinity appeared in
their political speculations ; and the principles of civil liberty, which
1 8vo., 1822 and 1872.
" The History of Religion in England, from the Opening of the Long Parlia-
ment to the end of the Eighteenth Century," 6 vols., 1881 (see vol. i. pp. 337-340) ;
Boyce's " The Higher Criticism and the Bible," crown 80., p. 40.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 381
during some reigns had been little avowed in the nation .... had
been strongly adopted by the new sect."1 LECKY remarks that
Puritanism is the most masculine form that Christianity has yet
assumed.2
The GREEK CHURCH remained in a state of subjugation in
Turkey after the fall of Constantinople, 1453 A.D. In RUSSIA it was
the Established Church. The patriarch Nikon, 1652-1667 A.D.,
endeavoured to reform the corrupt text of the religious books used
in the Churches, and thus incurred the enmity of the priesthood and
monks. He retired in 1658 A.D., was deposed in 1667 A.D., and
died, 1 68 1 A.D. His character and literary labours have been
celebrated by Dean Stanley.3
LITERATURE FROM 1520 A.D. TO 1688 A.D. : —
A bare sketch of names and dates is a very unsatisfactory record
of literature ; but it is useful as an index and as a memorial to
remind us that amid the political changes of the period the cultiva-
tion of the intellect kept pace with the general improvement. It
must not be forgotten that the writers of the fifteenth and sixteenth
century had to create a reading people. Readers and lovers of litera-
ture, classical and theological, there were in considerable numbers, but
not sufficiently numerous to form a reading public, upon whom an
author could depend for support. The learned scholar who devoted
himself to literary labour had to depend upon Church endowments
and state employment, but more especially upon the patronage of
the great officials of the Church or of the government. He had to
affix a dedication to his patron, and on presentation expected his
fee. The possible profit arising from the sale of works was not
contemplated by the author. "It would be a degradation for the
scholar to sink into a tradesman. The printer undertook the
expenses of publication, and, although the sale of the works of
Erasmus" (for instance) "was large and rapid, the expenses of
printing " (and the cost and difficulty of circulation) " were at this
time so great that the profits were not likely to be considerable." 4
It is probable that the theological and party literature of the English
commonwealth found its supporters in the large increase of readers,
deeply interested in the affairs of the Church and the State, but with
this exception, up to the middle of the eighteenth century, literary
men placed much dependence upon the pecuniary gifts of their
patrons, as well as upon the liberality of their publishers.
1 Vol. v. pp. 192-195. 2 " History of Christian Morals," vol. ii. p. 390.
3 " Eastern Churches, " 8vo.
4 Hook's " Lives of the Archbishops," vol. i. pp. 325, 326, new series.
382 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
The leading scientific men of this period were — Copernicus, a Pole,
who discovered the true system of the universe, now all but
universally accepted, 1546-1602 A.D. ; the other great astronomers,
Tycho-Brahe (Denmark), 1546-1600 A.D. ; Galileo (Italy), 1583-
1602 A.D. ; Kepler (Germany), 1586-1680 A.D. ; Gunter, 1581-
1626 A.D. ; Horrocks (England), 1639 A.D. ; Sir Isaac Newton
(England), 1642-1719^0.; Flamsteed (England), 1646-1719^0.;
Pope Gregory XIII. had the good sense to reform the calendar (the
error was ten days up to 1699 A.D.; after 1700 A.D., eleven days ;
after 1800 A.D., twelve days.) It was not received in England until
September 2nd, 1752, when the day following was reckoned as
September i4th. Russia alone maintains the old calendar. William
Gilbert, 1573-1603 A.D., studied magnetism. Harvey discovered
the circulation of the blood, 1593-1607 A.D. Napier (Scotland),
1550-1617 A.D., invented logarithms in 1614 A.D. Robert Boyle
cultivated natural philosophy, 1626-1691 A.D., and in 1660 A.D.
helped to form the Royal Society. Sydenham, the physician, 1624-
1689 A.D. Torricelli, in Italy, invented the barometer, 1643 A.D.
The Marquis of Worcester began to see the nature of a steam
engine, 1663 A.D. Sir Thomas Gresham founded the Royal
Exchange, 1566 A.D. John Ray (naturalist), 1686 A.D. Tusser
wrote on agriculture, 1520-1586 A.D. But the greatest of all these
names is undoubtedly Lord Bacon, 1561-1626 A.D. "In the name
of utility, Bacon laboured to divert the modern intellect from the
idle metaphysical speculations of the Schoolmen to natural science,
to which his own sounder method and a cluster of splendid
intellects soon gave an unprecedented impulse. To the direct
influence of this movement, perhaps, even more than the teaching
of Gassendi and Locke, may be ascribed the great ascendancy of
sensational philosophy among modern nations, and it is also con-
nected with some of the most important differences between ancient
and modern history. Among the ancients the human mind was
chiefly directed to philosophical speculations, and in which the law
seemed to be perpetual oscillation, while among the moderns it has
rather tended towards physical science, in which the law is per-
petual progress."1
In reference to non-scientific literature, it may be well to classify
the great authors according to their several nationalities.
ENGLISH LITERATURE before the Restoration, 1660 A.D. — John
Lilly (Euphues), 1582 A.D.; James Howell, 1610-1660; Felton,
1 Lecky, "History of Christian Morals," vol. i. p. 130.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 383
1627 A.D.; Sir Thomas Brown, 1634-1671 A.D. Harrington in his
"Oceana" indulged in daring speculations on the principles of
government, 1611-1627 A.D. Roger Ascham, in his "Schoolmaster"
advocated the interests of education, 1525-1568 A.D. Burton, in
his "Anatomy of Melancholy," 1576-1639 A.D., gives a miscel-
laneous collection from the libraries of his day, and has earned the
praise of Dr. Samuel Johnson. Poetry and the Drama : SPENSER'S
"Faerie Queen," 1557-1598 A.D., a poem redolent with beauty, but
too long for the readers of our day; SHAKESPEARE, 1564-1616
has combined wisdom and moral teaching in his dramas, which
makes them the admiration and wonder of the English and of
the Teutonic nations; Ben Jonson, 1574-1637 A.D., a poet
and a dramatist ; Sir Philip Sydney, the "Arcadia," 1572-1586 A.D.;
Chapman, poetical translator, 1557-1624 A.D. ; Fairfax, 1602-
1632 A.D.; Beaumont, 1597-1616 A.D.; Fletcher, 1590-1624 A.D.;
Marlow, 1563-1593 A.D. ; Massinger, 1606-1640 A.D.; Ford, 1602-
1604 A.D., belonging to the drama. Amongst the Historians and
Antiquaries, John Leland, who died 1553 A.D.; Stowe, 1527-1605;
Camden, 1551-1623 A.D. ; Speed, 1562-1641 A.D. ; Usher,
1600-1656 A.D. ; George Buchanan (Scotland), 1506-1582 A.D. ;
John Foxe, the martyrologist, 1577-1587 A.D. ; Hollingshead died,
1581 A.D.; Baker died, 1645 A-D-; Sir Walter Raleigh, 1522-1617;
Knolles (Turkish history), 1610. The collections of voyages, &c.,
by Hakluyt, 1552-1636 A.D., and of Purchas, in his "Pilgrims,"
1577-1628 A.D., stimulated the maritime enterprise of England.
Theology. — The divines of the Reformation, John Knox, A.
Melville (Scotland), with Cranmer, Latimer, Jewell, Parker, are
little read, Latimer and Jewell perhaps excepted. HOOKER, " the
Judicious," 1553-1600 A.D.; Chillingworth, the great champion of
religious freedom, 1602-1649 A.D., ought to be read as well as
praised by all educated Englishmen; John Hales, 1600-1646 A.D.;
John Smith, 1636-1652 A.D.; Dr. Thomas Jackson, 1600-1640;
Bishop Hall, 1617-1656 A.D.; Henry Moore, the platonist, are
yet read with pleasure; Mede's writings on prophecy, 1610-
1618 A.D., are very occasionally quoted. The leading Puritans were
Bolton, 1572-1611 A.D. ; Perkins, 1580-1602 A.D.; Preston, 1587-
1628, A.D., and Sibbs 1577-1615 A.D., quoted more than studied.
The great English Lawyer is Sir Edward Coke, 1580-1584, whose
comments on Littleton's "Tenures" used to be the study of young
lawyers; Selden, 1584-1654 A.D., is more remembered by his
" Table Talk " than by his other legal and antiquarian writings.
In Biblical Literature we have Walton's Polyglott, and Castell's
384 From C/uirles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Lexicon, 1655 A.D.; Matthew Poole, Synopsis Criticorum, 5 vols., folio,
1669-1676 A.D. ; the critics are those in the bulky Critici Sacra.
ENGLISH LITERATURE AFTER THE RESTORATION, 1660-1688 A.D.
— In general literature, Isaac Walton, Evelyn ; Pepys, for the diaries
especially; Dennis, the critic; Sir William Temple, 1660-1700;
Algernon Sydney, 1637-1683 A.D. Poetry and the Drama : Butler,
the coarse satirist of hypocrisy and often of religion itself, 1622-
1688; JOHN MILTON, whose "Paradise Lost" is the great and only
epic in our language, 1608-1674 A.D.; JOHN DRYDEN, whose poetry
and prose still hold their ground — the prose is described as " stand-
ing at the head of the plain English prose style, possessing at the
same time a capacity for magnificence " (Saintsbury) ; Cowley, 1636-
1667 A.D.; Waller, 1625-1687 A.D., are in the collection of the
poets. Historians and Antiquarians : Fuller, the witty and pithy,
1608-1661 A.D.; Clarendon, 1608-1673 A.D., the historian of the Civil
War; Bishop Burnett, 1643-1715 A.D., historian of his own times
and of the Reformation in England; May's Parliamentary History ;
Lucy Hutchinson 1653-1711, Life of Col. Hutchinson. Theology:
ISAAC BARROW, 1630-1677 A.D., the most exhaustive of ethical
preachers, leaving nothing unsaid; Pearson on the Creed, 1612-
1686 A.D. ; Bishop Jeremy Taylor, 1646-1677 A.D., whose prose was
poetry, and whose piety was deep, but of whom it is truly said that
he had " genius ; but yet how little was he capable of handling any
great question "; T Bishops Stillingfleet, Louth, and Bull ; JOHN
SCOTT, of St. Giles (author of the "Christian Life"), 1660-1716;
Hammond, 1660 A.D.; Archbishop Leighton, 1641-1684 A.D.;
Bishop Beveridge, 1774-1908 A.D. ; Bishop Ken, 1630-1710 A.D.;
Archbishop Tillotson, 1651-1694 A.D. ; Bishop Sherlock. The
great Puritan Divines, whose writings in the seventeenth century
were the chief mental food of the respectable trading classes and
the middle class of gentry: RICHARD BAXTER, 1615-1691 A.D.,
whose " Saints' Rest " was read more than any other book except
the Bible and Bunyan; JOHN HOWE, 1630-1688 A.D. ; Howe did
not consider religion so much a system of doctrine as a divine
discipline to reform the heart and the life";2 John Owen, 1616-
1683 A.D., a diffuse but highly spiritual writer ; JOHN BUNYAN, 1628-
1688 A.D., of whose great work we have already spoken, and of whom
Dr. Arnold speaks as a man of incomparably greater genius than
any of the other divines, and of profound wisdom ; 3 Matthew
1 Dr. Arnold's " Life," p. 400.
"' Stoughton, " History of Religion," vol. iv. pp. 387, 388.
3 Dr. Arnold's " Life," p. 410.
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 385
Henry, the commentator, 1662-1714 A.D., whose work is an ency-
clopaedia of practical and spiritual theology ; add to these the names
of Joseph Allein, Richard Allein, Ambrose, Binning, Charnock,
Culverwell, JOHN GOODWIN (the Arminian), Thomas Goodwin, and
Manton : Rutherford, Scougal, and THOMAS HALYBURTON, the
Scotch divines. Biblical Literature: John Lightfoot, the great
Rabbinical scholar, and Edward Pococke, the Orientalist; Galey
"Court of the Gentiles," 1652-1678 A.D. Political Economy : Louis
Roberts, 1641 A.D.; Thomas Munro, 1620-1664 A.D.; Sir J. Child,
1670 A.D.; Sir W. Petty, 1667-1692 A.D.; Sir Dudley North, 1677
(also Hobbes and John Locke). The first English newspaper printed,
1588 A.D. (the "English Mercury," by Lord Burleigh). The
"London Gazette," in 1665 A.D.
French Literature, in the vernacular, begins a little before the
reign of Francis. Before the accession of Henry IV., the satire
" Menippe," the work of several lawyers and poets, contributed much
to the peaceful succession of the king to the throne. Clement
Marot, 1513-1544 A.D.; Jodelle, 1552-1575 A.D., were popular poets
in their day. RABELAIS, the satirist, 1537-1559 A.D. ; MONTAIGNE,
the essayist, 1554-1592 A.D. ; Balzac, 1621-1659 A.D.; Voiture,
1631-1648 A.D.; Rochefoucalt, 1650-1680 A.D., belong to general
literature; so also MADAME DE SEVIGNE, 1644-1694 A.D., whose
inimitable letters never tire. Thz poets and miscellaneous writers are
Scarron, 1610-1660 A.D. ; LaBruyere, 1673-1696 A.D. (the essayist) ;
Corneille, 1647-1684 A.D.; Racine, 1673-1699 A.D.; Moliere, 1658-
1673 A.D., are the great dramatic poets. BOILEAU, the critic; La
Fontaine, the fabulist. Historians: De Thou (Thuanus), 1572-
1617 A.D.; Sully, 1572-1641 A.D.; Brantome, 1566-1644; Bodin,
political writer and historian, 1577 A.D. ; he outstepped all the
political writers of this day; Mezerai, 1610-1683 A.D. ; Salmasius,
1604-1649 A.D., the opponent of Milton; De Retz, 1643-1679
The Ecclesiastical Historians: Patavius, 1617 A.D.; Fleury, 1658-
1713 A.D. ; Tillemont, 1666-1698 A.D. ; Du Pin, 1684-1719 A.D.
The Benedictine congregation of St. Maur, which has contributed
so much to historical literature, was established 1621 A.D. Theology:
BOSSUET, 1647-1704 A.D.; FENELON, 1666-1715 A.D.; Massillon,
1681-1742 A.D. ; Huet, 1670-1721 A.D. ; St. Vincent de Paul,
the philanthropist, 1600-1660 A.D. PASCAL, the opponent of the
Jesuits, 1623-1662 A.D.; Father Simon, 1678-1712 A.D., Orientalist
and critic, belong to the Catholic Church. To the Reformed
Church belong CALVIN, 1533-1564 A.D.; BEZA, 1548-1605 A.D.;
D'Aille, 1637-1670 A.D.; Jurien, 1674-1713 A.D.; Abbadie, 1684
2 c
386 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Farel, 1523-1565 A.D.; Claude, 1645-1687 A.D.; Saurin, 1674-
1730 A.D. ; most of these were obliged to exercise their func-
tions in Holland or Switzerland, and were thus lost to France.
\K Classical Literature: Budaeus, 1525-1540 A.D. ; the Stephens,
I535~I572 A-D^ w^k Scapula, 1579-1612 A.D., famous for their
lexicons ; Madame Dacier, 1672-1720 A.D. The DELPHIN CLASSICS,
edited by Huet for the Dauphin, 1670-1680 A.D. Biblical Criticism:
Bochart, 1621-1667 A.D.; Capellus, 1624-1650 A.D. ; Father Simon,
1678-1712 A.D. ; PETER BAYLE, the great critic, theological, philo-
sophical, and historical, and the author of the famous " Dictionary,"
was a Frenchman, but was domiciled in Holland, 1647-1706 A.D.
Perhaps of all these writers the most read, next to the dramatists,
are Pascal, and Fe'nelon's " Tele*maque"; Colbert, the economist,
1648-1683 A.D. The first regular French journal, the " Gazette of
France," 1631 A.D. The French Academy founded 1635 A.D.; the
"Journal des Sciences," 1665 A.D.
SWITZERLAND was the asylum of French Protestants. ZWINGLE,
the reformer of Zurich, 1508-1531 A.D. ; Turretine, 1630-1687 A.D. ;
LE CLERC, the critic, 1651-1706 A.D; Bullinger, 1527-1571 A.D.,
were native-born theologians. CASAUBON, philologist and critic,
1559-1614 A.D.; Diodati, translator of Italian Bible, 1576-1649 A.D. ;
Vattel, law, 1741-1767 A.D.
HOLLAND was also the asylum of French, and other Protestants,
but, previous to the separation of the Netherlands, Anna Bigus,
a fierce Catholic poetess at Antwerp, 1520-1567 A.D. ; Marnix
of Aldegonde wrote the song called " Wilhelmuslied," 1530-
1598 A.D. ; then the purely Dutch Hooft, historian and poet,
1581-1647 A.D. ; Vondel, 1587-1679 A.D. ; Cats, 1577-1660 A.D.,
poets. Huygens, diplomatist and poet, 1596-1687 A.D. ; Vos,
1667 A.D. ; Bekker, philosophy, 1634-1698 A.D. The theologians
were ARMINIUS, the father of Remonstrant theology, 1588-1609 ;
Gomar, his opponent, 1583-1640 A.D. ; GROTIUS, 1583-1645 A.D. ;
Episcopius (both of them Remonstrants, Grotius being also a
legist of great repute), and VITRINGA, 1659-1722 A.D. Then,
in philology, Heinsius, philologist and critic, 1580-1655 A.D. ;
Erpennius, Biblicist and Orientalist, 1600-1613 A.D. ; Golius,
Orientalist, 1622-1667 A.D. Historians: Hooft, the poet; Brandt,
1628-1725 A.D. Justus Lipsius (Louvain), philologist, 1546-
1606 A.D. ; ERASMUS, the reviver of learning, 1496-1536 A.D. ;
the Elzevirs, 1565-1590 A.D. ; and Spinoza, the philosopher,
1632-1677 A.D.
, GERMANY. — The early Mystics and the Deventer theologians :
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 387
LUTHER and the German Bible, 1516-1546 A.D. ; MELANCTHON,
1540-1560 A.D. ; CEcolampadius, the reformer, 1522-1531 A.D. Then
ARNDT, author of "True Christianity," 1590-1621 A.D. ; Calovius,
1612-1656 A.D. CALIXTUS, who attempted to unite the Churches,
1639-1656 A.D. ; Gerhardt, hymnologist, 1640-1675 A.D. ; Cocceius,
1640-1669 A.D. ; FRANKE, 1685-1727 A.D., with Spener and the
Collegian pietests at Halle, 1671, 1650-1705 A.D. Historians : the
Magdeburg Centuriators (ecclesiastical history), 1559-1574 A.D. ;
Seckendorf, 1626-1692 A.D. ; F. Spanheim, 1652-1701 A.D. Law :
Sleidan, 1540-1556 A.D. ; Puffendorff, 1661-1694 A.D. Classical
literature: J. Comenius, 1624-1671; Gronovius, 1643-1671 A.D. ;
Graevius, 1658-1703 A.D. hi Biblical and Oriental literature : The
BUXTORFFS, 1591-1732 A.D. ; Glassius, 1633-1656 A.D. Opitz, the
poet, 1551-1639 A.D., began the revival of German vernacular
literature. The Bohemian golden age of literature was from 1570-
1600 A.D. Science: Conrad Gesner, 1516-1565 A.D. (he is called
the German Pliny) ; Otto Guerike invented the air-pump, 1650 A.D.
ITALY. — Poetry: Guarini, 1461-1573 A.D. ; TASSO, 1544-1595 A.D.
Theologian: Cardinal Bellarmin, 1574-1621 A.D. Historians:
Machiavelli, 1482-1528 A.D. ; Guicciardini, 1505-1540 A.D. ; Paul
Jovius, 1528-1552 A.D. ; Cardinal BARONIUS, 1557-1617 A.D. ;
PIETRO SARPI (Father Paul), 1572-1623 A.D. ; Davila, 1594-1613 A.D. \
Elias Levita (Orientalist}. In Political Economy : Gaspero, 1579 A.D. ;
Serra, 1613 A.D. ; Bernardo, 1588 A.D. ; Turbulo, 1616-1629 A.D. ;
Montinaro, 1680 A.D. ; Scaliger, the critic, 1559-1593 A.D. ; the
Aldi, 1490-1574 A.D. ; the Academy Delia Crusca at Florence,
1582 A.D.
SPAIN. — Poets : Calderon de la Barca, 1540-1566 A.D. ; Lopez de
Vega, 1585-1635 A.D. ; Herrera, 1575-1582 A.D. (fought in the
Armada). Theology: Suarez, 1564-1615 A.D. ; Molina, 1553-
1601 A.D. ; Du Parron, 1580-1618 A.D. Fiction: CERVANTES
(Don Quixote), 1569-1626 A.D. ; Quevedo, 1646-1686 A.D. His-
torians: Osorius, 1525-1580 A.D. ; Oviedo, 1514-1558 A.D. ; Mariana,
1514-1625 A.D. ; Mendoza, 1565 A.D. ; De Solis, 1655-1686 A.D. ;
Herrera, 1549-1625 A.D.
PORTUGAL. — CAMOENS, the poet of " The Lusiads" 1553-1579 A.D.,
fought at Lepanto. Historian: De Barros, 1522-1570 A.D.
Miscellaneous. — (i) IN THE FINE ARTS : —
ITALY boasts of MICHAEL ANGELO, 1492-1564 A.D. ; RAPHAEL,
1502-1520 A.D. ; TITIAN, 1521-1576 A.D. ; Benvenuto Cellini,
1518-1572 A.D. ; Bramante, 1506-1524 A.D. ; Bernini, 1598-
1680 A.D. ; Domenichino, 1581-1641 A.D. ; Guido, 1575-1642 A.D. ;
2 c 2
388 From Charles V. of Germany, 1520 A.D., to the
Palladio, 1518-1580 A.D. ; Salvator Rosa, 1635-1673 A.D. ; Paul
Veronese (Cagliari), 1513-1588 A.D. ; the five Bassanos, 1510-
1622 A.D. ; CORREGGIO, 1493-1534 A.D. ; the four Carracci, 1559-
1619 A.D. ; Agostino, 1490-1536 A.D., and Poussin, 1630-1675 A.D.
were engravers; Claude Lorraine, 1600-1652 A.D.
HOLLAND has Diirer, 1494-1554 A.D. ; HANS HOLBEIN, 1524-
1543 A.D. ; RUBENS, 1605-1640 A.D. ; VAN DYKE, 1616-1633 A.D. ;
Sir P. Lely, 1618-1680 A.D.
ENGLAND. — Sir C. WREN (1653-1714 A.D.), INIGO JONES (1573-
1652 A.D.), architects.
GERMANY. — Louis Cranach, painter.
(2) The Bollandist Fathers recommenced the publication of the
" Acta Sanctorum," which had been projected by Herbert of
Roswych, a Flemish Jesuit, who died 1629 A.D. The Bollandists
persevered with this to 1794 A.D. The society revived after the year
1837 A.D., and published the fifty-fourth volume.
PHILOSOPHY. — So far the philosophical schools had followed in
the main Aristotle and Plato, to whom even the Schoolmen, though
they occasionally criticised and differed, paid due reverence. The
Renaissance brought forward a series of speculators, as Paracelsus,
Cornelius Agrippa, Cardan, and Bohme, whose views are difficult to
understand, and perhaps scarcely worth the labour required for the
effort, as they appear to have exercised no abiding influence ; but
Bruno, 1550-1600 A.D., as far as his system can be understood,
taught a double pantheism, one connected with " the Soul of the
World," and the other embracing a Universal Unity. P. Ramus, a
great theologian, was killed in the Massacre of St. Bartholomew,
1572 A.D. SPINOZA (1632-1677 A.D.), the Jew, a remarkable man,
framed a system essentially pantheistic, partly disguised under a
Scriptural phraseology, and considered by himself quite orthodox.
He insists upon the existence of an Infinite Substance which
possesses extension and thought (this is God), possessing no
personality, but simply an absolute essence, which is ever unfolding
its own self-existent nature in the universe. He is ridiculously called
" the God-intoxicated man " by some of his followers. Of the
philosophy of the seventeenth century, BACON may be regarded, with
Descartes, as the founders, the former leaning to sensationalism,
the latter to idealism. DESCARTES is remembered by most through
his " Cogito ergo sum ; " his philosophy is built upon the fact of
thought, 1616-1650 A.D. Malebranche, 1660-1715 A.D. His system
considers mind and body as having no power of self-action except
by divine action; "he sees all things in God." Gassendi, 1614-
English Revolution, 1688 A.D. 389
1655 A.D., criticised Descartes, and partly anticipated JOHN LOCKE ;
so had Hobbes, 1608-1679 A-D- Cudworth, in his great work,
"The Intellectual System," attacks the Atheistic systems, 1640-
1688 A.D. LOCKE, in his essay concerning "Human Understanding,"
published 1690 A.D., traced the origin of our ideas to outward
impressions received through our senses ; hence his followers taught
that " there is nothing in the understanding which did not first pass
through the senses." LEIBNITZ, 1665-1714 A.D., added "except the
intellect itself/' On these two principles the English and Scotcli
philosophy of Locke and his modern followers depend. Leibnitz
taught that all substance is of necessity active, consisting of the
atoms or monads of which God is the absolute original and the
creator. The action of these monads is regulated by the original
constitution of things as perfected by God himself, by a pre-established
harmony, so that they work in complete unison, and bring about at
last the great end for which they were intended.
The Jesuit Schools in this and the following period cultivated
Latin, logic, rhetoric, the mathematical sciences, and their practical
application, and were most successful teachers ; but in their schools
all freedom of thought was suppressed.
State of the World 1688 A.D.
EUROPE.
NORWAY and DENMARK united under the same king.
SWEDEN, with Western Pomerania, and Bremen in Germany. Fin-
land, Carelia, Ingria, Eastland, and part of Livonia, also
under the Swedish crown.
GERMANY. The Empire held by the House of Austria, a mere
nominal authority. Austria, with Bohemia and Hungary.
HUNGARY, on the death of Louis II., killed in the battle of
Mohacz, 1526 A.D., was overrun by the Turks, but Ferdinand
of Austria was regarded as the lawful king. From that time
the history of Hungary is that of the Vaivoides of Transyl-
vania, the Zapoli, the Boczkai, the Racoczi, and others,
supported by the Turks in opposition to Austria. A Turkish
pasha ruled at Buda, while the Austrian governor resided in
Presburg. The bigotry of the Austrian emperors drove the
Protestants into rebellion under Bethlem Gabor, 1620-
390 State of the World 1688 A.D.
1630 A.D., and again under Count Tekeli, 1676-1679 A.D.
The history of Bohemia, Hungary, and the German states,
testify to the incurable, insensate bigotry of the then House
of Austria, now happily extinct. In 1687 A. D., Joseph, son
of Leopold I., was crowned hereditary King of Hungary, but
a large part of Hungary was in possession of the Turks until
the Peace of Carlowitz, 1699 A.D. Bohemia became Austrian
after the death of Louis at Mohacz, 1526 A.D. Its previous
history is that of a struggle for religious liberty, under Ziska,
the leader of the Hussite insurrection. This was granted by
Sigismund, 1436 A.D. ; again by the diet of Prague, 1571 A.D.,
and again by the " Letters of Majesty " of Matthias in
1609 A<D- After the rebellion of 1619 A.D., followed by the
success of the Austrians, Protestantism was totally suppressed.
SWITZERLAND. A republic composed of thirteen independent
republics, all of an aristocratic character, oppressive to the
country peasantry.
HOLLAND. The Seven United Provinces. An aristocratic republic,
with William III. of England as stadtholder.
NETHERLANDS under Spain ; the object of desire to France.
GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. Practically one kingdom since the
accession of James I. of Scotland, 1603 A.D.
FRANCE under Louis XIV. (not including Lorraine).
ITALY. SAVOY (including Piedmont) under its dukes. MILAN and
LOMBARDY to Spain. VENICE, which had a large territory on
the mainland, and Dalmatia with the Morea was a very im-
portant republic, strictly oligarchic. The dukedoms of MODENA
and TUSCANY under their respective dukes, together with the
PAPAL STATES under the Pope, had no political importance.
GENOA was an independent republic, to which Corsica was
subject. NAPLES and SICILY were under the kings of Spain,
together with the island of SARDINIA. The Knights of Malta
were in possession of MALTA and Gozo.
SPAIN. Much decayed in population and power, notwithstanding
the large supplies of bullion from her American possessions.
PORTUGAL, which had been united to Spain, on failure of the royal
line, 1580 A.D., revolted under the Duke of Braganza,
1640 A.D.
State of the World 1688 A.D. 391
POLAND. As the natural result of an elective monarchy, distracted
by factions. The great John Sobieski was king.
RUSSIA had subjected the Tartars of Kazan and Kipshack, had
received the addition of SIBERIA by the conquest achieved
by the Cossack Yermak, 1580-1584 A.D., and had reached
the confines of Chinese Tartary ; but had not yet reached
the Gulf of Finland or the Black Sea, and was, therefore,
without a direct outlet to the west or south by water. Peter
the Great was preparing for a new state of things.
TURKEY IN EUROPE included the Crimea, Moldavia, and Bessarabia
north of the Danube, with Wallachia, Bulgaria, Roumelia,
Bosnia, Servia, Albania, and Greece (except the Morea).
Hungary had just been wrested from the power of the sultans.
ASIA.
TURKEY IN ASIA included the territory which yet is found on our
maps. ARABIA claimed by Turkey.
PERSIA, under the Sefi Dynasty, claiming authority over the tribes as
far as the Indus.
INDIA yet nominally under the Great Mogul at Delhi, but disturbed
by the Mahrattas, Seiks, and others, and by small settlements
of Portuguese, French, Danish, and English traders. Goa
was the capital of the Portuguese possessions in India and
in the Eastern Archipelago. The PHILIPPINE Islands were
settled by Spain, 1585 A.D., the MOLUCCAS by the Portuguese,
Spanish, and Dutch. CEYLON to the Dutch, taken from the
Portuguese, 1656 A.D.
CHINA under the Mantchu Tartars. The Portuguese occupy
Macao, 1586 A.D.
JAPAN troubled by internal disputes and wars. The Dutch allowed
to have a factory at Nagasaki, 1641 A.D., the Portuguese
having been expelled and the Christians massacred, 1637 A.D.
SIBERIA and all northern Asia, as far as explored, subject to Russia.
AFRICA.
EGYPT under the Turks.
BARBARY STATES — i.e., Tripoli, Tunis, Algiers — nominally acknow-
ledged the Sultan of Turkey, 1574 A.D., and soon began their
piratical attacks on European shipping in their corsairs.
392 State of the World 1688 A.D.
They were first seen in the Atlantic, 1585 A.D. They were
wickedly permitted by the two great maritime powers, England
and Holland, to rob and plunder the ships of the southern
nations on the Mediterranean. Portugal claimed the coast 01
Guinea, Congo, &c., Mozambique, 1506 A.D. Cape of Good
Hope (Dutch), 1650 A.D.
MOROCCO was under the Xeriffs, and was also engaged in plundering
and piracy.
NORTH AMERICA.
CANADA, 1497-1663 A.D., with all the territory bordering on the
Mississippi (west of the English colonies) down to the Gulf
of Mexico, forming the Province of LOUISIANA, 1683 A.D.
Also ARCADIA (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Cape Breton,
1604 A.D.) to FRANCE. All the EASTERN COAST (of the
present United States) from Main to Florida to England,
i.e., MAINE settled, 1635 A-D> > NEW HAMPSHIRE, 1623 A.D. ;
MASSACHUSETTS, first settled by the Puritans, 1620 A.D. ;
RHODE ISLAND by Roger Williams, 1631 A.D. ; CONNECTICUT,
NEW YORK, settled by the Dutch, 1614 A.D., conquered by
England, 1664 A.D. NEW JERSEY settled by the Dutch,
1634 A.D. ; by the Swedes, 1638 A.D. ; then by the English
united to New York, from which it was separated, 1736 A.D.
VIRGINIA, first settlement by the English, 1585 A.D. ; second
in 1587 A.D. ; third when Jamestown was founded, 1607 A.D. ;
MARYLAND by a Catholic colony, 1633 A.D. The CAROLINAS
first at Roanoke by Raleigh, 1585 A.D. ; settled, 1650 A.D.
NEWFOUNDLAND to England, 1583 A.D. ; settled, 1621-
1633 A.D.
MEXICO to Spain (first viceroy, 1530 A.D.), with CALIFORNIA, dis-
covered by Cortez, and NEW MEXICO. And FLORIDA to
Spain.
SOUTH AMERICA.
PERU conquered, 1531, 1532 A.D. ; CHILI conquered, 1535 A.D.
TERRAFIRMA (North Coast), 1532 A.D. BUENOS AYRES and
PARAGUAY, 1580 A.D., to SPAIN.
BRAZIL settled, 1520 A.D. ; DUTCH occupation, 1623-1660 A.D. ;
then yielded to PORTUGAL.
GUIANA, including Demerara, Surinam, and Cayenne occupied by
English, Dutch, and French, but frequently changing masters.
State of the World 1688 A.D. 393
WEST INDIES.
CUBA, PORTO Rico, TRINIDAD to Spain.
JAMAICA conquered by the English, 1655 A.D. ; the Bahamas,
1666 A.D.; the Bermudas, 1612 A.D. The smaller Caribbee
Islands divided among England, France, and Holland,
frequently changing their possessors.
SAN DOMINGO (Hayti, Hispaniola) settled by Spain, partly occupied
by the French, 1664 A.D., and divided between them,
1690 A.D.
ELEVENTH PERIOD,
From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to
the French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D.
THE occurrences of this period may conveniently be classified : —
(i) A Retrospect.; (2) the Revolution of 1688 A.D. to the Peace of
Ryswick, 1697 A.D.; (3) the preparation for the War of the Spanish
Succession, to 1700 A.D.; (4) War of the Spanish Succession, 1703-
1713 A.D., to the Peace of Utrecht; (5) Great Northern War of
Russia and Sweden, 1697-1709 A.D.; (6) the Western Powers and
their negotiations, 1717-1731 A.D.; (7) War of the Polish Suc-
cession, 1733-1738 A.D. ; (8) War of the Austrian Succession,
1740-1748 A.D. ; (9) the Seven Years' War between [Prussia and
Austria, 1756-1763 A.D.; (10) the first partition of Poland, 1772 A.D.;
(n) the War of American Independence, 1773-1783 A.D.; (12)
moral condition of the Governments of Europe in the eighteenth
century; (13) the efforts towards improvement and progress in the
eighteenth century; (14) local histories; (15) ecclesiastical history;
(16) literary history.
I. — A Retrospect.
i. A period of one hundred years separates the English Revolu-
tion from the beginning of the greatest of modern political cata-
strophes, the overthrow of the monarchy of France. The connexion
between the two Revolutions is obvious, for the gradual spread of
the principles which triumphed in 1688 A.D. in England were felt
more or less in all Europe. In France they quietly and imper-
ceptibly took possession of the minds of the educated classes, and
to vague desires for the revival of free institutions. But, though
connected, the two Revolutions differ greatly in their character.
From tJie English Revolution to the French Revolution. 395
The English Revolution " was a movement [conducted by leaders]
essentially aristocratic. The whole course of its policy was shaped
by a few men who were far in advance of the general sentiments of
the nation, though backed by an intelligent and active minority." *
In the French Revolution the movement was controlled by the refuse
of the population of Paris, in the absence of the natural leaders of
the people, acting through the irresponsible municipality, effectually
destroyed the legal authorities in every department of government,
and were guilty of excesses and atrocities which made the very name
of Liberty a bye-word of reproach. The educated classes had no
direct share in this Revolution. " Profound and searching changes
in the institutions of France were inevitable; but, had they been
effected peacefully, legally, and gradually, had the shameless scenes
of the Regency, and of Louis XV., been avoided, that frenzy of
democratic enthusiasm, which has been the most destructive pro-
duct of the Revolution, and which has passed almost like a new
religion into European life, might never have arisen, and the whole
Napoleonic episode, with its innumerable consequences, would never
have occurred."2 The wars of Louis XIV., followed by the equally
unnecessary wars of his successors, in the period upon which we are
entering, involved France in financial difficulties, and increased the
burden of taxation until it became unbearable. A just and popular
government might have grappled with and overcome all the financial
and social difficulties of their position ; but France had a govern-
ment neither wise nor just, and which had no hold on the affection
or confidence of the people, and no support from the obedience
of the army. The general misery of the population gave to the
Revolution its peculiar and singular ferocious character.
II. — The Revolution 0/1688 A.D. to the Peace of Ryswick, 1697 A.D.
2. The Revolution of 1688 A.D. placed William III., the Stadt-
holder of Holland, on the throne of England. He was the nephew
of James II., and the grandson of Charles I., through his mother,
the daughter of Charles I. Mary, his wife, the daughter of James II.,
was a firm Protestant, and in all things of one mind with her hus-
band. The position of king in England was specially gratifying to
William from the additional power and prestige which it gave him
in his leadership of the League of Augsburg (founded in 1685),
consisting of the German and other princes, against Louis XIV.
1 Lecky, "English History," vol. i. p. 16. 2 Ibid.
396 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D,, to the
The emperor, Spain, Holland, Brandenburg, Saxony, Bavaria, Den-
mark, and Savoy on the one side, and France, with the Sultan of
Turkey on the other. The Catholics, who were allied with Protestants
in opposing Louis XIV., justified themselves by the still greater
inconsistency of the French alliance with the Turks, incited by
France to ravage Hungary, and, as the ally of France, to enslave
thousands of Christians, carried away and sold in the slave-markets
of Turkey. Thus was formed the Grand Alliance, in the spring of
1689 A.D. This was the third great war in which Louis XIV. had
engaged — a nine years' war, 1688-97 A-D-J m which France displayed
again her astonishing power, and exhausted her ample resources.
Already the Palatinate had been laid waste by the French armies,
early in 1689 A.D. The first campaign was, on the whole favour-
able to the allies ; but in 1690 A.D. the war became a game of chess
the Netherlands, in which the Marshal Luxemburg was opposed
first to the German generals, and then to King William. The
battle of Fleurus, June 30, 1690 A.D., was a great victory for the
French over the German generals ; but, on the other hand, the
Irish rebellion in favour of James II. was quelled July 12, 1691
and the English fleets were victorious at Harfleur and La Hogue,
May 29, 1692 A.D. King William, at the head of the army
of the allies, was able to check the progress of the French
generals, although Luxemburg, June 5, 1692 A.D., took Namur,
defeated William at Steinkerk, August 3, 1692 A.D., and again at
Neerwinden, July 19, 1693 A.D. In Italy, the Duke of Savoy was
obliged to make peace with France, August 4, 1696^.0., and
the French took Barcelona from Spain, August, 1697 A.D. The
French found, however, that their victories were barren of results
through the singular skill and power of William to check the
advance of his enemies, even when defeated by them. Louis
desired a respite, and peace was made at Ryswick, September 30,
1697 A.D. France surrendered all its conquests, and gave up the
barrier fortresses in the Low Countries to the Dutch. William was
also recognised King of England. The Duke of Lorraine was
restored to his territories, after an absence of twenty-seven years.
In this war William, though often defeated, was so judicious in
his retreats that his opponents were not able to profit by their
success. The allies, though not successful in every instance,
accomplished their great aim of checking the encroachments of
the French monarch. They mortified his vanity and compelled
him to give up the acquisitions which he had made in violation
of public faith. On one point there was a mean yielding to France,
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 397
on account of the religious feeling of the emperor. It had been
properly yielded to France that the Romish religion should be
continued as it had been in the places yielded by France to the
allies. The Protestant princes also demanded that Protestantism
should be restored in the places in which it had formerly been
established ; but this was set aside as disagreeable, not only to
France, but to the emperor. This same emperor, Leopold I., and
his predecessor had repeatedly violated the settlement of the
Peace of Westphalia, made in favour of the Protestants, 1648
A.D., and was at that time persecuting them in Hungary. It is
not gratifying to think that King William's statesmanship, and
English and Dutch blood and treasure were in any degree subservient
to the maintenance of this worthless and bigoted dynasty in Austria,
and we need not wonder at the general alarm of the Protestants in
England, Holland, and in the Electorate of Brandenburg. It was
during the campaign of 1692 A.D. that, in May, Louis, accompanied by
his court and a large number of the nobility, held a review of his two
armies of 100,000 men at Mons, the line presenting a front of eight
miles. As a sample of the pomp and luxury of his camp, the son of
the Duke St. Simon had a suite, thirty-five horses and sumpter mules,
and servants in proportion. Racine, the poet and historiographer
of Louis, was present, and left the ground on which the review had
been carried on from early till late on a summer day, deafened and
tired, regretting that " all these poor fellows (the soldiers) were not
in their cottages with their wives and children." To men like Louis
war was a pastime. His successors and their families to this day
are paying the penalty of his unscrupulous selfishness and pride.
He agreed to the Peace of Ryswick " in order to gather new forces
for a not very distant, but a far more important, transaction about
the Spanish Succession."
III.— The Preparation for the War of the Spanish
Succession, to 1700 A.D.
3. The brief period of peace was occupied by the great powers in
arrangements respecting the Spanish Succession. Charles II. of
Spain was dying, childless, of incurable maladies. " He was too weak
to lift his food to his misshapen mouth. At thirty-seven he had the
bald head and wrinkled face of a man of seventy, his complexion
turning from yellow to green. He frequently fell down in fits, and
remained long insensible, and was a victim to superstitious fancies." J
1 Macaulay, vol. v. p. 145.
398 From the English Resolution ', 1688 A.D., to the
The succession to his many kingdoms was that great question in
which every European government felt that its own prosperity,
dignity, and security depended. A partition of these extensive
dominions seemed inevitable, and even desirable. There were, how-
ever, three claimants — (i) the dauphin, the son of Louis XIV. by
the Infanta Maria Theresa, eldest daughter of Philip IV., and sister
of Charles II. of Spain. The fact that at the marriage she had
renounced for herself and posterity all pretensions to the Spanish
crown did not weigh much under altered circumstances, though it had
been made an article at the Treaty of the Pyrenees (November 7,
1659 A.D.), and Louis had pledged his faith for its observance ; (2)
the claim of the emperor was derived from his mother, Mary Anne,
daughter of Philip III. and aunt of Charles II. of Spain, in which
case no renunciation of the claim to the crown had been made ; (3)
the son of the Elector of Bavaria, whose mother, the Electress Mary
Antoinette, was the only child of the Emperor Leopold by his first
wife Margaret, a younger daughter of Philip IV., and sister of the
Queen of France. Margaret had also renounced her rights ; but
Philip IV. had settled that, failing male issue, Margaret and her
posterity would be entitled to the crown of Spain. " The partisans
of France held that the Bavarian claim was better than the Austrian
claim, the partisans of Austria held that the Bavarian claim was
better than the French claim. But that which really constituted the
strength of the Bavarian claim was the weakness of the Bavarian
government. The electoral prince was the only candidate whose
success would alarm nobody He was, therefore, the favourite
candidate of prudent and peaceable men in every country." As the
union of the two crowns seemed altogether too dangerous to the
notions then entertained of the balance of power, a Treaty of Par-
tition was made by England, France, and Holland, October n,
1698 A.D., at Loo, by which the elector's son was to receive Spain, the
Netherlands, and the colonies ; the dauphin the Two Sicilies, Gui-
puscoa, and some small Italian islands; the Archduke Charles, Milan.
Such an interference on the part of the makers of this treaty is only
defensible, or rather excusable, on the desire to prevent a general
war by a mutual agreement on the part of those specially interested
in the avoidance of war. Unfortunately the electoral prince died
suddenly, February 6, 1699 A. D. A Second Treaty of Partition was
proposed by France, and signed by England and Holland, March 3,
1700 A. D., by which the archduke was to receive the crown, the
dauphin Lorraine (Milan being given to the Duke of Lorraine as an
indemnity). These partition treaties were not popular in England.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 399
Neither F ranee nor the emperor were satisfied, though not ready to
dispute this arrangement. But the whole affair changed its aspect
when, on October 5, 1700 A.D., Charles II., influenced by his con-
fessor, appointed Philip, Duke of Anjou, grandson of Louis, his heir,
and died November i, 1700 A.D. For some time Louis hesitated,
but at length he formally presented the Duke of Anjou to his court
as King of Spain as Philip V. On December 4 Louis took leave
of the new king, exclaiming, " Go, my son, there are no longer
Pyrenees," an anticipation of unity in politics not in this case
realised. This disposal of Spain and its empire in Europe and
America was not immediately opposed by either England, Holland,
or Austria. England was not willing to contest the point until roused
by Louis acknowledging the son of James II. as King of England,
September 16, 1701 A.D. Then a cry for war arose, and parliament
granted the necessary supplies. King William died March 8,
1702 A.D. ; but his successor, Anne, carried out his policy, and the
War of Succession began. (The national debt of England at this
time was ^16,394,702.)
IV. — War of the Spanish Succession, 1702-1713 A.D., to the Peace
of Utrecht.
4. The War of Succession continued from 1702-1713. France,
the electors of Bavaria and Cologne, and Spain on the one side ;
England, Holland, and the Empire on the other. Savoy changed
sides occasionally, never needing an excuse. On one occasion
Victor Amadeus withdrew from the alliance because an " arm-chair "
was denied him in the presence of the King of Spain. The chiet
battles were fought in the Netherlands. The great commanders on
the side of the allies were the Duke of Marlborough and the Prince
Eugene. On the side of France Vendome, Tallard, and Villars.
Battles were gained by the allies at Blenheim, August 13, 1704 (when
thirty-four carriages of French ladies were captured) ; at Ramilies,
May 23, 1706 ; at Oudenarde, July n, 1708 ; Malplaquet, September
n, 1709. Such tedious campaigns, so different from the short wars
of late years, explain the extraordinary pomp of the King of France and
of the King of the Romans (Joseph son of the Emperor Leopold),
when present in the campaigns. This prince, at the siege of
Kaizerswerth, had a retinue of 232 persons, among whom were
gardeners, poultry-keepers, cellarers, and 20 cooks and assistant-
cooks. The queen had 170 attendants, 77 carriages, requiring 206
horses at every station as reliefs. Schlosser calls this an illustration
4OO From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
of " the union of the greatest pitifulness and meanness, with the
most absurd expenditure and pomp of the higher classes at the
courts of this time." J On each side the combatants were prevented
from bringing out their full strength. France, owing to the civil
war in the Cevennes, carried on by the Protestants, provoked by the
bigotry of the king, 1703, 1704 A.D. ; and the emperor, through the
revolt of the Hungarians, caused by a similar bigotry and mis-
government of that important frontier province, 1701-1707 A.D. In
Spain the allies were at first triumphant, and the Archduke Charles
was acknowledged as king. Gibraltar was taken by the English,
J704A.D. ; but on April 25, 1707 A.D., the army of Charles was
defeated at Almanza, and Philip recovered his throne. France,
however, suffered from the exhaustion of the war, and in 1706 and
1709 A.D., Louis desired peace, and was willing to make the most
humiliating concessions, which the allies, flushed with success, most
unwisely refused. By anticipating the taxes for eight years, and by
the sacrifice of gold and silver plate on the part of the king and
nobles, and by supplies of bullion from Spanish America, Louis was
able to hold his ground. Fortunately for him, the caprice of Queen
Anne, influenced by the Tory party, led to the change of a Whig
ministry for one composed of Tories. The new ministry, whatever
might be their reason, acted the part of traitors to their allies,
and compelled them to consent to the Peace of Utrecht, April 1 1,
1713. Spain was left to Philip V., a ruler neither better nor worse
than his competitor Charles ; both of them equally ignorant and
bigoted. Austria received Naples, Milan, and Sardinia; Savoy
received Sicily and Montferrat ; England gained Gibraltar, and the
Assiento contract for supplying the Spanish colonies with slaves from
Africa, and obtained a guarantee that the kingdoms of France and
Spain should never be united. A fear of the overwhelming power
of France was the bugbear of the English rulers then and for some
years following — in fact, there is never wanting an occasion for war
between powers jealous of each other and not afraid of a conflict.
We ought now to look with indifference upon the aggrandisement of
the Continental powers, conscious of our ability to protect our own
interests. Prussia gained part of Gueldres and Neufchatel. Holland
a small increase of territory. The treaty was as good as either party
deserved. France was reduced to the lowest state of depression,
with a debt of eighty-six millions sterling. Louis himself, depressed
by his ill success and by family losses, died, 1715. The news of
1 Vol. iii. p. 35.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.I}. 401
his death was received by his people with undissembled joy. He
was succeeded by his great-grandson Louis XV., a child, under the
regency of the Duke of Orleans. So far as England was concerned,
the continuance of the war after 1706 A.D. was a great mistake, or
rather a crime. A peace then would have saved England thirty
millions sterling, as well as the lives of many thousands of its soldiers.
*' There can be little doubt that the party interests of the Whig
ministry were a main cause of the failure of the negotiations. Still more
indefensible was their conduct in 1709 A.D."1 Louis then offered
to abandon his conquests, and to give up Spain to the Archduke,
but the allies insisted that he should unite with them in expelling
his grandson from Spain. "There are few instances in modern
history of a more scandalous abuse of the rights of conquest than
this transaction. It may be in part explained by the ambition of
the emperor, who desired a complete ascendancy in Europe, and in
part also by the excessive demands and animosity of the Dutch,
who remembered the unprovoked invasion of their country in
1670 A.D. The prolongation of the war, however, would have been
impossible but for the policy of the Whig ministry, who supported
the most extravagant claims of their allies." 2 In the Peace of
Utrecht, England and the Empire shamefully abandoned their allies,
the Catalans, to the vengeance of Philip V., the Bourbon King of
Spain. England permitted, and, to some extent, aided, in the siege
of Barcelona, which was taken by storm September n, 1714 A.D.
A frightful massacre followed, and then legal prosecutions. The
old privileges of Catalonia were finally abolished. England, how-
ever, was satisfied, and, to its further disgrace, became, by the
Assiento contract, "the greatest slave-trader in the world." The
secret understanding which the Tory ministry of Oxford and Boling-
broke had maintained with France during the negotiations " formed
afterwards one of the most formidable of the articles of impeach-
ment against Bolingbroke, and they admit of but little palliation."3
The national debt at the death of Queen Anne was ^"52,145,363.
The debt of France at the death of Louis XIV. was 120 millions
sterling, and the annual deficit three millions sterling.
V. — Great Northern War of Russia and Sweden, 1697-1709 A.D.
5. The great northern war arose out of the struggle of Russia
with Sweden for access to the Baltic and the Gulf of Finland, a
point of the utmost importance then to the development of Russia
1 Lecky, vol. i. pp. 45, 46. 2 Ibid., pp. 46, 47. 3 Ibid., pp. 109-112.
2 D
402 From the English Revohition, 1688 A.D.y to the
as a European power, far more than the possession of Crimean
Tartary, which afterwards gave it access to the Black Sea. At that
time Russia had no maritime port for trade with Europe except at
Archangel, a port on the White Sea to the extreme north, inaccessible
in the winter, and at the extremity of the empire. Sweden, since
the Treaty of Westphalia, 1648 A.D., had been placed in a position
formidable to its neighbours. On the death of Charles XL, his
successor, Charles XII., was a minor, fifteen years of age, 1697 A.D,
The kings of Denmark and Poland and the Czar Peter of Russia
attempted to despoil him of his German, and Polish, and Baltic
states. By a resolute attack on Copenhagen he compelled the King
of Denmark to make peace, on August 18, 1700 A.D. ; he defeated
the Czar at Narva, November 20, 1700 A.D. ; the Saxons and
Poles at Duna, July, 1701 A.D. ; and placed Stanislaus on the
throne of Poland in the place of Augustus, the Elector of Saxony,
1706 A.D. In 1707 A.D. the allies, by extraordinary civilities, kept
Charles XII. neutral in the war with France. Peter the Czar
defeated him at Pultowa, June 27, 1709 A. D. ; Stanislaus was de-
throned and Augustus replaced; Charles fled to Turkey, and
remained there until 1714 A.D., when he returned suddenly to
Stralsund, the only place left to Sweden in Germany. He renewed
his efforts against Denmark and Russia, but fell at Frederickshall,
Norway, December n, 1718 A.D. A scheme for the overthrow of
the Hanoverian Dynasty in aid of the Pretender, by the help of
Spain and Sweden, with the Czar's approval, ended with his death.
Peace was made between Russia and Sweden, 1721 A.D., Russia
obtaining a small part of Finland, Esthonia, Ingria, Carelia, and
Courland. Russia had now access and territory on the Gulf of
Finland and the Baltic Sea. Europe recognised Peter as emperor,
and added the title of " the Great." St. Petersburg was founded
1703 A.D., by which he had opened a window to the west, at the
mouth of the Neva, where Sweden had a small fort, which he de-
stroyed, and on a neighbouring island founded the citadel of St.
Peter and St. Paul, 1703 A.D., amid dark forests, vast marshes,
dreary wastes, where no building could be erected except on piles
of wood. From this time the power of Russia was supreme in
Sweden, Denmark, and Poland. In our admiration of the genius
and indomitable perseverance of Peter, we must not forget the cost
of the misery arising out of his contest with Charles XII. Livonia
and Esthonia suffered a devastation " worse than that of the Pala-
tinate by Louis XIV." All the towns were pillaged except Riga,
Pernau, and Revel, and the whole country made a desert. The
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 403
Cossacks and Tartars did not know what to do with their prisoners.
One tribe alone took 4,000 men, women, and children to the Lower
Dnieper.1 Sweden also was completely exhausted, having in this
war lost, it is said, 400,000 men.
VI.— The Western Powers and their Negotiations, 1717-1731 A.D.
6. The alliance made by the western powers against their neigh
bours show the unsettled state of European politics and the per-
manence of national jealousies. (i) A quadruple alliance of the
emperor, France, England, and Holland against Spain, January 4,
1717 A.D. The regent Philip, Duke of Orleans, on the death of
Louis XIV., found Spain his greatest enemy. This led him to ally
himself to England, and to favour the new Hanoverian Dynasty.
At that time both France and England had been disturbed- by the
failure of two grand financial schemes, — that of the Mississippi
scheme of Law in France, 1717-1720 A.D., and the South Sea
scheme in England, 1719 A.D., speculations which ruined thousands
of all classes of society. Alberoni, the prime minister of Spain,
intrigued with the Czar and Sweden to obtain a position in Italy
for the son of the second wife of Philip V., but without success.
Alberoni was, however, suddenly exiled December 5, 1719 A.D., and
peace was made, June 13, 1721 A.D., by which Tuscany, Parma, and
Placentia were to be given to Don Carlos, the son of Philip's second
wife (on the decease of the Medici and the Farnese family). Sar-
dinia was to be given to Savoy in lieu of Sicily, which was to go to
the emperor. (2) The League of Herrenhausen, September 3, 1725,
was formed by England, France, and Prussia against Spain and
Austria. Spain and Austria, alHed against France, by the intrigues
of Baron Rippenda; the formation of an East India Company
at Ostend, the granting of Tuscany by the quadruple alliance to
Don Carlos, and the jealousy of the friendship of Spain and
Austria, were the main causes. Peace was made through Cardinal
Fleury, the wise minister of Louis XV., at Seville, November 9,
1729 A.D., between England, France, and Spain; and March,
1731 A.D., at Vienna, with the emperor, by which the Italian
States of Don Carlos were to be garrisoned by Spanish troops,
and the East India Company at Ostend given up. George I. of
England had died 1727 A.D. The national debt at that time was
^52,092,235.
1 Rambard, vol. ii. p. 7. ::
2 D 2
404 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
VII. — War of the Polish Succession , 1733-1738 A. D.
7. The war of the Polish succession followed on the death of
Augustus II., Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, February i,
1733 A.D. Stanislaus, the deposed king, and Augustus, the son of
the late king, were the competitors. France supported Stanislaus,
Russia and Austria Augustus, who was crowned king, 1734 A.D.
France, Sardinia (Savoy), and Spain ally against Austria ; " thus from
-Cadiz to Archangel the gold and blood of nations were demanded
for the decision of the contests about the Sarmatian throne."
England, under the prudent Walpole, declined to assist Austria with
subsidies. Cardinal Fleury endeavoured to make a peace from
•October, 1735, to November, 1738 A.D., and at last succeeded.
Augustus was acknowledged King of Poland, Stanislaus- had the
duchy of Lorraine, which was to be absorbed by France after his
death. This was a great gain to France, which had been long
desired. Francis, Duke of Lorraine, was to have the duchy of
Tuscany when vacant ; Naples, Sicily, and Elba given to Don Carlos
of Spain ; Parma and Piacenza to Austria. Walpole had had great
difficulty to keep England out of this war. Voltaire regards the war
which brought the accession of Lorraine as the only one which pro-
duced any solid success to France since the days of Charlemagne.
It was the great glory of Fleury's administration.
VIII. — War of the Austrian Succession, 1740-1 748.
8. With the exception of a war between England and Spain,
arising out of the American trade, 1739 A-D-> tnere was peace
in Europe, when Charles VI., the last male of the Hapsburg
family, died, October 20, 1740 A.D. Frederick, the first King
of Prussia, had died 1713 A.D., and his successor, Frederick
William I., on May 31, 1740 A.D. The Hapsburgs, since Rudolph,
1272 A.D., had flourished four hundred and sixty-seven years, and
had given sixteen emperors to Germany. There was every reason
to expect that Maria Theresa, the daughter of Charles VI., would
peaceably succeed to the hereditary possession of Austria, as the
arrangement called the Pragmatic Sanction had been acknowledged
and guaranteed, not only by the states of the Austrian Empire, but
also by nearly all the powers of Europe. The opposition to her succes-
sion was a manifestation of the weak hold which the public law of
nations possessed over the consciences of European statesmen —
further instances of which were furnished by the division of Poland
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 405
and the overleaping of all the bounds of public law in the wars of
the French Revolution, (i) Prussia, under Frederick, afterwards
surnamed the Great, a great prince, master of the arts of peace and
war, a friend to the sciences and literature, but without respect for
religion or law, and without German sympathies, immediately in-
vaded Silesia, without any declaration of war. A few days after his
ambassador appeared at Vienna, offering Maria Theresa an alliance
with Frederick, with Russia, and the maritime powers for the pro-
tection of her inheritance, together with his vote and interest for her
husband at the imperial election and a loan for defraying the expenses
of war — on this one condition, the cession of Silesia : this offer was
refused. (2) Bavaria, by its elector, had refused to sign the Pragmatic
Sanction, and now openly and honestly claimed the whole Hapsburg
succession, as a descendant of a daughter of the Emperor
Frederick I., who had not renounced the succession unconditionally,
but merely in favour of all the male heirs of Frederick's sons ; but the
original document kept at Vienna, and produced, did not say male,
but legitimate heirs, by which the Bavarian claim was nullified.
(3) Spain, influenced by Queen Elizabeth, wanted a principality in
Italy for her second son Philip, having already obtained Naples and
Sicily for her eldest son Don Carlos. (4) France declared openly
for Bavaria, thus violating the guarantee of the Pragmatic Sanction,
given most solemnly and most explicitly, and for which she had
received the high price of Lorraine, ceded expressly for this guarantee,
the object being the desire to destroy the power of the house of
Austria, and eventually to profit by accession of territory either in
Flanders or on the Rhine. (5) Saxony, by its elector, as heir of
the elder daughter of the Emperor Joseph, claimed the whole suc-
cession, although he had been paid for his acceptance of the Prag-
matic Sanction. (6) Sardinia (Savoy) laid claim to Milan, the duke
being descended from Catherine, a daughter of Philip II. An
eight years' war followed against these unprincipled oath-breakers,
these would-be robbers of the heritage of a woman who had only
the public law of nations and the pledged public faith of Europe on
her side. France proposed a plan of agreement by which the various
claimants were to be pacified by a fair share of the Hapsburg domains,
leaving only Lower Austria, Carinthia, Carniola, and Styria, with Hun-
gary, to Maria Theresa, and securing the Spanish Netherlands for France.
The French-Bavarian army, under the elector, who was Lieutenant-
General of all the French forces in Germany, had threatened Vienna,
when Maria Theresa, September n, 1741, entered the assembly
of the Hungarian States at Presburg with the infant Joseph, her
406 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
first-born in her arms, claiming their aid; the effect was inde-
scribable. These men, the descendants of the nobles and
commoners, whom Leopold I. had sent to the scaffold, and who
had hated the dominion of Austria, filled with enthusiasm, drew their
swords, and exclaimed " Let us die for Maria Theresa, our king."
New regiments were formed, all the nobility called to arms, and
large subsidies granted. Francis Stephen, the husband of Maria
Theresa, Grand Duke of Tuscany, was appointed regent, and the
liberties of Hungary established immediately on the accession of
Maria Theresa. The French and Bavarians, leaving Vienna
undisturbed, advanced northward, and with the Saxons took
Prague, November 20, 1741, and on January 24, 1742, Charles
Albert was elected Emperor of Germany, as Charles VII. Almost
immediately the army of Maria Theresa drove the French out
of Austria, and occupied Munich and all Bavaria, February 13.
1 742. Bavaria suffered from the violence of an exasperated barbarian
enemy; pillage, conflagration, and murders by the Croats, and by
the unscrupulous bands of the army. Meanwhile peace was made
with Frederick by the cession of Silesia, June n, 1742 A.D., and
July 26, while England, Hanover, Prussia, and Saxony entered
into an alliance with Maria Theresa, December 20. England
(under Walpole), 1741 A.D., granted subsidies (being at enmity with
Spain). King George II., with an English-Hanoverian army, gained
the battle of Dettingen over the French, commanded by Noailles,
June 27, 1743 A.D. France declared war against England, 1744,
and the King of Prussia, jealous of the success of Maria
Theresa, allied with the French and took possession of Bohemia
with one hundred thousand men, August 10 to September 17, 1744.
A quadruple alliance of England, Holland, Hungary, and Poland,
to re-take Silesia for Maria Theresa followed, January 8, 1745, A.D.
Then the death of the Emperor Charles VII., January 20, 1745.
Marshal Saxe gained the battle of Fontenoy, March n, 1745 A.D.
Peace was made with Prussia, Austria, and Poland, December 25,
1745 A.D. Russia, as the ally of England, saved Holland
from the French, 1748 A.D. By this peace of Aix-la-Chapelle,
November 7, 1748 A.D. (i) King of Sardinia kept his posses-
sions. (2) England gained the revival of the Assiento Treaty.
(3) Don Philip, Parma and Placentia, and Guastalla. This
treaty was thought to secure the balance of power, supported by
more than a million of men in the standing armies of the Great
Powers. " Thus small were the changes effected in Europe by so
much bloodshed and treaties by nearly nine years of wasteful and
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 407
desolating war. The design of the dismemberment of Austria
had failed, but no vexed question had been set to rest. Inter-
national antipathies and jealousies had been immeasurably increased,
and the fearful sufferings and injuries that had been inflicted on the
most civilised nations had not even purchased the blessings of an
assured peace. Of all the ambitious projects that had been con-
ceived during the war, that of Frederick alone was substantially
realised, and France, while endeavouring to weaken one rival, had
contributed largely to lay the foundation of the greatness of
another." 1 Little did the French politician of that day anticipate
the Prussia of 1870 at the head of united Germany; little did
Louis XV., who, while living in adultery with four sisters, was so
" religious " as to object to employ Marshal Saxe, a Protestant,
imagine, that within another century there would be a government
in France which would scarcely tolerate Romanism itself.
9. Eight years of peace followed, well employed by England.
Holland was on the decline. So also France and Spain. The hatred
and rivalry of Austria and Prussia occasioned the Seven Years' War,
1756-1762 A.D. England and France were already at war about their
possessions in America, 1755, 1756 A.D. France sought to seize
Hanover. England allied with Prussia, January 16, 1756 A.D.
France with Austria^ May i. Russia and Sweden united with
France and Austria. Frederick of Prussia was the soul of the war,
animating his army and the Prussian people. Maria Theresa, loved
and venerated by her people, was able to raise and support a mass
of forces which astonished Europe. The commanders were Prince
Charles of Lorraine, Counts Browne, Laudon, and Daun, on the side
of Austria ; Marshal D'Estrees, the Duke of Richelieu, and Soubise
on the part of France ; Soltikow, the Russian count, and Frederick
Duke of Brunswick, on the part of Prussia. The chief battles were
Lowritz, October 13, 1756, A.D., in which Austria was beaten by
Prussia ; Prague, May 6, 7, 1756, A.D., in which Austria was beaten;
Collin, in which Prussia was defeated, June 18, 1757, and the cause
of Prussia appeared quite lost ; then the battle of Rosbach,
November 5, 1757, in which the King of Prussia defeated France
and Austria, and in a panic terror the army was annihilated ; then
the battle of Leuthen, December 5, 1757 A.D., the most glorious of
Frederick's victories, in which eighty thousand men, under Daun,
were defeated by twenty thousand Prussians ; followed by the
battle of Kunersdorf, August 12, 1759, in which the Russians and
Austrians defeated the Prussians with great loss. After the death
1 Lecky, vol. i. p. 430.
408 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
of George II., 1760 A.D., England withdrew from the war. This
loss to Frederick was more than compensated by the friendship of
Russia, 1762 A. D. No results beyond heaps of dead from these
contests. England had triumphed at sea and had driven the French
from North America by the conquest of Canada, and had increased
the national debt to above one hundred millions. The Bourbons of
France and Spain formed the family compact, August 15, 1761 A.D.
England took the Havannas and Manilla, and peace was made,
November 3, 1762 A.D., England gaining Canada and Florida. France
ceded Louisiana to Spain ; then peace was made between Austria
and Prussia at Hubertsburg, February 10, 1763 A.D. " Thus ended
this terrible and unexampled war, which had deprived Germany of
more than a million of men, and which had accumulated misery
and sufferings without number upon Central Europe, without any
fruit either for Europe, or for any particular state except the British,
the commercial power of which it strengthened."1 It would be
more correct to say that there were no real advantages to any party ;
these wars prepared the way for the success of the French in the
revolutionary wars of the next generation, by the exhaustion of the
resources of the German powers, and by the loss of all that mutual
confidence which was necessary towards united action in opposition
to the common enemy the French. The expulsion of the French
from Canada was not to the advantage of England, as it freed the
southern colonies from the fear of French conquest and made them
independent of the help of the English troops for their defence, by
which their separation from England was precipitated. It was, how-
ever, an advantage to the world and to the United States of the
future, which had from that time neighbours secured to them of
people of their own race, religion and language.
X. — The first Partition of Poland by Austria, Prussia, and Russia ,
August 21, September 13 and 18, 1772 A.D.
The death of Augustus III. (Elector of Saxony and King of Poland),
October5, 1 763, led to the civil warwhich always preceded the choice of
a new king. Catherine 1 1. of Russia supported the Count Poniato wsky,
her favourite (as Stanislaus Augustus), and procured, by force and
intimidation, his election, September 7, 1764. A general disunion
and civil broils arising out of the claim of the Dissidents (the non-
Catholics) to full equality of privilege, was opposed by the Catholic
1 Rotteck, vol. iii. p. 327.
French Revolution, 1788, 1798 A.D. 409
party, but supported by Russia and Prussia. The Russian troops
attacking the rebellious Poles, even in Turkish territory, roused the
Turks, already jealous of Russian and Prussian influence in Poland ;
they declared war against Russia, 1768 A.D., which, in 1774 A.D. ,
was concluded on terms favourable to Russia. Meanwhile, Austria
and Prussia had taken possession of portions of Poland adjacent
to their respective territories,1 an act which led to the idea of
mutual accommodation of the threatened contest by the partition
of Poland. The author of this project, there is reason to believe,
was Frederick II. It was first mentioned to Catherine II. by
his brother Henry, and reluctantly agreed to by Maria Theresa,
through the influence of her son Joseph. On the authority of
Von Hammer, the scheme originated with the Sultan Mus-
tapha III., who directed the Turkish envoy in Vienna to
propose the division of Poland between Turkey and Austria ten
months before Prince Henry had brought the matter before
Catherine II. No one can justify or excuse the conduct of the
three powers. Poland had been for some time a disturbing nuisance
to her neighbours, but by a cordial support of a rational constitution
she might have been made a valuable member of the European com-
monwealth, and an invaluable bulwark between western and central
Europe and Russia, the want of which has been felt in the nineteenth
century. No one of the three powers had any ground of justification
for this partial spoliation of Poland. That Poland, with its elective
monarchy, was more or less in a state of chronic disorder, troublous
even to its neighbours, might have been a reasonable ground for
attempting to erect there a strong government and a prolonged
occupancy ; but to curtail its territory was only calculated to
perpetuate the anarchy of the country. The cession comprised
one-third of the territory and one-half of the population. Poland
wras left with a population of four millions. Prussia obtained West
Prussia, which made them masters of the Vistula and of Polish
commerce, besides the port and customs of Dantzig — 3,060 square
miles j population, 600,000. Russia took Lithuania and the country
between the rivers Dwina and the Dnieper — 9,200 square miles ;
population, 1,800,000. Austria obtained the most fertile and the
most populous part, Galicia. — 6,440 square miles, with 300 towns,
6,000 villages, and nearly 3,000,000 of population. The three
powers guaranteed to Poland most solemnly the portions left
to Poland. This portion was erected into an hereditary kingdom
1 Rotteck, vol. iii. p. 338.
4IO From the EnglisJi Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
for Stanislaus Augustus. "The fall of Poland, announced ....
to the civilised world the complete overthrow of the balance of
power. The empire of the law of the strongest, and consequently
the fall of all public law, according to the forcible expression of
Ion Von Miiller, ' God designed it to show the morality of the
great.' " x Much of the blame of this partition of Poland is due to
the impracticable character of the Poles themselves, and the essen-
tially defective political constitution of their republican monarchy.
But the partition of Poland was not less an evil to Europe. It
prepared the way for the fearful preponderance of Russia in the
councils of Prussia and Austria, which at one time seemed to give
the Czar the leading position in Europe. It was the first instance,
on a large scale, and by what were considered respectable legal
governments, of the disregard for treaties and the rights of long-
established nationalities which had occurred for more than three
hundred years; it was the beginning of the lawlessness and the
contempt of public law, which was imitated by the French republic
and empire, and also by the sovereigns of Europe in 1815 A.D.,
and since then, as opportunity has been offered for successful
aggression.
XI. — The War of the Thirteen Colonies of North America against
England, and the establishment of their Independence, 1773-
The thirteen English provinces in North America had grown up
since the end of the sixteenth century. They were all of them
practically self-governed republics, but warmly attached to England,
not only from their dependence upon English protection from the
French in Canada and Nova Scotia, but also from sympathy with
the religion and institutions of the mother country. The population
was not quite three millions. According to the narrow notions of the
English people and government — and, in fact, of all peoples and
governments — colonies were supposed to exist merely for the
advantage of the mother country. Hence it was deemed perfectly
right and reasonable that by mercantile regulations, by navigation
laws, and by restrictions on their manufacturing industries, and by
compelling them to purchase their manufactured supplies from
England, the mother country should have the monopoly of their
custom and trade. The revolt of the colonies was foreseen by
1 Rotteck, vol. iii. p. 334.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 411
Montesquieu and Turgot, on account of these English restrictive
trade laws, the object of which was to subordinate the commerce
and manufactures of her colonies to her own. They were to have
no emporium but England ; there their produce was to be sold, all
they imported was to be from England. All manufacturers competing
with England were crushed ; they were not to export their woollens
to England or to any of her colonies. Every obstacle was thrown
in the way of all manufactures. These absurd regulations would, in
due time, have been superseded, and it is no just cause of complaint
that the English and its rulers of that day were no wiser than the
rest of the world. But there was a just cause of complaint when
England attempted to raise a revenue from them by Act of Parlia-
ment, in order to reimburse the English treasury for the expense of
the late war with France, by which the colonies were so greatly
benefited. The duty of contributing towards the cost of that war
was readily admitted, and large supplies would have been raised, if
required, in the legal way, through the colonial assemblies. It is
painful to read the narratives of the blunderings of the English
officials, and the growth of estrangement on the part of the colonies,
and to notice the conceit and presumption of the English people,
the majority of whom resented the claims of the colonists as
insolence to the British nation. What claims had the English
nation on the regard of the American colonists ? The first actual
resistance took place at Lexington, April, 1775 A.D. ; then at
Bunker's Hill, June 17, 1775 A.D. The general Congress published
the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776 A.D. Washington
was the cool and wise leader of the new government. He had to
contend with the indifference of the farmers to the military service,
and the want of supplies. His patient ability and the blunders of
the English government and governors, secured the independence of
the States. France, willing to embarrass England, acknowledged
the independence of the United States, December, 1777 A.D., and
sent money and regiments. In a word, after every blunder possible
had been committed by the English Parliament and governors, as
well as by the Congress and its generals, the independence of the
United States was acknowledged by England, September 24,
November 30, 1783 A.D., in the Treaty of Paris between England
and France. " Thus, then, was finished one of the most calamitous
wars that England had ever been driven into, through a mistaken
view of the relative positions of a mother country and her colonies,
and an obstinate reliance upon her power to enforce obedience." x
1 Knight, " History of England," vol. vi. p. 459.
412 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
It is admonitory to read an opinion expressed by David Hume,
October 26, 1775 A.D. : "We hear that some of the ministers have
proposed .... that both the fleet and the army be withdrawn
from America, and then the colonies be left entirely to themselves.
.... I should have said that this measure only anticipates the
necessary course of events in a few years." The cost of this
unnecessary war was ;£i 30,000,000 ! Proposals were suggested by
Franklin,1 which, though at that time thought to be absurdly extrava-
gant and degrading to the mother country, represent now the
opinions perhaps, with some qualification, of a large majority of
English people. The proposals were, that England should yield all
British North America and the Bahamas to the United States, in
consideration of a certain sum of money to be paid by the United
States, and that there should be a free trade to all British subjects
through the United States and ceded colonies. Where was the
disgrace in the mother country ceding to her children and their pos-
terity territories the larger and more important portion of which were
already occupied by them, to which the remaining territories must,
of necessity, sooner or later be united, either as states of the union,
or in strict confederacy with them ? At this time we contemplate with
pleasure the period when our large important colonies in America
and Australia may bej^/ more entirely self-governed, while remaining
in friendly union with the mother country. The permanence of
such a union must be founded on mutual respect and mutual
courtesies. The colonial agents representing colonial interests are,
in fact, the ambassadors of communities second to none in the
importance of their political and commercial relations with the
government and people of the United Kingdom ; they must occupy,
at least, an equal status with the ambassadors of foreign powers.
The colonies are not subject to Great Britain as territories conquered
in war ; they are part and parcel of the territory beyond the four
seas, not separated, but united by the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans.
In common with their fellow-subjects in Britain, they are the
subjects of one common monarchical constitutional government,
and desire to continue to live under the same flag, and to maintain
loving, brotherly relations with their cousins at home. The lower
class of English officials in all the government departments, the
Press, and the English people, do not yet fully understand that
British colonists occupy no position of inferiority to their brethren
in the mother country, but are not, on the whole, an inferior sample
' "Works," vol. ii. p. 43.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 413
of the British nation. It is from the more practically educated and
enterprising classes of our population that the emigrants are mainly
taken, and they naturally expect to occupy a position of perfect
equality with their English brethren in all their relations with the
home government. At this period the great majority of the British
race speaking the English language are found beyond the narrow
limits of the United Kingdom. More than fifty millions are in
North America, and another nation in Australasia is about to begin
its federation with a population of three millions, a larger population
than that of the thirteen colonies of North America when they
separated from the mother country. This Greater-England in the
Far West, and at the Antipodes, is the glory of Old England yet
flourishing in the (we trust) perpetual vitality of a healthy and
vigorous old age.
XII. — The Moral Condition of the Governments of Europe in the
Eighteenth Century, the century which ended in the Revolution of
France.
In the seventeenth century the coarse brutality and moral
corruption of the leading courts in Europe began to force itself on
public attention. The reigns of Charles II. in England, of Louis XIV.
in France, exhibited an ostentatious display of profligacy and reckless
waste which was imitated more or less by the petty sovereigns of
Germany, all of whom had their courts, court officers, and mistresses,
and their palaces, like Versailles, on a smaller scale. The latter
years of Louis XIV., after his marriage with Madame de Maintenon,
1685, were decorous. Under the regency of the Duke of Orleans, a
man of ability, but whose character was marked by the foulest
profligacy, the old order of court profligacy was restored. " He
organised a system of nightly riot and debauchery, to which, since
the days of Commodus, Europe had seen no parallel. Every night
he assembled in his apartments in the Louvre a motley band of the
most disreputable persons of both sexes whom the capital could
furnish, — nobles, gamesters, his old tutor (the Abbe Dubois), his
own daughter (the Duchesse de Berri), opera-girls, and other women
notorious for the openness and multiplicity of their intrigues. No
introduction was requisite but infamy of character, readiness of wit,
real or affected frivolity of disposition, and strength of constitution
sufficient to stand the ceaseless, measureless excess of the unhallowed
orgies. To the men he himself gave the name of roues, to signify,
as he explained it, that they were all guilty of offences that deserved
to be expiated on the wheel. The women he spared any such
414 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
distinctive appellation, but the general voice proclaimed them still
more vile and abandoned than their male companions ; and the
worst of all was the duchess, who at times transferred the scene of
revelry to her own apartments at the Luxemburg. As soon as the
whole company were assembled the doors were closed, that no
uninitiated person might interrupt and shame the revellers by his
unexpected entrance For keenness of wit, foulness of
ribaldry, and depth of intoxication, none could surpass the regent
himself."1 Dubois, the infamy of whose past character was
notorious, but a man able and of sound political judgment, was
appointed Secretary of State. He had himself been ordained as
sub-dean, deacon, and priest in one service, and then was made
Archbishop of Cambrai (the richest in the French Church), and
afterwards by the help of George I., the Pretender, the regent, and
by bribes to the cardinal, and to the Pope (Innocent XIII.), most
of which (^320,000) was paid out of the French Treasury, received,
1721, a cardinal's hat, "conferred on him, as he was in the habit
of boasting, with the unanimous approbation of all the sovereigns of
Christendom." He died, August 10, 1723, "ridiculing those who
besought him to receive the sacraments, and reviling doctors and
priests with equal vehemence."3 The regent soon followed him,
dying suddenly on December 2, in a fit, with his head on the lap
of his mistress (a Duchess), in his fortieth year ! Louis XV. for a
few years led a decorous hfe, but in 1733 began a career of profligacy
with the two sisters of Madame de Chateauroux, and then with that
lady herself. Madame Pompadour's disgraceful reign followed,
1745. To keep up her influence over the king, she established the
" Pare aux Cerfs," a school for handsome young girls, to provide
mistresses for the king, without injury to her own influence. There
was a great financial distress in 1762, and the king was engaged in
continual struggles with his various Parliaments in 1766, 1768,
1770, 1771. Madame de Pompadour died 1764, and her place
was filled, 1769, by Madame Du Barry, originally a common prosti-
tute. These women mainly governed and plundered France, until
the death of Louis XV. on May 10, 1774, a space of forty-one years.
Through Du Barry's influence the Due de Choiseul was dismissed
from the ministry, January, 1771.
The princes of Germany were not less notorious for their bold
defiance of the moral law. The private lives of George I. and II.
are too well known to need remark. Frederick Augustus, Elector
1 Yonge, vol. iii. p. 23. ~2 Ibid., p. 81.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 415
of Saxony and King of Poland, 1697-1733 A.D., surpassed all his
compeers in the variety and extent of his debaucheries, and in his
contempt of the decencies of society. He had twenty-five illegiti-
mate children ; some say three hundred and fifty-two (Mensel). To
enter into particulars is impossible. The Margravine of Bayreuth
has gone into details in her memoirs. The lavish expenditure of
this king and his wars exhausted the people of Saxony yet more,
while suffering from a terrible famine. The Elector of Cologne,
Joseph Clement, had the shameless impudence to boast that (1702-
1713 A.D.), as the ally of Louis XIV., he had so wasted the country,
that not a peasant could be seen for twenty miles. The Bishop
of Wurtzburg, as well as the Archbishop of Cologne, kept up
their luxurious courts in imitation of that of France, and equally
immoral. So also the courts of Bavaria and Wiirtemberg. The
mistress of Louis of Wiirtemberg was married by him in his wife's
lifetime ; she was a fit representative of evil (as the prelate Osiander
remarked to her), remarkable for her love of gambling, avarice, and
sensuality. Charles Alexander, the successor of Louis, permitted
the Jew, Joseph Sass, to plunder the state and the charitable
institutions, the money being spent on singers, buffoons, and enter-
tainments, 1733-1737 A.D. As a proof of the ignorance and
superstition yet prevalent in Germany, witches were burned up to
•1783 A.D. Frederick IV. of Denmark, 1695-1730 A.D., married
the daughter of the Prussian ambassador, while his own wife was
living, and then lived publicly with another. Peter the Great of
Russia set at naught all the restraints of morality in his private life,
as well as in his political actions : the man who could execute
hundreds of the rebel strelitzes with his own hands was, after all
his love of Western arts, a savage in grain.
These were the men who made the wars of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. All of them unjust and heedless, with the
one exception of the war of resistance to the aggressions of
Louis XIV., 1688-1697 A.D.. The other wars were purely for
dynastic interests, in which the resources procured by a heavy taxation
from the industrious workmen of the nation were wasted in the
destruction of life and property and in the creation of human misery.
The rulers of Europe were then, much more than even now, apparently
insensible to the guilt of bloodshed. Who could hope for any
real benefit from men to each of whom the language of the Hebrew
prophet might with propriety have been'addressed : " Thou hast shed
blood abundantly, and hast made great wars : thou shalt not build an
house unto my name, because thou hast shed much blood upon the earth,
416 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
in my sight" * Amid these atrocities of war and the most abomin-
able immorality, the rulers and leaders of the nation lived in riotous
living and frivolous amusement, "for, as in the days that were before
the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in
marriage .... and knew not till the flood came, and took them all
away." 3 That flood was the French Revolution, which was truly
like the destruction of Jerusalem, a " Coming of the Son of Man" to
vindicate the punitive administration of the moral government of
God in the infliction of his judgment upon the European monarchs
and nobles. The French armies were like those of Attila, " the
scourge of God upon the effete rulers and aristocracy of Europe."
XIII. — The efforts towards improvement in the various countries in
Europe during the eighteenth century, before the great Revolu-
tion broke out in France.
In England, whatever might be the private vices of George I. and II.,
and however lax and disgraceful the morality of their courts, yet as
constitutional kings they were blameless. It was well for England
that Walpole was for so long a period the virtual ruler of the
Government and of the corrupt House of Commons. The open
and unblushing bribery of the members, and the overwhelming
influence of the great Whig Revolution families, carried the
government safe through a very trying period of English history, and
the genius and eloquence of the elder Pitt (Lord Chatham) raised
the character and power of Britain to a very high point. Under
George III., the morals of the court were placed on a rigid scale far
beyond the mere maintenance of propriety and decency, and the
example of the court had in time some effect upon the higher and
middle classes of society. The controversies raised by the eccen-
tricities of Wilkes and the letters of Junius, prepared the way for
serious discussions of the condition of the parliamentary representa-
tion. Chatham and his son, William Pitt, were anxious to carry-
large reforms, conservative and liberal, in the modification of the
constituencies, by which the members of the House of Commons
were chosen, and the feeling of the country had begun to move in
this question during the latter stages of the American War, 1779 A. D.
The Duke of Richmond and William Pitt brought forward plans in
1782, 1783, and 1785 A.D., which were rejected. The effect of
the French Revolution was unfavourable to political reforms. The
1 i Chron. xxii. 8. 2 Matt. xxiv. 38, 39.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A. D. 417
great majority of the English people, horrified and disgusted by the
disorders and bloodshed of the reformers in France, were indisposed
to make changes of any kind in the forms of their institutions.
Meanwhile the increase of the population, which from 1750-1780 was
four hundred thousand annually, and of the agricultural and manu-
facturing productive power of the country, the improvement of inland
communication by roads and canals, 1758-1772 A.D., the new
inventions applied to the cotton manufactory especially, and, above
all, the application of steam as a power, 1764-1785 A.D., enabled
the English people to bear the burden of their past wars, and to
meet the still larger outlay of the revolutionary wars. There were
also moral influences in the rise of the Methodistical and Evangelical
movement, which stimulated the Established Church and the non-
conforming bodies ; a result of equal importance with the establish-
ment of the Methodist Churches and Societies. Sunday schools
accompanied this movement, and their influence, in counteracting
the sceptical spirit and the coarse immorality of the day, cannot
be over-estimated. Maritime enterprise was not neglected. Anson,
1740-1744 A.D., circumnavigated the world on his errand to capture
the Spanish galleons ; and James Cooke, in three voyages round the
world, explored the east coast of New Holland and of New Zealand,
1768-1779 A.D.
In Germany, the reforms attempted by the Emperor Joseph II.,
created great opposition on all sides. With the best intentions, the
rulers of the Continental governments generally failed in effecting
the most obvious and necessary reforms in their territories. No
man was more worthy of confidence than Joseph II., or more able
in the management of the internal affairs of the empire. He aimed
at the toleration of the Protestants and the Jews, the suppression of
six hundred and twenty-four useless monastic institutions, and the
lessenening the number of the monks by thirty-six thousand, the
spread of education, the freedom of the press, the liberation of the
serfs, the regulating the privileges of the nobles, and the fair appor-
tionment of taxation ; but in all these attempts his motives were
misunderstood and his plans resisted. He could not throw himself
upon an enlightened public opinion, for none such existed.
Brabant and Austrian Inlanders (Belgium) raised the standard of
revolt, 1790 A.D. Hungary was, by the power of its privileged
classes, opposed to the modification of villenage, and the
peasantry, especially in Transylvania, were moved to a premature
action against the nobles, which had to be put down by force;
three hundred seats of the nobility desolated and many atrocities
2 E
41 8 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
committed. Joseph died February 21, 1790 A.D. "Almost every
well-meant reform that this noble prince instituted had for its
consequence crafty or violent resistance on the part of the narrow-
minded boasters of historical rights, or, on the other hand, a per-
nicious misunderstanding and excess on the part of the liberated." 1
Joseph II. wished, by means of monarchical power, to effect that
which in other states was opposed by the same means ; he therefore
came in collision with the people and opinions of his time, from a
cause entirely different from that which generally operated among
the despotic princes of Europe. He wished to effect a complete
change in the administration and government, the education, instruc-
tion, and state of religion, the legislation and law of his dominions,
and these changes were such as cannot possibly be brought about
without a revolution, and without consulting the people; and
Joseph had no idea of adopting this course. His history is, there-
fore, an account of the disappointments of a prince, who, inspired
with the best intentions, contends against the existing state of things,
without finding any assistants or fellow-labourers, or without seeking
any .... he was often, therefore, obliged to act the tyrant against
his will, in order to carry into effect those measures which form a
subject of rejoicing to all men of understanding in Austria even to
this present day."2 In the smaller states, as Bavaria, Saxony, Wur-
temberg, and others, there were no practical improvements, and no
prospect of any. The people generally were prepared to receive
the matevial benefits of a freer government, although paid for by
subjection to France, so that the introduction of the Code Napoleon
and the abolition of all feudal burdens threw the west of Germany
into the arms of Napoleon in the early part of the next century.
In Spain, Charles III. of Spain (Charles IV. of Naples) introduced
and carried out large reforms under his ministers Squillaci, Wall,
Aranda, Grimaldi, and Florida Banca, which the power of the clergy
and the interference of the Pope considerably circumscribed. An
attempt was made to re-people the deserted lands in the Sierra
Morena by Swiss and German colonists, 1768-1778 A.D. It failed
through the superstition of the people and the interference of the
priests; but on the death of Charles, 1788 A.D., Spain was com-
paratively prosperous.
Portugal, in the reign of Jose, 1755 A.D., suffered from the great
earthquake by which Lisbon was laid in ruins. Great assistance
1 Rotteck, vol. iii. p. 355 ; Menzel, vol. iii. pp 87-95.
1 Schiosser, vol. v. pp. 319, 320.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D: 419
was rendered by England. It is quite characteristic of the then
condition of the people that " they received the relief, but cursed
the heretical hands which afforded it." Spain also gave large
assistance, and met with the same treatment. There was a con-
spiracy against the life of the king by the Tavora family, 1758 A.D.,
which failed. Pombal (Cavalho, Count d'Oeyras) was the great
reforming minister of this reign, and carried out his plans under a
system of terrorism equal to that of the Robespierres and Dantons
of the French Revolution. Such was the state of Portugal that a
purely destructive administration was not without its benefits ; the
clergy, the ministers, the schools, and the administration of law, all
by turns were changed. These ' reforms were, however, not per-
manent. In 1762 A.D., the Spanish government invaded Portugal.
English troops were sent to aid the Portuguese, and the Spanish
invasion was a failure. In order to leave the succession to his
daughter Maria, he (Jose) married her to his own brother. Such
incestuous and unnatural unions have been the peculiar degradation
of the royal family of Portugal.
Italy. — The reforms of Leopold I., of Tuscany (afterwards
Leopold II. of Germany), were thorough, and carried out with
great wisdom. By his motu proprio, 1786 A.D., he gave a new
criminal code, abolished torture and capital punishments, and esta-
blished penitentiaries; the Inquisition was abolished, 1782 A.D. ;
in the Church he placed the monks, &c., under their bishops,
reformed the morals of the clergy and monks, and obliged the Pope
to concur. But in his attempt to enforce the four rules of the
Gallican Council, and to enlighten the priests and people religiously
in the Council of Pistoia, 1785 A.D., he failed, for the Council of
Florence, in 1787 A.D., annulled the decision of that council.
Bishop Ricci, the reformer, was deposed, 1790 A.D. The grand
duke was more fortunate in his civil reforms ; the communes were
placed under self-government, feudal rights repealed, monopolies
abolished ; he drained the Val di Chiana and part of the Maremme,
opened roads and canals, and planted colonies in desert places ; he
also established schools, and reformed the Universities of Pisa and
Sienna. The Duke of Parma also reduced the power and the
revenues of the clergy, and obliged the Pope to make concessions,
1773 A.D. In Sicily and Naples, Charles IV. (afterwards Charles III.
of Spain), under his ministers Tanucci and Squillaci, taught the
clergy that the king, and not the Pope, was the sovereign of Naples
and Sicily ; he lessened the number of the priests and the powers
of the nobility. His successor, Ferdinand, as he grew up, became
2 2 E
42O From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
"great as a lazarone, insignificant as a king and a man."1 The
discovery of the ruins of Herculaneum, 1713 A.D., and of Pompeii,
1689-1721 A.D., attracted the attention of travellers to Italy.
The expulsion of the Jesuits from France, 1764; Spain, 1767;
Portugal, 1759 A.D. ; with the abolition of the order by Pope Gan-
ganelli, January 23, 1773 A.D. (published August 19, 1773 A.D.), was
one of the greatest efforts at reform in the eighteenth century until
the French Revolution. It was carried out with unnecessary cruelty
upon individuals innocent of the intrigues, and follies, and crimes
of their superiors. The Jesuits had been for years past engaged in
large trading speculations with the West Indies, in which their agent,
De la Valette, became bankrupt in 1760 A.D. This led to inquiry,
which had been preceded by the action of Pope Benedict XIV.,
who had issued a bull against trading, slave-dealing on the part of
priests, without naming the Jesuits, February, 1741 A.D., and the
bull " Immensa Pastorina," in December, in which the Jesuits were
censured for their conduct in the missions in Asia, Africa, and in
Brazil and Paraguay. Paraguay having been ceded by Spain to
Portugal, the Indians, under the orders of the Jesuits, resisted,
1751-1755 A.D., and were with difficulty subdued. This affair of
the trading and the bankruptcy, and the discovery of their organisa-
tion in Paraguay, helped to insure the abolition of the order.
In France. — The prospect of improvement in France, arising out
of the character of the young king, were marred by the incom-
petency of the Count de Maurepas, his prime minister, whose well-
meaning "policy" could never rise beyond an ideal despotism
exercised by a virtuous king. He knew the faults of the old regime
as administered by selfish and tyrannical agents, and his notion of
reform was limited by the change of administration, while the neces-
sities of the times required a thorough change in the principles of
the administration itself. It was impossible for any statesman to
carry out reforms while the parlements, courting popularity by oppo-
sition to the executive, were altogether opposed to the necessities
and claims of the age and the wishes of the people. Had the
king's advisers adopted the extreme measure of calling together the
States-General at once, and then exhibited their plans of reform, they
might possibly have been able to make some progress, and perhaps
the unfortunate war with England on behalf of the American
colonies, 1778-1783, might have been prevented, to the great benefit
of France. Unfortunately, the king and his various ministers were,
1 Schlosser, vol. iv. p. 266.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 421
from the beginning, engaged in contests with the Parkment of Paris,
which declined to register the royal edicts. These refusals were
followed by a royal lit de justice and the exile of the parlements
— the aristocratic conservative parlements which, with no sympathy
for popular rule, appeared, however, to the public in the position of
patriotic asserters of liberty. Under Maurepas, who was prime
minister from 1768 until his death, November 21, 1781, Turgot and
Lamoignon with Malesherbes directed the finances. Turgot, one
of the sect of Economistes, praised by his friends as " possessing
the head of Bacon with the heart of L'Hopital," reduced the ex-
penditure at once 100 millions of francs, abolished restrictions on
the sale of corn and wine, removed the provincial custom-houses to
the frontier, thus giving freedom to internal trade, abolished the
corvee (the forced labour of the peasantry in the war), and the
monopoly of the trading guilds in the cities. Other great reforms
were contemplated which would have remodified the entire system
of government ; as, for instance, the abolition of " lettres de cachet,"
by which men were, without trial, sent to the Bastille or any other
prison, also of the gabelle (salt duty), and the taille (property tax), to
be replaced by a tax on all property, including that of the privileged
classes. Feudal dues also were by degrees to be removed, and the
disabilities of the Protestants were to be set aside. But these plans
were opposed not only by the court party and the privileged classes,
but by all those whose interests were to any extent affected by them,
and so great was the clamour both Malesherbes and Turgot retired.
Malesherbes died before he received a formal dismissal, and Turgot
left office May, 1776. Maurepas still remained prime minister, and
in 1776 prevailed on Necker, a wealthy banker of Geneva, to take
charge of the finances. He swept away six hundred sinecure offices,
but the war with England increased the public debt by the addition
of fifty-six millions sterling. In 1781 Necker published his compte
rendu, a somewhat sanguine exposition of the financial condition
of France, and soon after claimed a seat in the council as necessary
to the efficient discharge of the duties of his office. This was refused
because of his being a Protestant, and he resigned May 25, 1781.
Maurepas himself died, November 21, 1781. After him the Count
de Vergennes filled his office. Under him Joly de Fleury, D'Ormes-
son, and De Calonne administered the finances. Fleury and
D'Ormesson, with more than ordinary incapacity, held office a few
months only. De Calonne, November 3, 1783, began his adminis-
tration, which was one of reckless prodigality, borrowing in four
years not less than thirty-two millions sterling. He called a council
422 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
of notables, consisting of 144 persons of the privileged class,
February 2, 1787, and proposed to them the large reforms pointed
out by Turgot, &c. These were refused, though the deficit increased
five millions sterling. Archbishop Brienne succeeded, April 30,
1787 ; he was obliged to advise the calling of the States-General to
meet, May, 1789, but resigned office, August 25, 1788, and was suc-
ceeded by Necker, who had been recalled to office from Geneva.
It is remarkable that, amidst all their troubles, the voyager La
Pe'rouse was despatched to make discoveries in the Pacific, 1785.
He arrived in Port Jackson a few days after the English colony
had taken possession, 1788, and was afterwards shipwrecked and
lost.
It will be obvious that the reproach cast upon the eighteenth
century as a dead, unprogressive period, unenlivened by any facts
or results of importance until towards its close, is undeserved. This
has been well stated by one of our rising statesmen : " The time,
far from being ordinary, was pregnant with events so momentous
that it would be difficult to find words which could describe them
or rhetoric which could exaggerate them. Problems had long been
ripe for solution which concerned not only the British kingdom but
all the civilised, and almost the whole of the inhabited, world.
Whether France or England was to rule in India; whether the
French manners, language, and institutions, or the English, were to
prevail over the immense continent of North America; whether
Germany was to have a national existence ; whether Spain was to
monopolise the commerce of the tropics; who was to command
the ocean ; who was to be dominant in the islands of the Caribbean
Sea ; what power has to possess the choice stands for business in
the great market of the globe : these were only some among the
issues which had to be decided during this period." x
XIV. — Local Histories of the several States during this Period.
Denmark and Norway. — Under Christian V., 1670-1699, there
was a war with Sweden, 1674-1679, with the usual disputes re-
specting the rights of the Danish kings over Schleswig and Holstein
(arising out of arrangements made by Christian III., 1533-1559).
Frederick IV. was also engaged in war with Sweden for a brief
period. He sent a fresh colony to Greenland, 1721, Christian VI.,
"Early History of Charles Tames Fox," by Geo. Otto Trevelyan, M.P.,
P. 19, 1881.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 423
1730-1746, established the Danish East India Company, 1740.
Frederick V. and his father and predecessor, were excellent and
popular rulers. Frederick was succeeded, 1766, by Christian VII.,
himself a weak and despicable character, while the court intrigues,
which resulted in the divorce of his wife (Matilda, sister of
George III. of England), and in the execution of the favourites
Brandt and Struense, 1772, were disgraceful to Denmark. In 1784
the prince royal was appointed regent.
Sweden. — Charles XL, through the general hatred of the aris-
tocratic power given to the nobles by the constitution, was enabled,
in 1693, to assume absolute authority, with the approbation of the
people, who preferred one ruler to many. Charles XII. succeeded,
1697-1718. His history has been anticipated in the Northern Alli-
ance (p. 402). His mad valour, and his wars with Denmark, and
Russia, and Saxony were ruinous to Sweden. Ulrica Elenora was
obliged to restore the old aristocratical government ; Baron Gortz,
the minister of Charles XII., was executed as a traitor ; the queen
abdicated in favour of her husband Frederick, Prince of Hesse-
Cassel (1720-1751). Two parties — the Hats, under French in-
fluence ; the Caps, favourable to Russia and to peace — divided the
court. There was a war with Russia, which ended 1743, with a
cession of part of Finland to Russia. The Swedish East India
Company was established 1731. Adolphus Frederick of Holstein
began the line of Holstein Gottorp. Party struggles disturbed the
peace of the country. Gustavus III., 1771-1792, was enabled to
revive the old despotism. The senate of nobles was set aside, 1771,
and the king gave a new constitution, on the whole more acceptable
to the people, though not to Russia. War with Russia followed,
but peace was made in 1790. The wars and jealousies which pre-
vented the cordial union of the Scandinavian nations in self-defence,
which would have made them a barrier against the advances of
Russia are much to be lamented. In the neglect of Scandinavian
interests France, England, and Germany have reason to regret the
mistake of their policy in disregarding the value of Scandinavia as
an ally and independent power.
Germany.— Austria was hampered in the wars against Louis XIV.
by the rebellion of Hungary and Transylvania, supported by the
Turks, who, unable to hold Hungary themselves, prevented Austria
from enjoying the quiet rule over it. By the Emperor Leopold
Hanover was raised to the position of the " ninth electorate," though
with some opposition, 1708. Ragotzki, Prince of Transylvania
(after Hungary had been relieved from Turkish dominion by Prince
424 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D.y to the
Eugene, victories at Zenta, 1697, and by the Peace of Carlowitz,
1699), raised a rebellion in 1705, which continued until 1710. An
amnesty and religious toleration by the peace of 1711. This tolera-
tion was a mere fiction, until Joseph II. made it a reality in 1781.
Besides the wars with Louis XIV., the war with the Turks, 1716-
1718, the wars of the Austrian Succession, 1740-1748, the Seven
Years' War, 1756-1762, there was a brief dispute arising out of the
attempt of Austria to annex Bavaria on the death of the last male
heir of the Wittenbach line, 1777, in which Prussia and Saxony
opposed Austria with success, 1778, 1779. The reforms of the
Emperor Joseph II. gave great offence to the privileged orders in
Hungary and the Netherlands, and were accompanied by revolts in
Hungary during the war with Turkey, 1788, 1789, and also in the
Netherlands. The smaller states of Germany were Bavaria, Saxony,
Hanover, Mayence, Treves, Cologne, Electorate Hesse-Cassel, Wiir-
temberg, Mecklenburg, Salzburg, the free imperial cities, and others.
Prussia.— Frederick III. succeeded the "Great Elector," 1688,
who left him a full treasury and an army of 28,000 disciplined men.
In 1700 he declared himself King of Prussia, and was crowned in
Konigsberg, 1701, as Frederick /., and acknowledged as such by the
emperor (through bribes given to the emperor's confessor), though
opposed by Prince Eugene. This act of vanity succeeded as a
policy; it liberated the House of Brandenburg from their blind
attachment to Austria; Prussia was in a few years the rival of
Austria, and sought to aggrandise itself by the seizure of Silesia
and other provinces belonging to that empire. This king had pecu-
liarities, which were yet more prominent in his son and successor,
Frederick William I., who began to reign, 1713. His grinding
economy, hatred of French refinements, and singularities of beha-
viour bordered on insanity, but were accompanied by so much
practical ability and good sense as vindicated his claim to rationality.
His son, Frederick II., "the Great Frederick," became king, 1740.
His wars with Austria and his share in the partition of Poland have
already been noticed. Frederick William II. succeeded, 1786. He
re-established, in connexion with England, the Orange Stadtholder
in Holland, 1787, 1788.
Poland. — John Sobieski, the heroic deliverer of Vienna. His
valour saved Poland from the Turks, whom he always resisted as the
great enemies of European civilisation ; and, though friendly with
Louis XIV. and averse to Austria, would on no account cease from
opposing the Turkish enemies of Austria. Had he been supported
by the diet Poland might have remained a bulwark against both
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 ^4. ZX 425
Turkey and Russia. He was the last independent King of Poland,
and died, 1696. During the reigns of Frederick Augustus I., Elector
of Saxony, 1697-1733, and of Frederick Augustus II., 1733-1763,
Poland was the seat of a civil war in which Sweden, Russia, Austria,
and France contended for the appointment to the throne. Stanislaus
Augustus was elected king through the influence of Catherine II. of
Russia, 1761. These wars and the history of the first partition of
Poland have already been narrated. A reform in the constitution
was proposed in 1773 and carried in the diet, 1788. A second
partition took place, 1793, which left Poland a territory of only
4,000 square miles, and an army of 15,000 men ; this was followed
by the third and final partition of 1798. Much as we may regret
the annihilation of this nation of warriors, and much as we may
blame the spoilers, it must be confessed that with such a vicious form
of society, in which the nobles trampled on the serfs, and refused to
obey the king or any ruler, and were always at war with each other,
an independent government was impossible.
Switzerland continued to be disturbed by religious jealousies, and
by the differences between the aristocratical and democratical parties.
In 1712, there was a war between the Catholic cantons and Berne
and Zurich respecting the abbot of St. Gall's conduct to the Pro-
testants of Tuggenburg, which was settled by the abbot's submission
in 1718. The Swiss Republican rulers relieved themselves of their
discontented subjects by hiring them into foreign service ; the higher
posts in the army were hereditary in the great families, and were
very lucrative; from 1742 to 1775 there were 22,000 serving in
France, 22,000 in Holland, 13,600 in Spain, 4,000 in Sardinia,
24,000 in the imperial army, besides several regiments in Naples,
and the old Swiss Guard at Rome.1
Holland^ after the long wars in which she was engaged in connexion
with the greater powers, gradually receded from political action.
By the Barrier Treaty, the allies (1715) secured the possession of the
Netherlands to Austria on condition that Austria should maintain
30,000 to 35,000 men as a defence, and that these territories should
never be ceded to France nor to any prince except of the House of
Austria. The Dutch were also allowed to garrison certain towns, as
Namur, Tournay, &c., as a check upon French aggression. After
sundry disputes, originating in the jealousy of republicanism, the
stadtholdership was made hereditary in the Orange family in the
time of William IV., 1747-1751. There was a brief war with
1 Menzel, " History of Germany," vol. iii. p. 40.
426 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to thz
England, 1780-1783, in connexion with the armed neutrality of the
northern powers. The Seven States were, in fact, independent
republics, each having its estates, with representatives of the nobility
of the time. All these states were governed by the assembly of the
States-General j there was a council of state, an executive, consisting
of deputies from each province ; there was a growing jealousy against
the nobility and the Orange party, which broke out in the expulsion
of the stadtholder (1787) and his restoration by Prussia and England
soon after.
Great Britain and Ireland. — England and Scotland were legis-
latively united as Great Britain, 1707; the accession of the Hanover
Dynasty on the death of Anne, 1714, was followed by the Stuart
rebellions of 1715 and 1745, which being repressed, the new dynasty
reigned in peace. In the wars already narrated, England obtained
Canada, and increased her Indian possessions. By the injudicious
policy of the ministry of George III., — a policy which expressed the
feelings of the majority of the English people, — the American
colonies separated from England, 1773-1776, and their independence
acknowledged in 1783. In 1 784, the political power of the great aris-
tocratical party in England, the Whig party, fell with the Coalition
administration. William Pitt, son of the great Earl Chatham, sup-
ported by the king, was the premier ; his administration was one of
great prosperity. No country increased so much in population,
wealth, trade, as England and Scotland, under the parliamentary
government of Walpole (under George I. and II.), and subsequently
of Chatham and Pitt ; the details of this marvellous progress form a
pleasant chapter in the history of England.
Spain, under Philip V. and his successors, except as partners in the
Wars of the Succession and the disputes growing out of these wars,
enjoyed repose. Ferdinand VI., 1746-1756; Charles III., 1756-1788.
Under Philip V. and Ferdinand VI. the leading ministers were Alberoni,
Ensenada, and Wall ; Charles III. promoted an Italian, Squillaci,
who was hated by the clergy ; this monarch, though one of the wisest
of his dynasty, obliged the estates to accept the doctrine of the
Immaculate Conception, and desired to place the Virgin as the
tutelary protector of Spain, but was opposed by the monks of
St. lago de Compostella, who successfully maintained the claim of
their saint. There were 90,000 ecclesiastics in Spain, — about
one-thirtieth of the whole male population. In 1713, Philip V.
induced the Cortes to pass a law (Salic) excluding females from the
succession, except in default of the male line of Philip, with sundry
provisoes and details.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 427
Portugal, having engaged with England in the War of Suc-
cession, was a party to the Treaty of Utrecht, by which the
boundaries of her possessions in South America were arranged with
Spain. The administration of the reformer, Pombal, has already
been narrated.
Italy continued to be " a mere geographical expression." Venice,
engaged in war with the Turks, gained the Morea in 1699 and lost
it in 1718 ; this was her last war. Genoa had to endure the rebel-
lion of Corsica, in which Paoli was celebrated, 1754-1758; this war
led to the cession of Corsica to France, 1758. Tuscany, on the death
of the last of the Medici, 1717, became an appanage of the Austrian
family in lieu of Lorraine, Francis, the husband of Maria Theresa,
being the grand duke. Milan belonged to Austria j Modena to
the D'Este family. Savoy received Sardinia in exchange for Sicily,
1720, and the king became King of Sardinia. Parma and Placentia
were given to Don Carlos, of Spain, 1731 j but, on his succeeding to
the throne of Naples, these duchies fell to the empire, but again in
1 748 were given to Don Philip of Spain. Naples and Sicily became
a settled kingdom under Don Carlos as Charles III., 1735; the
feudal submission to the Pope was thrown off, 1788. Rome and the
Papal Territory were under the Pope and his curia.
Russia. — The history of Russia since the death of Peter the Great
has not been pleasant to narrate. It is the history of the abuse of a
sensual civilisation carried on by a few individuals either for selfish
interests orcaprice, the general result of which has been the employment
of the power of the empire injuriously to the progress of constitutional
liberty in Europe, without producing any real improvement in the
mass of barbarism of which the empire is composed, The one good
thing which commands the regard of the civilised world is the
continued barrier which Russia opposes to the power of Turkey.
On Europe the influence of Russia has, with this one exception, been
evil; Catherine succeeded Peter, 1725; Peter II., 1727; Anne,
1730; Ivan III., 1740; Elizabeth, 1741, possessed no one quality
of a ruler, nor any one female virtue ; drunken and debauched, her
court was one of peasants, soldiers, and grooms, one of whom, her
paramour, filled the highest offices, and obtained great wealth. In her
wardrobe she left 15,000 dresses, two chests filled with silk stockings,
two chests of ribands, and some thousands of pairs of shoes, &c.
Peter III. succeeded, 1762, but was deposed by his clever wife,
Catherine, a German princess. " Beautiful, sensual, and luxurious,
she was mistress of all the splendid qualities of her age and sex.
.... She had long reached that exalted height of genius at which
428 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
all social virtues may be boldly despised."1 "She was a great
woman so far as greatness can exist without morality." 3 Crim
Tartary was united to Russia, 1783, and in the war against Turkey,
in union with Austria, she took and kept Choczim, Okzakov, Bender,
and Ismail, 1788.
Turkey rapidly declined, especially after the Peace of Carlowitz,
1699, by which Hungary was abandoned. It remains "the shadow
of a name," existing purely through the jealousy of the great Euro-
pean powers, who cannot decide as to the division of the territory
under her nominal rule. The war with Austria in 1716, 1717, and
with that of Hungary, 1718; war again with Russia and Austria,
1735-1739. In 1760, Ali Bey, the Mameluke, made himself master
of Egypt by the murder of eleven beys, until 1793, when he was
defeated and put to death. The Wahaby sect (Mahometan puritans)
made themselves powerful in Arabia at the end of the eighteenth
century. In 1768, the Turks, jealous of the Russian advance in
Poland, declared war. A Russian fleet appeared in the Archipelago,
1770-1773, to the astonishment of the Turkish government, who did
not believe in any passage from the Baltic to the Mediterranean, and
the Greeks were tempted to rise against the Turks ; the war ended
by the cession of all the country between the Dnieper and the Bog,
with Azoph and Taganrog to Russia. The Crimea was placed under
the protection of Russia, and the free navigation of the Black Sea
and of the Hellespont was conceded to them by the peace of
Kutschouk-Kainardji, July 21, 1774, which was the beginning of
Turkey's dependence upon Russia. Another war with Russia, 1787,
and .with Austria also, ended in 1791 and 1792. The interference
of the English government, and of its ally, the King of Prussia, 1790,
to arrest the great successes of Austria and Russia, was much
opposed by the Whig leaders in England. This policy is founded
on the dread of the conquest of Constantinople by the Russians, and
the supposed predominance which would then be given to Russia in
the East which might possibly affect the British rule in India.
However cogent these reasons may be, it must not be forgotten that
Russia must have access direct to the Mediterranean, and will have
it sooner or later, for her commercial and warlike marine. It is
time that some practical measures were taken by the great powers to
meet the natural yearnings of Russia, and thus remove one occasion
which might lead to a second war. The pachas of Widin (Oghlu)
and Yanina (Ali) were virtually independent at the close of the war.
1 Schlosser. * Rotteck.
French Revolutioji, 1788, 1789 A.D. 429
In PERSIA the Sefi family, after a long period of imbecile govern-
ment, was superseded, 1736, by Nadir Shah. An Afghan invasion,
1722, first destroyed the prestige of the old dynasty. Nadir Shah,
a Turcoman chief, expelled the Afghans, and conquered the North
of India, plundering Delhi to the amount of thirty-two millions
sterling, 1739. Eight thousand persons were murdered in the riot
which followed. He was murdered, 1747. The anarchy which fol-
lowed was put down by Kurim Khan (Zund), 1759, who reigned
till 1779. A renewed anarchy until, in 1789, Luft Ali Khan (Zund)
and Aga Mahommed Khan (Kajar). The latter became sole
monarch, 1795. The weakness of the Persian rule favoured the
rebellion of the AFGHANS of CABUL and CANDAHAR, who from 1708
were equally a trouble to Persia and all their neighbours. The
Durani Dynasty was founded 1747, and was generally at war with
India or Persia.
INDIA. — Aurung Zeeb, the last of the Great Moguls who really
ruled, died 1707. " His life would have been a blameless one if he
had had no father to depose, no brethren to murder, and no Hindoo
subjects to oppress His Mahometan generals and viceroys, as
a rule, served him well during his vigorous life, but at his death they
usurped his children's inheritance."1 The Seiks and Mahrattas over-
ran India. The viceroys set up separate kingdoms, as the Dekkan,
Oude, and others. The French were for a time supreme in India (in
the Carnatic), 1745-57. The BRITISH RULE dates from the action
of CLIVE in South India, 1747, who in 1755 was Governor of Fort
David, and in 1757 defeated the Surajah Dowlah at Plassey. In
Southern India, Hyder Ali, who had founded the kingdom of Mysore,
was the consistent enemy of the English. WARREN HASTINGS, who
was Governor-General 1774-1785, consolidated the Indian Empire of
England. At the close of this period, there was already established
in INDIA the predominating power of England. The Carnatic
Kingdom of Hyder Ali, under his successor, Tippoo Saib ; the
Mahrattas, under Scindia ; and the Seiks were all-powerful and
important, but the GREAT MOGUL IN DELHI, the successor of
Baber and of Aurung Zeeb, was the mere " shadow of a name."
CHINA remained under the Mantchoo dynasty. Kam-hi per-
secuted the Jesuit missionaries, 1664. In 1692 they were again in
favour; but in 1723 the disputes between the Jesuits and other
Catholic missionaries was the cause of the proscription of Christianity.
In 1727 a Russian envoy was resident in Pekin. Between 1752-1780
1 W. W. Hinks, " Indian People."
43 o From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
Thibet became subject to China. Hi and East Turkestan were
annexed by Kien-ling, 1780.
JAPAN. The population under the Tyocoons (Shogans) improved
in civilisation, while excluding all Europeans, except the Dutch,
from even commercial intercourse.
IN AFRICA, EGYPT remained nominally subject to Turkey, so also
the Barbary States ; MOROCCO, as before, under its own sovereign.
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, the Independence of which
was acknowledged by England 1783, consolidated their Government
under the presidency of GEORGE WASHINGTON.
ECCLESIASTIAL HISTORY. — The popedom skilfully dealt with
the opposition of Louis XIV., supported by the Council and defended
ly Bossuet, and expressed in the four articles which asserted the
liberties of the Gallican Chiirch. Louis compromised the matter
by not insisting upon the reception of these four articles by the
clergy, but at the same time not permitting any of the clergy to be
prevented from acknowledging their validity, 1693. The arbitrary
conduct of Louis in maintaining the right of asylum in the embassy
at Rome, and in some other points affecting the papal dignity,
rendered Innocent XL favourable to the Augsburg League, and to
the attempt of William III. to dethrone James II. of England.
Similar attempts to those of the Gallican Church were made in
Tuscany by the Grand Duke Leopold, and Bishop Ricci of Pistoia,
1770-1786, but they were suppressed by a council held at
Florence, 1787. In all cases affecting mere temporal interests, the
secular power — (as in the case of the emperor and the Duke
of Savoy) — persisted and accomplished its aims, being thoroughly
interested, and was then the more ready to yield in points
of the reform of discipline and church usages. The order of
the Jesuits, which from the first had been embroiled with the
Dominican and Franciscan orders, fell into discredit with the
Romish powers. They were expelled from Portugal 1759, from
France 1764, and from Spain 1767, in some cases under circum-
stances involving cruel suffering. At length Pope Ganganelli,
Clement XIV., abolished the order, 1773. The Jansenist Controversy
in France was settled by Clement XL, who, in his Bull "Unigenitus,"
1711, forbade the use of Quesnel's Commentary, and considered as
heretical 101 propositions selected from it, many of which were
Scriptural or taken from St. Augustine. Cardinal Noailles was firmly
opposed to this Bull, with many others. Louis XIV. had already
destroyed the monastery of Port Royal, the head-quarters of
Jansenism, and the Jansenists had taken refuge in Holland and
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 431
the Netherlands, where they had many followers. The moderate
Catholics complained that in the Bull " Unigenitus " the points of
difference between the Catholic and Protestant Churches were
unnecessarily paraded, and that by this means the separation of the
Churches would be perpetuated. The disputes between Archbishop
Fenelon and Bishop Bossuet respecting the mysticism of Mad. Guyon,
involving all the leading points in the Molinist Controversy respect-
ing grace and free will, for a time disturbed the quiet of the Romish
Church, and were an additional proof of the mere nominal unity
of that Church, 1695-1699. To compensate for these exhibitions of
intellectual freedom in the Church of France, the ruling powers
carried on the persecutions of the Protestants, at this time numbering
two millions of the population. In 1715, 1717, and in 1724, there
was peculiar activity in this direction. In 1715 there were 188
Protestants in the galleys, released by English intercession. In 1717
an assembly of seventy-four Protestants at Audure being surprised,
the men were sent to the galleys and the women to prison. In
1724, when the rulers were generally sceptical, a new law was
made, punishing with the galleys any private exercise of Protestant
worship, and with death every Protestant pastor. One of these was
hanged at Montpelier in 1728. In 1745, 1746, in Dauphiny, 277
Protestants were condemned to the galleys. So late as 1762 there
were in the galleys thirty-three men, and sixteen women in prison, in
Languedoc, many of whom had been in this state more than thirty
years. In 1761, 1762 the affair of the Galas family, at Toulouse,
judicially murdered as Protestants, called forth the talents of
Voltaire, who roused the public opinion of Europe on the side
of justice, and thus compelled the reconsideration of the case,
which led to the vindication of the innocence of the victims in
1765. In 1774 the Protestants were restored to civil rights, and in
1787 were placed in full possession of all rights, equal with the
Catholics. In Poland the ruling powers impartially burnt an atheist,
1686 or 1689, at Warsaw, and in 1733 expelled all dissidents
(non-Romanists) from the holding of public employments. In 1724,
some disturbances having arisen at Thorn, sixty-six Lutheran
citizens were tried, of whom twenty six were at once executed
and forty imprisoned, Protestantism being the real fault. This
atrocity was disapproved of by the Pope, the emperor, the czar,
the King of Prussia, and was reprobated by the public feeling of
Europe. In Hungary (under the House of Austria) the Protestants
were compelled by Charles VI. (the father of Maria Theresa) to
swear " by the Virgin Mary and all saints," thus excluding them
432 From the English Revolution^ 1688 A.D., to the
from legal defence. The animus of the governing classes may be
inferred from the fact that in 1747 a society was formed "for the
extermination of the Protestant religion," and that the government
forbade the Protestants to restore decayed churches without permis-
sion, or to study in foreign lands. Joseph II. gave full toleration in
1781. In Germany Catholicism and Protestantism had their several
territories, within which the rulers decided the religious profession of
the people — a proof of the general indifference to religious convictions.
In Catholic governments the Protestants were generally persecuted.
At Saltzburg 17,000 Protestants emigrated and took refuge in Prussia,
Holland, or in the New English colony of Georgia, 1732-4. In some
of the Protestant states Catholics were placed under legal disabilities.
There was very little of real religion before and during the great
war of thirty years, from 1618 to 1648, and the following wars
which were carried on during the eighteenth century were unfavour-
able to the peace and prosperity of the Churches. To revive the
old evangelical truths of the fathers of the Reformation was the
object of Spener, Francke, and others ; by whom the University of
Halle, founded in 1694 by the Duke Frederick, was greatly
influenced. They founded there the Orphan Home in 1698, and,
with this, societies which were called " Colleges of Piety," and on
this account the high orthodox Lutherans gave the new religionists
the name of Pietists. Attempts were made to unite the Lutheran
and Evangelical Churches from 1703 to 1736. Meanwhile the
writings of the English Deists produced a school of learned
imitators. The German Rationalism, beginning with Edelmann
of Weissenfels, 1735-1767, was popularised by the Wolfenbiittel
fragments of Reimarus, published by Lessing in 1774. From these
originated the Biblical-critical school of Semler, Rosenmiiller,
Eichhorn, and others. The Church of the Moravian Brethren,
which may be traced to the Hussites of Bohemia, revived under
the patronage of Count Zinzendorff. Their head settlement was at
Herrenhut, 1727, from which they sent out their missionaries to
various parts of Germany, England, and the West Indies.
THE ENGLISH ESTABLISHED CHURCH was delivered from the
fear of popery and oppression by the Revolution of 1688, 1689.
The bishops, having suffered from the tyranny of James II., which
called forth the sympathies both of Churchmen and Nonconformists,
it was hoped that a reunion of all the religious parties might be
effected ; but the Bill for Comprehension^ though supported by all the
influence of William, failed, 1689, in the Parliament, partly through the
opposition of High Churchmen, and partly through the indifference
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 433
of the Dissenters. Very likely the treatment suffered by the two
hundred Episcopalian clergy in SCOTLAND, who, on the re-establish-
ment of Presbyterianism, were rudely and roughly " raddled," i.e.,
expelled from their homes by a mob, lessened the desire for a union.
The Toleration y^:/ received the royal assent May 24, 1689. "By
shielding dissent, the law .... might also be said, in certain
sense, to establish it .... it produced a relative change in the
legal position of the Establishment .... that Church ceased to be
national in the sense in which it had been so before. It could no
longer claim all Englishmen, as by sovereign right, worshippers
within its pale ; it gave legalised scope for difference of religious
action." ] The last ten years of the seventeenth century witnessed the
firm establishment and consolidation of the various sections of the
nonconforming portion of the community, the Presbyterians, the
Independents, the baptists, and the Society of friends (better known as
Quakers). Gradually the Presbyterian congregations either merged
into orthodox independent Churches, or by degrees adopted Arian
or Socinian views. The common term, that of Congregationalism,
began to be used as comprehending all the dissidents except the
Friends. At the time of the Revolution there were twenty small
academies, chiefly in the hands of the so-called " sectaries " (the
popular term of reproach), with about two hundred and seventy-
three congregations, and it is calculated that not more than one-
twentieth of the population were formally connected with these
Churches. Under William the policy of the government in the
appointment of bishops was somewhat latitudinarian in the opinion
of the more zealous Churchmen, but the parochial clergy appointed
by the lay patrons were generally High Church in religious opinion,
and in politics disaffected to the Revolution. Under Archbishops
Tillotson and Tenison, and such bishops as Burnett, the convocation
of the clergy was accompanied by reactionary efforts, and, after its
prorogation in 1691, it was not again permitted to meet until 1701.
On the accession of QUEEN ANNE in 1702, the High Church party
was in the ascendant; the queen gave up the sum of ;£i 7,000, due
for the "first-fruits," to the benefit of the working clergy. A plan
for the building of fifty additional churches in London was zealously
patronised, but, through the usual extravagance of builders and
others, only eleven were built. A bill against occasional conformity,
after repeated failures in 1702, 1703, 1704, was at last passed by the
creation of twelve new peers in 1714. This bill has been described
1 Dr. Stoughton, vol. v. p. 96.
2 F
434 From the English Revolution, 1688 A. D., to the
as " a bold attempt to repeal the Toleration Act, and to bring back
the pains and penalties of the times before the Revolution." * It
imposed severe penalties on all officials who, after receiving the
sacrament at church as a qualification for office, should, while in
office, be present at any conventicle (the contemptuous term for all
places of worship belonging to the " sectaries "). Sacheverell's preach-
ing, 1709, 1710, had greatly helped to promote the political-
religious feeling which made this bill popular. It was followed by
the Schism Act, the favourite measure of the sceptical Lord
Bolingbroke, in aid of the religious purity of the Established
Church, by which no one was permitted to keep a public or a
private school unless he be a member of the Church of England
and licensed by the bishop. This act has been called one of the
worst acts that ever defiled the Statute Book. It never took effect,
for, the day on which its operation was to commence, the queen
died, January, 1714. Besides the Nonconformists, there was a
small body of NONJURORS, consisting of certain bishops and clergy
and a few laity, who had declined to take the oath of allegiance
to the new government, but these by degrees, dying, "left few
successors, and were gradually absorbed by the Established Church.
BISHOP KEN was one of these. On the accession of George I.,
the act on Occasional Conformity and the Schism Act were repealed.
The Con vocations of the Clergy were suspended in 1717 (until 1854),
but the fear of the influence of the clergy in the elections prevented
the abolition of the Test Act, which was deemed a necessary
safeguard against popery, though attempts were made from 1730 to
1736 to obtain its repeal. The jealous feeling against Dissenters
was shown in the attempt to interfere with the academies for the
training of Nonconformist divines ; but the decision of the law
courts, in 1733, placed them in a secure and legal position. The
government was mostly favourable to religious liberty, and the
Regium Donum, the personal grant of the king to the Presbyterians,
which in 1672 was ;£6oo, and under William III. was raised to^i,2OO,
was increased under George I. In 1-784 it was ^2,000, and in
X792 ;£5)°°°- From the complaints and statements of members
of the Church of England, it would appear that for many years,
during the reigns of the first two Georges, the higher interests of the
Establishment were generally neglected. There was, for a long period,
a series of insignificant archbishops. "Carlyle pertinently asks,
' Who was the primate of England at this time ? ' and he answers
1 Perry's "History," vol. iii. p. 145.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 435
with bitter irony, ' No man knoweth.' Nor was this far from the
truth. There were contented Erastians, like Wake and Potter,
carrying on controversies, now entirely forgotten, as they well
deserve to be. There were men full of decencies and proprieties
like Seeker. But who cares to know what Archbishops Herring,
Hutton, or Moore thought, said or did? .... They never
attempted to guide or elevate the religious destinies of the nations
over whose Church they carelessly presided, and the same might
be said of the great body of the clergy." * The bishops are com-
plained of as aristocratic, latitudinarian, and secular. One family
of an archbishop held sixteen rectories, and one of his sons-in-law
received eight different preferments estimated at ^10,000 a year.
They are accused of being absent from their dioceses, lax in the
discharge of their duties, and indifferent in the exercise of dis-
cipline, more especially in the examination of candidates by their
chaplains. The parochial clergy appear to have been generally ill
provided for in a large number of parishes; the Church services and
the churches themselves neglected. 3 It is useless to refer to the
state of the Universities, described by the same pen, pp. 470, 471.
There were, however, sundry controversies, which imply some
interest in religious doctrines. They were carried on by leading
clergymen. The Trinitarian, 1694-1698, in which Sherlock and
South were opponents; the Arian controversy, 1712-1719, in which
Whiston and Clarke were engaged; the Bangorian controversy
respecting the limits of political and ecclesiastical authority was
conducted with great fierceness, 1717. Hoadly was opposed by
Sherlock, and fifty others followed on both sides, so that above
seventy pamphlets were published.
There were also, amid the general indifference, many Churchmen
deeply interested in the Church and in Christianity. Certain religious
societies, commenced in 1672 by Horneck and Woodward, were multi-
plied, especially in London. To these religious societies, independent
of all Nonconformity or Methodism, the EVANGELICAL CLERGY may
trace their origin. Then an Association for the Suppression of Vice,
1691; the Society for Promoting^ Christian Knoivledge, 1698;
and the Society for Propagating the Gospel, 1701, which sent out
many Church missionaries, to the colonies especially. It was the
noble carrying out of the project put forth in the time of the
1 "History of the Church of England," by Rev. W. N. Molesworth, pp.
297, 298.
'2 "Eighteen Centuries of the Church of England," by Rev. A. H. Hore, 8vo.,
pp. 542-546, 1 88 1.
2 F 2
436 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
Commonwealth. The Boyle Lecture in defence of revealed
religion against infidelity was instituted in 1691, and produced the
able discourses of Bentley in confutation of atheism. Berkeley, to
whom Pope ascribed "every virtue under heaven," attempted to
establish a missionary college in the Bermudas, 1726-1734, but
receiving no adequate support retired to England and became
Bishop of Cloyne, 1735. The Bampton Lecture was instituted in
1780. Both these lectures called forth sermons, which, however
useful at the time, have been superseded by writings suited to the
altered position of apologetical controversy. Among the clergy
were found many whose views differed greatly from the plain mean-
ing of the formularies of their Church. By these, attempts were
made, by application to the Parliament, to set aside the necessity of
subscription to the Articles (1771, 1772), but without effect. One
great institution, that of Sunday schools, commenced by Richard
Raikes, at Gloucester, 1781-1783, had an immediate practical
bearing upon the religious training of the rising generation. These
schools have been maintained with increasing efficiency by all the
churches of the nineteenth century.
The NONCONFORMIST CHURCHES increased after the Revolution
had given a practical toleration to dissent, and in 1715 there were
one thousand one hundred and fifty congregations in England ; in
1776, one thousand five hundred and nine congregations. But
with them, as with the Established Church, there was observable a
great difference in theological literature and in the pulpit deliverance,
in the age of the two first Georges. "We miss Anglican and
Puritan sweep of thought, minuteness of detail, intensity of utter-
ance, and show of passion We meet with regularity, order,
smoothness. It is the age of Renaissance in Divinity. x Much
of the fire and force of a previous age had died out, but a good
deal of that unction which gave a charm to the best preachers of the
Commonwealth continued still." By degrees the character of the
pulpit ministrations was changed both in the Church and in the
dissenting congregations. A writer in the reign of George I. com-
plains of " the way of preaching in the Church " being such " as
ordinary sort of people are not capable of receiving any benefit by,"
and adds that dissenting preachers "are running into the same
strain, and nibbling at rhetoric as well as we." 3 It cannot be
denied that there was a general deadness in all the churches.
1 Stoughton, vol. v. pp. 249, 443.
1 Wadington's "Congregational History," 1700-1800, pp. 22-24.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 437
Sermons, which are now found to be unreadable, were, no doubt
felt to be unbearable. By the growth of religious indifference, a
way was prepared for the favourable consideration of the Deistical
writings which appeared in England from 1660 to 1780, from Lord
Herbert, Hobbes, Blount, Morgan, Tindal, Lord Bolingbroke, and
others, and to which suitable replies appeared from Halyburton,
Howe, Butler, Bentley, Lardner, Leland, Doddridge, Lyttelton, and
others. Lord Chesterfield, though indifferent to religious truth,
perceived the weak side of the Deistical views, and exposed them
to ridicule in " the Creed of the Freethinkers." : Nothing, how-
ever, short of a revival of spiritual religion could meet the case,
and " the last echoes of the Deistical controversy had not ceased
when it was rumoured that Wesley and Whitfield were attracting
to the churches crowds of people who professed to realise in them-
selves the truths of that religion which the Deists are said to have
assailed." 3 The history of this great revival has been given by
Mahon (Earl Stanhope), and by Lecky, as well as by Episco-
palian and Nonconformist writers. It was an appeal to the
consciousness of sin and the need of peace with God which most
men feel, and which few choose to admit. It produced directly a
great improvement in the spiritual state, chiefly of the poor and of
the rising class of the population ; it roused the Churches to labour
sacrificially and lovingly in the evangelical work, and prepared
England to withstand the revolutionary and infidel teachings with
which the country was flooded after the establishment of the French
Republic, 1789-1793.
In SCOTLAND, the Presbyterian Church was established bylaw, 1689.
The leading division in this Church has been the Secession Church
in 1743, which in 1747 was split into Burgers and Anti-Burgers.
The parochial schools, established by Act of Parliament, 1615, and
enjoined 1656, have done much to advance the education and
stimulate the exertions of Scottish youths in their pursuits in after-
life.
In IRELAND, Protestantism suffered while James II. held possession
in 1691. The Episcopalians •, who from the time of the Scotch
colonisation of Ulster, in the reign of James I., had opposed and
persecuted their fellow-Protestants, because, as Presbyterians, they
refused to conform to the Anglican Church, were kept in check by
the Toleration enforced by William III. and the Georges. It is
1 Published in The World, 1735, 1736.
2 Hunt's " Religious Thought in England," vol. iii. p. 395.
438 From the English Revolution 1688 A.D., to the
much to be regretted that the Roman Catholics were regarded as
beyond the pale of the law, and the injustice with which they were
treated must be condemned by every candid Protestant.
In RUSSIA, Peter the Great abolished the Patriarchate, and made
himself the head of the Greek Church. He appointed, in 1721,
"the Holy Legislative Synod." Catherine II. confiscated the
landed property of the Church, granting salaries to the clergy, and
tolerated the Separatists in 1762. These Separatists are remarkable
for the ridiculous peculiarities which necessitated their dissent from
the Greek Church.
In TURKEY and the East, the Greek and other of the Eastern
Churches were tolerated by the Turkish and Persian governments.
ABYSSINIA, after enduring no small annoyance from the wars provoked
by the missions of the Jesuits, retained its questionable Christianity
nominally in connexion with the Coptic .Churches of Egypt.
CHRISTIAN MISSIONS were continued and enlarged by the Roman
Catholics under the direction of the Propaganda in Rome, in India,
China, and the East, also in the Spanish, and Portuguese, and French
colonies in America. XAVIER in India, and RICCI in China, deserve
to be remembered for their self-denying labours. The Romish
missionaries, in zeal and self-sacrifice, far exceeded the efforts of the
Protestant Churches, and the sufferings of the missionaries and the
converts in China and Japan were beyond all ever experienced. The
DUTCH had missions in Ceylon and Java, in which secular motives
were unfortunately largely influential on the minds of the natives.
The American Puritans, assisted by their friends in Britain, sent
the celebrated John Elliot as a missionary to the Indians ; he died
1690. After him David Brainherd, who died 1 747, followed by many
others. The German Lutherans sent John Egede to Greenland, 1721,
a mission patronised by. the kings of Denmark and Sweden. He
was followed by the Moravian Brethren, 1732, who also began a
mission to the Negroes in the West Indies. The German Mission
to INDIA, under Ziegenbalg, commenced in 1703, and was
assisted by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in
England. Its greatest name is that of Schwartz, who died 1758,
after a labour of 40 years. These missions were patronised by the
kings of England and of Denmark. The English Methodists sent
out missionaries to revive the religious feeling of the American
colonists in 1769, and to the West Indies. The great Methodist
Episcopal Church of America originated in these missions to America.
There was nothing new in this revival of missionary enterprise in
England. During the Civil War before the Commonwealth, the
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 439
Parliament, 1644, contemplated the establishment of a corporation
for promoting the preaching of the Gospel in New England, to be
supported by a general collection, and to be empowered to hold
land to the value of ^2000.
LITERARY HISTORY. — The large and increasing number of
eminent gifted writers in every department of literature and science
in this transition period between the English and the French revolu-
tions makes it impossible to do more than chronicle a few leading
names in each department of knowledge. The so-much decried
eighteenth century was a period of progress, quiet and gradual,
almost unnoticed in the histories of contemporaries, which were
mainly occupied with the narratives of the wars for extension of
territory, undertaken to gratify the ambition of the ruling powers,
and in which the interests of the people were systematically dis-
regarded. If, in reviewing the history of this period, characterised
by bloody and destructive wars, which, with one exception, had no
ground of justification, we at the same time form a true estimate of
the gross immorality, luxurious self-indulgence, and disregard of all
the duties and decencies of morality on the part of the sovereigns
and higher classes, more especially from the middle of the seven-
teenth century ; hence we look upon the great catastrophe of the
French Revolution as one of those great and dreadful " days of the
Lord," in which He manifests His judgments as the Moral Governor
of the world.
i. England. — Neither science nor literature was patronised by the
revolutionary government of 1688, nor by the Hanoverian Dynasty.
The era of Queen Anne has been called the Augustan age of English
literature (1701-1715), but few of the ornaments of that period
received any encouragement from the government, except in
connexion with political partisanship. Some few literary men were
noticed by King George III., but for the most part the booksellers
were the Maecenas of literature. A few writers met with patronage
and support from the public, but the majority, even of our ablest
authors, found it difficult to live in comfort. In Mathematical and
Astronomical science, the leading names are Sir Isaac Newton,
1642-1727; J. Harison, the inventor of the chronometer, 1699-
1776; Halley, 1673-1742; Flainsteed, 1720; Bradley, 1728.
Maclaurin, 1720; Ferguson, 1710-1776; Hutton, 1737-1823!
Sir W. Herschell, 1740-1826. In Chemistry : J. Black, 1750-1799!
Cavendish, 1749-1810; Jos. Priestly, 1733-1804; Sir Joseph
Banks, the companion of Cooke in his voyage, cultivated science,
and was the President of the Royal Society, 1743-1810. In
440 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
Medicine and Anatomy, the name of J. Hunter, 1728-1793, and of
W. Hunter, 1718-1783, are noticed. The great Architects: Sir J,
Vanbrugh, 1666-1726; Gibbs, 1674-1754; Kent (gardening),
1684-1748; Wyatt, 1743-1813; Lord Burlington, the patron of
architecture, 1700-1720. The great Musicians were Purcell, 1658-
1699; Dr. Burney, 1726-1814. The Painters were Hogarth,
1697-1764; Sir G. Kneller, 1672-1726; Sir Joshua Reynolds,
1723-1792; Sir J. Thornhill, 1715-1734; R. Wilson, 1749-1781;
B. West, 1738-1820; Gainsborough, 1745-1788; Romney, 1756—
1802; J. S. Copley, 1775-1815; Barry, 1763-1806; Sir Thomas
Laurence, 1769-1830. The Engravers were G. Vertue, 1709-1750 ;
Thomas Bewick, 1787-1828; John Bewick, 1760-1795. In
Engineering works, in canals, and bridges, and roads, we have the
Duke of Bridgwater, 1748-1803; Metcalf, 1717-1800; Brindley,
1716-1772; Smeaton, 1724-1792. For Steam Machinery: Watt,
1736-1819; Bolton, 1728-1809; Roebuck, 1718-1764; for
after Improvements : Arkwright, 1732-1792; Strutt, 1760-1771;
Compton, 1776; Hargreaves, 1760-1778. The Great Voyagers of
this period were the circumnavigators, Lord Anson, 1740-1744;
Byron, 1740-1764; Wrallis, 1766-1768; Carteret, 1766-1769;
James Cooke, 1768-1779. The discovery and examination of the
east coast of New Holland by Cook led to the settlement at
Botany Bay, and to the colonisation of Australia and New Zealand.
The travels of James Bruce in Abyssinia, 1 730-1 794, created a general
interest in East Africa. Arthur Young, 1775-1820, travelled in the
United Kingdom and in France, examining the state of agriculture,
and his writings are our best authorities as to the state of agriculture
at that time. Oriental and Biblical literature has never been
neglected altogether in England: Hody, 1654-1706, re-edited the
Septuagint ; Kennicott commenced his collection of MSS. of the
Hebrew Bible, and laboured diligently, 1748-1782; Sir W. Jones
cultivated Sanscrit literature, 1746-1794; the Asiatic Society of
Calcutta was founded, 1784; Bishop Lowth, 1710-1787; Mills's
new edition of the Greek Testament, 1707; George Campbell on
the Gospels, 1728-1759; Dr. Geddes, a Romish priest, published a
translation of the Old Testament, 1769-1802. In Philology and
Criticism: BENTLEY, 1694-1742; Person, 1759-1808; Hudson,
1684-1729; Barnes, 1678-17*0; J. Harris, 1761-1786 ; J. Home
Tooke, 1736-1812; Thomas and John Wharton, 1749-1800. The
Monthly Review, established 1749; the Critical Review, established
J756 ; the Gentleman's Magazine, by Cave, 1731 ; the Daily Evening
Register, 1785, became, in 1788, THE TIMES. Law : The London.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 441
Gazette had been established, 1663 ; the liberty of the Press followed
after the Revolution in 1692 ; Lord Mansfield, 1730-1793, is one of
the great legal authorities ; Blackstone, in his Commentaries, 1 746,
was the great expOunder of the principles of our English law;
the letters of JUNIUS, in 1767-1769, led to the discussion of great
constitutional questions ; Jeremy Bentham laboured for law reform
and codification, 1767-1832. Political Economy was cultivated by
SirW. Petty, 1643-1687; R. Wallace, 1753; Sir J. Stewart, 1767;
by EDMUND BURKE, 1770-1797; but the great work of ADAM
SMITH, 1733-1780, on the Wealth of Nations, published 1776, is
the leading work even to the present time. The Historians may be
classified in relation to their several subjects :— (i) Antiquarian :
Sir W. Dugdale, 1638-1686; Hearne, 1680-1735; Strutt, 1770-
1802; Whitaker, 1773-1775. (2) Collections: The Ancient and
Modern Universal History, 62 vols., 8vo., 1736-1765; Blair's
Chronology, 1761-1782 ; Dodsley's Annual Register, commenced
1758, and continued to this day. (3) Greece: Gilles, 1747-1830.
(4) Rome: Hooke, 1744-1827; A. Ferguson, 1724-1816; GIBBON,
The Fall of the Roman Empire, 1717-1794. (5) England:
Rymer's Foedera, 1638-1713 ; Echard, 1671-1712 ; Carte, 1684-
1754; Rapin (English translation), 1728; HUME, 1711-1736;
Smollett, 1721-1771; Henry, 1718-1790. (6) Scotland: D. Dal-
rymple, 1776-1779; J. Dalrymple, 1721-1728; Gilbert Stuart,
1767-1782; ROBERTSON, 1721-1793, wrote History of Scot-
land, Charles V., India, &c. (7) Spain: Watson, 1730-1781.
(8) Mythological History: Jacob Bryant, 1740-1804. (9) India:
Orme, 1763-1778. (10) Commerce: Anderson, 1764. (n) Eccle-
siastical History : Jortin, 1715-1770; Conyers Middleton, 1700-1750,
published critical remarks on portions of ecclesiastical history;
JOSEPH MILNER, 1744-1797, whose history does justice to real
Christianity in the Romish and other Churches, but is too evangelical
in its views to be acceptable to extreme Broad or High Churchmen,
by whose organs it is zealously traduced ; J. Bingham, " Origines
Ecclesiastics," 1710-1722, is invaluable in the study of ecclesiastical
history. It is scarcely necessary to remark that HUME and GIBBON
have left two works which will last as long as the language. Gibbon
has been re-edited and annotated repeatedly. Hume requires the
same friendly criticism, for which abundant material exists. The
Theological writers of this period are numerous. In connexion
with the Church of England are Dr. John Scott, 1691 (Christian
Life); Horneck, 1660-1690; men deeply interested in the revival
of religion by the formation of select societies in London. The great
442 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
doctrinal writers are Waterland, 1704-1740, Bishop Bull, 1678-1756,
and Bishop BUTLER, 1718-1752. Soame Jenyns, 1741-1787, Stil-
lingfleet, 1657-1699; Lord Lyttelton, 1730-1773; Leslie, 1680-17 20;
PALEY, 1733-18063 defended the outworks of Christianity. Whitby,
1660-1726, Samuel Clarke, 1661-1729, Bishop Hoadley, 1676-
1761, Bishop WARBURTON, 1776-1779, and Bishop HORS^LEY, 1733-
1806, were mighty in controversy. James Hervey, 1714-1758,
John Newton, 1725-1807, HENRY VENN, 1749-1796, belong to
the evangelical revival coincident with the rise of Methodism.
In the Church of Scotland: THOMAS HALYBURTON, 1681-1712;
Blair, 1742-1800; the Erskines, 1680-1752, were all of them very
different but remarkable men. Among the Nonconformists were
ISAAC WATTS, 1698-1748; Leland, 1690-1766 ; Lardner, 1760-
1780; DODDRIDGE, 1726-1757. The two great Wesley an leaders,
JOHN WESLEY, 1703-1791, and JOHN FLETCHER, 1757-1785, have
left writings which to this day remain as specimens of plain,
powerful, faithful expositions of the Word of God, opposed equally
to Antimonianism and Formalism, and advocating the strictest
morality. Those who wish to understand the state of England
in the age of the Georges, up to the close of the eighteenth century,
should read the Journals of Wesley, the lives of the early Methodist
preachers, the biographies of the leading members of the Society of
Friends, and BoswelFs Life of Dr. Johnson, — a very varied literature,
but not the less instructive. Our modern historians are beginning
to see their value. The autobiography of John Newton is connected
with the history of the evangelical revival in England, just as the
life of that extraordinary man, Thomas Halyburton, is with the
history of Presbyterianism in Scotland. Compare these with
Walton's lives of Donne, Hooker, Wotton, Herbert, and Sanderson;
Burnefs lives of Sir Matthew Hale and Lord Rochester, Orme's
lives of Baxter and Owen, and the life of Matthew Henry. In
General Literature and Poetry the list of approved writers is large.
DE FOE, 1685-1731 (Robinson Crusoe);1 ADDISON, 1672-1719
(The Spectator); Steele, 1671-1722 (Tatler, &c.) ; Lord BOLING-
EROKE, 1678-1751 ; SWIFT, 1672-1745 (The Tale of a Tub, Gulli-
ver's Travels, &c.);2 Richardson, 1689-1761. (Novels): LADY.
1 A political partisan, master of plain idiomatic English ; never yet excelled
as a political writer ; a wonderful master of science and nature. England owes
to him thanks for his advocacy of the union with Scotland, and the succession of
the Protestant Dynasty to the United Kingdom.
2 Swift was a born politician, and a strong political partisan, the master of
plain, perspicuous, and powerful English.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 443
MARY WORTLEY MONTAGU, 1716-1762 (Letters); Fielding, 1727-
1754 (Novels) ; Smollett, 1721-1771 (Novels); Lord Kaimes, 1696-
1782 (Philosophy); Lord Chesterfield, 1726-1773 (Letters); Sterne,
1713-1768 (Sentimental Fiction); Horace Walpole, 1761-1797
(Letters); OLIVER GOLDSMITH, 1728-1774 (Essays and Poetry);
Dr. SAMUEL JOHNSON, 1709-1784 (Lexicographer, Essayist, &c.);
James Boswell, 1740-1795 (Biographer); Melmoth, 1742-1789
(translator); H. Brooke, 1706-1783 (Fiction); H. Mackenzie,
1750-1831 (Fiction); R. B. SHERIDAN, 1751-1816 (Dramatist,
Orator, &c.). The Poets are numerous ; chiefly read now in col-
lections and in specimens. POPE, YOUNG, THOMSON, GOLDSMITH,
COWPER, BURNS are yet read with pleasure. The rest are read from
duty by those who wish to know English literature. Wesley and
Thos. Oliver are used devotionally by many who do not discern
the poetical genius of the writers. POPE, 1681-1744 (Homer);
Congreve, 1670-1729 (Dramas); Gibber, 1688-1757 (Dramas);
McPherson, 1738-1796 (Ossian);1 Gay, 1680-1732; Armstrong,
1746-1779; Bishop Percy, 1764 (Reliques) ; Mickle, 1734-1789
(The Lusiads) ; Mason, 1745-1797; Grainger, 1748 (Tibullus) ;
YOUNG, 1681-1765 (Night Thoughts); J. Thomson, 1700-1748 (The
Seasons); COWPER, i73i-i8oo(TheTask, Homer,&c.); Allan Ramsay,
1686-1758 (Scotch Lyrics); Akenside, 1744-1770; Churchill, 1731-
1764; Falconer, 1730-1769; Parnell, 1679-1717; Dyer, 1700-
1758; Collins, 1720-1756; Shenstone, 1714-1764; Hoole,
1762-1783 (Tasso, Ariosto) ; Rowe, 1728 (Lucan) ; Francis, 1743
(Horace); Fawkes, 1767 (Theocritus, &c.) ; CHATTERTON, 1752-
1770 (Poems of Rowley); Home, 1722-1808; Colman, 1762-
1836; BURNS, 1759-1796 (Lyrics in Scotch and English); CHARLES
WESLEY, 1708-1788 (Hymns); THOMAS OLIVER, 1780 ("The God
of Abraham praise " — one of the finest lyrics in our language) ;
Darwin, 1721-1802 (Botanic Garden); Garthe, 1717 (Ovid);
Lewis, 1767 (Statius); Cooke, 1728 (Hesiod). The two great
actors of this period, David Garrick, 1741-1779, and S. Foote,
1742-1772, were literary men.
Our ENGLISH LITERATURE in this period embraces the age of
Anne and the Georges up to the great political convulsions which
gave a new character, not only to the politics, but the literature of
1 The dispute as to the genuineness of Ossian is not yet settled. Gray remarks :
" I remain still in doubt .... though inclined rather to believe them genuine
in spite of the world ; whether they are the inventions of antiquaries, or of a
modern Scotchman, either case is to me alike unaccountable."— Gosse, "Life of
Gray," p. 150.
444 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
Europe. The age of Anne was " the age of taste, of critics, of
style as an elaborare art, a thing cultivated for its own sake. . . . .
Pope brought its poetical utterance to perfection After him
were echoes and repetitions There was a good deal of philo-
sophy and instruction of various sorts conveyed in the mediums of
that melodious verse .... all enunciated .... in rhymes as
correct as Boileau could have desired. It was not according to the
genius of the English language, but it was as excellent a rendering
of the rules of classic French into English, with a vigorous admixture
of English force and robustness into the foreign medium, as could
have been desired A dreary interregnum followed, in which
a few fine voices were heard (by intervals) belonging neither to the
age that was past, nor to the new epoch which was still unrevealed :
Goldsmith, with a fresh and genial note ; Gray, delicate, melodious,
and refined; Collins, too classic for the general taste."1 The
awakening of the new epoch in literature which dawned in the end
of the eighteenth century was prepared by two poets, whom we may
call the precursors of the new age. WILLIAM COWPER became the
reformer of literature. He was bold to say what was in him, and to
say it in his own way .... he broke the spell of Pope, and opened
the way to Wordsworth .... the world would have been a different
world for them if Cowper had not been. BURNS came, like Homer,
from the very fountain-head of life ; nobody had taught him a note,
he had his music from nature, and he took his theme from nature.2
Several Encyclopedias appeared; Chambers's (the first in England),
1729; the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1778, which is now going
through the ninth edition, 4to. Rees's Encyclopedia was being
compiled within this period, but was not published till 1802.
The Philosophy of Locke, 1651-1704, began a new era of English
mental speculation. It was opposed by Shaftesbury, 1691-1713;
by Berkeley the Idealist, 1707-1753; and by Hume, I7ii-i776.3
Locke was followed by Hutcheson, 1694-1747; Hartley, 1720-1755;
Beattie, 1763-1803; and by Reid, 1726-1 796, with some differences.
1 Abridged from Mrs. Oliphant's "Library History of England, Eighteenth
and Nineteenth Centuries," pp. 9-11. 2 Ibid., p. 113.
3 Shaflesbury 's protest against Locke's rejection of everything minute falls back
upon the word " connatural" : he supplied the Scotch school with the term
" common sense"; which he represented as being the same as "natural know-
ledge," and "fundamental reason." Berkeley taught that mind alone existed,
everything else mere phenomena. Hume thought that all mental phenomena con-
sisted of impressions, and of ideas produced by them, and that Berkeley's argument
against the existence of an external world applied equally against the real existence
of mind.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 445
2. French Literature is connected with the peculiar state of society
existing in Paris in the age of Louis XV., — a society limited to a
small circle of the higher classes and of the most celebrated and
fashionable and literary classes, and best described in the following
extracts : — The reign of Louis XV. was remarkable for a state of society,
among the higher and literary classes especially, which was " one
of the most singular social phases which has yet been presented in
the history of man Society, properly so called, the assem-
bling of men and women in drawing-rooms, for the purpose of
conversation, was the most serious as well as the most delightful,
business of life. Talk and discussion in the senate, the market-
place, and the schools are cheap : even barbarians are not wholly
without them. But their refinement and concentration in the salon,
— of which the president is a woman of tact and culture, — this is a
phenomenon which never appeared but in Paris in the eighteenth
century One does not wonder that they did not perceive
that in those graceful drawing-rooms, filled with stately company of
elaborate manners, ideas and sentiments were discussed and
evolved which would soon be more euphonious than profound." *
"We English have no proper conception of the intellectual
French charms of the old salon .... that meaning which the old
attach to 'society,' namely, as another term for the irrepressible
interchange of ideas, — another word for the highest intellectual
excitement, — is far from being our national interpretation for
company." .... Madame de Stael remarks that "conversation
is a talent which only exists in France."2
Literature in the time of Louis XV. had become quite separated
from the court ; but all that was neglected at Versailles was culti-
vated at Paris. Some of Louis XV. 's mistresses, as Madame
Pompadour, affected to patronise certain writers; but the great
impulse to literature was given in the private coteries of certain
learned ladies, some of whom had very questionable private
characters. Madame de Tencin's parties were frequented by
Cardinal Lambertine (afterwards Pope Benedict XIV.), and she
had influence enough to get a cardinal's hat for her brother. This
noble lady had abandoned the conventual life, and had gone, back
to the great D'Alembert, 1718, her son, whom she had abandoned
and disowned. She had been imprisoned in the Bastille on a
charge of having assassinated her lover, 1726. On her death, 1749,
1 J. C. Morison, "Life of Gibbon," p. 48.
3 Quarterly Revieiv, No. clii. p. 12.
446 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
Madame Geoffrin's house was " the first school of bon ton in
Europe." She corresponded with Stanislaus, King of Poland,
Catherine II. of Russia, Maria Theresa, and the King of Prussia.
Though very devout (secretly), she appeared as the patroness of the
fashionable scepticism. Madame du Deffant was her contemporary.
She was visited by the Emperor Joseph, and corresponded with
Walpole and Hume. Mademoiselle L'Espinasse, her friend, began
a rival soiree ; this breach was regarded as a public affair. Madame
Poplinere, in the time of De'Tencin, also gave parties and held salons.
The Farmers-General Pelletier, Baron Holbach, with Baron Grimm,
were distinguished also by their patronage of literature.1
The great writers of France, as well by their excellences as by their
general moral shortcomings, established the character of their literature,
and spread it over Europe. With all its faults, it is a grand literature,
only equalled by that of England, and in our day by Germany, The
following classification displays its variety : — Oriental Literature :
Herbelot, 1625-1695, Bibliotheque Orientale; Gaillaud, 1646-1735,
translator of the Arabian Nights; Du Halde, 1674-1743, History
of China; De Guignes, 1759-1845, the Huns, Moguls, Tartars;
Anquetil, 1754-1805, Persia, the Zend-Avesta ; Calmet, 1622-1757,
Dictionary of the Bible; Astruc, 1751. History : Rapin-Thoyras,
1661-1725, History of England; Rollin, 1661-1741, Ancient and
Roman History; Velley, 1709-1759; Barthelemy, 1750-1830, Ana-
charsis, &c.; Raynal, 1713-96, History of European Commerce in
the East and West Indies ; Maty, 1743-1845; Vertot, 1701-1734;
VOLTAIRE, 1694-1778; Boulainvilliers, 1658-1712 ; Rulhiere, 1735-
1791; St. Simon, 1678-1755; Rivet, 1683-1749; Moreri, 1600,
Historical Dictionary ; Bayle, 1647-1706, the Protestant sceptic, and
the father of literary scepticism; Church History, Tillemont, 1637-
1698; Fleury, 1640-1723, able and learned; Du Pin, 1657-1719,
the fairest of all the Catholic ecclesiastical historians. Natural
History : BUFFON, 1707-1788, who first popularised Natural History.
Science: Maupertuis, 1698-1759; Bougainville, 172 9-1811; La Con-
damine, 1701-1794. Law: MONTESQUIEU, 1689-1755, his works are
more praised than read ; Burlamqui, 1721-1748 ; D'Aguesseau, 1618-
1757 ; D'Argenson, 1724-1764. Literature, Poetry : Le Sage, 1692-
1747, author of Gil Bias; Fontenelle, 1691-1757; De Lille, 1774-
1813 ; Marmontel, 1745-1799 ; Florian, 1768-1794; Beaumarchais,
I732~I799; Grimm, 1776-1807, the German correspondent of Cathe-
rine II., from Paris ; St. Pierre, 1737-1814. Political Economy: Turgot,
1727-1781 ; La Mettrie, 1709-1751; Quesnay, 1694-1774; Bonnet,
1 Schlosser, vol. i. pp. 155, 156.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 447
1720-1793. Metaphysical Philosophy and Social Life: -Rouman,
1712-1778; D'Alembert, 1717-1783; Diderot, 1711-1784; Holbach,
1723-1789; Condorcet, 1743-1794; Condillac, 1746-1780; Hel-
vetius, 1771, — all of them patrons of the sensualistic philosophy.
Biblical Criticism : Astruc, 1753. The Arts: Roubilliac, 1695-
1762. Periodicals: Journal des Savans, Gazette de Trevoux, Mer-
cure de France. Explorers and Navigators : Bougainville, 1729-
1811; La Perouse, 1741-1788.
The sensualistic philosophy, as adopted from a one-sided view of
Locke's system, was popularised in France as a powerful weapon
against Revelation by Holbach, D'Alembert, Diderot, Condorcet,
and Helvetius. Much of the literature of France was Atheistic;
Voltaire, the best of these literary men, endeavoured to maintain a
pure Theistical belief. The famous work, the " Encyclopaedia," 28
vols., folio, 1751-1777, was as sceptical as it dared to be. Diderot,
and D'Alembert, the chief editor, Voltaire, Rousseau, Raynal, and
all the wits of Parisian society, were contributors. This work and
the writings of Voltaire have permeated and saturated the mind of
France, and their power is felt in the literature of the nineteenth
century. Rousseau, almost perfect as to his style, was a sentimental
madman, with sane moments ; his influence, partly for good but more
for evil, is perceptible in the European literature of our day.
3. Sweden. — Botany : Linnasus, 1707-1778; Hasselquist, 1722-
1752. Chemistry: Berzelius, 1729-1800.
4. Denmark. — Holberg, the dramatist, 1684-1754.
5. Holland. — Poetry: Bilderdyk, 1756-1833. Medicine: Boerhaave,
1668-1735.
6. Switzerland. — Medicine: Tissot. National Law : Vattel, 1744-
1767 ; De Lolme, 1771-1806 ; Turretine (Theology). Gesner, 1730-
1787; La vater, 1741-1801 (Physiognomy).
7. Italy. — Natural Science : Galvani. In Political Economy : Vico,
I670-I744;1 BECCARIA, 1735-1793 ;2 Pagano, 1748-1799; Geno-
1 "The great truth which he endeavours to establish in his f Scienza Nuova '
is, that, as the idea of the material world existed in the Divine intellect previous
to the creation of the world, so there must also have existed in it an eternal idea
of the history of mankind ; and that this idea is realised and manifested in the
actual events of history. It is a philosophy of history which he endeavours to
establish, and in which he affirms that a divine providence is discernible through-
out the history of mankind." — "Penny Encyclopaedia," vol. xxvi. p. 298;
Flint's " Vico," Phil. Class., 1884.
2 His work of Crimes and Punishment?, "Trattato dei Delitti e delle Pene,"
is the great work on penal law ; in which the principles of legal restraints and
penalties are fully discussed, with depth and originality as well as with due regard
to humanity. It has been widely circulated in all the languages of Europe.
448 From the English Revolution, 1688 A.D., to the
vesi, 1712-1769; Verri, 1725-179?; Filangieri, 1752-1788. In
History: Muratori, 1672-1750;* Tiraboschi, 1731-1794 ;3 Maffei ;
Giannone, 1 676-1 748 ; 3 Denina. Poetry : Lanzi ; Metastasio, 1698-
1782; Goldoni (the wittiest and most versatile of all dramatists),
1707-1793; Alfieri, 1749-1803 ; Gozzi, 1761; Parini, 1729; Pignotti.
8. German Literature. — Gottschied, next to Opitz, is to be
credited with the revival of modern German literatuture in the ver-
nacular tongue, 1724-1776; though Christian Thomasius had pre-
ceded him in 1687 to 1710, opposing the false taste of his contem-
poraries, and advocating the use of the German language in the
lectures in the universities. The leading Poets of this period are
Gleim/ 1719-1803; Ramler, 1725-1798; Gellert, 1715-1769;
Gaertner, 1712-1719; Hagedorn, 1708-1754; Haller, 1708-1777;
Gessner, 1730-1786 (best known by his Death of Abel); Kleist,
*73i-*759', Biirger, 1748-1794; Herder, 1744-1803; Schiller
(J. F. C. Von), 1759-1808; Klopstock, 1724-1803 (the Messiah);
Voss, 1751-1823 (the unrivalled translator of Homer, &c.); Wie-
land, 1731-1803 (is regarded as too much affected by French prin-
ciples and tastes; Lessing, 1729-1781, is the critic and dramatic
writer whose influence was at once felt by his contemporaries and
successors. There are two comic writers, Hippel, 1741-1796, and
Zacharia, 1726-1737. The Historians were the Magdeburg cen-
turiators : Mosheim, 1690-1750 (methodical, but dry); Schrochk,
1733-1808 (both Church History); G. F. Miiller; Schiller, the poet,
also the historian ; Herder ; and Frederick the Great, King of
Prussia. In Science: Fahrenheit, Reaumur, Mesmer, Bernouilli.
In Law : Puffendorf, 1632-1694. In General Literature ', the book-
seller, C. F. Nicolai, did great service by his "New German Library,"
56 volumes, and his "Library of Belles Lettres,'' 1757-1766;
Niebuhr, "Travels in the East," 1731-1805; and Biisching's writings
are valuable contributions to Geographical science. Winckelmann
wrote on Art, 1738-1768. Music: Handel, Gluck, Bach, Haydn,
Mozart, and Beethoven. Philosophy: the philosophy of J. C. WOLFF,
l679~i754, J- J- Lange, 1670-1744, Rudiger, 1673-1731, Brucker,
1 Muratori was the editor of the "Italian Writers from A.D.5OO to A.D. 1500,"
and of a great work on the " Antiquities of the Middle Ages."
2 Tiraboschi is the historian of Italian literature.
3 In his " Storia Civile del Regno di Napoli," he exposes the means by which
the Romish Church, having invaded every civil jurisdiction, strove to place the
empire under the priesthood ; the work was condemned by the Inquisition, and
Giannone, expelled from Naples, was imprisoned in Turin for twelve years, and
died in prison, 174?.
French Revolution, 1788, 1789 A.D. 449
1696-1770, followed that of LEIBNITZ ; but all the preceding systems
were set aside by that of IMMANUEL KANT, whose " Critique of
Pure Reason" first appeared in 1781, and has left its mark on all
philosophical systems, whether in Germany or elsewhere, which have
since been promulgated. In Biblical Literature, LESSING, by his
publication of the Wolfenbiittel Fragments, 1774-1778 (written by
Reimarus, 1694-1768), may be regarded as the founder of the
Rationalistic school of interpretation ; Semler, Michaelis, Ernesti,
Spalding, and others who lived at the close of this period, were more
or less affected by these writings. BENGELIUS, in his "Commen-
tary," defended with learning and piety the old orthodox creed,
1687-1752. The PHILOSOPHY OF KANT requires some remarks on
the character of the man so different from the Sensualistic philoso-
phers. It is a pleasure to refer to a gem of thought from his philo-
sophy, " There are two things which excite my admiration ; the moral
law within me, and the starry heavens above me.'; So far as it is
possible for an Englishman to understand a German philosophy, we
think that Kant contends, in opposition to the Sensational school,
that there is a REASON, or knowledge, independent of experience,
and which precedes and goes beyond it ; this consists of certain
pure forms of knowledge, the necessary conditions of our experience,
which man himself creates independent of all experience. These
pure forms are forms of intuition or thought ; the forms of intuition
are SPACE and TIME, the forms of thought are the TWELVE CATEGO-
RIES, or original conceptions of the UNDERSTANDING, on which all
the forms of our judgment are conditioned ; these are unity, plurality,
totality, reality, negation, limitation, substantiality, causality, recipro-
cal action, possibility, existence, necessity. These categories are
applicable only to the objects which are in our own conscious-
ness,— the phenomenal and the conditioned. But REASON strives to
attain to the sphere of the unconditioned (the noumena), which com-
prises all supersensible objects that the mind may conceive but
which cannot be the object of perception. These ideas are purely
speculative, for which no corresponding object can be scientifically
shown to exist ; thus, neither the existence of God, nor the freedom
of the will, can be demonstrated. But this Reason is a practical
faculty, which gives the law of human conduct and action, for these
laws present themselves with such absolute necessity that Kant
calls them the CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, and holds that no rational
man can refuse obedience to them.1
1 See articles " Kant " in Encyc. Brit., ninth edition; Tenneman ; Lewes ; and
in Gostwick and Harrison's "History of German Literature."
2 G
450 State of the World, 1788 A.D.
9. Slavonic Literature. — The old songs of the Slavish nations,
the Bulgarians, the Servians, the Bohemians, the Poles, the Croats,
the Wends, and the Russians, have been current among these
people from the earliest period of their tribal existence. Some
notion of them may be formed from the labours of Sir J.
Bowring in his "Anthologies." The Latin writings of learned
Bohemians and Poles do not properly belong to the nation, but
to a clerical class, the Latin literature of the mediaeval period.
Russia boasts of its old chronicler NESTOR, 1056-1115, and, in
common with the other Slav races, it had a national popular lite-
rature, the expression of the minds of the people. All of this
literature that can be rescued from the neglect of generations past
is now being made known by the researches of the learned. The
modern literature is that which interests the general reader, mainly
RUSSIAN, Polish, Bohemian, and Servian. RUSSIAN dates from
the reign of Peter the Great. Prince Kantemier, 1708-1744; Lomo-
nosoff, 1703-1769; Tatishcheff, 1686-1750 (History of Russia);
Kraschennikoff (naturalist), 1713-1755; Soomarokoff (drama),
1718-1777; Kheraskoff (poetry), 1733-1807; Bogdanovich (poetry),
1743-1803; Derjavin (poetry), 1745-1816; Von Viezin (satire);
Karamsin, 1766-1826. In POLAND, Naruszewicz (historian), 1733-
1796; Krasicki (poetry), 1734-1801 ; Niemcewicz, 1765-1841. In
BOHEMIA, Count Slavate, who died, 1658 (history); Pelzel (history),
1775; Parizek, 1753-1823; Dobrowsky (history), 1753-1827.
SERVIA, Obradovich, 1739-1811; George Brankovid, 1645-1711;
John Raich (history), 1726-1801. To most of us these are mere
names, but they are enough to show that there has been laid the
foundation of a Russian, Polish, and Bohemian literature.
State of the World, 1788 A.D.
EUROPE.
SWEDEN (including Finland), with part of Pomerania in Germany,
under Gustavus III.
DENMARK and Norway, including Jutland, Schleswick, Holstein,
and the Islands, with Iceland and Greenland. Christian VII. ,
an imbecile, the government by a regency.
GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. Under George III. since 1760,
Hanover, Bremen, &c., in Germany, to the king as Elector
of Hanover.
State of the World, 1788 A.D. 451
GERMANY : the CONFEDERATION, AUSTRIA, PRUSSIA, SAXONY,
HANOVER, BREMEN, HESSE, MECKLENBURG, BAVARIA, WUR-
TEMBERG, BADEN, and a large number of petty principalities
and free towns, nominally constituting the empire.
AUSTRIA (empire of), under the reformer Joseph II., Austria,
the Tyrol, Carinthia, Salzburg (Germany), Bohemia, Moravia,
Hungary, Croatia ; also the NETHERLANDS, formerly belong-
ing to Spain ; MILAN, formerly belonging to Spain ; Gallicia,
from POLAND.
PRUSSIA. Brandenburg, Silesia, and sundry principalities
scattered in Germany, with part of Poland, WEST PRUSSIA,
and Dantzig. The king Frederick William II.
FRANCE. Its boundaries enlarged since 1688 by the acquisition of
Lorraine and Alsace with Strasburg ; also by a portion of
the old Spanish Netherlands bordering on France. CORSICA,
also conquered by France, 1769. Louis XVI. king.
SWITZERLAND. A confederation of republics very aristocratical in
their constitution.
SPAIN. Under the Bourbon kings after the death of Charles II.;
1700.
PORTUGAL. Under the House of Braganza since the revolt from
Spain, 1640.
ITALY. SARDINIA, Savoy, Piedmont, Montferrat, Sardinia, Nice,
under the King of Sardinia.
NAPLES AND SICILY. Under a king of the Spanish family since
1735, called the Two SICILIES.
MALTA. To the Knights of St. John, by the gift of the
Emperor Charles V. in 1530.
THE STATES OF THE CHURCH. Under the Pope.
TUSCANY, PARMA, and PLACENTIA, MODENA, LUCCA (inde-
pendent duchies nominally, but really under Austria).
MILAN and MANTUA. To the empire — i.e., to Austria.
VENICE (republic of). Italy north of the Po and north-east of
the Addo. Dalmatia.
RAGUSA (a petty republic), dependent on Venice.
MONTENEGRO, independent after the fall of Old Servia in 1389.
GENOA (a republic). CORSICA having rebelled under Paoli,
1755, was ceded to France in 1768.
2 G 2
452 State of the World, 1788 A.D.
POLAND, deprived of one-third of its territory and one-half its popu-
lation in 1772 by the first partition. Stanislaus II. (Ponia-
towski), a mere creature of Russia, was king.
RUSSIA. — RUSSIA in possession of the Crimea bounded on the west
by the Pruth and Poland ; Courland and LITHUANIA formed
part of the Russian empire. Catherine II. was the empress
in 1788.
TURKEY, separated from Russia by the Pruth, includes Bessarabia,
Moldavia, Wallachia, and all south of the Danube, including
Greece, Albania, Bosnia, Servia.
HOLLAND. — The Seven United Provinces under the Stadtholder,
who was maintained in office by the power of Prussia.
ASIA.
RUSSIA IN ASIA. Siberia pressing southwards and eastwards over
the barbarous tribes. Its extreme eastern boundary and
separation from America was first discovered by Behring,
1728, whose name is given to the strait which separates the
two continents.
TURKEY IN ASIA. Asia Minor, Syria, and all west of the Tigris.
Arabia nominally Turkish, disturbed by the Wahabee sect,
PERSIA. East of the Tigris bounded by Afghanistan.
AFGHANS checked by Persia ; generally independent. DURANI
Dynasty, founded 1747, invaded India and Persia.
INDIA. The Mogul power extinct. The Seiks and Mahrattas are the
chief northern powers. The English the predominant power.
CHINA under the Mantchu Dynasty.
JAPAN under the Tycoons.
AFRICA.
EGYPT to the Turks. Ali Bey, the Mameluke, was master of Egypt,
1766-1773.
TRIPOLI nominally Turkish. Since 1683 under Hamet Caramanti
and his descendants.
TUNIS nominally Turkish, governed by its own Beys.
State of the World, 1788 A.D. 453
ALGIERS nominally Turkish, governed by its own Beys. Repeatedly
bombarded by the French and others on account of the piracies.
A new form of government by Deys and a Council, 1710.
MOROCCO under its Xeriffs.
ABYSSINIA. SHOA independent of Abyssinia, 1700. Visited by
James Bruce, 1769-1771.
AMERICA (NORTH).
CANADA, NOVA SCOTIA, CAPE BRETON, NEWFOUNDLAND. British
colonies, with the Bermudas ; also Honduras.
THE UNITED STATES, thirteen colonies (Georgia the latest, founded
by General Oglethorpe, 1732 included).
MEXICO, the FLORIDAS, CALIFORNIA, NEW MEXICO, and LOUISIANA,
subject to SPAIN.
AMERICA (SOUTH).
TERRA FIRMA, PERU, CHILI, La Plata, with Buenos Ayres to Spain.
BRAZIL to Portugal.
CAYENNE to England, France, and Holland.
WEST INDIAN ISLANDS.
CUBA and PORTO Rico to Spain.
JAMAICA to England, also the Bahamas.
HAYTI (San Domingo) to France and Spain.
THE CARIBBEE ISLANDS, Barbadoes, to England. Martinique, to
France. Trinidad, to Spain. St. Eustatius, St. Bartholomew
to Holland. St. Thomas, to the Danes. The other islands
either to England, France, or Spain, according to the chances
of war.
TWELFTH PERIOD,
The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815.
I. — Introductory.
THE causes of the great Revolution in France, and its subsequent
history, will be the easier to understand by first acquainting ourselves
with the condition of France previous to 1788.
The Modern French Monarchy, which commenced with the acces-
sion of Hugh Capet, 689, has been formed out of the independent
dukedoms, baronies, and counties, which at that time occupied the
territory which is now called France. Hugh Capet was the most
powerful of these barons, and was ruler over Picardy, the Isle of
France and the Orleanais, provinces in the very centre of France.
By degrees his successors, by absorbing the other provinces, formed
the France of our modern maps. Berry was united to the
crown by Philip I., noo; Touraine, 1203; Normandy, 1205, by
Philip II.; Languedoc, 1271, by Philip III. ; Champagne, 1285 ;
Lyonnois, 1310, by Philip IV.; Dauphind, 1349, by Philip VI.;
Poitou, Aunis, Saintoigne, 1372, by Charles V.; Guienne, 1353, by
Charles VIII. ; Burgundy, 1477 ; Anjou, Maine, Provence, 1481,
by Louis XL; Bretagne, 1515; Bourbonnais, March e, 1528, by
Francis L; Limousin, 1589; Beam, Foix, 1589, by Henry IV.;
Auvergne, 1615; Rousillon, 1642, by Louis XIII.; Alsace, 1628;
Flanders, Artois, 1659; Nivernais, 1659; Franche-Comte, 1674, by
Louis XIV.; Lorraine, 1738; Corsica, 1769, by Louis XV.
The Pays-d'ctat were Flanders, Provence, Bdarn, Lower Navarre,
Bigorre, Foix, Soule, Armagna, Nebouran, and Marsau. These
The Revolution in France, 1788, to the Peace of Paris. 455
states voted their own taxation and managed, to a great extent, their
own local affairs.
The Parliaments (parlements) were those of Paris, Toulouse,
Grenoble, Bordeaux, Dijon, Rouen, Aix, Rennes, Pau, Metz, Besan-
gon, Douay, and Nancy ; thirteen in all. These were originally
courts or councils, consisting of the great vassals and prelates, to
decide on questions affecting those holding lands from the Crown.
Philip the Fair established them as courts of justice and finance.
By the law called the paulette, the judges were enabled to make their
offices hereditary by a payment annually of a sixtieth part of the
value of their offices. The Parliament of Paris was the most
remarkable, and, from the fact of its being accustomed to register
the royal edicts, began to assert the right of refusal, which brought
it in collision with the kings, and led to the holding of the lits de
justice, in which the kings on their own authority compelled the
necessary enregistrement ; these parliaments had no sympathy with
popular rights, and never contemplated popular representation.
The condition of France, economical and financial, has been
thoroughly investigated by Taine : — (i) Population, about twenty-
six or twenty-seven millions in 1788. The privileged classes consisted
of about one hundred and forty thousand nobles, forming some
twenty-five to thirty thousand families, and one hundred and thirty
thousand clericals, i.e., twenty-three thousand monks in two thousand
five hundred monasteries j thirty-seven thousand nuns in one thou-
sand five hundred convents; sixty thousand cures and vicars in
charge of as many churches and chapels ; thus, in each square
league in all France and to every thousand of the population, there
was one noble family with its mansion, in each village a cure and
church, and in every six or seven leagues a conventual body. At
present there are in France, or were under Louis Napoleon, fifty-
one thousand secular clergy, eighteen thousand five hundred monks,
and eighty-six thousand three hundred nuns, in a population of
thirty-eight millions. (2) The Land: Various statements as to the
distribution of the land are given ; one is that one-fifth of the soil
belonged to the Crown and the commoners ; one-fifth to the third
estate ; one-fifth to the rural population ; one-fifth to the clergy ;
one-fifth to the nobles ; so that, deducting the public lands, the
privileged classes owned one-half of the kingdom. It is calculated
that one-third of the land consisted of small proprietors, who in
Alsace, Flanders, Beam, and the north of Bretagne were in comfort-
able circumstances, but in Lorraine and Champagne there was
great poverty through the extreme subdivision of the land ; the re-
456 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
maining two-thirds to the higher classes. At present one-third of the
land (eighteen millions of hectares), is divided among one hundred
and eighty-three thousand great landholders; fourteen millions of
hectares among seven hundred thousand middle-class holdings, and
fourteen millions among about four millions of peasant farmers.
Some other holdings are very small, owing to the division of land
on the death of the head of the family ; thus there has been no
change in the number of the peasant proprietors ; the change is
seen in the seven hundred thousand middle-class proprietors, the
result of the Revolution of 1788. The holdings in 1788 : nine
millions of small cultivators to twenty-seven millions of hectares.
In 1870, twenty-three millions of hectares held by small proprietors
and metayers, of which eight millions were rented ; nine and a half
millions by wealthy landholders • four and a half millions in petite
culture, and four and a half barren. (3) The productive power of the
land: in 1788, forty million hectolitres of wheat, equal to one
hundred and sixty-seven litres per head of the population ; cattle,
thirty-three millions. At the present time, 1876, there are raised seventy
million hectolitres of wheat, equal to two hundred and eight litres
per head of the population, and forty millions of cattle in 1 840. The
vegetable productions in 1738 were valued at two thousand millions of
francs, they are now six thousand millions ! (4) Imports and Exports :
in 1788, the imports were five hundred and seventy-six millions ; the
exports, five hundred and forty millions. At present, imports, one
thousand eight hundred millions, and the exports one thousand eight
hundred millions. (5) Finance : in 1785, the receipts from the taxes
five hundred and fifty-eight millions of livres, with forty-one millions
for local expenditure, about six hundred millions ; the Church
raised one hundred and thirty-three millions, and other taxes made
up about eight hundred and eighty millions, equal to two thousand
four hundred millions of the present French money.1
II. — The Causes of the Revolution.
i. The French Revolution was not caused merely by the financial
difficulties which had compelled the king to convoke the States-
General. A government out of funds was no novelty in France, and
was not of itself likely to occasion any serious alarm. Louis XIV.
left a debt of about one hundred and twenty millions sterling,
with which the Regent D'Orleans dealt very economically and
reduced considerably. Louis XV. left to his successor a debt of
one hundred and eighty-three millions sterling, of which the interest
1 The statistics are from Taine.
Peace of Paris •, November 28, 1815. 457
was ,£9,400,000. In fact, from the year 1739 there had been
a regular deficiency of income, varying from one and one-third
of a million to five millions annually up to 1788. These figures,
however, are mere approximations to the reality, judging from the
references to finance which are met with in the histories ; for
instance, Terrai, in 1774, at the close of the reign of Louis XV., to
which we have referred, acknowledged a debt of four thousand
seven hundred millions of francs, equal to one hundred and eighty-
eight millions sterling, as already stated, while Calonne, in 1787, stated
the debt to be not more than one thousand six hundred million francs,
with six hundred and fifty millions of arrears, making it in all eighty-
eight millions sterling, with a yearly deficiency of one hundred and
forty-four millions, nearly five millions sterling. The compte rendu
of Necker, in 1788, was imperfect, and concealed more than it re-
vealed as to the state of the finances. He supposed that the actual
deficiency of revenue was not more than two millions one hundred
thousand sterling annually. Crowe1 throws some light on these other-
wise unaccountable discrepancies. " The mode of drawing up French
financial accounts was then what it is still, one that baffles rather than
facilitates comprehension. The ordinary revenue was represented to
consist merely of what reached the treasury, the part abstracted
from it by mortgages, anticipations, or guarantees, being left out.
The interest of the greater part of the debt being paid in this way
was also left out of the account of expenses. By this means it was
easy to present a decorous statement of ordinary revenue and
expenditure, whilst the extraordinary requirements and outlay,
although equal in amount to the ordinary, was altogether omitted."
But, supposing the deficiency to have been five millions sterling, this,
though a large sum, was not a burden so heavy as to be unbearable
by a nation of twenty-five millions, in which the noble and wealthy
classes had hitherto paid the smallest contributions to the revenue.
2. These financial difficulties, now pressing and making them-
selves felt, were the result of the war with England on behalf of the
United States, in addition to the wasteful prodigality of the recent
expenditure. To meet them required the application of a wise and
rigid economy, and the removal at once of the grand evil and curse
of the entire system of the national taxation — that is to say, its
unjust and unequal pressure upon the class least able to bear it.
Very small, indeed, was the burden imposed upon the privileged
classes, the nobles, the clergy, and the officials. The noblesse and
1 Vol. iv. p. 361.
458 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
clergy were, with their families, in number about 270,000; their
estates were free from taxation. So also large numbers, not noble,
the possessors of posts (purchased) which conveyed the privilege of
exemption. Practically, the whole burden of the support of the
government fell upon the middle and rural classes, the citizens and
the peasantry. Many of the cities and the towns were exempt in
virtue of ancient charters, or by other special rights enjoyed from
time immemorial, and, even if subject to taxes, had means of
making bargains favourable to themselves. The rural cultivators
were specially oppressed by this incidence of taxation. It was
calculated and verified by sad experience that the various payments
to the tax-collecter, the feudal and other dues, left a mere pittance,
say one-fourth of the net produce of the land, to be divided between
the landlord and tenant even in good years. In ordinary and bad
seasons the cultivators had to incur debts at usurious interest.
Industry was paralysed, the spirit of the peasantry was broken, fpod
of the lowest description, and too little of it, ruined the physique of
the population, and left them without the requisite strength to labour.
There was no hope of favourable change. " Why should I labour?
it would be but to earn more for the collector," said the peasant.
Artificers had no work, the merchants and small dealers no trade.
The Customs' regulations made each province a foreign country to
its neighbours, and barred the internal trade of the kingdom with
imposts which rendered exchange impossible. The corvee (civil and
military) was laid upon the peasantry ; the maintenance and making
of roads, and the. conveyance of the baggage and of provisions for
the troops, was especially oppressive ; add to these the claims of the
seigneurs upon the rural population for labour and for sundry duties,
the relics of the feudal system, which (although no longer a bond
of union and mutual protection) claimed its dues. These oppressions,
in the shape of an undue burden of taxation and the feudal claims,
were the source of the financial distress of France. A rearrange-
ment of taxation such as had been recently proposed, first by Turgot,
then by Calonne, which included the abolition of the corvee, the
diminution of the gabelle (salt duty), would have been as the
beginning of a new era to the peasantry, and would have laid the
foundations of a sound fiscal policy. The selfish obstinacy of the
privileged classes was opposed to this measure ; they gave way in
due time, but it was too late !
3. Up to this period there had been no thorough amalgamation of
the various classes of society, so as to realise the idea and the benefit
of a united nationality. The Romanised Kelt of the fifth century,
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 459
though subdued by the Frankish tribes which had adopted his
language, remained a separate and distinct class, a bourgeoisie or
peasantry. The nobles and noblesse, proud of their Frank ancestry,
occupied the position of feudal seigneurs, lived apart in the chateaux,
and intermarried in their own circle. The citizens in their towns
were equally separated from each other by guilds and local privileges,
and looked down upon the peasantry as an inferior class and caste.
Rarely, indeed, were there intermarriages between the inhabitants of
the towns and the cultivators of the land. From this social isolation
the various classes were led to regard each other as aliens and
foreigners, and in their riots and ententes were apt to act towards
each other cruelly and vengefully. On this account some have
thought that Frenchmen were unfitted, by their eager partisanship
and by their love to contend to the Mtter end, to work free institu-
tions, in which the minority yields to the majority, and government
is carried on by a series of compromises. The political changes
in 1830, in 1848, and in 1870 have shown the contrary. With the
exception of the Communist mobs of Paris, the dregs of a corrupt
civilisation and the extreme politicians of the Press and of the
Assembly, the French people seem generally anxious to secure a wise
administration of their own affairs, and to live as a nation in peace
with their neighbours.
4. From 1672, the condition of the rural and labouring class in
the cities and villages had gradually deteriorated, though with
occasional periods of reaction and tolerable comfort. At their best
estate the French peasantry and labourers are content with a degree
of comfort which among the English would be deemed far from
satisfactory. In bad times, deficient harvests, stagnation periods so
often occurring, these classes were reduced to actual starvation, and
driven to beggary and brigandage. The ten years previous to
1788 had been years of drought and scarcity, and a few months
before the States -General had assembled a hailstorm of unprece-
dented fury had destroyed the vines, the fruit, and the crops of
nearly one-half of France. In the south, the olives were destroyed
by the frost. The additional distress arising from these calamities,
added to the average chronic amount of misery and starvation, made
the most sanguine despondent. So much misery and privation on
the part of a large portion of the population painfully contrasted
with the luxury and prodigality of the nobles and other privileged
classes. At this time, too, by the working of the provincial
assemblies, instituted by Necker in 1779, and increased in number
by Lomenie de Brienne, every parish was called upon to take its
460 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
part in the assessment and levying of the taxes. For the first time
the peasant and the seigneur met face to face in consultation
together ; for the first time the peasant became fully aware of the
enormous excess of burdens laid upon him ; his eyes were opened
to the monstrous fact that the poor, who in his day "had eaten
grass like sheep and had died like flies," had been compelled for
more than a century to pay eighteen-twentieths of their hard earnings,
in order to exempt the count, marquis, or seigneur from paying
anything at all. At the same time these discoveries were made, a
summons from the king was received, requiring each parish to make
known its grievances. The long pent-up forces of misery were set
free. The ignorant peasantry no sooner heard of redress than they
wanted it at once, and proceeded to snatch it by violence. Hence
the painful catalogue of chateaux burnt, pillaged, or despoiled, and
the attacks upon life, producing the widespread desolation of the
provinces, of which Taine gives in detail the full particulars. To
these privileges of the higher classes, so ruinous to the lives and
enjoyments of other classes, and so unjust as to admit of no excuse,
we may trace the hatred for the nobility and noblesse, and that
passion for equality (rather than for constitutional liberty) which is
so peculiarly manifest in France. Among the many and crying
evils, social and political, in France, the two most hateful of all the
burdens under which France groaned were the injustice of the
incidence of taxation, and the insolent assumption of the privileged
classes as if by nature ordained to rule over the whole of the other
population of France. Liberty and fraternity were mere phrases to
round off the sentence in which equality was the real thing, the one
most desired above all others. In the Revolution they obtained
equality of taxation, equality legal and social. Whether all this
might not have been obtained at a less cost of human misery and
blood is another question. It is some consolation to know that
the substantial benefits of the Revolution survive and remain to
this day.
5. The weak goodness of the king, the incapacity of the noble classes,
who for generations had been estranged from all official and admin-
istrative life, the rashness of the king's advisers, who seemed to act
without plan or foresight, threw the entire working of the govern-
ment into the hands of the National Assembly. " No cause is seen
so universally and persistently in action, from the first outburst of
the Revolution, as the want of those larger and sounder principles of
action which are specially needed in the higher classes of a great
country. There was no political knowledge, no power of organisa-
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 461
tion, no habit of administration, except as regards the last, in a
mechanical routine, which, in the time of danger, only increased
the evil."1 The National Assembly, by its position in Paris, became
dependent upon the municipality, the only party which had at its
command an armed force upon which it could rely. The Jacobin
Club, by its energetic action, ruled both the Commune and the
Assembly, and ruled public opinion over all the provinces. The
Girondists, men of speculation, were dethroned and executed by
the men of action, the Jacobins. One clique of Jacobins sent
the Hebertists and Danton to the scaffold, leaving the rule in
the hands of another clique of which Robespierre was the head.
All political life seemed to consist of one party denouncing
and executing the other (its rivals), and in due time being de-
nounced and executed in its turn. Robespierre fell by the action
and management of men even worse than himself, and so on
until France, weary of mob government and of bloodshed, sub-
mitted gladly, first, to a Directory, then to a Consul, and finally to
an Emperor.
6. All this might have been prevented. "The career of the Revo-
lution could have been often and easily arrested by the commonest
exertion of manly judgment and co-operation." 2 The evils, and
the means of remedying the evils which had brought the state to
the brink of ruin, were patent to all practical statesmen.3 The diffi-
culty was that the whole system of the constitution and of the
administration of justice was so intimately connected together, that
everything must be left as it was or everything entirely changed ; and
that, meanwhile, the government had no money and no power to
repress the disorders in Paris and in the provinces. But a loan to
meet present exigencies was possible, and the compulsion exercised,
as it might have been constitutionally by the Tiers Etat and the
king upon the nobles and clergy, would have enabled the executive
to carry out the financial and other reforms which experience had
proved to be necessary. There is no mysterious fatalism in human
affairs either to the individual or to the nation. Men and political
associations reap as they have sown. The king, the nobles, the
clergy, and the population of France may be described in the words
of the prophet : " The whole head is sick, the whole heart is
faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no
soundness in it." 4 As there was no timely reform, there was a revo-
1 Quarterly Review, 1882, p. 134. 2 Ibid.
3 Schlosser, vol. v. p. 399. 4 Isaiah i. 5, 6.
462 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
lution — a revolution of blood and misery unknown in the past
history of mankind ; such as, we trust, may never occur again.
France, after nearly ninety years of revolution, having tried the
extremes of democracy and autocracy, is now trying a sort of con-
servative republicanism, which is wasting its strength upon the effort
to destroy the moral and educational influence of the clergy, while
it is neglecting to check the spirit of communism which bids fair to
attempt a new revolution.
7. Some indirect influence of the sceptical and atheistical philosophy
of the popular teachers, whose Bible was the Encyclopedic, sup-
plemented by a corrupt literature "sensual and devilish," from
which even the leading litterateurs of the day (Voltaire especially)
recoiled, was undoubtedly felt in the Revolution, as well as before it
began and after it had exhausted itself. The practically godless
contempt of morality manifested, especially by the higher classes,
soon spread deeper and wider among the very lowest of the town
population. Theoretical atheism took away the feeling of the
sacredness of human life as well as the feeling of responsibility to
God. Hence the callous indifference to the shedding of blood. If
man is but an animal, his life, like that of any other animal, may be
taken away when deemed convenient by the ruling power. In this
way we may suppose the political leaders to have reasoned, when
one party after another sent its predecessors by batches to the
guillotine. The only security for right government and political
freedom is the cultivation of the moral sense, which sympathises
with the image of God in man and realises to the full its respon-
sibility to God.
8. The injury to the cause of progressive reform in Germany, Spain,
Italy, and England, by the excesses of the revolutionary leaders in
France, was a serious evil. There had been for more than a gene-
ration past a steady progress of change for the better in the financial
and educational administration of most of the European nations.
Old things and old thoughts were being quickly modified, although
the old forms were retained. But the reckless, unreasonable haste,
and the impatient zeal of the men of the new era alarmed the
rulers, and roused a powerful conservative opposition among the
populations as well as on the part of the rulers of the European
nations.
9. In judging the conduct of the National Assembly — and, in fact,
of all the prominent facts of the Revolution — we must remember
the lamentable condition of France during the preceding generation
and the long-continued chro"nic misery of the population. This
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 463
actual, felt misery of the millions explains everything. For two
generations past the decay in the productive power of the country,
and consequently in the means for the employment of labour, was
followed by a large increase in the number of the unemployed,
driven by necessity to vagabondage and crime. This evil was
intensified by ten years of deficient harvests and by the calamities
of the year 1788. In spite of the efforts of the government and
of the richer classes, the famine was a reality over the whole of
France ; bread made with rye and barley was black, and sour, and
uneatable, and even this could only be procured by hours of waiting
before the bakery. The government was obliged to direct the
cutting of 250,000 bushels of rye (before quite ripe) to provide food
for the soldiery. The numbers reported of the unemployed almost
defy belief. In Normandy 24,000. In many of the provinces one-
fourth of the population.
Vagabondage, accompanied by brigandage on a large scale, had
gradually grown up into an institution, which within the last thirty
years had made itself felt, and, though repressed at times, had
never been extinguished. The game laws were openly defied ; the
collection of the gabelle (salt tax) and other taxes had been opposed
by bands [of 50 to 200 men under popular leaders, in 1754,
1764, 1777, 1782 ; farmers terrified and controlled by armed bands
of fifty to sixty claiming free quarters ; forests cut down and
the timber carried away ; the avenues of the manorial halls in
some places maliciously cut dowTn. These bandits at different
times numbered from 10,000 to 50,000, roaming over the country,
destroyed all security of property and life to the land proprietors,
and all officials of the government. These evils appeared to have
increased early in 1789; there had been three hundred outbreaks
in the rural districts. It is easy to account for this. Hope had
been raised ; the people had learned the unfairness of the taxation ;
they had heard and had gladly received the doctrine of the
natural equality of man ; they were eager to seize and enjoy their
rights ; hunger is the excuse of their impatience, and their ignorance
is some excuse for their atrocities ! But who can excuse the court,
the nobility, the clergy, and the educated classes for the neglect
of generations past ? These unnatural leaders of the people are
the responsible parties : power and property have their rights, but
these rights will only be respected when viewed in connexion with
the duties incumbent upon them. In France, power and property
had forgotten their duties for generations with impunity ; but there
is a Nemesis in human affairs, to use the language of the heathen
464 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
moralist; there is a God who governs the world, and of whose
retributive justice we may say, —
" The mills of the gods grind slowly,
But they grind exceeding small."
10. In January, 1789, a pamphlet by the Abbe Sieyes clearly
pointed to the desirable and probable results of the coming revolu-
tion, the full establishment of an irresistible popular power. It was
entitled, "What is the third estate? Everything. What hitherto
has it been in the state ? Nothing." The whole tenor of the
pamphlet was to prove that the people were everything ; the privi-
leged classes a mere excrescence and hindrance to progress, and
that without them the people would be a free and flourishing
nation.
III. — The leading events of the Revolution up to 1795, the beginning
of the Directory.
The narrative must necessarily be brief. No compendium can give
any correct impression of the events from the year 1789 to 1795.
To the English reader the voluminous work of Alison is as fair an
account as could be expected from a Tory gentleman, whose
reverence for historical accuracy was a continual check upon his
political prejudices. Von SybeVs history is from the German stand-
point, and has from this its main value. Thiers's history is written to
glorify the Revolution and conceal, as far as possible, its excesses; he
writes as an apologist. Taine's recent works furnish the most ample
materials for forming a correct judgment as to the causes and conse-
quences of the Revolution and the character of its actors. In the
Edinburgh, Quarterly, and other reviews, as the Westminster, British
Quarterly, and London Quarterly, there is scarcely a single fact in the
history and legislation of the French Revolutionists which has not
been fully discussed from both the Liberal and Conservative school of
English politics. The history by McFarlane (" Pictorial History of
England") by the continuator of Russell's "Modern History of
Europe, 1852," and by Dyer in his "History of Europe," the
history by Chambers, and the volume, in the " Epochs of Modern
History" on the French Revolution, by a lady, B. M. Gardiner, are
all of them respectable compilations. Carlytis " French Revolu-
tion " is sui generis, and should be read in connexion with histories
which condescend to state the facts in the ordinary style.
The work of Carlyle may be used as a condiment or a stimulant
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 465
to aid in the mental digestion of the history and its striking
lessons.
The States-General assembled May 4, 1789. No arrangement
had been made by the government beyond the directions issued
regulating the number of the respective orders. The tiers etat
were to be equal in number to the representatives of the nobles
and clergy, i.e., nobles, 300; clergy, 300; the tiers etat, 600.
This scale of representation would have given the predominance
to the popular party if the three orders assembled and voted in
one chamber. The court, with the privileged classes, had expected
that the mode of procedure followed in the last meeting of the
States-General would be the precedent for 1789. This was the first
contest, and the point in dispute was settled by the express orders
of the king in favour of one chamber, June 27. The spirit of the
Assembly may be gathered from the assumption, on June 17, by
the tiers etat of the title of the National Assembly, a name
happily suggested by the advocate Legrand^ and from an incident in
connexion with the stance royale, held June 23, in which the king
read a decree of thirty-five articles, all of them concessions embody-
ing " the whole elements of national freedom." Mirabeau, when
asked, " What was wanting ? " replied, " Nothing — but, that we
should have taken — not he have given them." Carlyle remarks,
" Folly is that wisdom which is wise only behindhand. Few
months ago these thirty-five concessions had filled France with
rejoicing .... now it is unavailing ; the very mention of it is
slighted." The assembling in one hall as one Assembly being settled,
there appeared a prospect of honest legislation, as the majority
desired practical reforms and the maintenance of order. There
were two great obstacles from the very beginning to the end of the
Revolution : the ill-feeling of the court, by which the well-meaning
good sense of the king was controlled ; and the evil influence
exercised by the mob of spectators admitted into the gallery of the
Assembly, by which the members were intimidated. Of this Arthur
Young was a witness. " There is a gallery at each end of the
saloon, which is open to all the world .... the audience in these
galleries are very noisy ; they clap when anything pleases them, they
have been known to hiss — an indecorum which is utterly de-
structive of freedom of debate." The evil increased, and the action in
the galleries became more and more demonstrative and threatening,
and was in fact a power, recognised by such men as Robespierre,
1 Schlosser, vol. i. p. 36.
2 H
466 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
who admitted that the " six thousand spectators at Versailles had
contributed not a little to the courage and energy required for the
success of the Revolution."1 Carlyle's account of the members of
the Assembly is not far wrong, though requiring some modification :
" So many heterogeneities cast together into the fermenting vat ....
probably the strangest body of men . . . •. that ever .met together
in our planet on such an errand. So thousand-fold complex a
society, ready to burst up from its infinite depths ; and these men,
its rulers and leaders, without life, rule for themselves .... other
life rule than a gospel according to Jean Jacques ! To the wisest of
them, what we must call the wisest, man is properly an accident
under the sky. Man is without duty round him, except it be ' to
make a constitution.' He is without heaven above him or hell
beneath him; he has no God in the world." The Assembly had
also to contend with the oiitside mob, which was permitted to insult
unpopular legislators within ; the press from 1790 to 1793 was con-
trolled by the violent party ; with the Clubs, especially that of the
Jacobins, in which the acts of the Assembly were often prepared
and always controlled ; and with the Municipality of Paris, which
by its organisation had a complete control of the city and the com-
mand of the civic guard. It had already raised the tricolor as the
Republican ensign on July 13. The army was estranged from the
executive through the monopoly of all honorable positions by the
noble class ; by the mulcting of the payments due to the soldiers by
the paymaster, &c., through the carelessness of their commanders,
and by the general neglect of all provision for their comfort. But
the obstacle of all others was the Municipality, an imperium in
imperio. Originally Paris was divided into twenty-one quarters.
In April, 1789, it was divided into sixty sections to arrange for the
selection of deputies to the States-General. These one hundred and
twenty members were increased to one hundred and eighty, then in
July to three hundred. It had a civic guard (National Guard) of
forty-eight thousand men at its command. In September, 1790, it
was reorganised — divided into forty-three sections, each of which
had its primary Assembly and a permanent executive council.
There was a general council for the Municipality of ninety-six and a
permanent committee of forty-four. The Municipality was not
legally confined to municipal duties, but was authorised to interfere
in matters belonging to the general administration of the nation
(May 21, 1790). With an armed force and with subsidies from the
1 Speech, Oct. 31, 1791.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 467
state, this central power, entirely in the hands of the extreme
/awfo'nSj in due time ruled the Assembly and the subsequent
assemblies. From the very beginning of the sittings of the National
Assembly to the end of the Republic, this Municipality was the tyrant
and the curse of France.
2. The reactionary spirit of the court led to the dismissal of Necker,
July ii. This was followed by the riot in the Palais Royal, raised
by Camille Desmoulins, and a trifling conflict between the guards
and a German regiment ; then on the i4th by a regular and
systematic attack of the mob (aided by arms and cannon which the
Municipality permitted them to take) on the Bastille. This prison
and fort had at that time no political character, and was as unim-
portant in that respect as the Tower of London. It was taken and its
defenders were brutally murdered. In this there was no triumph over
tyranny. // was simply the daring manifesto of certain parties to teach
the National Assembly the strength of the new power, which, itself a
mere fraction of the dregs of the populace, called itself the people ; a
power which in due time reconciled France to a dictatorship,
beginning with Robespierre and so on to the great hero and con-
queror of the Revolution, NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE. The news
arrived at Versailles early in the morning of July 15. The king
remarked, "This is a revolt." "Sire," replied the informant, "it
is a Revolution." Necker was recalled July 16, and reached
Versailles July 28. The disorders in the rural districts increased,
and the Seigneurs, alarmed by news from all quarters of the
plundering and burning of their chateaux, and the general repudia-
tion of rents, feudal dues, and government taxes by the peasants,
permitted the Vicomte de Noailles, and the Due d'Aiguillon, on
August 4, to propose the abolition of all feudal rights and of all
exclusive privileges, as well as of tithes. " A sort of intoxication
possessed the Assembly, which broke up at two A.M. (August 5),
after having caused a Revolution, much more efficacious than that
of the taking of the Bastille." In one night the whole fabric of feudal
power had fallen, the result of mutual fears, vanity, and revenge,
each class forcing sacrifices on one another. These measures could
not be modified afterwards, though regarded by many in the
Assembly as " the St. Bartholomew of property," while by others,
far in advance of the rest, it seemed as if not enough had been
done. Dumont regards the party of the nobles as " ready to lose
their heads for their cause, but not able or willing to w^thein
rationally." Thiers remarks that, "a nation never knows how to
resume with moderation the exercise of its rights." The proposal
2 H 2
468 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
to redeem the tithes (valued at six millions sterling), though opposed
in the Assembly, was supported by Sieyes and Morellet, who, though
sceptics of a very advanced sort, had an interest in Church property.
For this they were violently censured, and even hooted in the
Assembly. Mirabeau gave them little comfort in his remarks, in
reply to their complaints : — " You have let loose the bull, and you
are annoyed at his giving you a touch of his horns." The Assembly
was occupied, from August 18 to 27, with "the Declaration of the
Rights of Man" This was a formal manifesto of national rights
which probably was needed to enlighten the masses. Thiers blames
it as too long. Bentham thinks that, " while the chiefs in the
Assembly gloried in the thought that they were pulling down the
aristocracy, they never saw that their doctrine tended to promote an
evil, a hundred times more formidable, Anarchy." Carlyle remarks,
" Rights, yes ; duties, where are they ? " forgetting that, though to
Englishmen the declaration appeared to be a string of mere common-
places, it was otherwise in France. The residence of the king at
Versailles and the locating the National Assembly there, though of
some advantage, was not pleasing to the leaders of the popular
party, and on October 5 and 6 the mob of Paris, followed by the
National Guard, as a check nominally, marched to Versailles and
brought the king and his family to Paris. The Assembly naturally
followed. Mirabeau, highly disapproved of this unauthorised act,
thinking it injurious to the freedom of the legislature. This triumph
over the monarchy and the legislature was followed by a decree
confiscating Church property valued at from eighty to one hundred
millions sterling (November 2), a measure which, if wisely arranged
and carried out, with due regard to vested interests, might have been
a blessing both to Church and state ; but it was so rashly and waste-
fully mismanaged, that the state is said to have incurred an annual
loss of two millions, and a final loss of seven millions in the
transaction. If true, the peculation must have been beyond all
calculation.
3. The Assembly, carrying out the principle of uniformity and of
the sovereignty of the people, and opposed to all centralisation, and
perhaps desirous of cutting all the links with the past, set aside the
old divisions of the land into provinces, each of which was a land-
mark in the history of progress in past ages, in which, by the union
of what had been independent and discordant elements, France had
become a nation. The new division into eighty-three departments
was convenient : each department was divided into districts, of
which there were in all 374; each district into cantons, in all 4,730;
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 469
the cantons into communes, of which there were in all 44,000.
The districts and cantons were for elective purposes. The electors
were men twenty-five years old, paying taxes to the amount of two
shillings to three shillings, supposed to be equal to three days' labour.
This gave in all 4,300,000 electors. These electors were to choose
deputies in the cantons to nominate the members of the National
Assembly. Eventually there was established, for judicial purposes,
tribunals in each department, a civil court in each district, and a
court of reference in each canton, all elected. Torture was
abolished, and the penalty of death much restricted. Necker,
already unpopular, and threatened by Marat and Danton, wisely
resigned, and left France, September 4. His real abilities as a
financier have been thrown into the shade by the preposterous but
pardonable eulogies of his gifted daughter, Madame de Stae'l. By
such men as Mirabeau and Napoleon he was not understood, and
has been unjustly depreciated. Soon after this, in October, Edmund
Burke published his remarkable " Reflections on the French Revo-
lution." Of this work Fyffe remarks : " In his survey of the political
forces, which he saw in action around him, the great Whig writer,
who in times past had so passionately defended the liberties of
America, and the constitutional tradition of the English Parliament
against the aggression of George III., attacked the revolution as a
system of violence and caprice, more formidable to freedom than
the tyranny of any crown Above all, he laid bare that agency
of riot and destructiveness which, even within the first few months
of the Revolution, filled him with presentiments of the calamities
about to fall upon France." 1
The National Assembly, unfortunately, came into unnecessary
collision with the clergy on a point on which the clergy had the
sympathy of a large majority of the French people, especially in the
provinces (November 27). The civil courts required of the clergy
an oath which implied their acknowledgment of the lawfulness of
the civil constitution of the Church, an oath which they were ex-
pressly forbidden to take by the Pope. Had the government been
content with passive submission, the clergy would quietly have sub-
mitted. It was a wanton act of aggression, and uncalled for. One
hundred and thirty-four bishops and two-thirds of the clergy refused
to take the oath. Talleyrand (the ex-Bishop of Autun) offered to
administer the oath and to ordain priests with the help of two
coadjutors, thus willing, at the early age of thirty-five, to take the
1 Vol. i. pp. 63 and 64.
4/O The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
position of patriarch of the new reformed Church. The Assembly
thus put itself in collision with conscience, a power which politicians
are not willing to recognise until compelled. Already it was evident
that the Revolution would be marred by the passions of political
parties, the all but universal distrust of the court, and the increasing
hate of the noblesse. There was not so much any aversion for the
throne as for the nobles. The majority of the population were not
carried away by strong*feeling, and might, by the exercise of their
voting power, have checked the madness of party. But the great
defect of universal suffrage was in its creating an indifference to its
frequent exercise. As a power to draw out the real views of the
majority, it was in France a failure, not only in Paris, but in the
44,000 municipalities. At Paris, in the election of deputies,
(August, 1790), out of 81,000 electors 14,000 voted; three months
later only 10,000; in 1791 only 7,000 voted. So also in the
provinces. At Chartres, 104 out of 1,551 voted; at Besangon
(January, 1790), out of 32,000 only 1,060, and the next year only
300 ; at Grenoble only one-fifth voted ; at Troyes and Strasburg,
with 8,000 electors, only 400 to 500 voted. Hence the results of
a legal universal suffrage were curiously at variance with the real
sentiments of the population, and gave a false impression of the
state of public opinion. For instance, in all Brittany, though in-
tensely Catholic, only anti-Catholic representatives were sent. Nine
regicides represented La Lozere and La Vendee, which were ready
to rise en masse in the name of the king. Thus the exercise of the
sovereignty of the people had already become a burden too trouble-
some for the proper discharge of its duties. A citizen had to give
up two days in the week to his political labours; an election of
some kind had to be held every four months, so that there was an
eternal round of voting and electing, the burden of which fell on
the busiest and the poorest. A large number of the voters in the
provinces could neither read nor write ; the majority were intent on
their own affairs, and satisfied with the freedom which appeared to
be insured by the constitution of 1790; partly, too, the fear of the
violent factions in Paris and in every locality in all France who were
able to injure those whose votes were opposed to them had full
influence. The control of the Revolution was thus in the hands of a
minority, which Taine thinks did not exceed 300,000 persons, of
whom 10,000 were in Paris, a mere tenth of the population, and,
deducting the Girondist party, not one-twentieth. A compact, active
minority, in most cases, exercised the same power as the whole popu-
lation, just as a well-disciplined army over an unarmed population.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 471
The minority thus united and disciplined was able to gather in its
support all the ragged rascality of the locality, as in Paris, to over-
awe the National Assembly or any other lawful authority.
4. The Clubs were the centres of the new authority, and furnished
the means of paying the hire of those forces, by their command of
the votes of the Assembly, by which subsidies were granted to the
municipalities. In justice, however, to the hireling mobs, we may
plead the scarcity of bread, amounting to a famine ; the genuine
fear also of supposed conspiracies of the aristocrats and the court to
restore the old regime, kept up by the press and by hired agitators.
The Paris of 1790-1793 was as an inflamed brain in the midst of a
nervous system artificially stimulated into delirium.1 Meanwhile,
the military power of Paris and of the provinces was in the hands
of the municipalities, and all of these were under the control
of the Jacobin Club. These Clubs became, each of them, " an
instrument to forge an artificial and violent state of opinion, to give
that opinion the colour of the spontaneous will of the nation, to
transfer to a noisy minority the rights of a mute majority, and to
exercise an irresistible pressure on the government, and on the
National Assembly itself.3 " In the subsequent contests of the
political parties in Paris, the violent party continually prevailed over
the less violent .... because the majority still clung to the forms
of law."3 And so in regard to the provinces, in which every one
had its August 10 and September 2, and was subject to pillage and
burnings through the affiliated Jacobin Clubs. All previous his-
torians before Taine have confined themselves to what took place
in Paris, hence we have had no proper conception of the awful
condition of the rural districts and of the demoralisation of the
population. In Thiers we find no traces of these enormities ;
Morley, in his life of Burke, writes as if all the uprisings and
atrocities were prompted by the rage excited by the insensate mani-
festo of the Duke of Brunswick in 1792. Every page of Taine,
taken from undeniable authorities, prove that what Lafayette called
the " sacred duty of insurrection " was actually carried out in all
France in the years 1790, 1791, and afterwards, as well as in pre-
ceding years. The death of Mirabeau (April 2) quashed a series of
secret negotiations, in which he endeavoured to reconcile the king
to a constitutional regime and to a hearty co-operation with the
constitutional party in the Assembly ; but he was equally distrusted
1 Quarterly Review, January, 1882, p. 178. 2 Taine.
3 Edinburgh Review, January, 1882.
472 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
by the court and by the extreme members of the Assembly. His
life had been one of rebellion against not only the moral laws
acknowledged by society, but also the social proprieties ; he had
deserted his own wife and had taken the wife of another ; his career
had been one of extraordinary extravagance, especially offensive to
his noble family and connexions ; imprisonment in fortresses by the
authority of lettres-de-cachet had not tamed him ; but, amidst all
the madness of his career, he had been a diligent student and a
profound thinker ; he knew the times in which he lived, and per-
ceived that the French people desired equality by the abolition of
all class distinctions, and that the King of France, by working in
accordance with the evident feeling of his age, might re-establish
the monarchy on a sure foundation. Conscious of his own powers,
he saw in the opening of the States-General his own opportunity.
" At last," he said, " we shall have men judged by the value of their
brains." He violated no principle, and was no traitor to liberty
when he entered into relations with the king. On his deathbed he
predicted the end of the monarchy and of all constitutional govern-
ment. His death was a serious loss ; it left the way open for men
less able and more violent. There was no influential leader of the
people competent to mediate between the constitutional party and
the court, and, if there had been, the unfortunate attempt and failure
of the king to escape, June 21-25, destroyed all confidence in his
apparent acquiescence in his position as a constitutional sovereign
(he was arrested at Varennes). Though the moderation of the
Assembly, in condoning the attempt, was creditable to them, yet it
would have been, on the whole, better for both France and the king
had the king been then compelled to abdicate ; his son, a child, under
suitable guardianship, might have been trained to occupy gracefully
a constitutional throne. The new constitution was completed
between September 3 and 13. The Assembly was to consist of
745 representatives, to be chosen for three years; the power of the
king was limited, and the veto could not be exercised beyond two
consequent legislatures. It was accepted by the king on Septem-
ber 16: he had no choice. In the calm judgment of nearly a
century, this constitution, even under the most favourable circum-
stances, would have been unworkable. " The great danger of the
Revolution was its simplicity (as in this new constitution)
There should be no checks or counterpoises ; all should be con-
secutive, logical. The ambitions, vices, prejudices of men were
regarded as nothing. The nation, not even educated as yet, was
thought fit to be trusted with absolute power. It is indicative of
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 473
the ferment and the ignorance even of Paris, that the very name of
veto aroused vehement disturbances. The royal veto was in their
eyes the old regime restored." l On September 30 the Assembly
was dissolved. During its sittings 3,753 persons were killed, and
107 chateaux were plundered and burned by the mob; 2,500 laws
were enacted, of which not fifty remained in force after twenty-five
years. France owes to it liberty of worship, the abolition of torture
and cruel punishments, the sale of national and Church property,
trial by jury, the abolition of lettres-de-cachet, of titles, of the law of
primogeniture, of all privileges and exemptions from taxation, and
legal equality. Much of the framework of the present organisation
of France was then prepared, and the principles of its internal
administration were definitely laid down. Burke (in his remarks on
the French Revolution) sarcastically observes : " In destroying
everything, the National Assembly could not fail to destroy many
abuses ; and, in making everything new, they would of necessity
make many useful and necessary regulations." A writer in the
Edinburgh Review*- thinks that "the reputation of the National
Assembly, far from diminishing, has rather increased with the progress
of time." The greatest of all its mistakes, fraught with all the evils
which ruined the Revolution, was the self-denying ordinance by which
it decreed that no members of its body should be eligible for the
new Assembly, nor should accept any office under the crown. Thus,
all the men who had gained experience, and who might have been
able to work the new constitution, or wisely serve as ministers of the
crown, were excluded from the Assembly and from official life. The
sarcasm of Burke, reflecting on the sweeping reforms of the As-
sembly, has been met by a remark of no small weight. Speaking
of these precipitous changes made by the Assembly, Schlosser
observes : " Every one, however, who considers the direction which
the public mind in Europe, and especially in France, appears to
take, will see that nothing but the senseless precipitancy of August 4,
and the shameful and inhuman murders and robberies of the times
of Terror, could have rendered the restoration of all the mischiefs
of the eighteenth century impossible, which otherwise would have
certainly taken place, or would still be effected. In the same
manner as the furniture and taste of the times of Louis XIV. and
Louis XV. are now and everywhere to be seen, so monks and petty
tribunals would have been, or would be, everywhere restored, such
J Kitchin, "England," Encyc. JBrit., ninth edition, vol. ix. p. 600.
2 Vol. xciv. p. 433.
4/4 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
as they are at this moment to be met with in several parts of
Germany and Switzerland."1 There is here a lesson for our own
times, unless history be nothing but an old almanack, from which
nothing is to be learned but the dates and sequence of events. The
great hindrance to the renovation and to the intellectual advance-
ment of English and European society, lies in the misdirection of
the influence of the middle classes, which is most palpably visible in
England. The silly aping of the fashions, the habits of life, the
vain show and extravagance of the less respectable portion of the
aristocratic families, destroys their personal respectability, and con-
sequently lessens their practical influence in society and in political
life. The merchants, the manufacturers, and the equally useful
retail middle dealers, should stand upon the dignity and utility of
their class. Their claim to a high position in society is, that by their
manufactures, by their mechanical and scientific discoveries, and by
their commerce they enabled England to stand and survive the
exhaustion of the revolutionary wars, and to carry out all peaceable
and necessary revolutions at home — in fact, to make England what
it is. The true dignity of this middle class is expressed by the
Shunammite, " I dwell among mine own people."3
5. The National Legislative Assembly opened October i, 1791.
Thiers gives a favourable account of the members, especially of some
who were constitutional partisans of the first Revolution. There
were others, distinguished men, whose heads were heated and whose
expectations had been exaggerated by the Revolution, and who were
of opinion that enough had not been done. Among these were the
deputies from La Gironde. This party was opposed to the cen-
tralising of all power in Paris, and would have preferred a smaller
town as the seat of the legislature (as in the United States) ; they
were fervent democrats, Voltairians in religion, hating Catholicism,
and in their hearts averse to monarchy. Their leaders were
Vergniaud, Guadet, Brissot, Gensonne, &c. The balance of opinion
in our day is, that the Legislative Assembly had all the passions and
shortcomings of the National Assembly, without the experience it
had gained. Taine crowds his pages with instances of the incom-
petency of the members, most of whom had been elected under
the influence of the Jacobin Clubs ; four hundred of them were
lawyers. " Nineteen-tvventieths of them had no equipages, but an
umbrella and a pair of galoshes," was the characteristic expression
of the contempt of the aristocratical party. They were certainly
1 Vol. i. p. 73, 1845. ' 2 Kings iv. 13.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 475
poor, as the whole Assembly did not own a revenue of 300,000 francs
annually from real estate. Such a separation of the property of the
state from its legislature is to be regarded as a misfortune, and will
not ordinarily take place, unless property, having neglected its duties,
had thus deservedly lost its natural influence. There was another
evil in this general poverty of the members, not fifty of whom had
a revenue of p^ioo a year — that to them the salary of 24 francs
daily, soon raised to 36 francs, was a prize to be coveted; their
position became their trade, their only means of living. The influence
of th'e leaders of the Clubs, and of the many members of the late
Assembly who sat in the galleries as spectators, was direct and
immediate. The feeling of all classes was intensified by the reports
of the anarchy of the provinces, and the general disregard of all law
and order. The Assembly was opened by the king in person, in
which he promised to give foreign powers such notions of the
Revolution as would tend to maintain a good understanding with
them. Yet, at this very time, he and the queen had just written to
the Emperor Leopold that, " if this Revolution were not checked, not
only they themselves, but all the crowned heads of Europe, would
be undone." The speech of the king was false and intended to
deceive. We may pity the king, but cannot palliate, much less
justify, his falsity. Both he and our Charles I. (with many noble
qualities) had been trained to regard truth and faith in politics as
secondary to what they called policy, and both paid for their error
with their lives. Schlosser thinks the moral code may be set aside in
war and politics, and on this ground defends the action of the king
as being then at war with the Assembly. If so, the Assembly need
no justification for treating him as the worst of their enemies. It is
impossible to deny that there had been, and that there continued to
be, a regular application of the public money by the court, in
rewarding the various agents, literary and others, who opposed the
Revolution, to the amount of 200,000 livres a month. About
100,000 livres per month were spent as douceurs to the three or
four hundred soldiers composing the Constitutional Guard. Bernard
de Moleville admits that, in the space of three months, the king
spent 2,500,000 livres in bribing public speakers. With all our pity
for the poor king, it is but just to remember that many in the
Assembly and out of it knew of these underhand proceedings, and
that the multitude outside had some foundation for their suspicions
and their enmity to royalty. Meanwhile, the infatuated prejudice
of the queen against Lafayette led her to use all the influence of
the court party against his candidature for the office of Mayor of
476 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
Paris in favour of Petion : for Lafayette meant well, " though
he never attained to clear ideas or decided action." T Petion, on
the contrary, was the decided enemy of the court. The position
of mayor at the head of the only available military force, with the
control of all the civic authorities of Paris, was at that time the
most important in France. Lafayette might not have been the
wisest of mayors, but he would not have used his position against
constitutional government and social order. Petion was elected,
November 1 7 ; thus the interests of monarchical and orderly govern-
ment were sacrificed by the folly of the queen. With equal folly
the Girondist party, which had begun to see that, despite their
republican theories, the monarchy might be regarded as necessary
to the establishment of order and constitutional government, was
alienated, and their influence thrown into the extreme republican
scale. Between March 8 and 23, 1792, there were changes in the
cabinet, and the Girondists were permitted by the necessity of the
case to form a ministry (the king only desiring to keep all quiet for
the few months intervening before the expected deliverance of the
court by the Germans). Of this ministry, Roland was the head ;
Dumouriez had the charge of foreign affairs. The court well
named this ministry Le minister e sans culottes. The pedantic
narrowness of the coterie of Madame Roland, whose knowledge of
the real .world was based on Plutarch's "Lives," was equally ridiculous
and injurious. When Roland presented himself at court in a round
hat and with shoes tied by strings, the master of the ceremonies
complained to Dumouriez, " Ah ! sir, no buckles in his shoes ; " to
which the ironical reply was, " No buckles in his shoes ! then all is
lost ! " On April 20, the king proposed a declaration of war against
the empire, though Mallet-du-Pan had been sent on a secret mission
"to implore help against those who ruled the king with a rod of
iron." Thus war was begun by the Girondists to do away with the
constitution of 1789, 1790, and with Louis XVI. ; their beau-ideal of
a monarchy being "a monarchical constitution from which the
monarch might, at pleasure, be omitted." This sarcasm of Von
Sybel 2 is practically carried out in all constitutional monarchies in
which the will and wishes of the king are from time to time over-
ruled. Dumouriez, whom Crowe calls " the last rational and able
politician who had at heart the maintenance of the king and of the
kingdom," quarrelled with his colleagues about the supplies for the
army, and induced the king, on July 13, to dismiss the Girondist
1 Von Sybel. 2 Ibid., vol. i. p. 459.
Peace of Par is > November 28, 1815. 477
ministry. The new ministry was chosen from the Feuillants
(Moderates), but Dumouriez resigned his position on the lyth,
finding the king resolute in his determination not to agree to the
extreme measures proposed by the Assembly in reference to the
nonjuring priests. A new ministry was formed from Lafayette's
friends. Lafayette writing from the army to the Assembly a letter
complaining of the mobs and of the clubs, his letter was read on
June 1 8, and produced a great commotion, Robespierre venturing
to call him a traitor. This letter hastened the preparations which
had been making for a public display of opinion by the Girondists
and Jacobins, now united, owing to the folly of the court, the
object being to alarm the court and the moderate party in the
Assembly. By the connivance of Petion (the mayor), the mob of
the Faubourg St. Antoine was roused, the Assembly was intimidated,
and under Santerre, the brewer and influential leader of the violent
party, the mobs forced their way into the palace, insulted the king
and family, compelling him to put on the cap of liberty. Buonaparte,
then a young officer, was present at this. To him the remedy was
" the cutting down the first five hundred with grape shot," and thus
ending the outrages. After nine P.M., Petion arrived, and persuaded
the mob to retire. This day has been called " the Doomsday of the
Monarchy." At first the violence and indecency of this specimen
of mob rule produced a great reaction in public feeling. Twenty
thousand Parisians addressed the king, and the Girondists
endeavoured to conciliate him, but all efforts were unavailing. The
king had fallen into a state of depression, and the queen and court
were looking forward to relief by foreign armies. Soon after, the
insolent proclamation of the Duke of Brunswick from Coblentz,
dated July 25, was published in Paris, July 28. This alienated every
true Frenchman, even those most attached to the royal cause.
Insurrectional committees, which had been formed soon after June 20,
were now stimulated to greater activity, the object being to overawe
the Assembly and dethrone the king. On August 3, Petion presented
a petition from the sections for the deposition of the king. This
was followed by action on August 8 (after midnight). Certain
commissioners from twenty-eight sections met at the H6tel-de-Ville,
and forced the General Council to call Maudet, the Captain of the
Civic Guard, before it. On his arrival he was arrested and murdered.
Then the commissioners set aside the lawful council, and usurped
its place. Potion was absent, and on his return was placed under
guard by the new commune (some think willingly). During
August 9, Danton and Robespierre arranged for the insurrections,
478 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
and on the loth the mob and the forces of the Municipality forced
the Tuileries. Then followed a great fight, murder, and pillage.
All this had been prepared by the Girondists, though they took no
personal part in the attack. The king and family took refuge in the
Legislative Assembly (284 out of 749 were alone present) ; royalty
was suspended. The king and family remained in the rooms of the
Assembly until August 13, when they were removed to the Temple.
The Assembly wished to place them in the Palace of the Luxembourg,
but the Municipality objected. After August 12, all aristocratic
journals were put down ; their printing-offices and presses transferred
to the liberal party. All who were supposed to have assisted in the
defence of the Tuileries on August TO were prosecuted as murderers.
From this time all power resided in the new municipality, the
Commune of Paris, which was really the tool of the Jacobin leaders.
There was great resistance to this in the Assembly, but in vain ; the
Jacobin members terrified the others. Robespierre and his party
desired to retain the Assembly to give the appearance of legality to
their measures, and through its decrees to raise the requisite funds. In
the middle of August 14-17, the Assembly was compelled to legalise
the appointment of a Committee of Surveillance, the precursor of the
Revolutionary Tribunals, to consist of two chambers, four judges
in each, with a public accuser and jury, all chosen by the forty-eight
sections of Paris. The annihilation of all opponents by a brief trial
and summary execution was henceforth the principle, not openly
avowed by all, but always acted upon. On August 30 and 31, the
Assembly attempted to reform the Municipality, but failed. There
was no resisting a power which, from the H6tel-de-Ville, could send
forth forty-eight battalions, 100,000 armed men. Taking advantage
of the alarm excited by the advance of the Prussians, August 26-29,
Danton formed the resolution of murdering all the prisoners in Paris
as conspirators in league with the Prussians ; his cry was, " Nothing
but terror for us." With him, Robespierre, Marat, Manuel, and
Tallien must share. the guilt of the massacres which followed. All
the barriers were closed. The Assembly, in terror, unable to act,
Danton said, " The country is about to save itself. The bells that
ring are no signal of alarm, they sound the charge upon our country's
enemies. To conquer them we need audacity and again audacity,
and France is saved." From September 2 to 7, the massacres were
perpetrated by bands of assassins, three hundred in all, hired at
six francs a day by the Commune, under the special direction of a
committee of municipal officers and others, as Marat. The Jacobins
held their sittings in the Club in permanence. The Girondists
Peace of Paris, November, 28, 1815. 479
clearly saw that the massacres endangered their party, which, since
August 10, had formed the nominal ministry, with Roland at its
head, and the bourgeoisie were indignant. Above two thousand
persons, including women and children, were thus murdered. While
blood was flowing, it is said that Danton, Camille Desmoulins, Fabre
d'Eglantine, and their wives, as if unconscious of what was going on,
sat down to a splendid banquet with Robespierre. It is probable
that one object of these murders was to influence the elections for
the coming National Convention. Twenty-four members were then
chosen for Paris, some of whom belonged to the murdering party,
and all of them approvers. This massacre was not alluded to in
the public press until after two days. Circulars were sent by the
Paris Municipality to the other municipalities, but happily with only
a very partial response.
Some reaction of feeling followed again. The Girondists,
imagining the elections to the Convention favourable, began to
organise an armed force to cope with that of the Municipality ; and
the Legislative Assembly itself, in its last sittings becoming con-
servative, decreed the restoration of order and the raising of an
armed force. The sittings closed on September 20, after eleven
months, in which eight thousand three hundred persons had
perished by violent deaths. Lafayette had fled from his army,
September 21. The guillotine began to be in daily use for public
executions; a proof that the new tribunal had not been inactive.
The National Convention opened September 21, 1792: it consisted
of 749 members, of whom 186 had been in the Legislative, and 77
in the first, the National Assembly. There were 486 new members,
all of whom were republicans. Notwithstanding the efforts which
had been made to fill the seats with Jacobins, not above fifty or
sixty were declared supporters of that party and the Commune.
This party, called the Mountain, sat as before on the highest benches
on the left. These were Danton, Robespierre, Billaud Varennes,
Collot d'Herbois, Marat, Camille Desmoulins, and the Due
d'Orleans (now calling himself Philip Egalite). Though a mere
minority, of not more than sixty or seventy at the utmost, they
managed, by their union and energy and by the support of the
Clubs of the Municipality, to rule the Assembly. The Girondists
(the Plain) occupied the right, about 180 in number, and, fancying
themselves secure of the support of at least 500 votes, Vergniaud,
Brissot, Gensonne', and Guadet, the former leaders, were now re-
inforced by the addition of Petion, Buzot, Louvet, Barbaroux, and
others. All this party had studied more the ancient republics, in
480 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
the one-sided histories then so popular, than the habits and
character of the French people. Their policy from the beginning
had been to employ the violent partisans of anarchy to destroy
the monarchy. They regarded the insurrections of June 20 and
August 10, as steps towards clearing the way for the establishment
of a republic, though as a party they had no share in these insurrec-
tions as direct actors. It is not so easy to say that indirectly they
were not concerned in them. In this Assembly, of which Petion
was the first president, the abolition of monarchy was at once
decreed, September 23, and the following day was to be reckoned
as the first of the French Republic. Then, with equal readiness,
they decreed the renewal of the whole administration and judicial
service. Taine states that 1,300,000 officers, including all the local
councils, the staff of the National Guards, and all the employes
of the government, down to the keepers and sweepers of the
chambers, were thus changed. So also the contractors and trades-
men, whose bills averaged 200,000,000 francs per month. New
places (it is said) were created and sold by the deputies of the
Mountain. Four hundred places were given [away by Pache, the
same by Chaumette. In those statements there is no doubt some
truth, and much exaggeration. The Municipality drew 850,000
francs monthly for its military police. Full pay was drawn for
skeleton regiments. Madame Roland states that the money, for
the expenditure of which no account was given, amounted to
130,000,000 francs, which is not improbable.
The deposition of the King was absolutely necessary. No one could
doubt the impossibility of working a constitutional government with
a weak though well-meaning man like Louis XVI., controlled as he
was by a woman perfectly ignorant of every branch of useful
knowledge, trained up in the belief of the divine right of kings,
and always actively engaged in counteracting every scheme of
constitutional reform. But the abolition of the office of king was a
mistake; the young Dauphin, placed on the throne, under the
guardianship of a constitutional regency, would have saved France
from many of the struggles which followed, and which have left it,
after nearly a century of conflict, with an unstable government, and
with three pretenders, who by their respective followers are regarded
as the rightful claimants of the throne. It is the tempting weakness
of patriot politicians in revolutions, to set aside the old forms and
to uproot the old foundations, instead of using them as the firm
support of the new institutions. From this time to November 7, the
mortal struggle between the Girondists and the Mountain began, the
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 481
Girondists evidently losing influence. The constitution, modified
by universal suffrage, the attempt to curb the Municipality, at first
apparently successful, and then rejected, the adoption of the title
citoyen and citoyenne, and the abolition of the order of St. Louis
were indications of the public feeling, at least in the class which then
ruled Paris. The Girondists fought a hard battle on the question
of the trial of the king — not for the king's sake, but for their own.
They had been from the first playing a false game. In spite of their
talents and real patriotism, it is impossible to condone the inherent
wickedness of their party strategy of non-opposition to measures
and actions evil in themselves, but which tended to further the
ultimate objects they had in view, as in the uprisings of June 20
and August 9, 1792. On November 5, it was decided to impeach
the king; his trial followed December n and 26; his con-
demnation January 17, and his execution January 21, 1793. The
Girondists, after opposing his trial and death, were compelled to
acquiesce in both. This act, a mere parody of the English Act of
1649, minus the order and dignity maintained by the English
regicides, was as foolish as it was unjust. It excited a sympathy for
the sufferer and a hatred of the ruling factions in which generations
to come will participate. The subsequent history of the Republic
is from this time a struggle of parties for personal power. Liberals
may set aside kings, but they cannot destroy kingship, which appears
under other names, as Dictator, President, Consul, &c., for every
government, especially of an important state, must have an executive
head with kingly power. In England the chief seat is filled by an
hereditary monarch, and is beyond the reach of political partisans,
while the executive ministry win and lose their office by parlia-
mentary majorities. But a struggle for the supreme power in France
then meant a mortal struggle, in which the beaten party were sent
in batches to the guillotine. Yet, strange to say, both parties,
Girondists and Jacobins, with their eyes open to the possible and
probable consequences to themselves, agreed to the institution of
the Revolutionary Tribunal on March 10 and n ; and also to other
two Committees of General Defence and Public Safety on March 25,
besides sundry local Committees of Surveillance in Paris and else-
where, authorised to make domiciliary visits and to seek out offenders
suspected of political disaffection. "These execrable engines" of
lawless oppression and cruelty that ever disgraced a nation were
passed by men who knew that the enemies of the Republic, against
whom these laws were directed, were the leaders of parties opposed
to the dominant faction for the time being. Both parties had
2 I
482 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
willingly accepted the consequences ; they had gaged their heads
and were ready to pay the forfeits. The Jacobins (the Mountain)
were thoroughly in earnest, and full of activity. " Eighty of the
most energetic of the Mountain spread themselves over France
in parties of two and three, with the title of Commissioners of the
Convention, and with powers over-riding those of all the local
authorities .... their will was absolute, their authority supreme
.... they censured and dismissed the generals ; one of them even
directed the movements of a fleet at sea But no individual
energy could have sustained these dictatorships without the support
of a popular organisation. All over France a system of revolu-
tionary government sprang up, which superseded .... all existing
local powers. The local revolutionary administrators consisted of a
Committee, a Club, and a Tribunal. In each of the 40,000
communes of France, a Committee of Twelve was elected by the
people, and intrusted by the Convention, as the terror gained ground,
with boundless power of arrest and imprisonment. Popular excite-
ment was sustained by Clubs A tribunal with swift procedure
and power of life and death sat in each of the largest towns, and
judged the prisoners who were sent to it by the communes of the
neighbouring district. Such was the government of 1793; an
executive of uncontrolled power, drawn from the members of a
single assembly, and itself brought into immediate contact with the
power of the people in their assemblies and clubs." x The contest
between Robespierre and the Mountain on the one side, supported
by the Jacobin Club and the Municipality and the Girondists on
the other, was decided by an armed multitude of 80,000 men, who,
on May 31 and June 2, compelled the Convention to decree the
arrest of thirty-two Girondist members. Nine of them, who were
present, were seized, but not tried and executed until after the
execution of the queen, October 16. On that day, Barere regaled
Robespierre, St. Just, and others, in a tavern, and in reply to
Robespierre, who condemned the unnecessary blood-shedding,
remarked, "The vessel of the Revolution cannot be wafted into
port, but on waves of blood." The nine Girondists, including
Vergniaud, Gensonne', and Brissot, were with others, in all twenty-one,
executed on October 31. The glowing accounts of their festival and
speeches in the prison the preceding night, as given by Thiers and
Lamartine, are pure inventions. The other executions of the
year comprehended thirty-three farmers-general (of the revenue),
7 Fyffe, vol. i. pp. 71-74.
Peace of Paris •, November 28, 1815. 483
twenty-one women and girls for welcoming the Austrians and
Prussians at Verdun, Custine, the unfortunate General, Gorsas (the
first deputy executed), the Duke of Orleans, Madame Roland, Bailly,
the former Mayor of Paris, and Madame Du Barry, the former
mistress of Louis XV. In Paris there were 8,000 in prison, in all
France 45,000. The members of the Revolutionary Committee in
all France were paid three francs daily, which was equal to an outlay
of 24,000,000 sterling annually. The Hebertists, who divided with
Robespierre the rule of the Commune, were opposed to religion in
every shape ; they practically abolished Christianity, November 7,
forbade public worship on the loth, and closed the churches on the
23rd. "The Goddess of Reason," a well-known courtesan, was
enthroned in the Church of Notre Dame. To all these measures
Robespierre was opposed, but he permitted the Hebertists to ruin
their cause and themselves by their extravagance. On the whole,
the people of France regarded Robespierre and his domination with
approval in 1793 and in 1794, until his downfall.
In due time Robespierre was able to begin the destruction of
the anarchy of small men by the denouncing of the Hebertists, Cloots,
and the Goddess of Reason, who were executed March 24, 1794.
Within a week after, to the surprise of all France, Danton, Camille
Desmoulins, and Chabot were denounced, and on April 2 executed
with La Croix, Herault de Sechelles, fifteen in all. Soon after
Gobel, Chaumette, Madame Desmoulins, and Madame Hebert,
Malesherbes and family, D'Espre'menil, Lavoisier, Madame Elizabeth
and Madame Montomorin, between April 10 and May 16. It is not
difficult to understand why Hebert and his party were thus disposed
of. They were felt to be a disgrace to the Republic ; and it is easy
to see why Danton, apparently the friend of Robespierre, was set
aside as a formidable rival and as removing all obstacles to the
dictatorship of ROBESPIERRE. This singular man seems to have
contemplated the renovation of society by a baptism of blood;
himself incorruptible and wholly devoted to this one purpose. He
desired to restore the belief in and the worship of God. In his
Fete of the Supreme Being on June 8, he seems to have taken
"the step which separates the sublime from the ridiculous." It
was evidently a failure. Soon after this, on June 10, the astringent
law of the 22nd Prairial was passed. "This law consisted of
eighteen articles It extended the jurisdiction over all the
enemies of the people, and gave such detailed definitions of what
was an enemy of the people, that there was no word nor action of
any man's life by which he might not be brought within its cate-
2 I 2
484 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
gories. It established for all offences one sole punishment, death.
The proofs on which the tribunal might proceed were to be any kind
of evidence, material or moral, that might ' satisfy the jury, whose
conscience is to be their only rule and their only object, the triumph
of the Republic and the ruin of its enemies.' If the juries could
acquire a moral conviction without evidence, none need be pro-
duced. As to official defenders (counsel), the law abolished the
practice. Calumniated patriots will find a counsel in the juries;
the law refuses any to conspirators." 1 After this law had been
passed the Dictator abstained from attending the Convention for
forty days (from June 15 to July 24), a proceeding inscrutable.
Possibly he anticipated a combination of parties against each other,
and was waiting to ascertain which party he might use for the
destruction of the others. Compacts implying the mutual sacrifice
of friends, such as took place in the Roman triumvirates, were not
unknown to Robespierre, if it be true that the destruction of
Danton was rendered possible through an agreement made with
Collot d'Herbois, Billard Varennes, and Barere, who readily
abandoned the Hebertists to Robespierre, on condition that he
should make no opposition to the destruction of Danton and his
party. The guillotine was meanwhile at work under the new law,
so tfiat between June 10 and July 27 1,400 persons were executed.
The leading members of the Convention and the various committees
began to doubt their individual safety, the consideration of which
was forced upon their notice by these executions ; the judges and
juries might unexpectedly find themselves the victims of the
guillotine. Conspiracies were formed and all confidences shaken
except such as were founded on a communion of personal interests.
Henriot and his party were preparing a Jacobin revolt to support
Robespierre, while Billaud Varennes, Collot d'Herbois, Barere,
Carnot, Robert Lindet, and others were concerting how to resist
him ; they were joined by Tallien (incited by a lady in prison whom
he afterwards married), also by Lecontre, Bourdon, Thuriot,
Barras, Freron, Fouche, and others. In the three days, the 8th,
9th, and loth Thermidor, corresponding to our July 26, 27, and 28,
the battle in the Assembly and out of it was fought and won,
though occasionally the success of the opponents of Robespierre
seemed doubtful. The Dictator, suddenly denounced and helpless in
the hands of his enemies on the 26th and 27th, was executed on
the 28th with twenty of his supporters. It is impossible to sketch
^' J Quarterly Review" vol. Ixxiii. p. 416.
"> --V
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 485
the history of those three days. It must be studied in the detail
which is given in the popular histories. The men who headed
this revolution and destroyed Robespierre are called "the
Thermidorians." They were for the most part one set of assassins
triumphing over another. In some respects they were worse than
Robespierre and St. Just, who, though men of blood and fanatics,
were incorruptible. These men, the victors, hoped to carry on the
system of promoting unity by the destruction of opponents. To
their great surprise they found that the majority of their party
looked for a change in the system. Within a few days eighty-one
of the members of the Municipality were executed, but 10,000 sus-
pected persons were released. Fouquier Tinville, the public accuser,
and twenty-three of the jurors were sent to prison. The payment to the
members of the Revolutionary Tribunals was stopped, and the law of
22 Prairial abrogated. Attempts were made with some success to
purify the local tribunals. These reforms, displacing many violent
men, caused from time to time riots and resistance. To support
the new government, a party call the " Jeune Doree " was formed,
composed chiefly of young men of the citizen class. The seventy-
three deputies expelled with the Girondists were restored to their
seats, and the Jacobin Clubs and seventy-three others were closed,
November 9. Carrier, infamous for his atrocities at Nantes, after a
trial of 40 days, was executed with two others, December 16. The
Revolutionary Tribunal was abolished December 28, and then the year
1 794 ended with hopeful prospects. The executions up to the death
of Robespierre were 2,375 persons. It is calculated, however, that
from the expulsion of the Girondists to July, 1794, 16,000 persons
had perished in France though the Revolutionary Courts.1
Accusations were presented against Billaud Varennes, Collot
d'Herbois, Barere, and Vadier, for their conduct as Terrorists, a proof
of the great reaction against the murderous system hitherto pursued
by -the dominant parties. There was an insurrection in their favour
on April i, 1795, and one more formidable on May 20 and 21,
happily defeated, and severely punished by the execution of nearly
a hundred. Fouquier Tinville, the public 'accu'ser, was executed, with
fifteen of the judges of the Revolutionary Tribunal,' .on; May 7. '.The
Parisian gendarmes and the cannoneers were .'dissolved, the National
Guard reorganised, and a camp of artillery established in the gardens
of the Tuileries ; troops of the line were cantoned in and out of
Paris, and the galleries of the Convention closed to the mob, and
1 B. M. Gardiner, p. 221.
486 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
on May 30 Catholic worship was allowed. The Convention was
thus at liberty to form a new constitution, which was promulgated
August 22, and accepted by the Departments, September 6
(20 Fructidor), and proclaimed on the 2 2nd. It was " the Constitution
of the year III.," the third since 1789. In Paris it was unpopular.
An insurrection broke out on October 3rd to the 5th, which was
quelled by Napoleon Buonaparte, a young officer appointed to com-
mand the troops of the Convention, on October 5 (13 Vendemiaire).
On the 26th the Convention broke up ; it had passed 8,370
decrees.
This NEW CONSTITUTION, elaborated by a Committee of Eleven,
established a Council of Five Hundred, and a Council of Ancients
(two hundred and fifty). At the head, a Directory of five members
selected by the Ancients out of a list drawn up by the five hundred.
Great changes were made in the internal administration of the
country. The Municipality of Paris was divided among twelve
distinct municipalities. The new government was simply a change
of name. "The five Directors, the six Ministers, and the two
Councils, stood in the place of the Committee of Public Safety and
the Convention, but the change was one of name and form, not of
system." *
The FIVE DIRECTORS were La Reveilliere Lepaux, Rewbell,
Latourneau, Barras, and Carnot, all of them men who had voted for
the death of the king. They set themselves to allay the commercial
and general misery of the country by absorbing a large portion of
the assignats, and then by replacing them with "territorial mandats,"
which represented a fixed amount of the public lands. A con-
siderable amount of coin came again into circulation, and credit
seemed to revive.
In the preceding sketch no reference has been made to the
massacre of Avignon, October, 1791; or the insurrection of La
Vendee, March, 1793, to February, 1795 j or to the disturbances in
the south of France, remarkable for the cruelties of the reactionary
party, as well as those of the republicans, of which Bordeaux,
Lyons, and Toulouse were the principal seats ; nor of the cruelties
at Lyons by Fouche' and Collot d'Herbois, 1793; or those at
Nantes by Carrier, 1794; nor the failure of the expedition of the
emigrants at Quiberon, July, 1795. All these were local in their
influences.
1 B. M. Gardiner, p. 251.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 487
IV. — The Wars of the Revolution up to the Consulate of
Buonaparte, 1792-1799.
The wars arising out of the French Revolution differ, not only in
their character and objects, from the preceding European wars, but
also in the development of military tactics and of generalship of the
highest character. The English reader has had to rely mainly upon
Alison, the voluminous historian of England, and upon Thiers, the
republican historian of France, and upon Von Sybel, the German
historian. Recently a work has appeared, by C. A. Fyffe, entitled,
" The Modern History of Europe," the first volume of which is
devoted to the history of the revolutionary wars, up to 1815. For
the first time the leading facts of this eventful period have been
fully, yet succinctly, detailed • the facts narrated are the more sig-
nificant, and are exhibited in their natural connexion. The com-
pletion of this work will furnish our literature with a standard
history of our own and of the preceding generation.
The declaration of war, made by Louis XVI. in the National
Legislative Assembly on April 20, 1792, began the struggle between
republican freedom and licence on the one hand and the old-estab-
lished feudality of Europe on the other. France had been provoked
by a series of insults specially calculated to offend the pride of the
French people. So early as July 6, 1791, the Emperor Leopold II.
had proposed a league to preserve the royal family of France, and
two weeks after this the emperor and Frederick William II. of
Prussia met at Pilnitz, and on August 26 had agreed to retake all
the provinces which Louis XIV. had taken from the Austrian
Netherlands, thus making beforehand a treaty of partition. This
was withdrawn when Louis XVI. had accepted the constitution,
September 14, 1791. On the death of Leopold, March i, 1792,
his successor, Francis II., demanded " the re-establishment of the
French monarchy on the basis of the royal sitting of June 23, 1789,
the restoration of the property of the clergy, of the lands of Alsace
with all their rights to the German princes, and of Avignon, to the
Pope." Such demands implied and necessitated war. Austria,
Prussia, Russia, and Spain were the aggressors. On the side of
France the war was one of self-defence. Two Austrian armies and
one Prussian army entered France from the Netherlands and from
Coblentz, July, 1792, from which place the Duke of Brunswick, as
generalissimo, issued his insensate proclamation. Longwy and
488 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to tJie
Verdun were taken, but the duke was checked at Valmy,
September 20, by Kellermann, and obliged to retreat. Custine, the
French general, entered Germany, and captured Spires, Worms, and
Mainz, October 20, while Dumouriez gained the battle of Jemappes,
November 6, and conquered at once the Netherlands. These
successes emboldened the National Convention to publish, in all the
languages of Europe, a decree offering the alliance of France to all
the peoples who wished to recover their freedom, November 19.
A month later, Savoy and Nice were annexed, and on December 16
the Convention declared that " in every country that shall be
occupied by the armies of the Republic the generals shall announce
the abolition of all existing authorities, of nobility, of serfage, of
every feudal right, and of every monopoly ; they shall proclaim the
sovereignty of the people, and convoke the inhabitants in assemblies
to form a provisional government, for which no officer of a former
government, no noble, nor any of the members of the former
privileged corporations, shall be eligible."1 By the conquest of the
Netherlands, the French were able to open the navigation of the
river Scheldt, which had been closed by absurd treaties, in order
to force the commerce of the North Sea into Dutch ports. This
act, in itself just and right, set aside treaties to which France was
then a party, and helped to force the English ministry, under Pitt,
most unwillingly into the war which soon followed after the execution
of Louis XVI. The declaration was first made by France, February 3,
1793. For this war, Burke's "Reflections," published 1790, and the
declaration of the Convention, had prepared the public mind in
England. By statesmen in general the language used by France
could only be understood as the avowal of indiscriminate aggression.
The Republican armies met with reverses, but the allied powers,
jealous of each other, and more intent upon appropriating territory
than in pursuing the great object of their alliance, made no real
progress. Carnot, the War Minister of France, reorganised the
army, sent unsuccessful generals to the scaffold, gave commands to
competent soldiers from the ranks, and permitted the new battalions
to choose their own officers. By these men, and by the admixture
of the old soldiers of the monarchy, France was cleared from
invasion. In 1794, the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria
were more interested in Polish affairs, and thus carried on the war with
France only so far as was necessary to obtain from the English govern-
ment the payment of subsidies. Holland was willingly conquered
1 Fyffe, vol. i. pp. 54, 55.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 489
by Pichegru in December, 1794, and early in 1795; Prussia con-
cluded a peace at Basle (April 5), and Spain (July 22); while Austria
and England continued the war. Austria was stimulated by a Russian
offer of a large share in the territory of Poland and by the promise
of English subsidies. The French were driven from the right bank
of the Rhine, and defeated at Mainz with heavy loss (October)
by General Clairfait, who first began to revive the spirit of Germany.
The campaigns of 1796 and 1797 were carried on by the French in
Germany under Moreau and Jourdan, and in Italy by General Buona-
parte (whose ready tactics had saved the Directory on the 13 Vende-
miaire). In Germany, the Archduke Charles successfully resisted
the French armies, but in Italy the battle of Monte-Notte enabled
Buonaparte to establish the Cispadane — i.e., Cisalpine — Republic, and
to take possession of Venice and the Ionian Islands. Venice, the
most recent conquest, was, however, given to Austria in exchange for
the Netherlands, by the Treaty of Campo Formic, October 17, 1797.
Peace had been made with the Pope previously at Tolentino,
February 19. Austria gave up Lombardy to the new Italian Republic,
and, on the whole, was a gainer by the war. The price which
Austria paid was the betrayal of Germany. Buonaparte ridiculed the
notion of founding freer political systems in Europe on the ruins of
the power of Austria. In a letter to Talleyrand he writes : " I have
not drawn my support in Italy from the love of the people for liberty
and equality .... the real support of the army of Italy has been
its own discipline .... above all, our promptitude in repressing
malcontents and punishing those who declared against us. This is
history, what I say in my proclamations and speeches is a romance."1
The French Directory had hoped that the Spanish and the Dutch
navies would be a real check upon the naval power of England ; but
the Spanish fleet was beaten and destroyed by Jarvis off St. Vincent,
February 14, 1797, and the Dutch fleet at Camperdown by Duncan,
October 6. A congress was held at Rastadt to arrange formally
that which Prussia and Austria had already settled with France, and
also to furnish the means of compensating the lay princes of the
empire by the confiscation of the territories of the ecclesiastical
princes. Meanwhile, a dispute with Switzerland ended in the
establishment of the Helvetian Republic, April 12, 1798, as a quarrel
with the Pope had issued in the creation of the Roman Republic,
February 15, 1798. In these campaigns nothing could equal the
rapacity and exactions of the French generals. The seventh volume
Fyffe, vol. i. p. 142.
490 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
of Schlosser gives full particulars.1 The disgraceful conduct of the
German states, from the smallest to the greatest, as well as that of
the Italian states, are honestly depicted by one who was no friend to
the Revolution. This year was remarkable for the departure of
Buonaparte for Egypt from Toulon, May 9, with a formidable arma-
ment, an expedition originated by himself. His plausible and
ostensible object was to strike a blow which might annihilate the
British rule in India. On his way he took and occupied Malta, and in
due time landed in Egypt, defeated the Mamelukes, and occupied
Cairo. Nelson with the English squadron followed, and on August i
destroyed thirteen out of the seventeen ships composing the French
navy. No destruction was ever so complete. Of 11,000 officers
and men, 9,000 were prisoners or perished. Meanwhile, a new
coalition, on the part of England, Russia, Austria, Turkey, and
Naples, was formed against France. The Neapolitans began the
war prematurely by the invasion of the Roman territory, November 23,
but were defeated, and Naples abandoned, the king flying to Sicily,
December 20. Early in 1799 Naples was changed into the Parthe-
nopean Republic, January 23 ; but by the arrival of the Russians
under Suvaroff, and the forces of the Austrians, both Italy and
Switzerland were re-conquered, and the French driven out. The
King of Naples retained his capital long enough to punish cruelly the
liberals who had joined the French. To all appearances the French
Republic was in danger, but was saved by the Austrian sinister
selfishness which had shipwrecked the coalition of 1793. Austria
had renewed the war for the purpose of extending its own dominions
in Italy. The Emperor of Russia, with the Pope, the King of
Naples, and Sardinia, were all alike disgusted with the indifference
of the Austrians to the great end of the coalition ; the Russian
army was withdrawn. An expedition from England to invade
Holland, August to October, failed, partly through the inefficiency
of the Duke of York, its commander, and on October 9 Buonaparte,
escaping from Syria, landed at Frejus in Provence, and was soon in
Paris.
To understand the state of France when Buonaparte so suddenly
appeared we must go back to the appointment of the Directory on
October 26, 1795. La Reveilliere Lepaux was placed in charge of
education ; he was a fanatical deist, and endeavoured to establish
what he called "theophilanthropy," to which he assigned temples,
chants, and a liturgy to be used every tenth day instead of Sunday ;
1 Pp. 56-102.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 491
Rewbell, a lawyer, took charge of justice, finance, and foreign
affairs; La Tourneau the marine and the colonies; Barras, of noble
birth, arranged all matters of ceremonial, and was suspected of being
largely implicated in stock-jobbing; Carnot was Minister of War.
The Directors took up their residence in the palace of the Luxem-
bourg, and lived in great pomp and luxury, inventing for themselves
splendid dresses, and imposing the same upon all officers of state —
a step towards the revival of the luxury and varied orders of rank
under the old monarchy. They found the whole administration in
a state of disorder, no money in the treasury, so that the govern-
ment couriers were often detained from the want of the means of
paying their expenses. One-half of the soil of France had been
sold, and the produce consumed in the cost of the government and
of the army, and in feeding the population of Paris mainly, but also
of other large cities which had been diverted from industrious
pursuits to politics. In January, 1796, the amount of assignats in
circulation was forty-five milliards of francs, about two thousand
millions sterling, the value so far deteriorated that a twenty-franc
piece in gold would purchase two hundred francs in the government
paper ; the army was without proper supplies of food or clothing ;
the police all but dissolved ; and the whole country infested with
robbers. The Directory had to put down the conspiracy of Babceuf,
August 29, 1796, the object of which was to restore the constitution
of 1793, and also to guard against a Royalist reaction which dis-
played itself in the return of two hundred Royalists (some of them
nobles) in the elections for one-third of the legislature (March,
1797), and in the choice of General Pichegru as President of the
Council of Ancients (this general was suspected of being engaged
in Royalist intrigues with Austria). Buonaparte, then with the army
in Italy, sent Lavalette to concert with Barras to put down the
royalist party. On May 20, 1797, La Tourneau retired from the
Directory (according to lot), and was succeeded by Barthelemy.
There were great differences of opinion among the Directors. Barras,
though opposed by Carnot, called Talleyrand to the ministry of
foreign affairs July 15, 1797. Carnot hated Barras, Rewbell, and La
Reveilliere Lepaux, and " that little Corsican Buonaparte," who was
sending money from Italy to the Directory, and who, alarmed at the
influence and conspiracies of the Royalists, sent Augereau to com-
mand the troops of the Directory, September 3, 1797. The generals
looked upon the treasury as merely paymaster to meet their wants,
and disposed of the funds which came into their hands as they
deemed necessary. The legislature called out the National Guard
492 The -Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
in their defence, but on September 4 Augereau arrested Pichegru and
many of the members. The remnant assembled at the Luxembourg
and appointed a committee of public safety, which condemned 'Gaffiot
and Barthelemy (two of the Directors), Pichegru, Barbe-Marbois,
and fifty others of the legislators, with the editors of forty-two
journals. Carnot made his escape to Geneva, Pichegru and several
hundred priests were transported, and the elections of forty-eight
departments disallowed. This is called the Revolution of the lyth and
\<£\hFructidor. The Directory then consisted of Barras, La Reveilliere
Lepaux, Rewbell, Merlin, and Francois. Two-thirds of the national
debt was struck off, to the great relief of the finance department.
In the month of May (11-22, 1798), some other changes took
place in the Directorate. This is called the 22nd Floreal. On
May 19 Buonaparte was permitted to sail on the Egyptian expe-
dition, the nominal object being to alarm the English in India,
but in reality to get out of the way a man to whom a subordinate
position was impossible, and for whom the highest position was not
yet open. The dissensions in the Directory continued. In June,
1799, Sieves succeeded Rewbell, and some other changes took place,
by which the executive government was in the hands of Barras
and Sieyes. Fouche' was appointed minister of police, and on
August 10 expelled the Jacobins from the hall. This is called the
3oth Prairial. It was well that a master-mind was at hand to arrest
the beginnings of new contests for power by persons incapable of
either obeying or commanding. General Buonaparte landed at
Frejus October 9. He was three days in Paris before the Directory
were aware of his presence. Augereau and Talleyrand were friendly
to his design to establish a new government, Sieyes hoped to
set aside Barras, and to become the head by the help of Buonaparte.
The losses of the French armies in the campaigns of 1798, 1799,
had rendered the Directory unpopular. All eyes were turned to the
young general, whose higher qualities were well understood, but
whose great faults were at that time undeveloped.'!' It^was clear to
any impartial observer that constitutional government, in the right
sense of the term, was impossible under the Directory, as the Revo-
lution of the 1 7th Fructidor (September 3, 1797) had suppressed all
opposition, and was but the last step to the despotism of the chief
of the army. " From the moment that Buonaparte landed at Frejus
he was master of France."1 Cautiously the agents of Sieyes
worked towards a revolution which had nothing to fear except from
1 Fyffe, vol. i. p. 201.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 493
a rising of the demoralised populace of Paris. On October 23,
Lucien Buonaparte was elected president of the Five Hundred, and
the sittings of the councils removed to St. Cloud by a decree of the
Council of Ancients, which also conferred the command of the
troops of Paris upon Buonaparte on November 9. On the loth
there was no opposition on the part of the Ancients, but the Five
Hundred were in direct opposition to the new Dictator, who entered
the chamber escorted by grenadiers, and the last so-called free repre-
sentatives of France were expelled. Writers, whose constitutional
sympathies are very properly with all that savours of " representa-
tion," are apt to forget that these Five Hundred were simply the
representatives of a party, which, on the iyth Fructidor, had
destroyed the very existence of free election and free government
in France. Constitutional government in the then divided state of
public feeling, through the animosity of the Royalist and Republican
parties being impossible, the only practical remedy was the rule of
a popular general, capable of enforcing authority through his hold
on the army, and of insuring obedience, and also likely, from his
known talents, to secure the prosperity of France ; and Buonaparte
was the man. This was the result of the Revolution of the i8th and
1 9th Brumaire. From that time France was a military monarchy.
Sieyes had framed a very complex constitution, logically perfect if
men had been mere machines, but which to the strong sense of
Buonaparte appeared impracticable. The frame of executive govern-
ment which the country received in 1799 was that which Buonaparte
deduced from the conception of an absolute central power. Three
consuls, one the chief, the others merely consultative ; a senate or
council of state for life, with high salaries ; a legislative body of three
hundred, one-third to be renewed annually, with no power of debate,
simply to accept or reject measures ; a tribunate of one hundred
members, one-fifth to be renewed yearly, who debated but did not
vote. The consuls chose the senate, the senate chose, out of the
list of candidates presented by the electoral colleges for the legis-
lative body, the tribunate. Buonaparte wished to retain Sieyes as one
of the consuls, but he wisely preferred a pension and an estate.
The other two consuls were Cambaceres and Le Brun. Ducos was
placed in the senate. The new constitution was accepted by three
millions of votes, a proof then, as on similar occasions afterwards,
that the population cared little for the form of government so
long as they could secure order and peace. The release of nine
thousand prisoners was a hopeful beginning for the new regime
(December 15-24, 1799).
494 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
" A system of centralisation came into force with which France
under her kings had nothing to compare. All that had once served
as a check upon monarchical power, the legal parliaments, the pro-
vincial estates of Brittany and Languedoc, the rights of lay and
ecclesiastical corporations, had vanished away. In the place of the
motley of privileges that had tempered the Bourbon monarchy, in
the place of the popular assemblies of the Revolution, there sprang
up a series of magistracies as regular and as absolute as the orders
of military rank. Where, under the court of 1791, a body of local
representatives had met to conduct the business of the Department,
there was now a prefet appointed by the First Consul, absolute like
the First Consul himself, and assisted only by the advice of a nomi-
nated council, which met for one fortnight in the year. In subordi-
nation to the prefet, an officer and similar council transacted the
local business of the arrondissement. Even the 40,000 maires and
municipal councils were all appointed directly or indirectly by the
chief of the state Nor was the power of the First Consul
limited to the administrative. With the exception of the lowest
and the highest members of the judicature he nominated all judges,
and transferred them at his pleasure to inferior or superior posts.
Such was the system which, based to a great degree upon the pre-
ferences of the French people, fixed even more deeply in the
national character the willingness to depend upon omnipresent, all-
directing power. Its rational order, its regularity, its command of
the highest science and experience, could not fail to confer great
and rapid benefits upon the country In comparison with the
species of self-government which then and long afterwards existed
in England, the centralisation of France had all the superiority of
progress and intelligence over torpor and self-contradictions. Yet a
heavy, an incalculable price is paid by every nation which, for the
sake of administrative efficiency, abandons its local liberties and all
that is bound up with their enjoyment." 1 Yet it is singular that the
majority of civilised people are deeply conscious of the need of
some powerful central check upon the ignorance, and selfishness,
and injustice of all mere local and parochial governments ; they are
willing to submit to the loss of some of their local liberties as the
price paid to receive a rational control of local prejudices and par-
tisanships. May not local government as well as centralisation be
carried too far ?
The position of the new government has never been so fully and
1 Fyffe, vol. i. pp. 207-209.
Peace of Paris ', November 28, 1815. 495
airly stated as by Fyffe, a writer most of whose opinions have been
confirmed by the experience of the present century at least: "What
the French had, in the first epoch of their Revolution, endeavoured
to impart to Europe — the spirit of liberty and self-government — they
had now renounced themselves Yet the statesmanship of
Buonaparte, if it repelled the liberal and disinterested sentiments
of 1789, was no mere cunning of a Corsican soldier, or exploit
of mediaeval genius born outside its age. Subject to the fullest
gratification of his own most despotic or most malignant impulses,
Buonaparte carried into his creations the ideas upon which the
greatest European innovators before the French Revolution had
based their work. What Frederick and Joseph had accomplished,
or failed to accomplish, was realised in western Germany, when its
sovereigns became the clients of the First Consul. Buonaparte was
no child of the French Revolution. He was the last and the
greatest of the autocratic legislators who worked in an unfree age.
Under his rule France lost what had seemed to be most its own • it
most powerfully advanced the forms of progress common to itself
and the rest of Europe. Buonaparte raised no population to liberty ;
in extinguishing privilege, and abolishing the legal distinctions of
birth, in levelling all personal and corporate authority beneath the
single rule of the state, he prepared the way for a rational freedom,
when, at a later day, the government of the state should itself become
the representatives of the people's will." l
V. — The Wars of the Consulate and the Empire , 1800-1815.
The wars of Napoleon as consul and emperor, from 1800-1815,
must be briefly noticed. They are studies for the strategist as well
as lessons for statesmen, connected as they are with revelations of
the indifference of the nations of Europe towards their rulers, until
driven by the tyranny of French armies and administrators to that
determined resistance against France which enabled the sovereigns
of Europe at last to put down the French Empire. In the year
1800 Moreau headed the French armies in Germany from April to
December, and gained the battle of Hohenlinden, December 3,
1800. His success weakened the efforts of the Austrians in Italy,
in which Buonaparte, having in May crossed the Alps by the Great
St. Bernard, cut off the Austrians from Lombardy, and gained the
battle of Marengo (June n, 1800), followed by the Peace of Lun£-
1 Fyffe, vol. i. pp. 213, 214.
496 The Revolution in France y 1788 A.D., to the
ville, February 6, 1801, by which Austria ceded to France Germany
west of the Rhine. Naples was permitted to make peace through
the influence of the Czar of Russia, who was now at the head of
the Northern Maritime League, formed to defend the rights of
neutrals at sea against the claims of search by England (Decem-
ber 1 6, 1800). This league was dissolved by the bombardment of
Copenhagen by the English fleet, April 2, 1801, and by the murder
of the Czar Paul on March 23. An English army obliged the
French in Egypt to capitulate, and a peace between France and
England, provisionally agreed to, October i, 1801, was formally
signed at Amiens, March 27, 1802. Of all the colonies conquered
by England, Ceylon and Trinidad alone were retained. Malta was
to be restored to the Knights of Malta, as their treaty was a mere
truce. Buonaparte improved the leisure, such as it was, by annexing,
practically though not formally, the Batavian Republic (September,
i SOT), the Italian Republic (January, 1802), of both of which he was
President. Piedmont was made a French province (September,
1802), and Tuscany was governed by French agents; he was the
ruler of Switzerland as mediator of the Helvetic League (October 4,
1802). The influence of France in Germany rested upon the anta-
gonism of Prussia and Austria, and was further increased by a
treaty between France and Russia for joint action in Germany
(October 1 1, 1801). Russia had no proper interest in Germany
beyond the conserving of the absurd pretensions of the petty states
of Bavaria, Baden, and Wiirtemberg, to increase of territory and
higher rank. The Diet of Ratisbon acted subordinately to the
secret agreement between France and Russia made June 3, 1802,
by which all the ecclesiastical estates and forty-five free cities were
extinguished. There was at the time no national spirit in Germany,
nor had there been for two hundred years past. The people cared
as little for Germany as their sovereign did. This arrangement,
settled March, 1803, was, on the whole, an advantage to Germany.
The priest-ruled states were remarkable for their ignorance and
beggary ; the free cities had become oligarchies ; the end of their
political existence was a clear gain to good government; all the
land held by religious corporations was confiscated, by which the
number of landed proprietors was increased. The government of
Germany gained in power, and the people profited — at least, in
West Germany — by the throwing open of appointments, trades, and
professions to all classes. The peasantry also were partially relieved
from feudal burdens. Between 1801 and 1804 the codification of
law in France produced the Code Napoleon^ passed March 21, 1803.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 497
The credit due to him is that of having " vigorously pursued the
work of consolidating and popularising law by the help of all the
skilled and scientific minds whose resources were at his command."
Also the Concordat with the Pope, by which the Catholic Church was
re-established in France (April, 1802). The episcopacy consisted
of ten archbishops at ;£6oo a year, fifty bishops at ^400 a year,
with a number of cures at from ^48 to .£60. This measure naturally
threw the clergy into the Ultramontane views of the papacy, as also
similar changes in Germany ; so that there are in Europe now
" an emancipated France, a free Italy, a secular state -disciplined
Germany, and the Church in conspiracy against them all." 1 This
is a strong expression by Fyffe, but demonstrated to be practically
true by succeeding governments in France, Germany, and Italy.
War with England broke out, May, 1803, ostensibly on account of
the retention of Malta by England, who declined to give up an im-
portant position, nominally to the so-called Knights of Malta, into
the hands of France. Hanover was seized, and the Elbe closed to
English shipping. The plot attributed to Cadoudal and Pichegru
against Napoleon failed. It was followed by the seizure in Baden
of the Duke d'Enghien (son of the Prince of Conde), who was
most unjustly suspected of being concerned in this plot, March 15,
1804. He was taken to Vincennes and shot, March 20. This, as
has been cynically expressed, " was more than a crime, it was a
mistake." Within a week all France, we are told, " desired the
security of an hereditary throne," and Napoleon accepted the
empire, May 18, 1804, and was crowned by Pius VII., the Pope,
at Paris, December 2. "Then closed the best part of Napoleon's
public life." Unfortunately he was convinced that " military glory
was necessary to the consolidation of the empire, surrounded as
France was with open enemies and resentful victims." . ..." It
must become the first of all states or it will fall." 3 The Emperor
of Germany, on July 4, took the title of Emperor of Austria.
The year 1805 was distinguished by the coalition of Russia,
England, and Austria against France. The incapacity (or worse)
of the Austrian general, Mack, who surrendered Ulm and 25,000
men without a blow, and the rapid movements of Napoleon (after
several battles fought near Vienna) upon the Russians and
Austrians, by which he won the Battle of Austerlitz, December 2,
led to the Peace of Presburg, December 26. Austria had to cede
1 Fyffe, vol. i. pp. 265.
2 Introduction to "History of the Peace," by Miss Martineau, vol. i. p. 118.
2 K
498 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
Venice to Napoleon's kingdom of Italy, and the Tyrol to Bavaria ;
other accessions of territory were given to Baden and Wiirtemberg,
and the Electors of Bavaria and Wiirtemberg were raised to the
kingly dignity. The Bourbons of Naples were deposed and fled
to Sicily, and Joseph Buonaparte reigned in Naples early in 1806.
One great disaster was the drawback to these successes, the destruc-
tion of the combined fleets of France and Spain at Trafalgar by
Nelson, October 21. "Nelson fell in the moment of his triumph.
.... He had made an end of the power of France upon the sea.
Trafalgar was not only the greatest naval victory ; it was the greatest
and most momentous victory won either by land or by sea during
the whole of the revolutionary war. No victory, and no series
of victories of Napoleon's produced the same effect upon Europe.
.... Napoleon henceforth set his hopes on exhausting England's
resources by compelling every state on the Continent to exclude her
commerce So long as France possessed a navy, Nelson
sustained the spirit of England by his victories. His last triumph
left England in such a position that no means remained to injure
her but those which must result in the ultimate deliverance of the
Continent."1
A new and politic measure carried into effect the aspiration
of France for that predominance in Germany which had been
sought by French kings during the reign of Henry III. The
Confederation of the Rhine, an organisation of Western Germany
under its native princes, under its protector Napoleon, was formed,
July 12, 1806. It comprised the kings of Bavaria and Wiirtemberg,
the Electors of Baden, and thirteen minor princes, representing a
population of 8,000,000. The Emperor of Austria wisely resigned
the title of Emperor of Germany, August 6. In the opinion of
Fyffe, the Emperor Napoleon had " now reached, but did not over-
pass, the limits within which the sovereignty of France might
probably have been long maintained." 3 Perhaps so, while France
was ruled by a Napoleon, but how otherwise ? The opinion that
" the true turning-point in Napoleon's career was the moment when
he passed beyond the policy which had planned the Federation of
the Rhine, and roused by his oppression the one state which was
still capable of giving a national life to Germany," 8 no one can
dispute. The arbitrary and most unjust execution of the bookseller
Palm at Nuremburg, August 26, was no recommendation of French
rule. He was an " innocent and unoffending man, innocent even
: Fyffe, vol. i. p. 291. • Ibid., p. 307. 3 Ibid., p. 308.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 499
of the honourable crime of attempting to save his country." l Prussia,
which had most dishonourably played false both to England and
Napoleon, when at last roused to resistance, began its resistance too
late, at a crisis when Austria was unable to help. The Prussian
army had been resting on the character of the armies of the great
Frederick, and had lost the discipline and the capacity for warlike
operations by long disuse, and by "an ignorant conceit of their
own superiority/' The battle of Jena, October 14, placed all
Prussia under the power of Napoleon. On November 21, 1806,
Napoleon issued his Berlin Decree, placing the British islands in a
state of blockade, confiscating all English goods and English pro-
perty. To carry out this decree was impracticable. Buonaparte him-
self had to obtain broadcloth for his army by granting licences for
this purpose. The English Government retaliated by the Orders in
Council, January to November, 1807. The Russian Czar continued
the war, but the battle of Eylau was a drawn battle, February 8,
1807. The two emperors met on a raft at Tilsit, June 24, when
the interests of his ally, the King of Prussia, were altogether ignored
by the Czar, who showed himself to be " a Greek of the Lower
Empire." Prussia had to resign its territory west of the Elbe, and
its Polish territory, out of which (i) the kingdom of Westphalia was
erected for Jerome Napoleon, and (2) a Grand Duchy of Warsaw
for Napoleon's ally, the King of Saxony. There were also secret
articles, in which Napoleon offered to Alexander the spoils of
Sweden and the Ottoman Empire. There was no " vestige " of
political honour surviving in the Emperor Alexander. When action
was really of decisive importance, in his mediation between France
and Prussia, he threw himself without scruple on to the side of
oppression. It lay within his power to gain terms of peace for
Prussia as lenient as those which Austria had gained at Campo
Formic, and at Luneville. He sacrificed Prussia, as he allied him-
self against the last upholders of national independence in Europe,
in order that he himself might receive Finland and the Danubian
Provinces. The English Government, having received informa-
tion that the Danish Government had agreed to give up their fleet
to France, sent a fleet, and compelled the Danes at Copenhagen, by
a severe bombardment, to surrender their fleet to England, Sep-
tember 2. This act could only be justified by the character of the
information upon which the British Government acted, which at the
time it was not able to produce without endangering the lives of its
1 Fyffe, vol. i. p. 311.
2 K 2
5OO The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
informants. Soon after, Napoleon, by a secret treaty with Spain,
October 27, arranged that Portugal should be divided between
France and Spain, and Junot was sent to take possession of Lisbon.
The royal family, however, embarked in the English fleet for Brazil
on November 29. A quarrel between Charles IV. of Spain and his
son Ferdinand led to the more intimate interference of Napoleon
with the affairs of Spain. He sent an army in December into
Spain, under Dupont, to protect Ferdinand, as was supposed, but
really to prepare for the conquest of the country ; and on February
20, 1808, Murat was sent to take the chief command. Charles IV.
abdicated on March 17, and Ferdinand succeeded. He was
persuaded to meet Buonaparte at Bayonne, and there was compelled
to resign the crown of Spain, his parents, Charles IV. and his
queen, being parties to the act. A more treacherous, unprincipled,
and unfortunate proceeding, of which the results were so unfavour-
able to the actors, history has never recorded. Napoleon had utterly
misunderstood the character of the Spanish people and the tenacity
of their resistance. The country itself presented difficulties in the
provisioning of a large army, and a small army would simply hold the
ground it occupied. Joseph Buonaparte was made king, and under
other circumstances would have been a blessing to Spain; but all
Spain was soon in a state of insurrection, which the French troops
suppressed from time to time in the several localities, but which
broke out again as soon as suppressed. The troops were harassed
by irregular guerilla bands of the peasants. The French were
beaten by the Spaniards at Baylen July 19. Sir Arthur Wellesley
landed in Portugal August i, 1808, and fought the battle of
Vimiera, August 21. By Sir Henry Burrard (the senior officer)
the Convention of Cintra was agreed to, by which Junot and his
troops were conveyed to France, August 30. Napoleon, after an
interview with Alexander at Erfurt, October 7, in the midst of a
" crowned and titled rabble," by which he imagined that Germany
would be preserved from resistance, visited Spain in November,
and entered Madrid, December 4. The English army at Lisbon,
under Sir John Moore, had been directed to move towards the
north, and had to retreat before the superior armies of France under
Soult and Napoleon. Moore was able to check his pursuers near
Corunna, January 16, 1809, but was killed in the battle, after which
the troops were safely embarked. Soon after, the resistance of
Saragossa, after it had been stormed, January 29 until February 20,
gave the French a specimen of the savage energy of the Spaniards
when fully roused. The departure of Napoleon from Spain had
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 501
been hastened by the expectation of a rupture with Austria. This
war tested the skill of Napoleon and the prowess of his arms, even
after he had occupied Vienna, May 13. In the battle of Asperna
the village itself was five times lost and won. " The belief in
Napoleon's invincibility was destroyed;" he had suffered a defeat in
person at the head of his finest troops, from an enemy little superior
in strength to himself." l The battle of Wagram, July 5, 6, was an
indecisive one ; there was then a truce. Austria might have
continued the war, for she had brave soldiers, but no generals ; so
peace was made at Vienna, October 14, 1809. Austria lost Salzburg,
and part of Upper Austria, to Bavaria ; Western Galicia to the
Grand Duke of Warsaw ; part of Carinthia, with the whole of the
country between the Adriatic and the Save, was annexed to the
French Empire under the name of the Illyrian Provinces." " Austria
itself, though overpowered, had inflicted a deadly injury upon
Napoleon by withdrawing him from Spain at the moment when he
might have completed his conquest, and by enabling Wellesley to
gain a footing in the Peninsula Russia was alienated by the
annexation of West Galicia to the Polish Grand Duchy of Warsaw.
.... The estrangement of Russia, the growth of national spirit in
Germany and in Spain involved a danger to Napoleon's power
which far outweighed the visible results of his victory."2 In
Germany Buonaparte " provoked all the states and individuals
whom he drew within his circle, by acting sometimes in a liberal and
sometimes in a despotic manner, never treating them as citizens
or provinces united to a kingdom, but always in a French and
revolutionary sense. This drove the German people into the hands
of a reactionary party, which became the national one by Napoleon's
endeavour to extirpate every vestige of nationality .... this was
the origin of the Tugenbund (League of Virtue) whose real object
was concealed under the attractive names of patriotism and zeal
for the restoration of the virtuous usages of past times." 3 Similar
secret associations of Carbonari, &c., were formed in Italy.
The marriage of Napoleon with Maria Louisa, daughter of Francis
of Austria, March u, 1810, was followed by the annexation of
Holland, July 10, and by that of the republic of the Valais and the
north German coast : these were the last annexations. As a result,
by the destruction of entails, feudal burdens, as well as the mono-
polies of the guilds, were removed; but, on the other hand, must
be placed the conscription and all the annoyances of Buonaparte's
1 Fyffe, vol. i. p. 422. 2 Ibid., pp. 431, 432. 3 Schlosser, vol. vii. p. 601.
5O2 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
continental system, which were very great. The war in Portugal
and Spain required 300,000 men to oppose Wellington, who had a
secure position in the lines of Torres Vedras, 1809, 1810. Massena
was checked at Fuentes d'Onoro, and Soult at Albuera, May 16,
1811. At the close of that year, Wellington moved towards Ciudad
Rodrigo, and took it, January 19, 1812, and Badajos on April 6.
The battle of Salamanca, July 22, obliged the French to fall back
on Burgos, after which Wellington fell back on Portugal. A consti-
tutional movement was created in Spain in 1809, 1810, and a
constitution framed by the Cortes in 1812, which was offensive to
the clergy and not specially agreeable to the population. But greater
events were about to interest all Europe. The friendship of the
Czar with the Emperor of the French had turned to hate. Russia
felt the continental system to be intolerable, and the pride of the
Czar had been annoyed by the recent changes of territory in Germany
and Poland. Napoleon left Paris, May 9, held a levee of sovereigns
at Dresden, and crossed the Russian frontier, June 23. Alexander
had an ally in Bernadotte, the Crown Prince of Sweden, partly
induced by the promise of adding Norway to the kingdom of
Sweden. The Russians wisely retreated before the French, whose
means of transport were unequal to the duties required. The loss of
men, before any engagement took place, was said to be 100,000.
There was a battle in Smolensko, August 18, and at Borodino,
September 7. Moscow was entered, September 14. It was evacuated
by the population, and in a few days burnt. Napoleon, on the
approach of winter, abandoned Moscow, October 19, in hopes of
finding suitable winter quarters, his armies harassed by the Russians.
The French suffered severely at Krasnoi, November 17, and again
at Beresina, November 28, so that, when they reached the frontier
on the Beresina, December 13, they numbered in all little more than
20,000 men. In all, 390,000 soldiers had entered Russia ; 170,000
were prisoners. Not a twentieth part of the 390,000 reached the
Prussian frontier. On December 3, Napoleon quitted the army and
returned to Paris, to prepare for the campaign of the following year.
Already General Yorck, at Riga, had committed the Prussian con-
tingent on the side of Russia, December 30. Stein, the great
statesman of Prussia, was with the Emperor Alexander, who, with
a portion of his army, entered Prussian territory in January, 1813.
A treaty was made with Prussia on February 2 7 ; on March 4 the last
French soldier quitted Berlin, and on March 17 the King of Prussia
declared war against France. " Seven years of suffering and humilia-
tion had done their work A movement as penetrating and
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 503
as universal as that which France had experienced in 1792 swept
through the Prussian state." l Napoleon was still stronger than his
enemies in spite of the losses in Russia. Italy and the German
confederates remained faithful, and Austria had not yet declared
against him. He defeated the allies at Liitzen, May 2, and at
Bautzen on May 21. Then followed an armistice of seven weeks,
in which Austria endeavoured to mediate. On August 10, Austria
joined the allies. Napoleon won the battle of Dresden, August 26
and 27, "one of the last and greatest victories of France. Several
other conflicts took place, in all of which it is evident that the
superiority had passed from the French to their foes. The battle of
Leipzig, known as the " Battle of the Nations," the greatest battle in
all authentic history, in which 300,000 men fought on the side of the
allies and 170,000 on that of Napoleon, was fought October 16-19.
The French had to retreat, Leipzig was stormed, and Napoleon lost
40,000 killed and wounded, 30,000 prisoners, and 260 guns ; while
the allies lost 54,000. On the last day of the year the Prussians
crossed the Rhine near Coblentz, and the invasion of France
commenced. In Spain the French were equally unsuccessful.
Wellington defeated King Joseph at Vittoria, June 21, and gained
the battle of the Pyrenees, July 27-31. San Sebastian was taken
by storm on August 31. Pampeluna was taken by the Spaniards,
October 31. Wellington entered France, and was master of the
district up to Bayonne.
On January 18, 1814, the Austrian army entered France by
Belfort, and marched towards the plain of Langres. Napoleon
placed himself at Chalons on the Marne. After some indecisive
skirmishes, a congress was held at Chatillon, and offers made to
France of peace and the frontier of 1 79 1 . These terms were refused,
again negotiations were renewed. At last the allies pressed forward
and took possession of Paris, March 31. On April 2 the senate
pronounced the dethronement of Napoleon ; on April 6 it proclaimed
a constitution, and recalled the House of Bourbon. Unfortunately,
before this news could reach the south of France, Wellington had
fought the battle of Toulouse, April 10, by which Soult was driven
from that city. This was the last battle of the war. The Count of
Provence, brother of Louis XVI., was thus, by the influence of
Alexander and the management of Talleyrand, restored to the throne
of France. He granted a charter which framed a system of govern-
ment similar to that of England, a chamber of peers to be nominated
1 Fyffe, vol. i. p. 487.
504 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
by the king, one of deputies to be chosen for five years by electors
paying £12 a year in taxes, the judges irremovable except for
proved misconduct. The king, a prudent and sensible man, had
learnt something in twenty years of exile. Not so his brother, nor
the nobles, nor the clergy, who aimed at the restoration of their
old privileges. " But no reaction, however severe, ever brings things
back to the point from which they had drifted. France could never
again be what she had been under Louis XIV." T There was an
active body of Napoleonists in Paris fanning the discontent of the
Liberal party, and urging the return of their chief from Elba, where
the generous fatuity of the allies had placed him. With four small
vessels and 900 men he landed near Cannes, on the coast of
Provence, March i, 1815. His progress was accompanied by the
enthusiasm of the people, and without a battle he entered Paris on
March 20, less than twenty-four hours after Louis XVIII. had left it.
The allied sovereigns, assembled in congress at Vienna, and on the
point of quarrelling about the division of the spoils of the French
empire, were at once reconciled, and issued a declaration of war.
The Liberals in Paris were not pleased with Napoleon's determination
to govern in his old fashion, and there were evident signs of aliena-
tion. The decisive battle of Waterloo, June 18, gained by Wellington,
in command of the English and Prussians, over Napoleon, was
followed by the abdication of the emperor, and his subsequent exile
in St. Helena, where he died, 1821. Louis XVIII. returned to
Paris on July 8, after an absence of one hundred days. Of Napoleon
we may admit as fair, perhaps as sternly fair, the character given by
Kitchin :z "He had genius and no breeding .... nor had he that
high sense of honour, truthfulness, and gentleness which go with
true nobility of soul His quick intelligence was altogether
scientific in the colder and harder aspects of scientific knowledge.
He took no interest in moral sciences, or in history, or in the lighter
works of imagination. Throughout we discern in him the precision,
the despot on exact principles No one was ever naturally so
untrue as he ; he never hesitated to lie and to deceive There
was in him a swiftness of intelligence, which answered to his hot and
passionate nature ; the true and solid balance was wanting. He
could not rest, and knew not when he had achieved success. And
this was immediately connected with another Oriental quality, his
vast and unmeasured ambition, and the schemes and dreams of a
visionary, which led him to the greatest errors of his life — his
1 Kitchin, " Encyc. Brit.," vol. ix. p. 617. 2 Ibid., p. 618.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 505
expedition to Egypt, and his hopes of an Eastern empire, and his
terrible attack on Russia. The same largeness of vision showed
itself in his endeavours to reconstruct the map of Europe, and to
organise anew the whole of society in France He was, in
fact, the successor and representative of the 'eighteenth century-
despots,' the military follower of the Pombals, the Arandas, the
Struenzas of the past. He had their unbalanced energies, their
fierce resistance to feudalism and the older world, their ready use of
benevolent and enlightened phraseology, their willingness to wade
through blood and ruin to their goal, their undying ambition, their
restlessness and revolutionary eagerness to revolutionise society.
Like them, with well-sounding professions, he succeeded in alienating
the people of Europe, in whose behalf he pretended to be acting.
.... When the popular feeling was thoroughly aroused against
him in Spain, in Germany, in England, his wonderful career was at
last brought to an end."
VI.— The Local Histories from 1788-1815.
The local histories of the nations, thrown into the shade by the
revolutionary wars, are now to be noticed.
ENGLAND (Scotland and Ireland). — The revolutions in France
found PITT the Younger, at the head of the English administration
since 1784, the most able of peace ministers, but by no means the
best director of warlike operations. He and most Englishmen
hailed the beginning of the Revolution as the harbinger of peaceful,
economical changes. Burke's treatise on the French Revolution
raised the first note of doubt and alarm, in spite of the able replies
of Sir J. Mackintosh and others, 1790. The conservative temper of
the middle and upper classes of society was displayed in the Bir-
mingham Riots of 1791, in which the mob but expressed the feeling
of the classes above them in social position. Among a large class
engaged in manufactures there were some demonstrations of a
contrary character in the shape of revolutionary societies, such as the
Friends of the People and the London Corresponding Society. After
the execution of the king, war was declared by France, February 8,
1793,1 and as the fanaticism of the revolutionary leaders in France
became more evident the general reaction commenced, and gradu-
ally increased during Napoleon's ambitious career. Two parties, the
1 "It was France, and not England, who at last wrested from Pitt's grasp the
peace to which he clung so desperately." — GREEN.
506 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
Whig (Liberal) and the Tory (Conservative), which must exist in
every free government, had full development in English politics,
and disturbed even the harmony of private society. The threat of
invasion from France united for a time all parties in England.
Never was there a more critical situation. The sailors at Spithead
and the Nore had mutinied, 1797; the call upon England for
subsidies on the Continent in specie, and for the purchase of food
through the failure of the harvests had drained the country of the
circulating medium. It was just in the position of a wealthy man,
rich in property but without a supply of specie for the payment for
daily wants, and therefore obliged to pay by notes of hand, which
would be received according to the belief of his ability to pay.
Cash payments beyond twenty shillings were stopped at the Bank,
February 21. This measure was in force twenty-two years, and
during the whole of that time the depreciation of the paper currency
was comparatively slight. The internal trade had to be carried on
with a paper currency guaranteed by government, because the specie
was needed for payments abroad where paper money was useless.
The strength of England was then, as now, in the patriotism of the
people, in its enormous material resources, and in its fleet. In 1798
there was an outbreak in Ireland from May 23 to June 21, which
was finished by the defeat of the rebels at Vinegar Hill. This was
followed by the Legislative Union in 1800, which added 100
members to the English Parliament to the great deterioration of its
character. The question of Catholic Emancipation broke up the
Cabinet, and Pitt retired, making way for Addington, who then, as
now, was generally regarded as the smallest and most unfit of all
prime ministers. The Peace of Amiens between England and
France was concluded in 1802 r1 it was a mere truce. War was
declared May 18, 1803. An Irish rebellion under Emmett broke
out July 23, and was speedily suppressed. All parties in England
were united in this war with France. The character of Napoleon
already developed, and as developed afterwards in the following
years, had produced a firm conviction in England of his grasping
ambition and faithlessness, and of his enmity to all constitutional
liberty, though there were then, and may be even now, a few
eccentric individuals who believe in him and his system. PITT was
minister again in 1804, but died in 1806, and Fox only survived a
few months, after securing the abolition of the slave trade, March 25,
"It was a peace which anybody was glad of and nobody is proud of." —
GREEN.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1^15. 507
1807. Portland and Perceval, with Castlereagh and Canning,
formed a ministry in 1807. The active interference of the English
army in Spain, though at first not accompanied by any definite
success in 1808, and the overwhelming forces opposed to Sir J.
Moore in January, 1809, was in the end the means of driving out
the French armies, first from Portugal and then from Spain, and
was yet more important as developing and making known the great
strategic abilities of Wellington. During the whole of that war this
great man was inefficiently supplied from home, and mercilessly
censured by the opposition press. The Whigs generally regarded
the resistance in Spain as hopeless. Perceval was prime minister
1809-1812, when he was assassinated by a madman. The king's
infirmity of mind placed the Prince of Wales as regent after 1811.
In 1812 a respectable ministry under Lord Liverpool was formed.
Soon after a dispute with the United States of America issued in
war, for which both nations were to blame. It was a war without
great events. The conquest of Canada, which was the temptation
held out to the American people, failed; at sea, in single encounters,
the English gained no laurels ; and the attacks upon Washington
and upon New Orleans were not creditable to the English com-
manders, or rather the ministry under which they acted. Peace was
made, December 24, 1814. The Peace of 1814, 1815 was welcomed
by all classes. During the long war the agriculturists and land-
holders had profited by the monopoly of the supply of the English
market, but the population generally had suffered under the enhanced
price of food and the increasing depression of trade and commerce.
The manufacturing districts especially had to endure periods in
which there was no employment for the workers, because no market
for the goods manufactured. The peace for a time seemed, how-
ever, to produce no favourable change.
SPAIN was never so low as in the reign of Charles IV. One
Godoy, the favourite of the king and queen, had the full direction
of affairs. From the peace made with France he was called " the
Prince of Peace," 1794. In 1796 he bound Spain to France by
the treaty of St. Ildefonso, August 19, again renewed in 1803 by a
convention on October 19. In 1804 the English Government in-
tercepted the treasure from Mexico, October 5, and obtained about
four and a half millions of dollars. This high act may be defensible
politically, but it is painful to record. On October 19, 1805, the
fleets of France and Spain were destroyed at Trafalgar, where Nelson
lost his life. In 1807 Buonaparte began his designs upon Spain by
a treaty for the conquest and partition of Portugal. Junot was sent
508 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
with troops through Spain to accomplish this purpose, and followed
by others, the real object being the supplanting of the Bourbon
Dynasty by a Napoleonist prince. The quarrel between Charles IV.
and his son Ferdinand ended in the abdication of Charles IV. in
favour of his son. Both parties were induced to meet Napoleon at
Bayonne, and there resigned in favour of Napoleon, as already
recorded, May 6, by whom Joseph, his brother, was appointed King
of Spain. The insurrections which followed, and the military opera-
tions of the Spanish leaders and of Wellington issued in the ex-
pulsion of the French from Spain by the end of 1813, and Ferdi-
nand VII. was restored in 1814 (May 14). During the war the
Cortes had framed a constitution in 1812, thoroughly democratic
and impracticable. This was immediately set aside, and the Cortes
dismissed, but no rational scheme of government was substituted in
its place.
PORTUGAL. — Saved from French conquest by the interposition of
England, 1808, the royal family being safe in Brazil, from which
Portugal was governed by a regency after the settlement of 1814,
1815.
ITALY. — Sardinia, the popedom, the smaller duchies, with Venice
and Naples, had no history disconnected with the occupation of the
French until 1814. In Sicily, Ferdinand IV. of Naples (III. of
Sicily) took refuge under English protection in 1806. Lord W.
Bentinck, the English ambassador, in 1812 obtained a new con-
stitution for Sicily, which, though opposed by the court, continued
until the arrangements of 1815 enabled the king to return to Naples,
when he abolished the constitution. He then reigned as Ferdi-
nand I. of the Two Sicilies.
SWITZERLAND, with AUSTRIA, have no history, apart from their
connexion with France from 1788 to 1814.
PRUSSIA has a history disgraceful in its partnership in the division
of Poland, in the pursuit of which it neglected the more important
matter of resistance to France in 1792, 1793. The humiliation of
Prussia by France was followed by the patriotic efforts of STEIN, a
"leader unrivalled in patriotic zeal, in boldness, and in purity of
character." The abolition of serfage and of all legal distinction of
caste freed the land from the restrictions which impeded its sale,
1807. In 181 1 HARDENBERG placed the peasantry in full proprietor-
ship of two-thirds of their tenancy. In connexion with Scharnhorst,
STEIN cautiously trained an active army of 40,000 men, and
established a large municipal reform. By his plans he drew upon
himself the suspicions of Napoleon, by whom he was expelled from
Peace of Paris, November 28 , 1815. 509
Prussia, December, 1808. The patriot people of Prussia helped
not a little towards the overthrow of the French Empire.
HOLLAND, under Louis Bonaparte, who was appointed king by
Napoleon, 1806, enjoyed as much freedom and prosperity as the
king could secure for it, but the tyranny of Napoleon made him
resign in 1810. Joyfully the French were expelled in 1813, and
the Prince of Orange restored to the Stadtholdership, with the title
of king.
SWEDEN. — Gustavus III. was assassinated, 1792. Gustavus IV.,
his son, steadily opposed the French Republic and Empire. On
March 12, 1809, he was arrested, compelled to abdicate, and his
family cut off from succession to the throne, May 10, the result of
a conspiracy, provoked by his own inconsistencies. Charles XIII.,
Duke of Sudermania (his uncle), succeeded. A constitution was
established June 6, 1809. Being permitted by law, he chose
BERNADOTTE, one of Napoleon's generals, as his successor, August,
1810. Bernadotte became the real ruler of the kingdom, resisted
the demands of Napoleon in 1811, and made a treaty with Alex-
ander of Russia. He was rewarded by the permission to occupy
Norway, the loss of which was the penalty inflicted on Denmark for
its fidelity to Napoleon, November, 1814.
DENMARK.— Charles VII. died 1808. Frederick VI. (his son)
succeeded. He had to give up Norway to Sweden, to the great
grief of the Norse people.
RUSSIA. — Catherine II. died 1796. Paul, her son, succeeded —
at first a great admirer of the French, and then their enemy — sent
Suwarrow to co-operate with the Austrians in 1799. He then
opposed England in the Northern League, 1800, but was assassinated,
March 24, 1801. ALEXANDER, his son, as versatile as his father,
was alternately the enemy and the friend of Napoleon, sacrificing
his allies without compunction, but driven to take a leading part
in the coalition by which Napoleon was deposed. He greatly
extended the Russian territory in Europe by the acquisition of
Finland from the Swedes, and of the larger portion of the kingdom
of Poland. In CENTRAL ASIA Russia is necessitated to extend her
territory over the uncivilised people on her frontier.
TURKEY, Selim III., one of the most cultivated of the sultans,
had to encounter a war with Russia and England, 1806, 1807. The
Wahabee, a puritan sect in Arabia, took and plundered Mecca and
Medina, 1802. Bosnia and Servia were in a state of insurrection.
Ali Pacha, of Yanina, established a virtual independence over
Epirus and Western Greece from 1787 to 1822. MAHOMET ALI,
510 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
the Pacha of Egypt, destroyed the Mamelukes by treachery 1811,
and established a power all but nominally independent. Selim was
deposed by the Janissaries 1807, who placed Mustapha IV. on the
throne ; this was opposed by Bairactar, the Grand Vizier, who
dethroned Mustapha IV. and placed MAHOMET II. as Sultan, 1808;
who was obliged to yield Bessarabia and the Kilia mouth of the
Danube to Russia, 1817.
PERSIA. — The Kadjar Dynasty, 1795, obliged to cede the Caspian
provinces to Russia, 1813.
The Barbary States were nominally under Turkish rule; but
Morocco maintained its isolated independence.
INDIA. — In the rule of Warren Hastings the British possessions
in India were confined to Bengal and Behar, the northern Circars,
Madras, and a few trifling stations on the Coromandel coast, with Bom-
bay on the west coast. Circumstances compelled the English leaders
to extend their authority by degrees over the whole of India. Lord
Cornwallis was obliged to make war on Tippoo, Sultan of Mysore,
1788, who submitted in 1792 and ceded part of his territory to the
Nizam and the British. Sir John Shore was obliged to curb the
ambition of Nizam Ali, who had to cede half his territory, 1795.
Under the act of Lord Mornington (Wellesley) the British dominions
were extended up the Ganges, and also in the Carnatic by the
conqueror of Tippoo, 1799. In 1807 Lord Minto succeeded, and
in 1813 was followed by Lord Moira (Hastings), who was involved
in a war with Nepaul, which was settled by the Treaty of Segowlie,
1816, The native powers in India were the RAJPOOTS, the
MAHRATTAS (Scindia), the NIZAM, and OUDE ; the MOGUL was a
name and nothing more.
CHINA. — Keinlung contrived to extend the empire over Nepaul,
approaching within sixty miles of the British frontier. He resigned
1795 and died 1798. His successor, Kea-King, was a capricious,
self-indulgent ruler. He was the emperor to whom Lord Macartney
was sent in 1792, and Lord Amherst in 1816. Both embassies
were failures as to any profitable results. The trade with Europe
was confined to Macao.
JAPAN remained closed to European commerce.
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, having secured their independ-
ence by the Treaty of 1783, next proceeded to form a constitution;
a Senate to consist of two from each state, irrespective of its size
and population ; a House of Representatives, to be elected by the
people in proportion to the population ; a President to be elected
every four years. At the close of 1788 all the States had adopted
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. S11
the constitution except Rhode Island and North Carolina, which,
however, conformed May 20, 1790. GEORGE WASHINGTON was the
first president and John Adams vice-president, and the first congress
was opened April 30. Washington served two terms of office until
1797. Two political parties were prominent from the first, the
FEDERALISTS and the DEMOCRATS. Under the government of
President Madison a war broke out with England, for which both
countries were to blame. Peace was concluded 1811-1814.
The British Colonies in North America. — Canada, Nova Scotia,
Cape Breton, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland, gradually in-
creased in population. So also Jamaica and the smaller Islands,
Demerara, &c., commonly called the West Indies. South Africa,
conquered from the Dutch, increased under British rule. The
colony established in 1788 Port Jackson, New South Wales (now
New Holland) had the equivocal benefit of convict labour, and
gradually enlarged its territory and population. Tasmania was soon
after occupied. These were the beginnings of the rich and popu-
lous colonies of Australia.
Ecclesiastical History from 1788 to 1815.
ENGLAND. — The bishops and higher clergy, in accordance with
the views of the lower clergy, had steadily refused to agree to the
abolition of the Corporation and Test Acts, originally passed to
exclude the Roman Catholics from certain offices, but necessarily
applicable legally, though not energetically enforced upon Protestant
Dissenters. Ministry after ministry were desirous of freeing Pro-
testant Nonconformists from this implied badge of inferiority, but
were deterred by the clerical power in and outside the House of
Commons. In 1787 Lord North was not ashamed to use the
language of the clerical zealots, and to declare that these acts were
" the corner-stone of the constitution of the Church and the State."
The feeling against any concession to dissent was, no doubt,
hastened by the excesses of the French Revolution, and by the
injudicious display of sympathy with the National Assembly of
France by a small but active body of " advanced " Dissenters, of
which Dr. Price was the representative. Burke's eloquent Reflections
deepened and extended the clerical alarm, in which a large body of the
laity were equally concerned. One good influence of the infidel rule
of the Terrorists in France was an increased regard to religious duties
and observances, especially among the higher classes in England,
to which the example of the court also contributed. A work by a
512 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
distinguished layman, WILLIAM WILBERFORCE, a member of Parlia-
ment, and an associate of the literary and higher classes of society,
and a friend of Pitt and other politicians, was widely circulated with
very beneficial effects. Its title was " A practical view of prevailing
religious systems, 1797." It is as necessary for the higher classes
now as it was then, and may be read by all classes with advantage.
The Low Church (Evangelical) were especially diligent in counter-
acting sceptical writings by the issue of cheap antidotes, among
which Mrs. Hannah Morels repository tracts were deserving of
praise for their homely common sense, and for the rare quality of
interesting the reader. The Religious Tract Society, founded by
Burder (Independent), 1799, was supported by many of the clergy
and laity of the Church of England. The Bible Society, 1802, was
zealously patronised by bishops and dignified clergy, as well as by
Nonconformists. The Church of England Missionary Society (for
Africa and the East) was established in 1804, to enable the
Evangelicals to send missionaries whose views were more in accord-
ance with theirs than those of the Society for Propagating the
Gospel, avoiding, however, in the beginning the localities occupied
by the old society. In 1812, the Prayer Book and Homily Society
was formed by some zealous Churchmen. Generally the High
Church party patronised in missions the Society for Propagating the
Gospel, while the Evangelicals were more attached to the Church
Missionary Society, and, as in the time of Charles I., funds were
raised and appropriated by zealous Evangelicals, for the purchase of
the right of presentation to Church livings ; of this fund Simeon of
Cambridge was a liberal patron. The High Church patronised the
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge and the Prayer Book
and Homily Society, while the Evangelicals generally preferred the
Bible Society and the Religious Tract Society. This friendly
rivalry helped to improve the character of the versions of the
Scriptures and of the theological and other works circulated by these
societies, all of which remain to this day in active operation, to the
great advantage of the public and of the Christian Churches. The
influence of such consistent laymen as WILBERFORCE and JOHN
THORNTON, and of clergy like RICHARD CECIL, Joseph Milner,
Thomas Scott, Edward Stillingfleet, Venn, Simeon, and others, was
a great power for good at this trying period. The bishops
HORSLEY, Porteus, and Watson, by their literary labours, contri-
buted to check the injurious effects of the sceptical writings of the
day by Thomas Paine. To the Evangelical party, supported by
eminent members of Parliament, is mainly owing the opposition to
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 513
the slave trade, which commenced in 1787, and which succeeded in
effecting its object by England, 1807, by the United States in 1808,
and by France under Napoleon, 1815.
The interests of EDUCATION were not neglected either by Church-
men or Dissenters. The National Society, 1812-1817, supported by
Churchmen, mainly adopted Bell's system. The British and Foreign
School Society (on Lancaster's plan) was established by liberal
Churchmen and Dissenters about the same time.
The INDEPENDENTS (Congregationalists) largely increased their
congregations and ministers, especially in the manufacturing towns,
connecting generally with their wealthier churches evangelical
labours in the neglected country districts. The London Missionary
Society, instituted in 1795, in which Churchmen also co-operated,
became mainly an independent society, though strictly avoiding any
sectarian test as to Church government. The Evangelical Magazine,
established at this time, remains to this day a valuable record of de-
nominational history. Great attention was paid to the training of the
ministry. Among the names which were well known in this period
may be mentioned Lavington, Bogue, Waugh, and the Claytons.
The BAPTIST churches also increased. They were foremost in
the foreign missionary work, having established their Missionary
Society in 1792, through the indomitable zeal and faith of Dr. Carey.
Howard, the philanthropist, was connected with them ; his labours,
1773-1790, are well known. Robert Robinson, of Cambridge, from
1761-1790, was a distinguished minister; so also Andrew Fuller, at
Kettering, 1782-1815.
The WESLEYAN METHODISTS lost their founder, John Wesley, in
1791, aged eighty-eight. Dr. TJwmas Coke took charge of the
colonial missionary work in America and the West Indies. The
Missionary Society was reorganised in 1817. Differences of opinion
on Church government led to the secession of the New Connexion
societies, 1797, and of the Primitive Methodists (called Ranters) in
1 8 10. Paley, in his " Feather Tavern Petitions," in favour of relaxing
the subscription to the Thirty-nine Articles, states that " the only
persons at the time who believed in the Thirty-nine Articles were
the Methodists, who were refused ordination by the bishops," 1 a
testimony to their orthodoxy. The Magazine (Arminian Wesleyan
Magazine), established in the year 1778, remains among the most
valuable of this class of literature.
The Calvinistic Methodists, chiefly followers of Whitfield, had
1 Here, p. 509.
2 L
514 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
been organised by Howel Harris in Wales, 1737, and supported by
Selina (Countess of Huntingdon), 1770. They are most numerous
in Wales.
The French Refugees who settled in England after the revocation
of the Edict of Nantes, 1685, had, in 1700, thirty churches; in 1737
only twenty, in 1780 only eleven; gradually amalgamating with the
other churches.
The QUAKERS (Friends) were identified with the charities and
social improvements of the age. Other small congregations, called
by various names, enjoyed the toleration of the English constitution.
The PRESBYTERIAN Churches in SCOTLAND and the North of
IRELAND flourished. They were divided into the old Cameronians
of 1743, the secession headed by Ebenezer Erskine in 1745, and
the Burgers and Anti-Burgers of 1743 ; also the Sandemanians from
about 1760. The old Presbyterian congregations in England had
mostly become Congregationalists. In Glasgow there was a Presby-
terian Tract Society and a Missionary Society, 1793-1796.
The ROMAN CATHOLICS enjoyed full religious liberty, though
generally regarded with suspicion by the population. They and
their friends suffered from the London riots of 1780, occasioned by
the folly of Lord George Gordon. In Ireland they constituted the
large majority of the population, and had already begun the struggle
for " Catholic emancipation."
One of the most important means employed by the churches of
all denominations was the institution of SUNDAY SCHOOLS, which,
originating in the labours of Robert Raikes, 1781, were established
all over the kingdom.
The Continental Churches were generally disturbed by the wars ;
but in France the Roman Catholic Church was utterly destroyed by
the Revolution, 1793, but restored by Napoleon.
LITERARY HISTORY FROM 1788-1815. — This period being merely
a connecting link between a past state of things, and the new
arrangements which followed the close of the revolutionary war (a
space of about a quarter of a century), the literary men are neces-
sarily connected with the past history, or with that of the following
period. Many of the writers who lived before the Revolution
survived to live in the new world which succeeded the battle of
Waterloo. There are already two separate nationalities which
are the homes of English literature — England and the United
States.
LITERATURE IN ENGLAND. — Scientific : W. H. Wollaston, 1766-
1828, and Thomas Young, 1773-1829 (natural philosophy); H.
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 515
CAVENDISH, 1731-1830; Sir H. DAVY, 1770-1829; John Black,
1728-1799 ; J. Priestley, 1773-1804 (chemistry); Sir Joseph Banks,
1743-1820; Kirby and Spence, 1769-1819 (natural history);
Arthur Young, 1741-1820 (agriculture); John BELL, 1763-1820
(anatomy); Sir J. Playfair, 1748-1819 (geometry); Sir William
HERSCHEL, 1738-1822 (astronomy); William Smith, 1769-1839
(geology). Oriental Literatitre : Sir W. JONES, 1746-1794; H. T.
Colebrooke, 1765-1837; William Carey, 1762-1834; Thomas
Maurice, 1755-1824. Classical Literature : Dr. Samuel Parr, 1747-
1825; R. PORSON, 1759-1808; Elmsley (Classics). Political
Economy: Jeremy BENTHAM, 1749-1832 (Defence of Usury);
MALTHUS, 1766-1834 (Theory of Population) ; Ricardo, 1744-1823
(Theory of Rent); Mrs. Marcett, 1769-1853 (a contributor to the
Penny Encyclopaedia). Mental Philosophy : Dugald STEWART, 1753—
1828; Thomas Browne, 1778-1820; Abercrombie, 1781-1844. His-
torians : John Gillies, 1747-1836 (Greece); SHARON TURNER, 1768—
1847 (England); George Chalmers, 1742-1825; A. Chalmers,
1753-1834 (Biographical Dictionary); Charles J. Fox, 1749-1806
(History of James II.); Sir J. MACKINTOSH, 1765-1832 (History of
England); Malcolm Laing, 1762-1818; John Pinkerton, 1758-1826
(Geography); W. Roscoe, 1753-1831 (Italian Biography); John
Nichols, 1745-1826 (Literary History); Andrew Kippis, 1725-1795
(Editor of Biographica Britannica); John Whitaker, 1735-1808;
William Godwin, 1756-1836. Travellers: Lord Macartney, 1792
(China); J. BRUCE, 1768, 1769 (Abyssinia); MUNGO PARK,
I795-I799 (West Africa); Sir J. Barrow, 1803 (South Africa);
Lichtenstein, 1805 (South Africa). Theology: Bishop Watson,
1737-1816 (Apology for Christianity); William Wilberforce, 1787
(Practical View of Religious Systems); Richard CECIL, 1748-1810
(Remains); Archbishop MAGEE, 1765-1831 (Unitarian Contro-
versy); Bishop HORSLEY, 1733-1806 (Sermons); Bishop Coplestone,
1776-1849 (Necessity and Predestination). Among the Noncon-
formists, J. Pye SMITH, 1797-1851; E.Williams, 1770-1820; C.
Winter and E. Bogue, 1752-1825 (Independents); Andrew FULLER,
1754-1815 (Baptist); Joseph BENSON, Edward HARE (Wesleyan
Methodists). Poetry : John WTolcott, 1738-1819 (Peter Pindar);
Anne L. Barbauld, 1743-1825; Mary Tighe, 1773-1810 (Psyche);
Robert Bloomfield, 1766-1823 (Rural Poems); Henry K. White,
1785-1806; James Grahame, 1765-1811 (the Sabbath) ; George
Crabbe, 1754-1832 (the poet of real life); Samuel Rogers, 1765-
1855 (Italy); W.L.Bowles, 1762-1850; Thomas CAMPBELL, 1777-
1844 (the Pleasures of Hope); Herbert Knowles, 1798-1817;
2 L 2
516 The Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
James and H. Smith, 1779-1844 (Rejected Addresses); DIBDIN,
1765-1814 (Songs for Seamen, &c.) The anti-Jacobin poetry of
Camus and others, 1788-1810; J. Leyden, 1775-1812. The
Drama: Mrs. Inchbald, 1753-1821; George Colman, 1762-1830;
Thomas Holcroft, 1745-1809; J. P. Kemble, 1751-1823; Mrs.
Siddons, 1755-1831. Fine Arts : Flaxman, 1755-1826 (sculpture);
G. Morland, died, 1804; H. Fuseli, 1741-1825 (painters); Joseph
Strutt, died, 1802; W. Sharpe, 1740-1824; Sir Robert Strange,
died, 1792 (engravers).
MISCELLANEOUS LITERATURE. — Essays and Poems: Mrs. Opie,
1769-1853; Mrs. Ann Grant, 1755-1838; William Hayley, 1745-
1820; Anna Seward, 1747-1809; William Gifford, 1756-1826
(editor Quarterly Review, 1808-1824; anti-Jacobin poetry); John
Leyden, 1775-1811; M. G. Lewis, 1775-1818; CHARLES LAMB,
1775-1834; HANNAH MORE, 1745-1833 (Repository Tracts);
Isaac Disraeli, 1766-1848; Gilbert White, 1720-1793; W. Gilpin,
1724-1804. Orators, Politicians: Charles J. Fox, 1749-1806;
Lord Erskine, 1754-1823; J. P. Curran,' 1750-1817; William Pitt,
1759-1806; R. B. Sheridan, 1751-1816; Edmund Burke, 1730-
1797; Shelburne (Marquis of Lansdowne), 1737-1805; Grattan, 1746-
1820; and Flood, Irish Parliament ; Whitbread, 1758-1815; Thomas
Paine, 1737-1806. Antiquities: Richard Gough, 1735-1809; John
Brand, 1743-1806. Fiction: Miss Burney (D'Arblay), 1752-1840;
Miss EDGEWORTH, 1767-1849; Miss Porter, 1776-1850; Mrs.
Radcliffe, 1764-1823; THOMAS HOPE, 1770-1831; JANE AUSTEN,
1775-1817; Miss Ferrier, 1782-1854; William Godwin, 1756-
1836; Beckford, 1764-1844; John Gait, 1779-1839; J. Morier,
1 780-1849 ; Charlotte Smith, 1 749-1806. The EDINBURGH REVIEW
•commenced 1802, the QUARTERLY, 1809, the respective organs of
the Liberal-Whig and of the Tory party. New editions of the
ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA were published : in 1 7 7 6 ; second edition,
ten volumes, 1797 ; third edition, eighteen volumes and two supple-
ments, 1810-1826 ; the fourth, fifth, and sixth editions, with supple-
ments, six volumes; the seventh edition, in 1826-1842, twenty-one
volumes; the eighth edition, 1859, 1860; the ninth edition began
to be published in 1878. The Daily Papers: The TIMES, COURIER,
MORNING CHRONICLE. The ANNUAL REGISTER, commenced 1758,
appeared regularly each year, and is yet continued.
LITERATURE IN THE UNITED STATES. — While the UNITED STATES
were mere infantile colonies, the State of New England manifested
that love of literature which it has communicated to the entire union.
Most of the authors, and the teachers of the thousands of schools
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 517
in the Union, are by birth and education New Englanders. HARVARD
UNIVERSITY was founded, 1636; YALE COLLEGE, 1700; the Uni-
versity in Philadelphia, 1731; Princetown, 1746; the Academy,
1751; King's, now Columbia, College, in New York, 1754; Rhode
Island (Brown's University), 1764, and Charleston University, 1786.
One exception to the general patronage of learning is found in the
person of the royal Governor of Virginia, the representative of
Charles II., who has stigmatised himself by a few words : " I thank
God we have no free schools here, nor printing God keep
us from both ! " Some of the early emigrants to Virginia were
authors, and sent their writings to England, but the first printing
press was at work in 1639 at New Cambridge (Massachusetts).
" Before the middle of the eighteenth century the colonists could
boast of such writers as Josselyn, Wood, Winthrop (the friend of
Boyle), Bannister (the correspondent of Ray), and the Pennsylvanian
Bartrams. In classical learning the leading controversialists, as
Cotton, Shepard, Hooker, the erratic Ward, the philanthropic
Eliot and William, were proficients."1 JONATHAN EDWARDS, the
great theologian and metaphysician, was born 1703, and died 1758.
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN, the printer, the patriot, and the common-sense
philosopher, was born 1706, and died 1790. The great names of
WASHINGTON, Joseph Warren, John Hancock, James Wilson,
JAMES OTIS, RICHARD HENRY LEE, ALEXANDER HAMILTON,
PATRICK HENRY, Fisher Ames, THOMAS JEFFERSON, and JAMES
MADISON are identified with the Revolution, 1776-1783. JOHN
WOOLMAN (the Quaker), 1720-1776, is distinguished for his noble,
simple piety, and his singular biography. Joel Barlow and John
Trumbull attempted poetry; but the literature of the UNITED
STATES has since taken a position alongside that of the mother
country, and is not afraid to claim an equality of excellence.
FRENCH LITERATURE FROM 1788-1815. — The political excite
ment in France under the revolutionary government and that
of Napoleon called forth a large number of political writings
from 1788 to 1796. During the Empire historical and philo-
sophical studies were discouraged. The mathematical and natural
sciences were, on the contrary, particularly patronised. The poly-
technical schools and the Institute were patronised by the emperor
to the exclusion of metaphysical and historical studies.
Mathematical Science : La Place, 17 29-1 807, whose exposition of the
system of the world and celestial mechanism, 1796-1799, has been the
1 "American Literature," by John Nichol, 8vo. 1882.
518 Tfo Revolution in France, 1788 A.D., to the
accepted theory by the learned; La Grange, 1736-1813 (mathe-
matics); Biot, 1774-1862 (natural philosophy and mathematics);
Carnot, 1753-1823 (mathematician and military organiser under
the Republic and Empire); Delambre, 1749-1822 (astronomy);
Monge, 1746-1818, (mathematical, and the arranger of the normal
and polytechnic schools) ; Fourier (J. B.), 1768-1830, (mathematics
and natural philosophy). Physiology: Bichat, 1771-1802. Minera-
logy: Haiiy, 1743-1822. Chemistry: Berthollet, 1748-1822;
Lavoisier, 1743-1794; Vauquelin, 1762-1829; Fourcroy, died
1809. Geology : Cuvier, 1769-1832, also Palaeontologist. Medical
Science: Cabanis, 1759-1808; Bichat, 1771-1802. Fouquet,
1727-1806. Politics: Rabaut, 1743-1793, and many others
perished in the Revolution ; there are a large number of memoirs
published by persons connected with the Revolution and the
Empire, chiefly apologetic, but of questionable veracity ; St. Pierre,
a moralist and philanthropical writer, 1737-1810. The great
painter is David, the founder of a school. Historians : Volney, the
traveller, 1757-1820; Segur the Elder, 1753-1830; Ferrand, 1751-
1825; Koch, 1737-1813; Levesque, 1737-1802. Necker, the
financier, 1732-1804, though a Swiss, was deeply connected with
French politics.
The Newspapers and Journals of the Revolutionary period are
more important than the literature. The principal were La Gazette
Nationale, which changed into Le Moniteur ; Journal de Paris ;
Nouvelle Politique ; Journal des Debats. The favourite republican
papers were the Courrier de Provence, edited by Mirabeau ; Journal
des Debats and des Decrets, by Barrere ; the Patriote Francois, by
Brissot ; the infamous Pere Duchesne, by Hubert ; the Defenseur
de la Constitution, by Robespierre ; La Sentinelle, by Tallien. Two
Magazines were of importance, the Decade Philosophique, by
Cabanis^ madly atheistic, though edited by a mathematician and a
moral philosopher, and the Revue Frangais, which became the
Revue des Deux Mondes. Among the Institutions, the Sorbonne
remained, but under restraint ; the Academy^ merged in the National
Institute^ and the Poly technique.
Italian Literature from 1788-1815. — Alfieri's last days were
spent in Italy after his marriage with the Countess of Albany
(widow of the Pretender), 1788; he died at Florence, 1803.
Filangieri, the great legal reformer, died, 1788. Rosario Gregoria
(the historian of Sicily), 1753-1809; Gioja, 1767-1825; and
Count Pecchio, 1785-1815 (political economy). Romagnosi,
1761-1835 (jurisprudence); Oriani (the astronomer), 1752-1832;
Peace of Paris, November 28, 1815. 519
Brocchi (the geologist), 1772-1826. The great men of the middle
of the eighteenth century were preparing for the approaching new
age of Italy.
GERMAN LITERATURE FROM 1788-1815. — It is very different,
as in the case of the other nationalities, to separate the writers
peculiar to this period ; most of them belong to the preceding and
.succeeding periods. Science: Chladin, 1752-1827; Scheele, 1742-
1786 (chemistry); Werner, 1752-1817 (geography); J. C. Rosen-
miiller, 1771-1820 (anatomist). Geography: Biisching, 1754-1792 ;
Mannert, 1758-1820; Memers, 1747-1810 (Greek and Roman
geography). Public Law: Justus Moser, 1701-1755; P. M.
Moser, 1723-1798; J. S. Putter, 1725-1807. Political Writers :
Brandes, who died 1819; Rehberg, 1757; Gentz, 1764-1832;
Goertz, 1 737-1832. Philosophy: Tennemann (history of philosophy),
1761-1819 ; Mendelssohn (Moses), died 1784 ; F. H. Jacobi, 1743-
1807, and the Schools of Philosophy after Kant, belong to the
following period. Oriental Literature : REISKE, who died 1774,
and J. D. Michaelis, who died 1791, left many Oriental scholars to
labour in this period; Jahn, 1750-1816. History: J. V. Miiller,
1752-1809 ; G. J. Planck, 1757-1831 ; A. H. Schlozer, 1737-1809;
Ecclesiastical History : Schroekh (35 vols.), 1733-1808. Philology:
ADELUNG (J. C), 1732-1806. Criticism of the Old and Neiv Testa-
ment: GRIESBACH, 1745-1812; HEYNE, 1729-1812 (Homer). General
Literature, POETRY: Gleim, 1719-1803; L. BORNE (the German
Voltaire), died 1784; W. Ramler, 1745-1798 ; UHLAND, died 1787 ;
WIELAND, 1733-1813; Kleist, 1776-1811; Hippel, 1741-1796;
Inland, 1756-1814. Biblical Criticism: Semler, 1725-1794; J.
G. EICHHORN, 1752-1827; J. A. ERNESTI, 1707-1781; J. G.
ROSENMULLER, 1736-1815, and many others of minor note. Cunei-
form Inscriptions : First deciphered by G. F. Grotefend of Hanover,
in 1802; born in 1775, died 1853.
DENMARK, from 1788-1815, had no great writers , but many
useful ones ; the names of her poets, dramatists, &c., have a mere
local celebrity, but there are a few names of more than local interest.
In general literature, Birkner, 1756-1798; Foersom, the translator
of Shakespeare, 1778-1817. In philosophy -, Baden, 1735-1804.
Zoega, well known for his study of Egyptian antiquities, 1756-1809;
and Thorlasius, 1741-1815, for his northern antiquities; and Bugge,
1740-1815, the astronomer.
SWEDEN from 1788-1815. — The great names belong to the past,
and to the period following the present ; there were a large number
of poets and dramatists. Botin, the historian, 1724-1790; Hoije'r,
520 State of the World 1815 A.D.
1757-1812 (philosophy); Bishop Celsius, 1716-1794 (the tragedy
of Gustavus Vasa) ; Thorild, 1759-1808 (philosophy and politics).
These writers are fair specimens, but their reputation is peculiarly
local.
HOLLAND. — Many authors of local reputation. C. de Pauw (his-
torian), 1739-1799; Helmers (poet), 1 767-1813 ;Tollens, 1780-1856,
romances and songs; BILDERDYK, 1756-1831, a distinguished poet.
RUSSIA. — KARAMSIN, 1766-1826, published his " History of the
Russian Empire," 1816-1829, and with Jakovskey and others belong
rather to the following period. In the SCLAVONIC literature of
POLAND, or in that of the MAGYARS in HUNGARY, there is nothing
beyond poems, &c., of local interest. One poet, Krasiski, who died,
1 80 1, is called the Polish Voltaire. Niemcewicz, 1767-1800, is the
Polish historian, poet, &c. Mailath, 1786-1855, is the Hungarian
historian, but properly belongs to the next period.
SPAIN. — The disturbed state of Spain was unfavourable to litera-
ture. Moratin, 1758-1828, is called the Spanish Moliere. Valdez,
who died, 1817 ; Luenprejos, who died, 1812 ; and Noronna, who
died, 1816, were chiefly lyrical poets.
State of the World 1815 A.D.
EUROPE.
NORWAY AND SWEDEN united. — All Sweden east of the Gulf of
Bothnia to Russia.
DENMARK, consisting of the peninsula of Jutland, Schleswig, and
Holstein, with Iceland.
RUSSIA. — Extending over the whole east of Europe, from the Gulf
of Bothnia and the White Sea to the Black Sea, with three-
fourths of the ancient Poland, and with the old German
provinces of Esthonia, Courland, Livonia. Separated from
Turkey by the Pruth and the Danube on the south-west.
GERMANY. — PRUSSIA, with Westphalia and the Duchy of Posen
(Poland) ; AUSTRIA, with Bohemia, Moravia, Hungary, and
Croatia, to which were added Lombardy and the old Venetian
territory in North Italy, and Dalmatia.
The KINGDOM of BAVARIA, WURTEMBERG, HANOVER, and
SAXONY, with about thirty confederate provinces and free
towns, with Prussia and Austria, formed the GERMAN CON-
FEDERATION.
State of the World 1815 A.D. 521
SWITZERLAND. — A collection of republics with aristocratic institu-
tions generally.
HOLLAND AND BELGIUM. — The kingdom of the Netherlands under
William of Orange.
ITALY. — The kingdom of SARDINIA, including Genoa, the kingdoms
of NAPLES and SICILY, the POPEDOM. The duchies of
Tuscany, Modena, Parma (independent nominally, but really
vassals to Austria).
FRANCE, with Corsica. — Its old boundaries under the monarchy in
1792, except Landau and some other frontier towns.
GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND, with Heligoland and Malta (the
Ionian Islands placed under British protection, and so re-
mained until given to the kingdom of Greece in 1864).
SPAIN, under its king (restored by the British army).
PORTUGAL, under its king (restored by the British army).
TURKEY (in Europe) had regained the Morea. Servia, Wallachia, and
Moldavia were under native rulers appointed by the Porte.
ASIA.
TURKEY IN ASIA, extending over Asia Minor, Syria, and Meso-
potamia, Kurdistan to the Tigris, and the separating range
which bounds Persia. ARABIA nominally subject to Turkey.
SIBERIA and all Northern Asia, and part of Central Asia to Russia.
CENTRAL ASIA. — Turkestan, Bokhara, Samarcand, Balk, &c., under
native rulers, coerced repeatedly by the Russians, or the
Persians, or the Afghans.
PERSIA, under the Kadjar Dynasty since 1795. Ceded Caspian
provinces to Russia, 1813.
AFGHANISTAN. — Cabul, Candahar, &c., to the Ameer of the
Afghans.
INDIA. — The Seiks, Mahrattas, the Ameer of Scinde, the King of
Oude, the Nizam, the Mysore, all subject to the English East
India Company, controlled by the British government. The
Mogul at Delhi dependent upon a pension.
Birmah and Pegu under Birmah.
Siam, Cambodia, Cochin China, independent. French settle-
ments in Cambodia.
Ceylon to England, Java and the Moluccas to Holland, the
Philippines to Spain.
522 State of the World 1815 A.D.
CHINA, with its Tartar tribes extending from Eastern Turkestan to
the Yellow Sea, her northern boundary conterminous with
the southern boundary of Russia. Korea independent.
JAPAN, at this time, closed to trade and intercourse with foreigners.
' AFRICA.
EGYPT. After the expulsion of the French, 1801, Mehemet Ali, the
Turkish commander, was chosen as viceroy by the Mame-
lukes, and appointed by the Porte Pasha of Cairo, &c., 1807.
By the massacre of the Mamelukes, 1811, he became absolute
master of Egypt, though nominally a vassal of Turkey.
NUBIA, and the country between Egypt and Abyssinia, under inde-
pendent tribes.
ABYSSINIA and SHOA. Two independent states, more or less dis-
tracted by civil wars.
TRIPOLI. Yet under the Caramanti family, nominally subject to
Turkey.
TUNIS under its Bey j ALGIERS under its Dey ; both nominally
subject to Turkey.
MOROCCO and FEZ under its Xeriffs. Christian slavery abolished,
1814.
NORTH AMERICA.
CANADA, and all the territory west of Canada, the exact boundary
line not yet settled, under England. Also Nova Scotia, New
Brunswick, Cape Breton, Newfoundland, and the Bermudas.
In the far west, Columbia, Vancouver's Island, and the coast
as far as the Russian claims.
THE UNITED STATES occupied all North America, south of the
British possessions and north of the Spanish territory.
MEXICO, NEW MEXICO, GUATEMALA, YUCATAN, and the FLORIDAS
yet remain under Spain.
RUSSIA claims the north-western peninsula, ALASKA and its territory.
WEST INDIA ISLANDS. Jamaica to England. Cuba, Porto Rico,
to Spain. Hayti independent blacks. The Caribbees to
England, France, and Holland.
State of the World 1815 A.D. 523
SOUTH AMERICA.
The Northern territories, COLUMBIA and VENEZUELA, with PERU,
CHILI, and BUENOS AYRES, to Spain.
PARAGUAY declares its independence, under two Consuls, 1813,
followed by the dictatorship of Francia, 1814.
BUENOS AYRES, dissatisfied with the Spanish Cortes, declared its
independence, 1810, and formed the Argentine Confederation.
GUIANA. Cayenne to France. Surinam to the Dutch. Demerara
to England.
BRAZIL to Portugal, the residence of the royal family since 1808.
AUSTRALIA.
The English Colony of NEW SOUTH WALES, founded January 26,
1788. The colonists first cross the Blue Mountains in 1813.
TASMANIA occupied, 1803, as a penal settlement by New South
Wales.
THIRTEENTH PERIOD,
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
THE history of this period of seventy years is naturally comprised
under five divisions, (i) To the revolutionary changes in France,
1830. (2) To the great revolutionary year, 1848. (3) To the con-
clusion of the war of England and France against Russia, 1856.
(4) To the overthrow of the Second French Empire by Germany,
1871. (5) To the year 1884. This portion of the history is, of
course, a mere chronicle; and has to be written by the next
generation.
I. — From 1815 to the Revolution in France (the three days of
July), 1830.
i. In the opinion of some extreme politicians, "the battle of
Waterloo put back the clock of the world's progress." By such, the
results of the Congress of Vienna will be viewed as the establish-
ment of a series of barriers against the liberties of the European
nationalities. The congress certainly destroyed no constitutional
liberties on the Continent, for there were none to destroy. Their
arrangements, though much open to censure, placed the separate
members of the European family to carry out changes and reforms
which were impossible while under the control of the despotism of
Napoleon, and so far they were beneficial. The plenipotentiaries
at the congress did what they could, not always what they would.
The old law of the strongest operated as usual, but checked to some
extent by higher and more liberal influences. Russia, Prussia, and
Austria had peculiar claims, with the great advantage of possessing
the power to enforce them. The Czar claimed the whole of Poland;
Prussia the whole of Saxony. Austria claimed Lombardy, Venice,
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 525
the Tyrol, with unmistakable desire to possess in addition the
smaller duchies and the Papal States. England proposed to unite
the Low Countries and Holland as a bulwark to the progress of
France, to which France was naturally opposed, as her astute repre-
sentative had some hope of absorbing a large portion of that
territory within the new boundaries of that kingdom. So deter-
mined were the intentions of Russia and Prussia to carry out their
exorbitant wishes, that early in February, 1815, England, Austria,
and France had entered into a secret treaty to oppose them. Had
there been no return of Napoleon from Elba in February, 1815, and
no restored Empire of TOO days, there would probably have been a
general war of the great powers, or, in other less dignified language,
an unprincipled scramble for increased territory among the pro-
fessedly disinterested deliverers of Europe from the aggressions of
Napoleon. But after the battle of Waterloo, when the congress
resumed its labours, Russia, not having had the opportunity of
joining in the last campaign, was more moderate in its demands.
Austria and Prussia, in opposition to the English proposal respect-
ing the Netherlands, thought it desirable rather to attempt the
revival of the old kingdom of Burgundy by the erection of Alsace
and Lorraine into a separate state under the Archduke Charles,
as a barrier between France and Germany. This was opposed by
England, France, and Russia. Mutual concessions had to be made
before the map of Europe was adjusted, (i) SWEDEN, under
Bernadotte, received Norway as the reward of the rebellion of that
lucky general against his master, Napoleon, the aristocratic con-
gress thus agreeing to maintain the son of the innkeeper on the
throne of Scandinavia. (2) DENMARK was thus punished for its
honourable fidelity to Napoleon by the loss of Norway. (3) RUSSIA,
so often the accomplice of the late Emperor of France, and whose
emperor had been personally a traitor to Prussia and Austria,
without the excuse of necessity, was rewarded by being left in
possession of Finland, and by the addition of the major part of
Poland, by which that semi-barbarian power intruded, as with a
wedge, into central Europe. (4) PRUSSIA received one-half of
Saxony, with part of Poland (the Duchy of Posen), and in addition
the Rhenish provinces, which had formed the kingdom of West-
phalia under Jerome Buonaparte ; thus Prussia was placed as a
barrier against France. (5) AUSTRIA received Galicia (part of
Poland), Cracow being erected into a petty city republic, and in
addition the Tyrol, Lombardy, and Venice. (6) The new GERMAN
CONFEDERATION, the heads of which were the Emperor of Austria
526 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
and the King of Prussia, consisted of Bavaria, Hanover (raised to
the rank of a kingdom), Baden, Wiirtemberg, and thirty other
smaller states. However defective such a confederacy, it was an
improvement upon the Germany of the eighteenth century, with its
300 independent sovereignties. (7) FRANCE received her old
boundaries (before 1793), except Landau and other towns on the
north-east frontier. She had to pay twenty-eight millions sterling as
an indemnification for the cost of the last campaign, and to bear
the burden of the support of a garrison of 150,000 men for
three years. (8) In ITALY, Naples and Sicily, Tuscany, and the
other petty duchies reverted to their old Bourbon rulers, and the
States of the Church to the Pope. The republics of Venice and
Genoa were not restored to their former position, not from any
objection to republics of such an oligarchic character, but from
the impossibility of their possessing anything but a nominal inde-
pence. The same objection might apply to the duchies and to
Naples; but there was this difference, that the sovereigns of these
states could fall back upon the support of the Austrian emperor,
wherein the two republics must have been virtually subject, the one
to Austria and the other to Sardinia. The King of SARDINIA
received Genoa, by which he acquired a maritime position of im-
portance. The Liberals raised a loud outcry at the loss of these
republics, as if they had been free, constitutional, and genuine
republics, whereas they had been the most narrow and tyrannical of
all oligarchies, and, so far as Genoa was concerned, its union to
Sardinia was a great gain. (9) SPAIN and PORTUGAL remained as
before. (10) ENGLAND restored Java to Holland, but retained the
Cape of Good Hope. So the French colonies were restored to
France except the Mauritius. Malta was retained. It was obviously
too important a point to be relegated to the care of Naples ; like
Gibraltar, it was held by the English Government, as much for the
interests of Europe as for those of England, (n) Holland and
the Low Countries were again united as in the sixteenth century,
and formed the KINGDOM OF THE NETHERLANDS. This measure was
first proposed by Lord Chesterfield, as appears from his letter (Sept.
23, 1748) to Mr. Darolles. Yet "the genius of Marlborough could
discern and declare the fatal obstacle " to that promising measure,
in his letter to Lord Godolphin, from Flanders, December 6, 1708.
" Not only the towns, but the people, of this country hate the
Dutch."1 Besides these regulations of territory, the congress
1 Lord Mahon's " History of England," I2mo. edition, vol. ii. p. 181.
From the Peace of Pans, 1 8 1 5, to 1 884. 527
condemned the slave trade and passed a resolution condemning the
piracy of the Barbary States of North Africa. The three great
powers, September 26, no doubt most sincerely at the time, entered
into " the Holy Alliance," an engagement to which France acceded,
but which England declined to join. This league was, in fact, a
mutual guarantee of "legitimacy" in political governments in
opposition to popular claims. It was no hindrance to the action of the
great powers in their relations with each other, while it evidenced a
jealousy of popular opinion, and created a feeling of jealousy
against these three great powers, which had a disturbing influence
on European politics. Practically, the constitutional governments
went on their way unaffected by the ultra-monarchical feeling of
Continental Europe generally, except in the case of Spain and of
the petty states of Italy. It required the experience and the gradual
enlightenment of a third of a century before Europe was ripe to
receive and manage representative assemblies and constitutional
governments. Napoleon was sent to St. Helena under the custody
of England.
2. One practical result of the Peace of 1815 was a gain to
humanity, especially to the populations of the south of Europe, by
the suppression of the piracies which, for three centuries, had been
carried on by the States of Barbary, to the great disgrace of England,
France, and Spain, who had, through their mutual jealousies,
permitted the infliction of so much robbery and misery. After futile
attempts to obtain redress for the past and security for the future,
the English and Dutch fleets, under Lord Exmouth, silenced the
Algerian batteries, burnt nine frigates and numerous gunboats, by a
tremendous bombardment, August 27, 1816. Within three days
1,083 Christian slaves were liberated and restored to their respective
countries, and the piracies ceased.
3. Some valuable remarks from the late Charles Knight and from
A. FyfTe are most important in connexion with the state of England
and of the Continent following the close of the war in 1815. They
ought never to be forgotten. "The peace of Europe was settled,
as every former peace had been settled, upon a struggle for what the
Continental powers thought most conducive to their own advantage.
The representatives of Great Britain manifested a praiseworthy
abnegation of merely selfish interests. Napoleon, at St. Helena,
said to O'Meara, ' So silly a treaty as that made by your ministers
for their own country was never known before. You have given up
everything and gained nothing.' We can now answer that we gained
everything when we gained a longer period of repose than our
528 From tJie Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
modern annals could previously exhibit. We gained everything
when, after twenty years of warfare upon the most extravagant scale,
the spirit of the people conducted that warfare to a triumphant end.
The gains of a great nation are not to be reckoned only by its
territorial acquisitions or its diplomatic influence. The war which
England had waged, often single-handed, against a colossal tyranny
raised her to an eminence which amply compensated for the mistakes
of her negotiators. It was something that they did not close the
war in a huxtering spirit, that they did not squabble for this colony
or that entrepot. The fact of our greatness was not to be mistaken
when we left to others the scramble for aggrandisement, content at
last to be free to pursue our own course of consolidating our power
by the arts of peace Security was won, we were safe from
the giant aggressor."1 So far for England and its gains by the
conclusion of the war. What were the gains of the Continental
powers ? We may quote the fullest and the clearest exhibition of
their gains from Fyffe : — " In the course of the epoch now ending
the whole of the Continent up to the frontiers of Austria and Russia
had gained the two fruitful ideas of nationality and political freedom.
There were now two nations in Europe where before there had
been but aggregates of artificial states. Germany and Italy were no
longer mere geographical expressions. In both countries, though in
a very unequal degree, the newly-aroused sense of nationality had
brought with it the claims for unity and independence. In Prussia,
Germany had set a great examble, and was hereafter to reap its
reward. In Italy there had been no state and no statesman to take
the lead either in throwing off Napoleon's rule, or in forcing him,
as the price of support, to give to his Italian kingdom a really
national government. Failing to act for itself, the population of this
kingdom was parcelled out between Austria and its ancient dynasties ;
but the old days of passive submission to the foreigners were gone
for ever, and time was to show whether those were the dreamers who
thought of a united Italy, or those who thought that Metternich's
statesmanship had for ever settled the fate of Venice and Milan.
The second legacy of the revolutionary epoch, the idea of constitutional
freedom, which in 1789 had been as much wanting in Spain, where
national spirit was the strongest, as in those German states where it
was the weakest, had been excited in Italy by the events of 1796-
1798, in Spain by the disappearance of the Bourbon king, and the
self-directed struggle of the nation against the invader ; in Prussia
1 Knight, " History of England," vol. iii. p. 456.
From the Peace of Par is > 1815, to 1884. 529
it had been introduced by the government itself, when Stein was at
the head of the state There was, in fact, scarcely a court in
Europe which was not now declaring its intention to frame a consti-
tution. The proposition might be lightly made, the desire and the
capacity for self-government might still be limited to a narrower
class than the friends of liberty imagined ; but the seed was sown,
and a movement had begun which was to gather strength during the
next thirty years of European history, while one revolution after
another proved that governments could no longer with safety
disregard the rights of their subjects. Lastly, in all the territory
that had formed Napoleon's empire and dependencies, and also in
Prussia, legal changes had been made in the rights and relations of the
different classes of society, so important as almost to create a new type
of social life The principles of the French Code, if not the
Code itself, had been introduced into Napoleon's kingdom of Italy,
into Naples, and into almost all the German dependencies of France.
In Prussia, the reforms of Stein and Hardenburg had been directed,
though less boldly, towards the same end; and when, after 1814,
the Rhenish provinces were annexed to Prussia by the Congress of
Vienna, the Government was wise enough and liberal enough to
leave these districts in the enjoyment of the laws which France had
given them In other territory, now severed from France
and restored to German and Italian princes, attempts were not
wanting to obliterate the new order and to reintroduce the burden
and confusion of the old regime. But these reactions, even where
unopposed for a time, were too much in conflict with the spirit of
the age to gain more than a temporary and precarious success. It
was, indeed, within a distinct limit that the revolutionary epoch
effected its work of political and social change. Neither England
nor Austria received the slightest impulse to progress. England, on
the contrary, suspended almost all internal improvement during the
course of the war. The domestic policy of the Austrian court, so
energetic in the reign immediately preceding the Revolution, became,
for the next twenty years, except when it was a policy of repression,
a policy of pure vacancy and inaction. But in all other states of
Western Europe the period which reached its close with Napoleon's
fall left deep and lasting traces behind it. Like all other great
epochs of change, it bore its own peculiar character. It was not,
like the Renaissance and the Reformation, a time when new worlds
of faith and knowledge transformed the whole scope and conception
of human life. It was not, like our own age, a time when scientific
discovery and increased means of communication silently attend
2 M
530 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
the physical condition of existence. It was a time of changes
directly political in their nature and directly affected by the political
agencies of legislation or war. In the perspective of history, the
Napoleonic age will take its true place among other and perhaps
greater epochs. Its elements of mere violence and disturbance will
fill less space in the eyes of mankind ; its permanent creations more.
As an epoch of purely political energy, concentrating the work of
generations within the compass of twenty-five years, it will, perhaps,
scarcely find a parallel."1
4. The peace was followed by a period of great distress
among the manufacturing and agricultural populations both of
England and the Continent. The necessary taxation, and the waste
of capital in war, which gave no material productive returns, had
affected all classes of society. Manufacturing industry had no
market, as the purchasing power of the people had been greatly
lessened ; so also with agricultural products ; there was everywhere
an enforced economy in consumption ; employment for labour was
difficult to find, and the labourers needing employment were in-
creased in number by the thousands who had been released from
the army and commissariat department ; wages were lowered, while
the necessities of the poor were deepened by the rise in the price of
food occasioned by bad harvests and by protectionist fiscal arrange-
ments, which raised the price of corn and fettered the commerce
of the country. For some years past the country had been living
partly upon its capital. Since 1810 the Government expenditure
had averaged nearly 109 millions annually, while in the years imme-
diately succeeding the peace the average was sixty-five millions, a
difference to the amount of fifty millions, much of which had been
spent on the home industry of the land. It is true that the wealth
of the country had increased during the Wat through the amazing
extent of the steam power and manufacturing skill which carried
the nation through the war, but in the absence of a market there
was no field for the employment of capital and labour. Every
capitalist, whether manufacturer or trader, had to limit his dealings,
and to wait until there was a profitable demand. Some years had
to pass away before the stagnation which followed the peace was
removed. Meanwhile political discontent was all but universal; the
Government was accused of profligate expenditure ; a national debt
of 800 millions necessitated heavy taxation, and, while the Govern-
ment had made at once great reductions, they were not considered
1 Fyfie, vol. '. pp. 516-54%
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1 884. 531
commensurate with the claims of a strict economy. Riots, public
meetings, seditious speeches, insults to the Prince Regent in 1817,
and the Peterloo meeting, and "massacre" at Manchester, 1819,
with the Cato Street Conspiracy, February, 1820, followed by Lord
Sidmouth's Six Acts of Repression, characterised this period of
distress. The agriculturists had obtained in 1815 a corn bill which
forbade the importation of wheat until it had reached the famine
price of 8os. per quarter; and the manufacturing and trading classes,
favoured by good harvests and the opening out of markets abroad,
gradually recovered their former prosperity. Unfortunately, reckless
speculation brought on a remarkable crisis at the close of the year
1825. A gradual change of public opinion on some points of our
foreign and commercial policy may be marked by the appointment
of PEEL as successor to Sidmouth — " the shallowest, narrowest, most
borne, and most benighted of the old Tory crew"1 — in the Home
Office, January, 1822; then of CANNING to that of Foreign Secre-
tary on the death of Castlereagh, September, 1822 ; of ROBINSON
(Goderich) to the Chancellorship of the Exchequer, and of Hus-
KISSON to the Board of Trade in 1823, at which time the Currency
Bill, which secured the bullion standard, came into operation. Lord
LIVERPOOL'S illness early in 1827, and the death of the Duke of
York, the great opponent of Catholic Emancipation, led to great
changes in the Cabinet. CANNING was Secretary for Foreign Affairs
from 1822, and had given a liberal character to our foreign policy;
he became Prime Minister from April to August, 1827, when he
died. Then Goderich, having failed as minister, the Duke of
WELLINGTON and PEEL, in 1828, directed the national affairs
(without the aid of the more liberal members of the former admin-
istration). By their influence over the Tory party they were able
to carry, in opposition to the will of the king (George IV.) and of
the public generally, the great measure of Catholic Emancipation,
March- April, 1829. George IV., who had begun to reign on the
death of George III., January 28, 1820, died, unlamented by any,
June 26, 1830. His reign as king had been disgraced by the
charges brought against his queen (Caroline), June- August, 1820,
and by his personal extravagance and self-indulgence.
5. In FRANCE, the experiment of " that worst of revolutions — a
restoration" — was tried without success. Louis XVIII. understood,
as well as any Bourbon could, the times in which he lived, and
desired to govern liberally, but he was, from his failure of health,
1 W. Greg, <f Essays," second series, p. 234.
2 M 2
532 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
unable to resist the influence of the ultra-royal and popish party,
which ruled the Comte d'Artois and the Duke and Duchess of
Angouleme. The Duke of Berry was assassinated, February 14,
1820; his infant child, known to us as Count Chambord, was
born several months after his death. In accordance with the wishes
of the Congress of Verona, December, 1822, a French army was
sent to put down the revolutionists of Spain, and to declare Ferdi-
nand VII. in 1823 (February- August). This expedition was hoped
to be the precursor of a campaign on the north-east, which the
ultra party had planned to recover the boundary of the Rhine,
and thus connect the restored regime with the military glory of
France. Louis XVIII. died, September 16, 1824, and Charles X.
succeeded.
Charles X., the successor of Louis XVIII., September 16, 1824,
was a true Bourbon, who had "forgotten nothing and learnt
nothing " in the twenty-one years of exile. He kept three objects
in view; (i) to modify or rather destroy the liberal constitution of
Louis XVIII. ; (2) to restore, as far as possible, the privileges of
the old regime ; the emigrants had already received a milliard of
francs (forty millions sterling) compensation for the estates sold by
the revolutionary government ; (3) the establishment of the clergy
in their former position — the king himself having long before
identified himself as president of the congregation, a religious party,
ultra-Catholic, and zealous in promoting processions, missions, and
festivals, altogether in opposition to the views of the French people.
Attempts were continually made to limit the freedom of the press ;
the National Guard of Paris was dismissed on account of some
seditious cries against the Jesuits and royal family, April 12, 1827.
Vilele's ministry was obliged to resign, January 8, 1828; that of
Martignac succeeded, and was again succeeded by Polignac, August
8,1829; under his administration Algiers was taken, June 14 to
July 7, 1830. This conquest produced no reaction in favour of the
Court, and the new elections were completely in favour of the
Liberal party. A coup-d'etat was resolved, unknown to any one but
the ministry and the papal nuncio / On Monday, July 26, five
ordinances signed by the king and his ministers appeared in the
Moniteur: (i) abolished the freedom of the press; (2) dissolved
the Chamber ; (3) altered the electoral law, so as to confine the
franchise to a richer class ; the practice of renewing the Chamber
by one-fifth yearly was restored and the power of the Chamber
limited; (4) the Chamber to meet on the following September;
(5) nominated a number of ultra-Royalists and of the priestly party
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 533
members of the Council of State. These ordinances astonished
and roused Paris. In the afternoon a meeting of the writers for the
newspapers met in the office of the National, and Thiers drew up the
protest, which was signed by forty-four representatives, and eleven
journalists. Paris was quiet, but the funds fell. On July 27, 28, 29,
began the "three glorious days of July," being the days of resistance
in the history of Paris. Lafayette was at the head of the National
Guard. The king, alarmed, appointed a new ministry too late.
On the 3oth, Louis Philippe, Duke of Orleans, was proclaimed
General Lieutenant. By August 3, Charles X. gave up all hopes of
recovering his position, and on the 4th began his journey to
Cherbourg, whence he embarked, August 16, for England. Louis
Philippe was called to the throne by the Chambers, August 7, and on
the gth took the oath required and was solemnly proclaimed king.
The dethronement of Charles X. was a good thing in itself; but the
revolution was spoiled in the mode of its accomplishment, and from
this circumstance was truly " an untoward event." There are few
civilised countries in which a town mob would be permitted to
change the head of the Government at the instigation of a number
of the gentlemen of the press, or in which a country like France
would at once submit to the dictation of the mob of its capital.
The success of the mob on this occasion has been an evil example
to prompt the imitation of mobs in other nations. Luckily for the
Revolution, the elected Chambers met and gave legality to the acts
of the improvised provisional government. Had Louis Philippe
refused power, except as Regent for the Duke of Bordeaux, and
had the youth been placed under the care of suitable guardians,
the state of France might now have been much happier and far
more prosperous, and Louis Philippe and his family would have left
a noble and brave act for the admiration of posterity.
6. The state of the Continent after the peace was as unsettled as
in England and France, and from similar causes. In GERMANY
and ITALY especially, the people were looking for the free institu-
tions for which they had been led to hope as the reward of their
sacrifices in the struggle with the common enemy, Napoleon ; they
saw no preparation towards the realisation of the promises made to
them in the time of trial. The sovereigns were to be pitied as well
as blamed ; they had no past experience from contact with consti-
tutional governments to guide them in the difficult task of framing
free institutions. The men in whom they had reason to trust as
guides were utterly incapable of comprehending the possibility of
government under constitutional limitations. Any one reading the
534 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
self-complacent memoirs of the Austrian Prince Metternich l may
perceive the Egyptian darkness in which the Continental counsellers
were involved, and may perceive the cause of the political revolu-
tions which make up the history of Europe for ten generations.
Something might have been accomplished towards the beginning
of a constitutional regime, by the improvement and extension of
the old liberties, which have been connected with the mediaeval
kingdom and provinces ; but there was a general prejudice against
all that was old, and a rage for the new. The Liberals forgot that
a free constitution is a very complex affair, which cannot be impro-
vised ; it must have roots in the past history and sympathies of the
people, growing with their growth, and gradually adapted to the
necessities of their position. A constitution on paper is one thing,
a workable arrangement, which will guarantee freedom while main-
taining order, is a different affair. The fault of the sovereigns was
that they appeared to oppose the very slightest exercise - of self-
government, and to rely upon the repression of all free action as
the only means of maintaining social order. The general discontent
expressed itself in SPAIN by the rebellion of the troops under
Hi ego in January, 1820, followed by the new constitution, March 9.
So also in PORTUGAL, September 15, and in NAPLES, July 20. In
the year 1821, in January, SARDINIA, and even beyond the Atlantic,
MEXICO and BRAZIL, in February, declared for representative insti-
tutions. The sovereigns held congresses at Troppau in October,
and at Lay bach in December, 1820. Italian risings were easily
put down. The condition of Spain, followed by the GREEK
REVOLT and the establishment of a provisional government, June 9,
1821, were considered in the Congress of Verona, December, 1822,
but the English Government, during the secretaryship of Canning,
separated itself from the policy of the great powers, which counten-
anced France in the invasion of SPAIN to put down the insurrection
and restore Ferdinand VII. to his supreme authority in 1823
(March-September). PORTUGAL was under English protection, and
the American Spanish and Portuguese states were beyond the
reach of the allied powers of Europe; but the insurrection in
GREECE, in its bearing upon TURKEY and the whole Eastern ques-
tion (as it is called), required the most serious attention and joint
action of all the great powers. From that time it has been the great
disturbing element in the politics of Europe, and will remain so
antil the great powers lay aside their mutual jealousies and provide
1 4 vols. 8vo.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 535
some settlement which will secure something like a fair and just
rule over the states which are regarded as parts of the Turkish*
empire. No one, however attached to legitimacy and " the right
divine to govern wrong," could imagine that the Greek resistance to<
Turkish rule was uncalled for. The insurrection commenced March,,
1821, and a provisional government established June 9. To attempt
the overthrow of the Turkish power was felt by the Greeks to be a
" sacred duty " after the murder of the Greek patriot at Constanti-
nople, April 21, 1822, and the massacre of 50,000 Greeks in Scia
in April and May of that year. Ali Pacha, of Albania, who had
long been virtually independent of the Sultan, was deposed and
killed, February 5, and the Turkish government were free to put
forth their full strength against the revolt ; but the Greeks, by their
small vessels at sea and by their guerilla parties on land, were able
to maintain their position. In 1825, the Sultan engaged the Pasha
of Egypt to send Ibrahim with an army to the Morea, by whom
that peninsula was cruelly devastated. England, France, and
Russia, July 6, 1827, offered their mediation, and required Ibrahim
to cease his ravages. On his refusal the combined fleets destroyed
the Turkish fleet at Navarino, October 26, 1827. This "untoward
event/' as the cold-blooded politicians of Europe called this act of
mercy, was followed by the expulsion of the Egyptians from the
Morea by the French troops, October 26, 1828. Meanwhile, by the
abolition of the rebel Janissary troops and their extermination in
the streets of Constantinople by Sultan Mahomet, June 15, 1826,
the military power of Turkey was weakened, and was utterly unable
to resist the Russian invasion which followed the Turkish declara-
tion of war, December 20, 1829. The Russians advanced to.
Adrianople, August 20, 1829, and on the 28th a treaty was made,
by which Russia acquired territory in the Circassian provinces and
on the Danube. MOLDAVIA and WALLACHIA recovered self-govern-
ment in local affairs. SERVIA retained its privileges; the inde-
pendence of GREECE was acknowledged, and Russia was to receive
four millions sterling indemnity for the cost of the war. This may
be regarded as one step in the right direction towards the settlement
of this vexed Eastern question. Capo d'Istria had already been
installed at Nauplia as President of Greece.
7. RUSSIA was troubled by secret societies, whose object was the
political amelioration of the government and of society, working by
clubs and associations in the army and in the universities. The
last days of the well-meaning but unstable Alexander I. were pained
by the knowledge of the existence of these conspirators. On his.
536 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
death, December i, 1826, there was a military revolt in St. Peters-
burg, mainly organised by the members of these societies, which,
affecting to defend the rights of Constantine, the elder brother of
Nicholas, to the throne, aimed at effecting a revolution. By his
personal bravery, Nicholas quelled the revolt, December 26, 1826.
He was the great hero of the Continental conservative party, but
during his whole life he had to struggle with the liberal reaction in
Europe, which may be traced to the influence of GEORGE CANNING,
the English Secretary for Foreign Affairs, September, 1822, and
Prime Minister, April 27 to August 8, 1827. In this interval of
four years England was the hope and stay of all the Liberals in
the world. The independence of the SPANISH colonies in America
was favoured by Canning. Mexico, Columbia, Peru, Chili, La
Plata, had been completely free since the battle of Ayahuco,
December 9, 1824, and after the surrender of Callao, January 22,
1826, Spain had no footing either in South America or Mexico.
English consuls were first appointed and the acknowledgment of
these colonies as independent states naturally followed. In defending
his policy in the House of Commons, when blamed for not resist-
ing the invasion of Spain by France in 1823, Canning remarked,
" If France occupied Spain, was it necessary, in order to avoid the
consequences of that occupation, that we should blockade Cadiz?
No ! I took another way. I sought material of compensation in
another hemisphere. Contemplating Spain such as our ancestors
had known her, I resolved that, if France had Spain, it should not
be Spain ' with the Indies.' I called the new world into existence
to redress the balance of the old." l The new world had already
influenced European affairs in PORTUGAL. BRAZIL, where John VI.
ruled as King of Portugal, had advocated a constitution, September
15, 1820, under the regency of Don Pedro, his son, who was pro-
claimed emperor, December i, 1822. On the death of John VI.,
in Portugal, March 10, 1826, Don Pedro placed his daughter
Maria as Queen of Portugal, under the regency of Don Miguel, his
brother, who, however, usurped the crown, June 25, 1828, in the
interest of the Absolutist party.
II. — From the Revolution of 1830 to the great Revolutionary
Year 1848.
The Revolution in FRANCE, July, 1830, disturbed the quiet
of all Europe. The new kingdom of the NETHERLANDS was dis-
solved, the union being specially disagreeable to the Belgians.
1 Miss Martineau, " History of the Peace," vol. i. p. 408.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 537
Between August 25 and December 26, when the great powers in-
terfered, the Dutch were expelled, and on June 4, 1831, Leopold
became King of BELGIUM, by the choice of the people and the will
of the great powers, to the great dissatisfaction of the King of
HOLLAND, who retained Antwerp until 1832. GERMANY had to
deal with troubles in Brunswick, Hesse Cassel, and Saxony. Insur-
rections in various parts of ITALY were raised by Mazzini and the
Carbonari conspiracy, by which the zeal of young Italy was kept
alive. In SWITZERLAND the cantonal governments revised their
constitutions, in some cases with opposition and bloodshed.
POLAND was unfortunately led to rise against RUSSIA, December 29,
1830, but in February, 1831, the Russian armies entered Poland,
and from that time to September 7, were engaged in the contest
with Czartoryski, the Polish leader, until, the rebellion being put
down, Poland was formally annexed to Russia, February 26, 1832,
and " order reigned in Warsaw." The existence of an independent
kingdom of Poland, in a territory consisting of a vast plain without
any natural defences, and surrounded by neighbours all of them
inimical, is a physical impossibility even if the people of Poland
were of one mind to maintain it. But the fact is that the desire
for independence is confined to the Polish aristocratical nobility,
while the peasantry have been placed in a better position as to
liberty and property by the Russian rule. The visitation of the
CHOLERA in Europe, 1831 and 1832, helped to sober the poli-
ticians, and to restore political quiet for a time — a short time, from
1832-1848.
The history of ENGLAND from 1830-1848 is mainly one of
internal reform, in the attempt to repair and rebuild on the old
foundations the old English constitutional liberty. A Liberal
ministry, under the veteran Earl Grey, succeeded the Wellington
ministry on November 16, 1830. By this ministry the Reform Bill,
by which the franchise was transferred to the middle class, was
carried June 4, 1832. Slavery was abolished August, 1833, and
carried into effect August i, 1834. Sir Robert Peel and a Con-
servative ministry were in office from December, 1834, to April,
1835, when the Liberals, under Melbourne, were restored, and on
September 7 passed the Act for the reform of the corporations of the
United Kingdom. On June 20, 1837, Queen VICTORIA succeeded
the good-natured, well-meaning King William. In 1830 the Liver-
pool and Manchester Railway was opened. In 1838 steam navigation
was established between England and the United States; and in
1840 the penny postage was established, January 10, and the
538 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Queen happily married to Prince Albert, February 10. The
administration of Sir R. Peel from September 16, 1841, to June,
1846, is connected with the revival of the income-tax, 1842. It
was disturbed by the agitation in Ireland for Repeal under
O'Connell, and by the potato famine, -1845, 1846; but there was
time [found to regulate factory labour, 1844, and to fix the endow-
ment of Maynooth, and to establish the Queen's Colleges in
Ireland. The necessity of a change in the Corn-laws appeared
evident to Sir R. Peel and his colleague the Duke of Wellington.
After a thorough revision of the tariff, Sir R. Peel, finding his col-
leagues opposed to the repeal of the Corn-laws, resigned, December,
1845, but, on Lord J. Russell's failure to form a ministry, resumed
his position, and by the pressure brought to bear upon the Peers,
the great measure for which Cobden, and Villiers, and Bright had
laboured, and towards which the Anti-Corn-law League had so
largely assisted, was carried in 1846, and the importation of corn
was freed from all restrictions. The external history of England is
mixed up with that of FRANCE in common with the affairs of SPAIN
and TURKEY. By the death of Ferdinand VII. (September 29,
1833), the crown of SPAIN devolved upon his infant daughter, under
the guardianship of her mother Christina. Don Carlos (the next
male heir) raised a civil war, supported by the Absolute party. In
defence of the child queen, England and France with Spain and
Portugal, formed the Quadruple Alliance, April 26, 1834-1839. The
weakness of the Sultan of Turkey emboldened his vassal, Mahomet
Ali, Pasha of Egypt, to seize Syria, to pass the Taurus, and defeat
the Turks at Konieh, December 20, 1832. Russia came to the help
of Turkey, and by the treaty of Unkiar Salassi, July 8, 1833, the
Sultan agreed to close the Dardanelles to foreign powers whenever
required by Russia ; but, meanwhile, Mahomet Ali had made peace
at Kutayeh, May 6, 1833, and had received SYRIA as his reward for
rebellion. In 1839 Mahomet again asserted his independence, and
beat the Turks at Nezib, June 25. England and France interfered
to save the Turkish Empire, though their plans were not in exact
accordance, France being not unwilling to allow the Pasha to possess
Syria. The English fleet took St. Jean d'Acre, November, 1841.
Peace was made by the great powers and Turkey, by which Syria
was taken from the pasha, and the invidious control of the Darda-
nelles by Russia was set aside, July 13, 1841. A settlement with
the United States of America respecting the Oregon boundary was
made in June, 1846. On the retirement of Peel, Lord John Russell
was Prime Minister. Soon after, in 1846, 1847, Ireland suffered to a
From the Peace of Par is y 1815, to 1884. 539
large extent the misery of famine through the failure of the potato
crop, and in 1847 England suffered from the great commercial panic.
The history of the experiment of a rebuplican monarchy in
France has an interest in itself. Louis Philippe was punished by
the very success of his selfish ambition, the crown was to him one
of thorns. He had to govern as a king a republican people, to
be ever talking of patriotism and liberty, and to be at the same
time obliged to impose restrictions on popular licence. He had to
consent to the abolition of the hereditary peerage, and to a series of
measures opposed to his own wishes, and perhaps to the opinions of
the real friends of liberty and constitutional government in France ;
he lived in daily danger of assassination, and the course of his
government was continually disturbed by conspiracies and revolts.
The Duchess of Berry, from April to November, 1832, was busy in
the west of France. There was a serious riot in Lyons, April, 1834,
and Louis Napoleon made two attempts upon his throne, one at
Strasburg, 1836, and another at Boulogne, August, 1840. After
this the body of the great Napoleon was removed from St. Helena
to Paris, and entombed in the Invalides, December 15, 1840.
Friendship with England was maintained, though there were serious
collisions respecting Otaheite and the missionary Pritchard in 1842-
1844, and the affair of the Spanish marriages in 1846, arising out
of the desire of Louis Philippe to secure the preponderance of his
dynasty in Spain, which had a tendency to lessen the friendship of
the two powers. The death of the Duke of Orleans, the eldest son
of Louis Philippe, July, 1842, was deeply felt by the king. Soult,
Thiers, Guizot were the leading ministers; but, under every ad-
ministration, the grasping demands of the king for donations to the
different branches of his family lowered his personal character, in
spite of his recognised ability and respectable family life. Towards
the close of 1846 some very disgraceful revelations of official and
social degeneracy and corruption aroused a cry for reform in the
electoral system. About 200,000 electors returned the members
for the Assembly, of which 120,000 returned only eighty-one, and
98,000, 273, the thinly-peopled rural and ignorant districts returning
the larger number. Reform banquets were instituted as means of
influencing public opinion : these were forbidden. An emeute
began on February 22, 1848, and continued on the 23rd and 24th,
on which day the king abdicated, yielding to the power of a mere
mob. The abdication in favour of the Comte de Paris was of no
avail. The republic was proclaimed, and the king and family took
refuge in England. Thus, by a singular Nemesis, the king, raised
540 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
by a mob revolution, was dethroned by a mob revolution after a
rule of eighteen years. "Louis Philippe smiled with pity in 1830
on the imbecility and blindness with which Charles X. rushed on
his fate; yet, eighteen years later, he himself showed the same
blindness, the same ignorance of the danger before him, and of the
spirit of the people which he governed. Human prudence failed in
the one as completely as divine right blinded the other. Louis
Philippe thought himself both right and safe as long as he scrupu-
lously kept within the letter of international law, without perceiving
that he totally nullified the spirit. Neither he nor'M. Guizot per-
ceived the danger of their position, and that in case of an £meute
the monarch's unpopularity would array the National Guard as well
as the people against them, and that, in the face of this, the army
would be reluctant to act. To be sure, the Government was always
able to prevent an dmeute, and in this indeed was their only chance.
But a variety of circumstances deceived the Government into allow-
ing full play and space for the commencement of the insurrection,
which, once aroused and in conflagration, it was no longer possible
by human means to repress."1
Between 1830 and 1848 SPAIN had been the victim of many
changes in its government and policy. Ferdinand VII., the most
thoroughly unprincipled and contemptible of all Spanish monarchs,
had died, September 29, 1833. Christina, his widow, was supported
against the Carlists by France and England. This rebellion ended
in 1839. The violence of political parties, the Moderados, the
Progressistas, and others, made regular government impossible.
The queen, as Regent for her daughter, was compelled to consent
to re-establish the impracticable constitution of 1812. Then fol-
lowed a series of changes of rulers in the name of the young queen,
Espartero, Narvaez, O'Donnell, Isturitz, &c. Isabella was declared
of age, April 4, 1846, and was married, October 10, 1846, to her
cousin, through the insidious policy of Louis Philippe. PORTUGAL
was relieved from Don Miguel's despotism in 1833 by the restoration
of Donna Maria by her father Don Pedro, the ex-Emperor of Brazil.
In SWEDEN, Oscar had succeeded Bernadotte (Charles XIV.),
March 8, 1844. In DENMARK, Charles VIII. succeeded Frede-
rick VI., December, 1839. Frederick VII. succeeded, January 20,
1848, and framed a new constitution, which became a source of
trouble to his successor. Sultan Mahomet, who had destroyed the
Janissaries, died in 1840, and was succeeded by Abdul Mejid as
1 Crowe, vol. v. pp. 559, 600.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 541
Sultan of TURKEY. The great powers placed Otho, a young
Bavarian prince, incapable from the very first, on the throne of
GREECE, August 30, 1832. By a revolution, the people forced upon
the king a charter of representative government, March 16, 1844.
ITALY : Rome, under the POPES, was disturbed by revolutionary
attempts. Gregory XVI. succeeded Pius VIII. in 1831, Pius IX.
succeeded in 1846. SARDINIA : Charles Albert succeeded Charles
Felix in 1831. He was liberally disposed. In NAPLES and SICILY
insurrectionary movements began at Palermo January 12, and at
Naples January 29.
There were occurrences of importance in CANADA which deserve
notice. A rebellion in 1837, 1838, was put down, and Lord Durham
sent on a special mission, 1839, which led to the union of the two
Canadas, and to great changes in the administration. In INDIA,
apart from the general and gradual union of the several states which
belong purely to the history of India, the Indian Government,
desirous of securing Afghanistan as a barrier against Russia, inter-
fered in the dissensions of the chiefs, and deposed Dost Mohammed,
the Ameer, in 1839, placing Shah Shuja in his place. This feeble
ruler was supported by English troops, but by a sudden blow the
English residents were murdered, and the army compelled to fall
back on India in the midst of winter. Four thousand English
troops, with their camp followers, were destroyed, November, 1841, to
January, 1842. The British armies under Pollock, Nott, and Sale
were again in possession of Kabul, September, 1842. SCINDE was
conquered in 1843. The first SIKH War, 1845, 1846; the second,
1848, 1849, ended in the annexation of the PUNJAB. There was
also a dispute, and practically a war, with China from 1839-1842.
The discovery of the gold mines in California in 1847, followed by
the further discovery of gold in Australia, 1851, was a great event
in connexion with the impulses given to manufactures and trade
over the whole civilised world.
III. — From the great Revolutionary Year, 1848, to the Conclusion of
the War of England and France against Russia (the Crimean
War), 1856.
The Republic (the second in France) of 1848, like its predecessor,
the first Republic of 1793, prepared the way for the Empire. As in
1830, when the real interests of the French people, which required
a firm executive controlled by constitutional checks, were sacrificed
to the rage for a mere change of dynasty, so, in 1848, the popular
impatience and the vanity of the leaders of the people, especially in
542 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
the case of the imaginative and eloquent Lamartine, led to the
rejection of the Comte de Paris and of the regency of the Duchess
of Orleans, under whom, the chief place being occupied, the area
of public strife and contention might have been limited to practical
arrangements bearing upon the reparation of great mistakes and
the provision of security for the future. An assembly of the reformed
representatives of the nation, meeting and acting under the authority
of the crown, might have secured the support of the army and the
control of the most revolutionary party, who regarded a revolution
as an end in itself, rather than as a means to a desired end. France
would then have been spared the loss of life in the civil war carried
on in Paris during the year, followed by the election of Prince
Napoleon, the coup-d'etat of December 2, 1851, and the Empire
of December 2, 1852, culminating in the disaster of Sedan,
September i and 2, 1870, and the German occupation which
followed.
The provisional government under Lamartine and his colleagues,
endorsed by Louis Blanc, issued a decree recognising the right of
every workman to labour ; for which purpose public workshops were
instituted. These, of course, became centres of idleness and waste.
They proved so costly, that they were, after a fair trial, abolished.
On May 4 the new Assembly met, and the provisional government
was succeeded by an executive committee of six, under Lamartine,
L. Rollin, Arago, and others. The Social Democrats, a minority,
with no votes in the National Assembly which met May 4, attempted
to dissolve the new government on May 15 ; but their attempts were
unsuccessful. The proposed dissolution of the week before was the
occasion of the fiercest insurrection on June 23. Cavaignac was
appointed to the command of the troops as Dictator. All attempts
at conciliation failed. The Archbishop of Paris was accidentally
shot while attempting to urge the insurgents to accept terms of
peace. In the four days' fighting 12,000 of the insurgents were
killed. On June 28 peace was restored, and Cavaignac was made
Head of the Executive Committee and President of the Cabinet.
The workshops were closed, so also the more extravagant clubs, and
eleven newspapers were silenced, and the state of siege (martial law)
was continued. Thus the Republic was obliged to follow and
exceed the restrictive measures of the Bourbon kings. Louis Blanc
and Caussidiere fled, to avoid inquiry into their connexion with the
late insurrection. Louis Napoleon, the nephew of the Emperor
Napoleon, had been elected, and took his seat in the Assembly,
September 21. In the new constitution, through the influence of
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 543
Lamartine, the choice of the future president was not given to the
Assembly, but to the people, and the members of the families who
had reigned in France were not excluded from election. Thus, by
this unfortunate influence of Lamartine, in this respect the evil genius
of France, the Republic, which his eloquence had saved, was, after
a brief period, destroyed. Had the choice of a president been left
to the Assembly, Cavaignac or Lamartine would have been elected
to the presidency, and the new Republic would have had a better
chance of a fair trial. The new constitution was read for the first
time, October 20, with singular haste, and on December 10 Louis
Napoleon was declared president by 5,500,000 votes, while Cavaignac
obtained only 1,500,000, and Lamartine only 18,000 ! The Chamber
consisted of 750 paid members, chosen for three years ; the President
for four years, who was not eligible for re-election until an interval
of four years had elapsed. The administration of the new President
fairly began when the Assembly, which may be called " constitution,"
was dissolved and superseded by the National Assembly which met
May 28, 1849. Then followed a series of struggles on the part of
the friends of the President and of the parties opposed to him.
Universal suffrage had been limited, May 31, 1850, by which the
majority of persons opposed to the president were secured. Of this
the President complained. The Assembly, by a majority of 446
against 278, was willing to agree to a revision of the constitution,
but this was a merely numerical majority, and not a legal one of
two-thirds of the voters present. Nothing was left but a civil war
or coup-d'etat. The President chose the latter, relying on the
prestige of his name and the unpopularity of the Assembly, and
supported by the army, which regarded his cause as that of order,
seized during the night of December 2, 1851, some 80 to 100 of his
leading opponents in the Assembly. The provinces heard of the
coup-d'etat with indifference. Between December 3 and 4, barricades
had been erected in Paris, but they were easily taken ; the loss of
life was small, though it is asserted that many hundreds of peaceable
persons were wantonly slaughtered on the boulevards by the soldiers.
This is improbable, and no proof has been as yet given of the fact.
The act of the President was accepted by 7,500,000 votes against
650,000 opponents. The President was for ten years. A new
Assembly of 261, with a senate, met, March 29, 1852, and on
December i the crown was offered to the President at the Palace of
St. Cloud, and on December 2 the Emperor Louis Napoleon III.
made his public entry into the capital. To most Englishmen, and
to a small band of high-minded Frenchmen, this act of the President
544 From tlte Peace of Paris 1815, to 1884.
— the coup-d'etat — was regarded as without excuse, as treacherous,
false, and treasonable, a deed which could not be condoned by its
success, or by the general approval of the French people. From
an English point of view this feeling was correct. But fairly to
judge it, we must look back to sixty years past. The original fault
is traceable to the decline of legal government, which commenced
after the dissolution in September, 1791, of the National Assembly of
1 789. The struggles of parties, and the helplessness of the Assembly,
without the support of any military power, then gave the Municipality,
which had the command of an armed force, the real government of
France, and set aside all legally-constituted authority. From that
time, under the Directory, under the first Empire, and after the
Restoration, during the reigns of Louis XVIII., and Charles X., and
Louis Philippe, the government of France, in its popular assemblies,
had never fairly represented the opinions of France. The authority
of the Assemblies, as well as that of the executive, had lost all the
prestige of sacredness which is associated with the rule of fixed,
inviolable, constitutional law. Only one power was recognised, that
of Force. On this Charles X, relied, and was beaten ; so also Louis
Philippe, and was beaten. Force established the Republic, and
upheld it for a while, though no one except the mob believed in it.
The same Force (might overcoming legal right) at the disposal of
Louis Napoleon set aside the Assembly, and by so doing avoided a
civil war for a time ; and Napoleon then, supported by Force,
re-established the second Empire. This act, to him and to his
party, and to the vast majority of French people, was what every
one expected, and seemed to be in the natural order of things.
And so it was in the natural order of things, in periods of revolution
when the old time-honoured rule of legal government has been
swept away. Revolutions, dynastic changes, and republican reaction
may be occasionally necessary, but they imply such a sacrifice of
principles and consistency in public leaders as is destructive of all
confidence in their honesty. The Assembly " had come to be regarded
as a plague, a mischief, and an enemy." Only when it ceased to sit
did France begin to breathe freely. The plain truth is that no
nation, not even the French, can bear to be for ever in hot water.
Ceaseless political agitation is an element in which neither material
prosperity nor moral well-being can live. No one can defend the
conduct of Louis Napoleon, but, in extenuation, he was fighting for
his life, and by his prompt action he saved France from a civil war.
The immediate effect of the revolution of February, 1848, in
Paris, was most disturbing to the peace of all Continental Europe.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 545
In Italy the desire for reform had been practically shown in the
attempts of the Duke of Tuscany and of the population of Lucca
to carry out changes in the administration of affairs. A new Pope,
Pio NONO, elected in 1846, evidently favoured the efforts of the
Liberals, and permitted the formation of a National Guard, while
Charles Albert, King of SARDINIA, annoyed at the seizure of Ferrara,
in the Pope's territory, by the Austrians, threatened resistance.
There was an insurrection at Palermo early in 1848, and a constitu-
tional government established in Naples, in Tuscany, in Sardinia,
and the popedom. The events in Switzerland gave an additional
impetus to the revolution in Italy. The people of Milan drove
out Radetzky, the Austrian general, after a fight of five days
(March 18-23). The VENETIANS rose, March 22, and took Mazzini
as their leader. The King of Sardinia declared war against Austria,
and gained a battle at Goito, but was utterly defeated by Radetzky
at Custozza, July 25. Milan, supported by Garibaldi, held out for
a brief period. King Ferdinand of NAPLES put down the revolution,
May 15, and rescinded the grants of liberties made only four
months before. The new ROMAN REPUBLIC did not work well. On
November 15, Count Rossi was assassinated, and soon after the
Pope escaped from Rome, and sought the protection of the King of
Naples at Gaeta. The Duke of TUSCANY fled, February 7, 1849,
and a republic was established ; but the reaction soon followed.
Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, was defeated at Novara, March 23,
1849, and was succeeded on his abdication by his son, Victor
Emmanuel II. The republic of Rome, under Garibaldi and Mazzini,
was dissolved, and Rome occupied by a French army, sent most
inconsistently by the new French Republic, July 2, 1849. VENICE
yielded to Austria, August 22, 1849. The Grand Duke of TUSCANY
and the Dukes of PARMA and MODENA returned to their old
positions, and the POPE was in Rome, April, 1850, but controlled
as well as supported by a French army, to the great benefit of Rome
itself. Then there was again " order " in Italy. The revolution,
however, was only smothered, the fires yet burned. In the dominions
of the King of SARDINIA preparations were making for reform and
national reorganisation, the benefit of which was seen in 1859
and 1860.
In GERMANY there had been for some time a general and deep
discontent. It is very difficult to exhibit a clear and precise narra-
tive of the revolution and reaction in brief. Perhaps the chrono-
logical order of the years 1848, 1849, 1850, 1851, and 1852 may be
the most lucid arrangement of the course of events. The year
2 N
546 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
1848: (i) there were almost simultaneous risings of the mobs in
VIENNA on March 13 to 15, and in BERLIN March 18 to 20.
There was also a revolt in PRAGUE (Austrian dominions), put down
June 12, 1849, and what was really a serious affair, an insurrection
in Hungary, June, 1848. (2) In the smaller states, BADEN, NASSAU,
and BAVARIA, there were similar disturbances and new consti-
tutions granted ; the King of BAVARIA, Louis, resigned March 21, in
favour of his son Maximilian. (3) At Frankfort, 500 respectable
Germans, belonging to all the different states, met, and on March 2 r
constituted themselves a PROVISIONAL GOVERNMENT, which was at
once recognised by the legal diet of the confederation ; the National
Assembly opened May 18, under Archduke John, of Austria, as the head
of the new provisional central government, and this also was acknow-
ledged by the confederate diet on July 12. The archduke appointed
a ministry of seven ; no opposition had been offered. Here was a
fair opportunity for the explication and redress of practical griev-
ances, but the unpractical character of the Continental liberals
destroyed all chance of benefit. The discussion turned on abstract
principles, and there was no agreement — a mere war of words, to
the great disgust of the people and to the mortification of all
friends of rational constitutional liberty. (4) While the assembly
was sitting German troops had been sent to protect the insurgents in
ScHLESWio-HoLSTEiN, who had risen against the rule of DENMARK,
and a truce had been agreed to by the German commander for
seven months, August 27. This was confirmed by the National
Assembly, September 1 6. A riot was the consequence, which had to
be put down by force on September 18. (5) In PRUSSIA, the result of
the insurrection in Berlin, March 9-18, was the calling of a National
Assembly, which met May 22 ; another on November 9, adjourned
to Brandenburg on the 27th, came to no satisfactory agreement with
the king and was soon dissolved. (6) In AUSTRIA, the insurrection
in Vienna, March 13, 1848, caused the flight of Prince Metternich.
A new Constitution was promulgated March 4, 1849. The Emperor
Ferdinand left for Innsbruck. On July 22 a National Assembly
met in Vienna, and the emperor returned to Vienna, August 1 2, but
had soon to leave for Olmutz. Vienna was in a state of anarchy
without any responsible government until the army rallied and re-took
it, October 30. On December i, Ferdinand abdicated in favour
of Francis Joseph. (7) The HUNGARIAN rebellion was a serious
injury to the power and prestige of Austria. In June, 1848,
Kossuth was the ruling mind in the diet. On September 1 1 the
independence of Hungary was proclaimed, and on September 28
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884, 547
a provisional government was established, but the Slavonians and
Croats took up arms for Austria. The insurgents in Vienna were
assisted by the Hungarians, but, when Vienna had been captured by
Windischgratz in October, the power of Austria, assisted by Russia,
June 17, 1849, prevailed; after various battles bravely fought by the
Hungarians, the resistance ended September 28, Kossuth escaping to
Turkey. In 1849, tne Frankfort parliament continued its sittings.
(i) Gagern tried to exclude Austria from the proposed new con-
federacy, but Austria formally claimed admission. On April 27, the
imperial crown was offered to the King of Prussia, but declined. May
20-30, AUSTRIA, PRUSSIA, and HANOVER withdrew from the Parlia-
ment, which then removed its sittings to Stutgardt, where it was
dispersed by the King of Wiirtemberg, June 18. (2) There were
riots and disturbances, from May 3 to July 23, in SAXONY, BADEN,
and BAVARIA, which were put down by the Prussian troops. (3) In
PRUSSIA, a new parliament was assembled February 26, composed
of two chambers, which closed April 2 7 ; another, which met
August 7, came to an agreement with the king February 6, 1850.
(4) The Constituent Assembly for Prussia met at Berlin, May, 1849,
to form a new confederation without Austria. (5) AUSTRIA, by the
help of Russia (May to August), succeeded in putting down the Hun-
garian revolt. In 1850, April 21, a parliament met at Erfurt, under
the influence of PRUSSIA, and a congress of German princes at Berlin,
May 10. By the advice of Russia, AUSTRIA, with BAVARIA and
WURTEMBERG, revived the old Diet of Frankfort (the old diet of the
Confederation), so that Germany had for a while two diets and two
rival powers. The Frankfort Diet sent help to the Elector of Hesse
against his refractory parliament, November i, but PRUSSIA inter-
fered and took possession of Cassel. Conferences between Prussia
and Austria took place at Olmutz and Dresden, May to December,
and the result was that in 1851 Prussia at last joined the Frankfort
Diet, apparently giving up its ambitious schemes, June 12, 1851.
In 1852, on January i, the Emperor of Austria withdrew the consti-
tution which had been presented, March 4, 1849, so that, with the
exception of a constitution in Prussia and the setting aside of the
constitution in Austria, and the unsettled state of the Duchies of
Schleswig-Holstein, the old order of affairs seemed to be restored.
The affairs of SCHLESWIG and HOLSTEIN exhibited the dishonesty,
duplicity, and greed of both Prussia and Austria, most disheartening
to all who desire to see legal governments established on the founda-
tions of justice and righteousness, so as to command the confidence
of the populations under their rule. Not less painful is the
2 N 2
548 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
conviction of the untrustworthy character of the most solemn
treaties, even when the great powers had solemnly pledged and
guaranteed their observance. The desire for German unity in 1848
was strongly felt, not only in HOLSTEIN, which was purely German,
but also in SCHLESWIG, with its mixed population of Danes and
Germans. Both these duchies were united to the Danish crown,
but HOLSTEIN could only be held by male heirs as a fief of the
German empire. So also Schleswig, by its own law of succession.
The first mistake was made by Christian VIII. of Denmark, who,
influenced by Russia, issued in 1846 letters patent extending the
Danish law of succession by females to the whole of the Danish
possessions, on his death-bed, January 20, 1848. Frederick VII., his
son, succeeded, and as soon as the news of the Revolution of Paris
was received a demand 'arose for the union of Schleswig and
Holstein, and the admission of Schleswig also into the German
Bund. A provisional government for the two duchies was appointed
with the Duke of Augustenburg at its head. Frederick William IV.
of Prussia pledged himself to support the duke. The diet at
Frankfort approved. German troops defeated the Danes and
entered Jutland, May 18, but were recalled by Russian influence.
An armistice at Malmo was concluded, August 26, for seven months.
War broke out again in 1849, April 26, but after the loss of a
battle and two of their best ships the Danes agreed to another
armistice on the basis of the separation of Schleswig and Holstein,
July 10. Peace was concluded between the Danes and the King
of Prussia on the part of the Bund, July 2, 1850, by which the
duchies were left to the Danes, but the rights of the Bund in
Holstein were admitted, though the Danes agreed to take no steps
towards the incorporation of Schleswig. Again, in the Treaty of
London, May 8, 1852, Austria, Prussia, England, France, Russia, and
Sweden guaranteed the integrity of the Danish monarchy, including
Schleswig and Holstein ; all the dominions then united under the
crown of Denmark were to fall to the Duke of Sonderburg-Gliicks-
burg ; the rights of the Bund in Holstein and Lauenberg were reserved,
and the Duke of Augustenburg relinquished for a pecuniary con-
sideration his claim : to this treaty, however, the German states were
no party. Hitherto Schleswig and Holstein had one common
assembly and political constitution ; this was altered, and then again,
November 13, 1855, Frederick VII. framed a new arrangement, by
which all the Danish states were united in one Rigsraad; but this
settlement held only a few years.
ITALY, after the first outbreak in 1848, remained quiet ; Austria,
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 549
the duchies, the Pope, and the King of Naples held their position
in peace. SARDINIA, under Victor Emmanuel, was preparing for
resistance to Austrian rule. AZEGLIO and CAVOUR were his able
ministers, by whom great reforms, civil and ecclesiastical, were
carried out. Though the Jesuits had been expelled in 1848, there
were yet left 23,000 ecclesiastics in this small kingdom. By the
SICCARDI LAW of 1850 all ecclesiastical courts, corporations, and
privileges were set aside, and forbidden to receive or purchase
landed property. In 1854 a bill was passed, empowering the
government to abolish monastic bodies. There was also a free
press, as well a constitutional representative government. By the
advice of Cavour, Sardinia joined England and France in the war
with Russia.
SWITZERLAND. — The League of the Sonderbund by the seven
Catholic cantons, 1846, was declared illegal by the diet, July 29,.
1847, and defeated at Lucerne by Dufour, November 24. In 1848,
the radical party were anxious to help the revolutionists in
Germany. In Belgium the revolution of 1848 in France created
no disturbance.
ENGLAND was slightly affected by the events in France in 1848.
There were Chartist meetings and processions, met by the firm
resistance of the middle classes, April 10, 1848, and a rash attempt
at rebellion in Ireland by a Protestant gentleman, Smith
O'Brien, and others, in 1848 (July 29). The appointment of
Romish bishops to English sees produced violent expressions of
dissatisfaction, and the passing of an act against the use of the titles
in question, August i, 1851. The opening of the International
Exhibition, May i to October i, was a great event, the beginning of a
series of those peaceable rivalries in which the civilised powers
displayed their treasures and resources. It is singular that, amid the
rejoicings of the friends of peace and progress, the news arrived of
the discovery of gold in New South Wales and in Victoria, 1850;
this, following close upon the discoveries of gold in California, was
a cheering fact in connexion with the impulse given to the manu-
facturing and agricultural community, and to the trade of the world.
Between 1848 and 1850, the production of gold had been calculated
at five to six millions annually, but from 1851 to twenty-four millions
at least. It is easy to understand how the industry of producers and
exchangers is stimulated by an increase of the purchase power of the
community to the amount of twenty-four millions annually. The
death of Sir Robert Peel, July 2, 1850, was felt as a national loss,
and that of the Duke of Wellington, September 15, 1852, called
55O From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
forth the respectful feeling of the Government and the people.
Through the alarm created by some foolish speeches in France,
the volunteer movement began and has maintained increasingly its
popularity. In February, 1852, the ministry of Lord John Russell
came to an end. Lord Derby succeeded, with Disraeli as his
Chancellor of the Exchequer, a change which alarmed the friends
of free trade and caused the Free Trade League to revive. In
December, Lord Derby resigned, and Lord Aberdeen formed a
coalition ministry of Whigs and Conservatives of the Peel class,
Gladstone being Chancellor of the Exchequer. As a war minister,
Lord Aberdeen, able and excellent as he was, did not meet the
excited expectations of the nation, so that in 1855 he resigned, and
Lord Palmerston became Prime Minister (Gladstone retiring from
office).
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA had since 1815 increased in
population and in wealth, as well as in the enlargement of their
territory. Louisiana had been sold to them by Napoleon, 1812.
Texas had been wrested from Mexico, 1835, by American settlers,
and was admitted into the Union, 1845. At the conclusion of the
war with Mexico, 1846, 1847, California and New Mexico were
ceded to the United States. Soon after, the gold discoveries in
California gave an impulse to production and trade unequalled even
by the immediate results of the discovery of America in the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries.
The peace of Europe was broken in 1853 by the resistance of
France and England to the natural yearnings of RUSSIA for a
southern extension of its boundaries at the expense of Turkey.
This craving for a southern outlet communicating direct with the
Mediterranean must and will be satisfied, despite the natural jealousy
of England for the safety of India. England may, for a time, check
the advance of Russia by the support of Turkey and Persia, and
perhaps of Afghanistan and other barbarians of Central Asia ; but,
considering the power which England possesses of influencing
peacefully the action of Russia by forwarding and helping its
reasonable aspirations, would it not be well for statesmen to re-
consider and weigh in the balance of humanity our past policy of
suspicion and resistance to Russian advances in Central Asia ? It is
admitted by all the opponents of Russia that the barbarous Turco-
mans and other tribes of Central Asia, together with the Khanates
of Khiva, Bokhara, and Samarcund, exercised the most grinding
oppression on the populations under their control, and were guilty
of continual raids upon their neighbours, murdering with extreme
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 551
cruelty the old and helpless, and carrying the young and the female
population into slavery, while under Russian rule there is peace,
prosperity, and personal freedom. England cannot perform the duty
of reducing these barbarians to order ; Russia is in a position to do
it, and has done it to a large extent. We know that Russia cannot
drive us from India, but it may make India a burden to us ; while,
on the other hand, we may seriously injure Russia by the support of
Turkish tyranny and misgovernment of the provinces bordering
upon Russia, which call upon Russia for help, and which Russia is
compelled by public opinion to help. The Emperor Nicholas
sounded the English Government, and desired a peaceable recognition
of the interests of all parties. Russia was exposed to danger by the
sudden collapse of Turkey, and desired, in connexion with England,
to provide for the coming catastrophe. There is no proof that the
Emperor Nicholas aimed at any unfair advantage. He was neither a
plotter nor a robber ; he proposed that which will surely come to
pass, a division of the so-called Turkish Empire by the European
powers. The proposal might be premature, but there was nothing in
it, or in his attack on Turkey, which necessarily called for the war.
The so-called Crimean War, which cost England fifty millions sterling
and the loss of thousands of its bravest men, and which effected
nothing but a brief delay, was a great mistake. Turkey obtained a
reprieve, but France and England incurred losses which will
effectually prevent a repetition of their sacrifices to again uphold
Turkey. We might have first tried to arrange with Russia measures
for the protection and advancement of the interests of the Christian
races in the Turkish Empire. It is questionable whether the bare
possibility of some distant improvement of the degraded Christian
races in Asiatic Turkey warranted the loss of so many valuable
lives, to say nothing of the wasted millions, the product of English
industry.
The ostensible cause of the war was the guardianship of the holy
places in Jerusalem, and a claim to the protectorate of all Greek
Christians in Turkey, claimed by Russia. To admit the latter
would have implied a right of constant interference in the internal
affairs of Turkey ; but, then, this is and has been the normal
condition of all the alliances of England and France, and of all
the Continental powers, with Turkey, not a year passing without
some such interference on behalf of Catholic, Greek, or Protestant
populations in Turkey. They had interfered in Greece, and in
Syria, in the Roumanian provinces, and in Servia. There was nothing
specially aggressive in the demands of Russia. The real fact, so far
552 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
as England was concerned, was the want of confidence in Russia
and the jealousy for India, while the Emperor of France had to
resent the cold civility of the Czar, and embraced the opportunity
of increasing the friendship of England as well as of gaining military
glory. In June, 1853, the English and French fleets were in Besika
Bay ; on June 26 the Russian troops crossed the Pruth, and on
November 30 the Russian fleet destroyed the Turkish fleet at Sinope.
The Turks declared war against Russia, October 4, the English fleet
entered the Black Sea, December 3, 1853, and on March 27 and 28,
1854, England and France declared war against Russia. Sardinia
in the following year joined England and France. An English
army of 20,000 and a French army of 50,000 landed in the Crimea,
and the battle of Alma was won, September 20. Sebastopol, the
Russian harbour and arsenal, was besieged and bombarded,
October 17. The battles of Balaclava, October 25, and Inkerman,
November 5, proved the bravery of the allied armies ; but the great
storm of November 14, in which there was a great loss of life and
of ships to the value of two millions sterling, was a serious calamity.
The Emperor Nicholas died, March 2, 1855, and was succeeded by
Alexander II. In the month of September the French took the
Malakoff, and the English were repulsed in the Redan after capturing
it — both of them forts of Sebastopol. Sebastopol was no longer
tenable, and was abandoned. On March 30, 1856, peace was made
at Paris at a congress in which Austria and Prussia were parties.
Russia gave up the protectorates, promised to create no arsenal on
the Black Sea, to reduce her fleet to the limits of that of Turkey, &c.
IV. — From the End of the Crimean War, 1856, to the Overthrow of
the Second French Empire in 1871.
THE SEPOY MUTINY. — It was well that ENGLAND was freed from
the burden of the Crimean War before the outbreak of the SEPOY
MUTINY in INDIA in March, 1857. The ostensible cause was the
distribution of greased cartridges, the use of which perilled the
purity of caste in the mind of a Hindu, and was equally offensive
to the Mahometans. The Mogul puppet sovereign at Delhi and the
ex-King of Oude became, in the course of the struggle, more or less
implicated in the rev.olt. The massacres of the Europeans in Delhi
and at Cawnpore in June were followed by swift retribution.
Lucknow was captured by the British forces, September 25, and
Delhi, September 27, and due punishment inflicted on the murderers.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 553
On August 28, India was placed under the direct government of the
crown. A little war with PERSIA, in which an expedition was sent
up the Persian Gulf, November, 1856, to March, 1857, and a war
with CHINA, 1855, in which Canton was taken, December 29, 1857,
and which ended in the Peace of Tientsin, June 26, 1858, are the
mere episodes of the Indian Mutiny. Very soon another war with
China, in which France was allied with England, began in 1860.
Pekin was captured by the allied forces, and the royal palace burnt,
October 12. Peace followed on November 5, 1860.
ITALY FREE. — The Emperor Louis Napoleon had in early life
been identified with the Liberal conspiracies and risings in Italy in
1831. Great things were anticipated from his interference when he
became the ruler of France, and the intervention against the
Republic of Rome, in 1848, was probably undertaken mainly to
anticipate Austria's action. On January 14, 1858, Orsini, one of
the fellow-conspirators with Louis Napoleon in 1831 made an attack
on his life by a murderous machine, in whicn 141 were injured,
and several were killed on the spot. This attempt was a means
of expediting Louis Napoleon's action on behalf of Italy, to which
he had been pressed by Cavour in 1856. The official reception of
the ambassadors, January i, 1859, by Louis Napoleon, excited some
alarm, by his declaration to the Austrian ambassador that " the
relations of that empire with France were not so good as they had
been." Victor Emmanuel, on January 10, stated in the SARDINIAN
parliament, that " he could not be insensible to the cry of pain
which proceeded from so many parts of Italy." On April 23,
AUSTRIA threatened war unless Sardinia disarmed in three days.
Sardinia refused, and Louis Napoleon declared that, if Austria
crossed the Ticino, he should consider it a declaration of war against
France. The Ticino was crossed, April 29, and the war began.
Napoleon hoped to free Italy "from the Alps to the Adriatic."
Tuscany, Parma, and Modena (without their dukes) identified them-
selves with Sardinia. The battles of Magenta, June 4, and Solferino,
June 24, were gained by the French and Italians. Then Napoleon
hesitated. The four quadrilateral fortresses, Verona, Peschiera,
Legnano, and Mantua, required to be besieged, and might hold out
a long time. It was also probable that Prussia might assist Austria.
Napoleon, therefore, made peace at Villafranca with the Emperor
Francis Joseph on July n. This peace was completed by the
Treaty of Zurich, November 10. LOMBARDY was yielded to
SARDINIA, TUSCANY and the DUCHIES refused to receive back their
old rulers, and soon, in 1860, united themselves to Sardinia. The
554 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Confederation of Italy, presided over by the Pope, and, as such,
depending upon France, which was the favourite idea of Louis
Napoleon, could not be carried out. Cavour, regardless of the
difficulties of Louis Napoleon, was disgusted with this treaty, and
resigned his position in the cabinet. FRANCE received NICE and
SAVOY as the reward for her interference which, though its imme-
diate results were disappointing, paved the way for the realisation of
Italian unity. Knowing the discontent imminent in NAPLES and
SICILY, GARIBALDI, the great free-lance of the nineteenth century,
raised 2,000 men in Genoa, May 5, landed in Sicily, which received
him as a liberator, and, passing over to Italy, entered Naples,
September 8. King Francis (who had succeeded Ferdinand in
1859) fled, and Garibaldi had the satisfaction of presenting the
kingdom of Naples and Sicily to Victor Emmanuel. The fortress of
Gaeta was taken by the regular Sardinian troops, the Pope's army
was defeated, and in February, 1861, Victor Emmanuel was KING
OF ALL ITALY (except Venetia and the city of Rome). Cavour
died, June 6, a martyr to labour, anxiety, and the quackery of
Italian physicians. His death was followed by brutal rejoicings,
prompted by the priesthood among the Irish in America and
England.
FRENCH AND ENGLISH INTERFERENCE IN SYRIA. — In 1860 fresh
proofs of the inefficiency of the Turkish government, or, in other
words, additional instances of the uselessness of all attempts to
reform and resuscitate this brutal empire were afforded in the state
of Syria. In May, 1860, the Druses of Mount Lebanon fell
unexpectedly upon the Maronite Christians, and murdered men,
women, and children of all ages. The Turkish troops are charged
with joining in these atrocities. In Damascus, 6,000 Christians were
murdered, and the rest would have been destroyed, except for the
interference of Abd-el-Kader, the former Emir of Algeria. France
occupied Syria until June, 1861. Lord Dufferin, as the English
commissioner, and Fuad Pacha, representing Turkey, punished the
more guilty, the governor was hanged, and peace restored.
RUSSIA AFTER THE WAR. — The emancipation of the serfs, in
1857, was a measure of policy as well as humanity. That it has
been accompanied by social evils and the existence of great disorders
is no proof of its impolicy or failure. We are now learning, both in
the West Indies, in the Southern States of America, and in the case
of Russian serfdom, the difficulty of righting an old-standing wrong.
The Polish insurrection in resistance to the conscription, roughly
carried out in January, 1863, ended, in spite of the remonstrance
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 555
of England, France, and Austria, with the annexation of POLAND to
Russia. Nihilism began, after this, to trouble the empire.
WAR OF THE SECESSION IN THE UNITED STATES. — Jealousy on
the slave question had long threatened the separation of the South.
The election of President Lincoln hastened the outbreak in 1860.
On December 20, South Carolina seceded from the Union. Lincoln
entered on his duties, March 4, 1861. A terrible war succeeded,
remarkable for the large number of combatants in the armies, for
the generals who commanded, and for the loss of life during the
contest. On April 9, 1865, General Lee surrendered Richmond to
the United States. On April 14, Lincoln was assassinated by a
slave-holder fanatic. On May 30, President Johnson proclaimed
an amnesty. The constancy and dogged determination of the
United States in this war, and the moderation and lenity after
their victory called forth the admiration of the civilised world. In
this war the Confederates were decidedly guilty, and upon them
the responsibility of the guilt of bloodshed rests. They had their
full share of representation in Congress, and had power sufficient in
the House of Representatives and Senate to fight constitutionally
for their real and fancied interests, for which they were able to
secure due deference. But they preferred war, and lost all they
contended for. The merciful conduct of the United States Govern-
ment cannot be too highly applauded. Much is it to be regretted
that in England so large a number of the higher and middle classes
sympathised (from ignorance of the true state of the question) with
the Confederates. The people of England, generally, instinctively
took the side of the United States Government. The result was the
abolition of slavery in the United States — the restoration of freedom
to more than four million of negro slaves. While the civil war was
raging, 1862, Mexico was invaded by an English, French, and
Spanish force, seeking the reparation of certain injuries inflicted on
English and French subjects. Reparation being made, the English
and Spanish retired, April 9, 1862. The French remained, and
occupied Mexico, June 5, 1863. The Archduke Maximilian,
brother of the Emperor of Austria, was invited to assume the
government as emperor, and on June 26, 1864, he and the empress
entered Mexico. By the United States Government this proceeding
was regarded with jealousy, and the Emperor of France was compelled
to withdraw his troops in 1866. The result was the fall of the
imperial power and the death of Maximilian, who, with two of his
generals, was shot by order of Juarez, June 19, 1867. The excuse
was a decree of Marshal Bazaine, the French general, which threatened
556 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
death to all Mexicans taken in arms against the emperor. In thus
opposing the establishment of an empire in Mexico by French
armies, the Government of the United States consistently maintained
the principle of the non-admission of any additional European
power on the continent.
GERMANY AND SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN. — On November 15, 1863,
Ferdinand VII., King of DENMARK, died, and Christian IX. suc-
ceeded, according to the protocol of 1852. Austria and Prussia
demanded the abrogation of the new constitution, but the Danish
Rigsraad passed an act for the formation of a new assembly, con-
sisting of deputies from Denmark and Schleswig only, excluding,
however, Holstein and Lauenburg. German troops entered
Holstein, December 23, and invaded Schleswig in February, 1864.
A truce was granted, May 12. England wished France to interfere,
but France declined. Jutland was overrun. Peace was made,
August i, when the Danes ceded Holstein and Schleswig to Austria
and Prussia, who had thrown aside the pretensions of the Duke of
Augustenburg, and claimed them as German territory by the right
of conquest. By the Convention of Gastein, August 14, 1865,
Holstein was to be governed by Austria, and Schleswig by Prussia,
while Lauenburg was purchased by Prussia. The robber powers, for
such they were, quarrelled, and in June, 1866, both duchies were
taken possession of by Prussia. The tedious narrative of this
nefarious transaction is justified by the light thrown upon the
unworthy and disgraceful conduct of both Prussia and Austria.
BISMARCK, the prime minister of Prussia since 1862, a man of iron
will, and untroubled by any scruples as to the moral character of
political transactions, is generally regarded as the responsible party.
DENMARK was, no doubt, partly to blame. This is admitted by
Bryce.1 If Schleswig and Holstein were fiefs of the empire, where
was the difficulty in the way of their being held by the King of
Denmark, who had a claim of 800 years standing, since 1026? It
was a singular conservativism to set aside the old landmarks. Bucca-
neering is not a safe proceeding for an old-established government
in the nineteenth century, nor a wise one, as time will show. Europe
has lost in the spoliation of Denmark a useful and respectable state,
which true policy would have strengthened, as holding the key of
the Baltic. Russia has gained in Europe an advanced position
through Denmark in the west, which may some day be a matter of
importance to the injury of civilisation and progress.
1 " Holy Roman Empire," p. 426.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 557
THE STRUGGLE FOR THE EMPIRE OF GERMANY BETWEEN PRUSSIA
AND AUSTRIA. — The struggle, the final struggle for pre-eminence in
Germany, which had begun in 1740, in the war against Maria
Theresa for Silesia, recommenced. Saxony, Hanover, Hesse Cassel,
Nassau, were at once overrun by the Prussians, then Bohemia, and
at Koniggratz the Austrians were defeated, July 2. This was called
the battle of Sadowa, the Prussians lost 10,000 men, the Austrians
20,000, besides 18,000 prisoners. On August 23 this seven weeks
war ended by the Treaty of Prague. Austria was excluded from
Germany, resigned all her rights in Schleswig-Holstein to Prussia,
and paid forty millions of dollars for the expenses of the war (re-
ceiving half of that sum on account of Schleswig-Holstein). Peace
was also made with the minor states, which made cessions of terri-
tory, and Wiirtemberg and Baden agreed to place their armies at
the disposal of Prussia. Hanover, Hesse Cassel, Nassau, and
Frankfort were annexed to Prussia. All the states to the north of
the Maine agreed to form a NORTH-GERMAN CONFEDERATION UNDER
PRUSSIA. On July 24, 1867, the first representatives of the Con-
federation met at Berlin.
SPAIN had been engaged in a war with Morocco in 1859, and in
1863 joined England and France in an expedition to Mexico for
redress of sundry injuries, which were obtained. The reign of
Isabella II. was characterised by the changes of the premiers, occa-
sioned sometimes by court caprice, and more frequently by military
pronunciamientos. In 1868 General Prim headed a revolution, and
Isabella fled to France. For a brief period Amadeo, of the family
of the King of Sardinia, occupied the throne, 1870, but retired in
1873, as he found his position painfully perplexing. The so-called
republic was then restored.
FRANCE. — In ]86o and 1861 the Chambers began to assume a
greater liberty of speech. An attempt to re-establish an empire
in Mexico, under the Archduke Maximilian, partly succeeded,
1864-1866, but, on the settlement of the Secession War in the
United States, Napoleon was obliged to withdraw his troops from
Mexico, and the new empire came to an end, Maximilian being
barbarously shot (June 19, 1867) by the Mexican Juarez in retalia-
tion for an edict issued by the French General Bazaine directing
every Mexican insurgent to be shot. The views of the emperor had
extended to the increase of French colonies in the east of Asia.
Saigon, in Cambodia, was taken in 1859, and Lower Tonquin was
ceded to France in 1863.
ENGLAND. — The history of the period in England is mainly one
558 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
of internal reforms : (a) Education, a Minister of Education ap
pointed, 1856 ; the Elementary Education Act, 1870, and the
appointments of the Civil Service by competition ; the removal of
religious tests in the Universities, 1871 ; with the reduction of the
excise duty on paper, 1860, 1861. (b) Trade had its checks and crises
in November, 1857, and May, 1866; the cause of free trade lost
its able advocate, Cobden, in 1865, by whom the treaty of commerce
with France in 1860 had been settled; in September, 1866, the Atlantic
telegraph was successfully carried out, the beginning of that quick
communication of thought now extended over the civilised world.
The years from 1868-1870 were not good years for the mercantile
or any classes, (c) Irish reform: The disestablishment of the
English Church in Ireland, 1869. Before this there had been
manifestations of Fenianism in Ireland, and an attempt was made
to release Irish prisoners in Manchester, 1867, and to blow up Clerken-
well prison, in which some Irish were confined. The agitation for
Home Rule increased in 1870. (<f) A new Reform Bill^ extending
the franchise, was passed by the Derby -Disraeli ministry in 1867.
(e) The warrant legalising purchases of commissions was cancelled
by the Queen, so that the old system of promotion by purchase
was set aside by a doubtful use of royal prerogative, 1871. Several
changes of ministry took place. In 1858 Lord Palmerston retired.
Lord Derby with Disraeli succeeded in February; the Jews admitted
to Parliament in July. In 1859, Lord Palmerston with Gladstone
(June) succeeded. After the death of Lord Palmerston, October,
1865, Lord J. Russell, with Gladstone as leader in the Commons.
This ministry resigned in June, 1866, and Lord Derby and Disraeli
took office. One great measure was passed by this administration,
the union of the North American colonies as the Dominion^ 1867.
Lord Derby retired February, 1868, and Disraeli was Premier until
December, when the results of the elections caused him to resign,
and GLADSTONE succeeded, 1868. By the death of the Prince
Consort, December, 1861, the Queen lost her beloved husband, and
the country the services of a man of sound judgment and high
character. Lord Brougham died, May 7, 1868, the last of the great
Liberals who formed the opposition from 1810-1830. The Great
Exhibition of 1862, in London, May to November, exceeded its
predecessor. By the remissness of the government, the Alabama,
privateer, fitted out by friends of the Confederates, was permitted
to sail from Liverpool, and was the cause of great loss to the com-
merce of the United States, for which England became morally
responsible. By the detention of some English in Abyssinia, the
From the Peace of Par is , 1815, to 1884. 559
English Government were obliged to send out an expedition for their
rescue, the king, Theodore, was killed, Magdala was taken, and the
captives released, after which the English forces returned, 1868.
GREECE. — By a revolution, which was the expression of the
national contempt, Otho was deposed, October 24, 1862, and retired
to Germany. Attempts were made to secure an English prince, but
without success. George, son of King Christian of Denmark, and
brother-in-law of the Prince of Wales, was made king, March 3,
1863, and the English Government relinquished the protectorate of
the Ionian Islands to the care of Greece.
The next great revolution in Europe, the SUBVERSION OF THE
FRENCH EMPIRE (the second) UNDER NAPOLEON III., was no doubt
provoked by the increase of power and territory accruing to Prussia
after Sadowa in 1866. Why the Emperor of France did not inter-
fere in 1866 is a mystery not yet fully explained. Whether he was
led by Prussia to expect the extension of France to the Rhine
frontier by the sacrifice of Belgium or not, he certainly expected
some addition of territory in the direction of the Rhine. Singularly,
Spain, which had proved so fatal to the great Napoleon I., was the
ostensible occasion of the war between France and Prussia. In
Spain, after a reign remarkable for civil broils and ministerial
factions, Isabella was dethroned, September 30, 1868. Early in
July, 1870, a petty German prince, Leopold, of Hohenzollern, was
proposed by the Spanish Government, with the permission of King
William, as a candidate for the Spanish throne. This excited great
commotion in France. On July 13, 1870, the French ambassador
demanded that Prussia should give an assurance that the can-
didature of this prince should not be renewed. This was out of
the question, and was obviously intended to produce war. France
declared war on July 19. The emperor relied on Bavaria, Wiir-
temberg, and Baden being willing to take the opportunity of throwing
off the control of Prussia, but was mistaken. Public opinion in
Germany had been purified by the experience of the evils of French
domination under the first French Empire. The war was for pre-
dominance in Germany, whether the Emperor of France or the
King of Prussia with the Confederation. The choice was between
a foreign or a home power. Never had France been so unprepared,
she had scarcely 300,000 troops to oppose a million of Germans.
On August 4, the French were defeated at Weissenberg, on the 6th
at Worth and at Saarbrucken. Marshal Bazaine was shut up in
METZ, with 170,000 men, and the army at SEDAN, under the
emperor, was beaten, September i, and had to surrender on the 2nd,
560 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
and the emperor and 84,000 men, fifty generals, and 5,000 officers
were prisoners to the Germans. After this followed the siege of
Paris, which commenced on September 19; Strasburg capitulated,
September 27 ; Bazaine, at Metz, with 170,000 men, capitulated in
October, with three marshals and 6,000 officers. King William's
head-quarters were fixed at VERSAILLES, October 5, 1870. Then,
while Paris was being besieged, and while brave efforts were being
made by the French provisional governments at Tours and Bordeaux
to resist the invaders, plenipotentiaries from all the southern states
of Germany met at Versailles, October 15, to form a German
Union, comprising the south as well as the north, November 15-25.
On December 4 the King of Bavaria proposed that the President
of the Confederation should be entitled the Emperor of Germany.
So, then, on January 18, 1871, KING WILLIAM was proclaimed at
Versailles EMPEROR. On January 28, Paris surrendered. A treaty
of peace was signed, February 26. France ceded ALSACE (not
Belfort) and LORRAINE, including Metz and Thionville, and agreed
to pay five thousand millions of francs : (the Emperor Napoleon
retired to England to live in privacy until his death, January 8,
1873). The conclusion of this war raised the NEW EMPIRE OF
GERMANY to the front place in Europe. This empire was no re-
production of the nominal empire which had ceased in 1806, and
which presumed to have inherited rights over France and Italy, &c.,
from Charlemagne. It was an empire over confederate states, each
having its own rights intact and each bound to specified duties, an
empire framed to meet the conditions and requirements of the nine-
teenth century. The policy of the treaty in some of its provisions,
which were hard and unjust, is questionable ; it will not be con-
sided as binding on France when France is powerful enough to
revendicate the lost territory. At present the disparity of the military
power and resources of France and Germany make the politicians
doubt the possibility of such an effort on the part of France. They
forget that France is and will be on this point a united will, and by
its compactness able, when ready , to act with united power. Germany
labours under the disadvantage common to all confederations, and
the next generation may not be disposed to make the sacrifices
which a citizen army must endure in war merely to hold Lorraine
and Alsace from France. No one acquainted with the past history
of France and its vast resources can doubt but that France, with a
government which knows how to rule France, and twenty years'
peace, will be a power competent to compel the reconsideration of
the treaty of 1871.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 561
V.—From the Overthrow of the French Empire, 1871-1884.
The events of general interest affecting the peace of Europe
during the thirteen years of this portion of the narrative are few ;
they are (i) the settlement of the German Empire ; (2) the Russian
and Turkish War ; (3) the Egyptian outbreak ; (4) the present
unsettled condition of Egvpt in its relations with Turkey, and the
Eastern Question.
1. The settlement of the German Empire. — The terms of the
peace with France were needlessly severe; the confiscation of 4,700
square miles of territory, including two most important fortified
towns, Metz and Strasburg, with the exaction of two hundred
millions sterling, was an abuse of power which France will never
forget. The first Imperial Parliament consists of (a) a Bundesrath
formed of the representatives of twenty-five governments constitut-
ing the Bund, in all fifty-eight votes ; PRUSSIA, seventeen ; BAVARIA,.
six; SAXONY and WURTEMBERG, four each; BADEN and HESSE,.
three each ; MECKLENBURG-SCHWERIN and BRUNSWICK, two each ;
the rest each one vote, six ; (b) the Reichstag, consisting of 382
members elected by manhood suffrage. The Chancellor of the
Empire is President of the Bundesrath. The population of the
Empire is about 41,000,000, and the area is about 217,770 square
miles. This Imperial Parliament met for the first time, June 15,
1871.
2. The Russian and Turkish War, like all previous wars between
these powers, originated in the uneasiness of all the Christian popu-
lations of Turkey, expressing itself in insurrections more or less
important, for which Turkish officials will always afford a reasonable
ground. The cry against Turkish tyranny which follows the
summary repression of rebellion excites the sympathy of the
millions of their co-religionists in the Russian Empire, and becomes
a power which the autocratic Czar cannot withstand. The revolts
in Bulgaria, and the attempts of Servia and Montenegro to sympa-
thise actively, had called forth the admonitions of the great powers,
and at length a conference was held at Constantinople, December
24, 1876, without any result. Russia declared war, April 24, 1877 ;
the Danube was crossed, June 27. Plevna was invested, but made
an obstinate resistance under Osman Pacha, and was not taken till
December n. The Balkans were crossed and Adrianople occupied
January 20, 1878, while in Asia Kars had been captured, November
8, 1877. Angry negotiations followed between England and Russia
2 O
562 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
with the usual inutility. Turkey, with a Russian army at the walls
of Constantinople, was compelled to sue for peace. After a pre-
liminary truce, the Peace of San Stephano was concluded between
Russia and Turkey, March 3, 1878, The conditions were not
unreasonable, compared with the terms granted to France by
Germany. The independence of MONTENEGRO, and SERVIA, and
ROUMANIA was secured with some additions of territory. A new
state, BULGARIA, extending from the Danube to the ^Egean Sea,
was to have self-government under a Christian prince tributary to
Russia. A Russian army of 50,000 men was to remain in the country
for two years. Russia was to receive part of Armenia and the
Dobrudscha with 300,000,000 of roubles. The Dobrudscha was to
be given to Roumania in exchange for a part of Bessarabia, which
had been taken from Russia in 1856. Meanwhile England (under
Beaconsfield's administration), highly excited and alarmed at the
additional territory taken from the Porte and at the increased
authority over Turkey which Russia would naturally exercise,
endeavoured to interest all Europe to interfere. By way of pre-
caution a secret treaty between England and Turkey was framed by
which Turkey agreed to give up Cyprus to England, and England
engaged to defend Asia Minor against Russia, on the humiliating
terms of paying to Turkey the usual tribute paid by Cyprus to
Turkey. This agreement was accepted by Disraeli, knowing at
the same time the impossibility of England's defending Asia Minor
against Russia, while, in fact, pledging England to a war with Russia
at any time whenever a Turkish pacha might tempt a Russian
general to an aggressive act. By the mediation of Germany, a
congress was held at Berlin, under the presidency of Prince
Bismarck, June 13 to July 13, and the Treaty of Berlin superseded
the Treaty of San Stephano. The territory added to MONTENEGRO,
SERVIA, and ROUMANIA was diminished. The new BULGARIA was
divided ; one portion between the Danube and the Balkans ; the
other portion received the name of EAST ROUMELIA, and was to
receive a Christian governor -general and separate administration,
but to remain tributary to Turkey. AUSTRIA received the military
possession of BOSNIA, HERZEGOVINA, and NOVI-BAZAR. GREECE
had to rely upon the hope that the advice given to Turkey to cede
EPIRUS and THESSALY would be effective. Russia received in Asia
Batoum, Kars, and a considerable territory. All the influence of
England had thus been employed to depress the Christian natio?i-
alities and to inspire Turkey with confidence in the support of
England against Russia. We need not wonder that Russia pays no
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 563
attention to the remonstrances of England against her progress in
Central Asia.
3. Then followed the Egyptian outbreak. It was obvious to all
politicians that the opening of the Suez Canal, October 16, 1869,
greatly increased the importance of Egypt and of its ruler, the
Khedive Ismael, who, from the beginning of his reign in 1863, had
devoted himself to the material advancement of Egypt, reckless of
the expense, which had been met by loans amounting to 80,000,000
sterling. A pressure on the part of the bondholders, supported by
England and France, established a dual control over Egyptian
finances. This was followed by the formal deposition of Ismael
on June 26, 1879. Mahomet Tewfik, his son, succeeded to his
position, but not to his authority. A so-called national party, com-
posed of all nationalities (except the Egyptian fellaheen, the real
nation) was formed. The usual universal remedy, a parliament (an
assembly of notables) was called together. Arabi, an influential
officer, supported by the army, became Prime Minister, and made him-
self a power superior to that of the Khedive and the parliament,
February to May, 1882. The ruffian mob of Alexandria, prompted
by some unknown power, rose in insurrection and murdered all the
Europeans within their power, June n, 12. The English fleet
bombarded Alexandria, July n, and an army was sent from England
under General Wolseley, who, on September 13, defeated Arabi,
and thus England, master of Egypt (and of the Khedive, the
nominal ruler) became responsible for Egypt, as France declined to
assist either by ships or troops. In the difficult task of maintaining
the authority of the Khedive while compelled to act independently,
and while opposed by all the foreign population, bent entirely upon
the maintaining their own interests at the expense of the Egyptian
population, the administration of England has been unsatisfactory.
Hicks Pacha was permitted to invade the Soudan, in order to
re-establish the dominion of Egypt, which had become hateful to the
natives. He and his army were destroyed by the army of the
MAHDT, a Mahometan prophet, whose head-quarters were at El
Obeid, November 3, 1882. All the Arabs, and the natives of Nubia
to the south of Egypt and of the Soudan, supported the Mahdi.
In order to rescue the Egyptian troops in Soudan, General Gordon
volunteered his services, important from his personal character and
influence, and was accepted as the agent and representative of the
English government, 1884. He proceeded to Khartoum, which he
has managed to hold against hordes of opposing Arabs and natives.
The policy of the English Government was almost daily impeached
202
564 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
in the English Parliament, sometimes with reason, but mostly in a
factious spirit, and has been yet more severely and more reasonably
censured by the Continental press. An expedition to Suakin, which
defeated Osman Bey, a supporter of the Mahdi, is to be followed by
an expedition up the Nile in the autumn of 1884. Meanwhile the
finances of Egypt are yet more deeply involved in debt and unable
to meet the interest of the loans advanced by European capitalists.
The proposal of England to reduce the interest upon this debt
made to a conference of the great powers has been rejected by the
influence of France, and the Earl of Northbrook, a member of the
cabinet, has been sent to Egypt as the representative of English
authority, to act as circumstances may seem to require. After making
every allowance for the peculiar and extraordinary difficulties in
which the English ministry were and are yet placed, it must be con-
fessed that these have been aggravated by the indecision and
vacillation of its policy in Egypt, in its anxiety to lessen the sus-
ceptibility of France. 4. Hence the present unsettled condition of
Egypt in its relations with Turkey (the suzerain power) and as
connected with the Eastern Question, in which all Europe is interested.
England is afraid to set aside altogether the claims of Turkey lest
Russia should be encouraged to further aggression. She is willing
to make great sacrifices to ensure the prosperity of Egypt by
regulating its finances and by securing justice to the fellaheen, but
is continually embarrassed by her own delicate consideration of the
claims of the bondholders. There is no European sympathy for
England in this affair. Our French and German allies especially
cannot understand the conscientious scruples of our administrators
which impede the prompt exercise of our power, while they would
probably resent the firm exercise of it as an unwarranted assumption.
The English Executive is thus placed in a trying position, from which
it is difficult to escape with credit ; it has erred on the side of a
prudent and just consideration of the claims of other powers, with
an anxiety to deal justly with all parties, especially with the Egyptian
fellaheen (the peasantry) : this high principle and honesty is not
generally understood. An expedition under Lord Wolseley is now
in Egypt to relieve Khartoum, in which General Gordon is resisting
the rebels successfully.
There are other difficulties looming in the future, arising out of the
action of the FRENCH Government in MADAGASCAR, 1882-1884, now
at war with the Hovas, the only civilised race in that island, partially
christianised by the labours of the missions of the London Society,
followed by those of the Church of England ; and again yet more from
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 565
the determination of the French to form, not merely a factory, but
a colonial empire, in connexion with their old settlement at Saigon
in Cambodia. They have conquered TONQUIN, and the empire
of ANNAM, of which it formed a province, 1882, 1883, and by this
conquest have come in collision with CHINA, — an important fact,
from the danger of the complications which may arise with the
European powers interested in the trade with China.
The Local Histories and General Review.
ENGLAND, 1870-1884. — Under the Gladstone administration
since December, 1868. In 1870, the first Irish Land Act was passed,
providing, for compensation to outgoing tenants, for loans to land-
lords for improvements, and to tenants desirous of purchasing their
farms. The Elementary Education Act was passed, authorising the
establishment and support of public schools by School Boards
elected by the ratepayers, while continuing the government grant
to denominational schools where the conscience clause is carried
out. Voting by ballot, a long-contested question, was settled,
1872, and the Supreme Court of Judicature Act, by which
the Courts of Equity and Common Law are consolidated
and a Supreme Court of Appeal is established was passed in
1873.
In the effort to meet the scruples of the Roman Catholics, the
Irish University Bill was proposed, which, however, was regarded as
unsatisfactory by both Protestants and Catholics, and was lost in 1873
(March). Parliament was dissolved in January, 1874, and, the result
of the elections proving unfavourable to the ministry, Gladstone
resigned, and in February the Disraeli administration commenced,
of which Sir S. Northcote was Chancellor of the Exchequer. The
purchase of the Canal shares belonging to the Khedive, 1875, and
the official proclamation of the queen as Empress of India, 1877,
were followed by the second Afghan War in India, 1878. By the
interference of this administration the Russians were persuaded to
moderate the requisitions of the Treaty of San Stephano, and agree to
the Treaty of Berlin (July 13, 1878). Discontent in Ireland expressed
itself in the Home Rule Association, first commenced in 1870, the object
being to obtain self-government, and the Irish Land League in 1879
(October), the object of which was to destroy landlordism in Ireland
by encouraging the non-payment of rent. The Irish party in the House
of Commons employed every means of obstructing public business
possible by the forms of parliamentary procedure, from 1877 and
566 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, io 1884.
through following years. Regulations amending the rules of the
House have been tried with some small success. Parliament was
dissolved, March, 1880, and, the elections proving unfavourable
to the ministry, Disraeli, who had become Lord Beaconsfield
(1876), resigned, and Gladstone, with Childers as Chancellor of
the Exchequer, succeeded to the direction of public affairs (April,.
1880).
An Irish Coercion Act was passed March 3, 1881, and an Irish Land
Act, August 22, providing a court of commission to settle differences
between landlords and tenants, granting practically free sale, fair
rents, and fixity of tenure. These Land Acts were interferences
with the rights of property, very questionable, and involving diffi-
culties extending to the whole landed property of the United King-
dom, and cannot be justified, but may be excused on the grounds of
necessity arising from the peculiar situation of Ireland, in which
property is, with some justice, regarded as having neglected its
duties, while enforcing with a high hand its rights. In 1882 (May 6)r
Lord F. Cavendish and Mr. Burke, secretaries to the Irish Government,
were barbarously murdered in Phoenix Park (Dublin), just one month
after Mr. Forster, a man of high character, had retired from office,,
dissatisfied with the ministry in refusing to continue the Coercion
Act in Ireland. With him and his views the country at large
sympathised, for, while desiring a liberal direction of Irish affairs, it
was felt that \hejftrst duty of the executive was the protection of
the loyal people of Ireland, comprising the bulk, if not the wholey
of the sober, orderly farmers, traders, and others of the population.
In the discharge of this first duty the Government has not been
sufficiently prompt and earnest. An Irish Government must not
only be just, but firm and vigorous. A new Coercion Act was
enforced, July 14, and fresh stringent rules of procedure in Parlia-
ment to meet the obstructions of the Irish party were adopted,.
November 27. In 1883, the advanced party of the Irish rebels
(in England, Ireland, and America), with whom the Irish party of
Home Rule and the Land League disclaim all connexion, com-
menced a novel mode of action, the most atrocious of all, the
attempt to destroy life and property by dynamite explosions. The
first was in Glasgow, in January ; in King-street, Westminster, in-
March; and at Birmingham, in April; and again in April, 1884, at
Victoria Station and Scotland Yard. The session of 1884 was pro-
ductive of the new Franchise Bill, which added about two millions
of voters for the rural districts. This Bill passed the Commons in
July, but was rejected by the House of Lords. During the entire
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 567
session the Opposition party emulated the obstructive conduct
of the Irish party in continued questionings and censures (to
some extent excusable) respecting the affairs of Egypt and South
Africa.
FRANCE, again a republic after Sedan, had destroyed the Empire
(September 2, 1870). The National Assembly at Bordeaux made
peace with Germany, February 26 and May 10, 1871. By the in-
surrection of the Communists of Paris, followed by the destruction
of life and property between March 28 and May 22, during which
period these anarchists held possession of Paris, it is evident
how narrowly France escaped a renewal on a large scale of the
atrocities of the Reign of Terror in I793-1 TRIERS was chosen
President of the National Assembly, August 31, 1871, but by a
coalition of extreme parties found it necessary to resign, May 24,
1873. Great efforts were made to obtain the restoration of the
monarchy under the Count de Chambord as Henry V., which failed
through the political obstinacy of the Legitimist Bourbons (honest
on this point at least). General MacMahon was appointed President
of the Republic for seven years, November 19, 1873. In February,
1875, tne republican constitution was settled. A Chamber of
Deputies, elected by manhood suffrage, for four years ; a Senate of
300 members, seventy-five of which were to be appointed by the
National Assembly, and afterwards by the Senate for life; 225
elected by the colleges of deputies, and delegates of the communes
for nine years ; a President for seven years, with powers almost
equal to those of a constitutional king. Four years were spent
in opposition on the part of the Liberals against the Legitimist,
Orleanist, and Buonapartist parties ; and also against the partisan-
ship of the President suspected of Ultramontane and Royalist pre-
dilections. A Dufaure ministry in March, 1876, was followed by
Simon's in December, 1876, and by a reactionary ministry, headed
by the Duke de Broglie, May 16, 1877. Thiers died, September 4,
the truest of patriots in his latter days. In the new elections,
October, the large majority was Liberal, but the President,
MacMahon, attempted to appoint a Royalist ministry ; he was, how-
ever, obliged to accept Dufaure. The International Exhibition in
Paris took place, 1878, and in 1879 the President, MacMahon, wisely
resigned, w\& Jules Grevy, the President of the National Assembly,
succeeded as President of the Republic, January 30, 1879, while
1 "Paris under the Commune in 1871," by the Kev. William Gibson,
crown 8vo., 1871.
568 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Gambetta succeeded GreVy as President of the Assembly. The
legislature was removed from Versailles to Paris ; Waddington was
minister, and an amnesty was granted to the Communists ; the
clerical schools were discouraged, and education was completely
secularised by Jules Ferry, the Minister of Education \ Freydnet
succeeded Waddington as minister, December, 1879; the Jesuits
in France were suppressed, March 30, iSSo ; fates Ferry became
minister, September 19, 1880; an expedition, wThich took possession
of Tunis to protect French rights, occasioned many complications
in foreign affairs in 1881 ; on November 13, Gambetta was minister,
and Paul Bert had the charge of public worship, Gambetta having
resigned because defeated on a motion to establish the scrutin de
liste, January 27, 1882; Freydnet succeeded him in the foreign
affairs, January 30, but resigned July 29, when defeated on the
measure required for the protection of the Suez Canal during the
Egyptian rebellion; Du Clerc succeeded him. French claims on
Madagascar, and the French protectorate of Annam (established
1874), led to the bombardment of Tamatave, the port of the
Hovas of Madagascar, and to an invasion of Tonquin, and the
conquest of that country in 1882, 1883. The death of Gambetta,
December 31, 1882, was a shock to all parties, and a loss to France.
Fallieres succeeded Du Clerc, January 29, 1883, and resigned,
February 18; Jules Ferry became minister, February 21. The
war in TONQUIN appeared to be settled by peace with CHINA in
1844, but was renewed in July to August by the treachery of the
Chinese officials. War is now raging on the borders of Tonquin
and on the sea-coast of China, to the great inconvenience of all the
nations trading with China. The aggressions of France upon the
civilised Hovas of Madagascar are painfully noticed by the philan-
thropists of England and the Continent as an attack upon a rising
civilisation from which great results were anticipated.
GERMANY. — The first Imperial Parliament met, June 15, 1871.
The whole business of the government from that time to 1884 has
been confined to domestic legislation and the contest with the Pope
and the Roman Catholic clergy. The Falk Laws were passed 1874
and 1880, but the policy of the court desiring a reconciliation with
Rome led to their modification in 1882 and their repeal in 1883.
Compulsory civil marriage was established, 1874. German com-
merce with West Africa, South Africa, and the Pacific has created
a desire to form German trade factories, or colonies, in West and
South Africa, which is encouraged by the government, and has been
already partially carried out.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, ft? 1884. 569
HOLLAND (the Netherlands] celebrated the Amsterdam National
Exhibition, May i, 1883. By the death of the Prince of Orange
the succession to the crown devolves upon a girl, now four years old,
the daughter of King William III. by his second marriage, January,
1879. Tne Dutch possessions in the East Indies are Java, Celebes,
part of Borneo and of Sumatra, and the west of New Guinea, with
the Moluccas. In the West Indies Curagoa and Surinam, on the
South American coast. A war which began with the Maho-
metan sultan of Achen (Sumatra) is not yet settled. The Dutch
people are apprehensive of interference on the part of Germany
with the freedom and independence of their nationality. To some
German politicians, the addition of Holland with its seaports appears
desirable to complete the consolidation of the empire, and make it a
maritime power of the first order. Causes of offence, and reasons
which may appear to justify the interference and control of Germany
may not be wanting. Judging from the utterly unjust and unprin-
cipled conduct of the German cabinet in the case of Schleswig and
Holstein, the Dutch have no reason to hope that any regard for the
public law of Europe (if such law can be said to exist) will be any
hindrance to their annexation to Germany.
BELGIUM, under King Leopold II., an intelligent and liberal
monarch. The Liberal ministry, under Frere Orban, 1878, has been
succeeded by a reactionary ministry in 1884, which is already inter
fering with the educational system.
AUSTRIAN-HUNGARIAN Empire, under Francis Joseph I. — Both
Austria and Hungary have their respective parliaments and adminis-
trations, yet continuing to act in concert. BOSNIA and HERZE-
GOVINA are occupied by Austrian troops, and may be considered as
Austrian territory.
ITALY. — Rome has been the capital of Italy and the seat of
government since July i, 1871. Opposition to clerical intolerance
and to the political Catholicism which would restore the papal rule
in the old Papal States is the policy of the government. In 1873,
all the monasteries in Rome and the Papal States were, with few
exceptions, dissolved. In 1878 Victor Emmanuel died, and
Humbert succeeded him, January 29. In 1881 a large measure of
electoral reform was carried. The financial condition of the country
is improving, and the paper currency has been replaced by a gold
and silver coinage. In 1882 the earthquake at Ischia destroyed
many lives as well as much property. In 1884 the cholera, which
commenced in the south of France, was yet more destructive in
Italy.
57O From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
SPAIN. — Amadeo having resigned the crown in 1873, a republic
and a civil war followed. By common consent, the son of Isabella,
the dethroned queen, was called to reign as Alphonso XII., January,
1875. Spain is prospering, only requiring a fair share of good
government and peace. Its great colonies are Cuba, with Porto
Rico in the West Indies, the Philippines in the East Indies, and the
Canary Islands.
PORTUGAL under Dom Louis I., who began to reign, November i r,
1 86 1. The colonial possessions are Macao in China, part of Timor
in the East Indies, Goa in India, Madeira, the Cape Verde Islands,
the Azores, and Bissagos on the north-west coast of Africa, with
St. Thomas and Princes Islands in the Gulf of Guiana. It claims
Congo, Loango, Angola, and a vast territory on the west and east
coast, with the corresponding interior, but these claims are not ad-
mitted (except in part) by the great powers.
RUSSIA. — The war between Turkey and Russia has already been
narrated, 1877, 1878. The Nihilist conspiracy extended itself far
and wide, so that three attempts were made on the life of the
emperor in ten months in 1880, and at last successfully, March 13,
1 88 1, when Alexander II. was killed. Alexander III. succeeded.
SERVIA, through Russian influence, became a kingdom, March 6,
1 88 1 ; population under 2,000,000. So also ROUMANIA, population
5,500,000. MONTENEGRO, with about 250,000 population, received
Dulcigno and other accessions of territory, November, 1880, through
the help of Russia. Russia is in Asia rapidly nearing the frontiers
of Afghanistan. Sooner or later Asiatic Russia and Asiatic England
will meet. To fix a natural boundary line, and to come to a mutual
understanding, should be the object of the two rival powers. To
avoid collision is the interest of both governments.
GREECE, with a population of nearly 2,000,000 in 1879, has since
received the additional territory of Thessaly and part of Epirus,
through the influence of the Congress of Berlin, 1878. These were
reluctantly yielded by the Turks.
TURKEY, by the Peace of Berlin in 1878, though more favourably
treated than by the Treaty of San Stephano, lost considerable
territory, (i) The principality of BULGARIA, population 2,000,000;
(2) EASTERN ROUMELIA, population about 800,000, besides the
provinces of BOSNIA and HERZEGOVINA, now placed under the
occupation of Russia. ALBANIA is governed by its wild, warlike
tribes and their chieftans, though nominally it acknowledges the
Turkish Sultan. ABDUL Aziz was deposed, May 29, 1876. His
successor, MURAD V., was incapable, and was followed by ABDUL.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 571
HAMID II., the present Sultan, August, 1876. The impossibility of
maintaining this fictitious power, at the cost of the misery of the
millions of its Christian and Mahometan populations, must soon
force the great powers to come to some decision. The Turk,
as a ruler ; is hated by his Mahometan subjects as well as by the
Christian.
DENMARK, reduced by the robbery of Holstein and Schleswig,
remains a respectable state, the king allied by the marriage of one
daughter to the Emperor of Russia, and by another to the Prince of
Wales, the future king of England.
NORWAY and SWEDEN under a king of the Bernadotte family,
Oscar II. Both in Denmark and in Sweden there are differences
between the executive and the parliaments (the Rigsraad and
Storthing), which, if continued, may lead to a serious disturbance of
the peace and prosperity of these countries.
PERSIA remains helpless and subordinate to Russia. Under an
active and able government Persia would have been able to control
the Turcomans, and other barbarous hordes, from ravaging its
territory, and might have exercised a restraining influence over the
Khanates of Khiva, Bokhara, and Samarcand. From the helpless-
ness of Persia, and from the desolation and misery caused by the
Turcomans and by the tyranny of the Khans of Khiva and Bokhara,
Russia has been compelled (not unwillingly) to extend its authority
west and south of the Caspian to the frontiers of Afghanistan, to the
great benefit of humanity and of civilisation, though to the great
annoyance of the British Indian Government.
INDIA, since the Sepoy War, has been placed under the immediate
government of the crown, 1858, and the queen has been proclaimed
"Empress of India" since January i, 1877. A terrible famine
(1877, 1878) was, as far as possible, relieved by an outlay of eleven
millions sterling in aid of the sufferers. The relations of the Indian
Government with Afghanistan were disturbed by the Ameer, Sheer
Ali, who engaged in intrigues with Russian officials. A Russian
mission was received with honour, but a British envoy was refused
admittance, 1878. British armies advanced, and Shere Ali fled
and died. Yakub Khan, his son, concluded the Treaty of Gandamak
(May, 1879), a British resident, Cavagnari, was admitted to reside
in Kabul, but in September, 1879, he and his suite were treacherously
massacred. A second war followed. Yakub Khan abdicated, and
was sent to India. Kabul and Kandahar were occupied, and an
insurrection of the Afghan tribes repressed, 1879, 1880. Abdurrah-
man Khan, the representative of the House of Dost Mahomet, was
572 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
appointed Ameer, and seems disposed to defend his independence
by the help afforded by the Indian Government.
CHINA, during the wars with England and France, had been
engaged in a civil war with the Taeping rebels, which, commenced
in 1850, gradually increased in importance up to 1863, when Colonel
Gordon, in the service of China, at the head of "the ever-victorious
army," undertook to subdue it. This he effected by June, 1864.
China, under the nominal government of a child, in the hands of an
empress, is really ruled by the Prime Minister at the head of the
Council. A child, Tungchi (six years old), reigned from 1860-1875.
Then another child, Kwangsi (three years old). A Mahometan
rebellion in Yunnan and Kansi, 1870, was suppressed, 1873.
Kashgar (Chinese Turkistan), which had rebelled under Yakub
Beg, 1866, was reconquered, 1877. Kuldja, a fertile province, was
annexed by Russia (as a temporary guardian), 1871; was restored to
China in 1881. The abolition of the absurd ceremony of prostra-
tion before the emperor (the kotow) by the ambassadors of foreign
powers, 1873, and the opening of the first railway in China (Shanghai),,
though only eleven miles, 1876, are indications of coming changes
in the policy of the empire. A war with Japan was avoided in 1882
by mutual concessions. The progress of the French from their
colony in Cochin China towards the conquest of Annam and of
Tonquin^ which commenced by the capture of Hanoi by the French
in 1873, has greatly annoyed the Chinese Government. In 1882,
the King of Annam submitted to France, and Tonquin was conquered
in 1883, and a treaty with China in 1884, which was unfortunately
broken by the treachery of a Chinese commander, and war is now
raging between France and China.
JAPAN abolished its exclusive systems of non-intervention through
the bold conduct of the American, Captain Perry, March 31, 1854,
after which treaties were formed with all the great powers, and
diplomatic intercourse opened with Europe and America. This
new state of affairs was followed by a resumption, on the part of the
Mikado of the authority so long exercised by the Shogun (Tykoon),
January 3, 1868. The residence of the Mikado was removed from
Kioto to Jeddo. Feudalism was abolished, the revenues from land
received by the Daimios (princes) exchanged for pensions, tele-
graphs, railways, schools, and all the appliances of European
civilisation introduced, 1871. Korea was compelled to enter into a
treaty in 1876, and the rebellion of Satsuma suppressed in 1877.
Local elective assemblies for arranging local taxation were estab-
lished in 1878, and a new constitution given in 1882.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 573
KOREA, a peninsula dependent upon China, had from time imme-
morial maintained the exclusion of all foreigners, and of all
intercourse with them. In 1876 the Japanese compelled the
Koreans to make a treaty with them, and other treaties were made
with the United States, Germany, and England, and four ports
selected for foreign trade.
The Imaum of Muscat (or Oman) in Arabia is a petty Mahometan
State.
EGYPT, under the Khedive Tewfik, occupied by the English
army since the deposition of Arabi, September 13, 1882. General
Gordon at Khartoum for some months past, the agent to the English
Government, held his position. The Mahdi's ally, Osman, in East
Soudan, was defeated and kept in check; an English army, under
Wolseley, sent to Egypt to relieve Khartoum, August, 1884.
ABYSSINIA. — An embassy sent to induce the king, Johannes II.
(Kassa), to co-operate against the Mahdi.
SOUDAN, independent of Egypt and under the Mahdi, the new
prophet.
TUNIS under the French resident since 1881.
ALGIERS under France.
MOROCCO under its Xeriffe, in danger of French or Spanish
control.
SOUTH AFRICA possesses now four European governments; (i)
that of the Cape of Good Hope and Natal; (2) the Orange River
Free State, a Dutch and English population; (3) the Transvaal
Republic (Dutch Boers) ; (4) a new Republic in a portion of the
Zulu territory ; the political relations very unsettled through the
vacillating policy of the English Government under every adminis-
tration from 1829 A.D., the result of which must be either the aban-
donment of English rule in the Cape Colony, or its extension and
maintenance over the whole of South Africa.
SOUTH-WESTERN AFRICA ON THE CONGO. — Through the explor-
ations of Livingstone and Stanley, a large territory, washed by the
affluents of the river Zain (Congo), has been laid open to trade.
Stanley, and De Brazza, the French agent, have made centres of
action for their respective parties. An " International Association"
has been formed, under the patronage of the King of Belgium, to
secure the mutual independency and neutrality of this region.
Portugal has extensive claims and rights, which, however, have not
been practically used since the sixteenth century.
LIBERIA is a Negro republic, with 500 miles of sea-coast, formed
by free blacks from the United States ; population of natives and
5/4 From the Peace of Par is t 1815, to 1884.
settlers, one million and a half; founded in 1822. Independent
since 1849.
ZANZIBAR is a small island exercising some influence over East
Africa, under an Arab Sultan.
MADAGASCAR.— A large portion under the HOVAS, partly civilised
and christianised by the missions of the London Society, 1818-
1825. The French engaged in war with them, claiming a protecto-
rate over the north-west coast, 1881 (Sakalava Territory); the
Madagascar ambassadors were treated with discourtesy in France,
and Tamatave was bombarded and captured by the French, June
1883.
In the PACIFIC OCEAN there are French colonies in Tahiti and
New Caledonia, and the English colony in Fiji ; with two petty king-
doms, that of the Hawaiian Islands, population 76,000 ; and that
of TONGA (the Friendly Islands), under King George, the Christian
king. Bordering on the continent of Asia are the PHILIPPINE
ISLANDS, subject to Spain, population about three millions.
The Australasian Colonies^ NEW SOUTH WALES, VICTORIA, SOUTH
AUSTRALIA, WESTERN AUSTRALIA, TASMANIA, QUEENSLAND, and
NEW ZEALAND have greatly increased in population, in wealth, and
in their commerce since the discovery of gold, first in New South
Wales, and then in Victoria in 1851. The amount of gold raised in
the colonies of New South Wales, and Victoria and New Zealand,
up to the end of 1883, is 283 millions. They have a population
of three millions. Two points of importance are now under con-
sideration, the annexation of the eastern portion of New Guinea and
protection from the surreptitious entrance of French convicts from
New Caledonia. There is also a discussion respecting the future
FEDERATION of these colonies.
In the INDIAN OCEAN, the Island of Sarawak and a portion of the
large Island of Borneo are occupied by English settlements.
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA under the Presidency of Grant,
Hayes, Garfield, and Arthur, have greatly prospered. By the census
of 1880 the population had exceeded 50,000,000; their territory had
been increased by the purchase of Alaska, in North-West America,
from Russia, in 1867. President Garfield was assassinated by a
madman soon after his accession to the Presidency, July 2, and
died September 19.
THE DOMINION OF CANADA includes all the British Colonies in
North America except Newfoundland, which chose to be separate
in its administration. The population is about four millions and
a half. NOVA SCOTIA, CAPE BRETON, NEW BRUNSWICK, PRINCE
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 575
EDWARD'S ISLAND, and MANITOBA (Red River Settlement), BRITISH
COLOMBIA, and VANCOUVER'S ISLAND, are all included in the Domi-
nion. The new Pacific Railway will soon connect New Westminster
and Victoria on the Pacific, with Halifax on the Atlantic Ocean.
MEXICO. — Spanish Republic, population 9,650,000, with the five
Republican States SAN SALVADOR, GUATEMALA, HONDURAS, NICA-
RAGUA and COSTA RICA; population 2,600,000.
THE WEST INDIA ISLANDS. — SPAIN holds CUBA, population
700,000 ; PUERTA Rico, population 400,000 ; ENGLAND, Jamaica,
population 580,000; Trinidad, 153,000; the Leeward Islands, popu-
lation 118,000; the Windward Islands, 285,000. The Island of
HAYTI (Hispaniola or St. Domingo) has now two republics — one
Spanish, the DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, population 300,000 ; the other
French, HAYTI, population 550,000.
The Old Republic of Columbia 1819, forms now two republics:
Venezuela, population, 2,075,000; and Columbia, population
3,100,000. The Old Peru, 1821, now forms three republics :
Bolivia (Upper Peru), population 2,525,000; Ecuador, population
1,100,003; and Peru, population 3,175,000. All the American-
Spanish republics have deteriorated since their separation from
Spain, but they are now beginning to settle with governments which
are more stable and settled. The war between Peru and Chili has
been a serious injury to both republics, and it is not yet fully con-
cluded. The ARGENTINE CONFEDERACY (Buenos Ayres), population
2,450,000; PARAGUAY, 1814, population 293,000; URUGUAY, 1828
(Banda Oriental), population 450,000; CHILI, population 2,234,000 ;
BRAZIL (Empire of), population 10,200,000. An English Colony
(DEMERARA) ; a French (CAYENNE) ; and a Dutch (SURINAM),
occupy GUIANA.
THE CONCLUSION. — Here ends the narrative of the history
of the past. The future, who can divine? Public opinion
fears rather than hopes. The three great emperors are meeting —
the men who control Germany, Austria, and Russia. . A sagacious
and thoughtful Journal sees the position of public affairs clearly,
but not hopefully : — " We are told this matter will secure peace.
We suppose it will secure peace of a sort. With the three Emperors
pledged not to fight while the Emperor William lives, — and that is,
and must be, the limit of any personal pledge, — France cannot
attack Germany, and Austria has no invasion to fear from Russia.
That is satisfactory, so far as it goes ; but, considering the vast age
of the Emperor of Germany, it goes but a little way, and will have
none of that effect of reassurance for which industrial interests are
5/6 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
longing, and which would allow Eastern Europe to complete its
railways and organise its commerce in peace. It is but a truce, and
a truce for which a price must be paid. An agreement among the
Emperors on policy in the Balkan Peninsula must mean, as the
Economist recently observed, either that Russia and Austria have
agreed on a dividing line, or that they have resolved for a certain
period to maintain the status quo, and either agreement means
throughout the Balkans a policy of repression. The Princes must
keep down all independent agitation by force. The States must
make no effort at federation, or alliances, or the development in any
way of their instinctive national life. The anarchy tempered by
murder which reigns in Albania must continue unchecked, the
efforts of the two Bulgarias for unity must be put down, and
Macedonia must remain in its existing condition, probably worse
than any condition ever endured by a civilised State, — a condition
which even in Turkey would not be possible, but that the ruling
Turks know that Macedonia is lost to Islam. If all prosperity
perishes in Macedonia, and the people are driven by despair to
brigandage, Greece or Austria will be the ultimate loser, and not
Turkey. No anarchy so frightful has, we believe, ever been seen in
Europe, for in no other country have an Asiatic garrison and an
Asiatic police ever been the sources of the anarchy, and have been
at the same time aware that for them there could be no future.
Yet all this is all to go on for an indefinite time, and with no hope
of redress, because the Imperial Powers wish to avoid any occa-
sion of quarrel, or desire, when the opportunity offers, to divide
Macedonia between them. Peace is good, but in a peace like
this we see little reason for congratulation. The States of the
Balkan are not enabled to go their own way, the peoples have no more
hope of freedom, the wretchedness of the provinces still Turkish, is
rather intensified than relieved. There is order ; but, to secure it,
from the Danube to the Morea, the burden is pressed down upon all
men a little more heavily. If, indeed, the Emperors agreed to let
the Peninsula alone, and not stir a soldier whatever happened,
there would be reason for congratulation ; but there is no prospect
whatever of any such arrangement. The Imperial Courts are not
prepared to give up anything, whether in possession or in prospect,
and at most only postpone their contest till circumstances are a little
more favourable for the signal.
" But, peace being arranged, the military burden may be reduced,
and that is a benefit for the world ? Certainly, if it were so ; but
where is the evidence of such reduction? The burden now
From the Peace of Paris ', 1815, to 1884. 577
-weighing on Europe, from the Elbe to the Volga, the devotion
of a tenth of all active life to military drill, is not diminished
because frontiers are left less strictly guarded, and Poland is less
like a cavalry exercise-ground. Conscripts are as unhappy in one
barrack as another, and the number of conscripts will not be
lessened. With a true peace, both Germany and Austria would, we
believe, disarm in part, if only to reduce financial pressure : but
Russia, in her present situation, cannot spare a soldier, and France
will not ; and peace, therefore, is only a period of preparation, with
none of the blessings of peace and none of the chances of war.
There will still be a million of men under arms between the English
Channel and the Volga, still a taxation for armaments equal to a
seventh of all human labour within those regions, still an organisa-
tion of society on the principle that everything must be sacrificed to
safety. It is, we suppose, all inevitable ; but it is all depressing, and
the depression will be in no degree relieved by the meeting of the
three emperors, even if they have no enterprise on foot, and sincerely
desire 'peace.'" — Spectator^ September 13, 1884.
ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY FROM 1815-1884. — Church of England.
— Up to the great political crisis which culminated in the Reform
Bill of 1832, the two parties in the Established Church, the HIGH
CHURCH and the Low (the EVANGELICALS), remained as before,
differing in their modes of action, but without collision. The
Evangelical clergy had by their activity and zeal increased in number
until they amounted to about one-third or one-fourth of the clergy.
Under the faithful and zealous ministrations 01 such men as
Romaine, Toplady, the brothers Sir Richard and Rowland Hill,
Grimshaw, John Newton, Thomas Scott, the Milners, Hervey,
together with the younger generation, as Stillingfleet, Dykes, Carus
Wilson, Simeon of Cambridge, and Wilson of Islington (after-
wards Bishop of Calcutta), this section seemed likely to become
the largest and most influential in the National Church, but with
the later brilliant representatives of the Evangelical party, Hugh
Stowell and the Deans of Ripon (McNeile) and Carlisle (Close),
who well sustained its reputation for pulpit eloquence, the school
appears to have come nearly to an end. One great mistake common
to them and to the Evangelical Nonconformists went far to neutralise
the effects of their zealous pulpit ministrations. This was their un-
readiness to recognise the educational influences gradually changing
the thought of the age in which they were living. Scientific dis-
coveries, the profound scholarship which had modified the old
Biblical criticism, and the general widening of the intellectual
2 P
57$ From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
horizon of the age had begun to alter the relations of the pulpit and
the pew. Hearers no longer received the dicta of the preacher with
submission, but rather questioned and doubted. There was nothing
in these new and enlarged conceptions of the hearers irreconcilable
with the old time-honoured truths ; but there was needed, for the
reconcilement of the new era with the old, a more thorough and com-
prehensive criticism, and a more thoroughly Christian (rather than
Calvinistic) theology in the pulpit. Unfortunately the clergy of all
denominations at first placed themselves generally in antagonism to
the increasing intelligence of the age, which appeared to them to savour
too much of the scepticism of the preceding century, and by this
lessened their influence upon the rising generation. The churches
exhibited the melancholy spectacle of an educated ministry, well
versed in classics, mathematics, and all other literary accomplish-
ments of the day, understanding, in fact, everything, except that which
was especially needed, the true character of the times in which they
lived. They have since rectified this mistake, and, while recognising
the truths of science and criticism, have found them to be efficient
helps rather than hindrances to their spiritual ministry.
The dangerous position of the Established Church in 1830-1832;
its general unpopularity, arising out of an exaggerated notion of the
opposition of the clergy to the political changes rendered necessary
by the advanced notions of the great majority ; together with the
increase in the numbers and political influence of the Nonconformist
party, led a body of serious and thoughtful Churchmen to consider
the position of the Church, its danger, and the possible remedies.
Since the year 1827, the publication of the Christian Year had
produced a great effect upon Churchmen, reviving in them the
appreciation of the old Church doctrines, substantially Evangelical,
but jealously guarded by the Prayer-book and the rubrics. This
little book is regarded as the " fons et origo " of the Tractarian
party. "But the year 1833 was the time, and Oriel common room
was the scene, of the birth of the Oxford revival. It found a voice
on July 1 4, • 1833, in Keble's famous assize sermon at St. Mary's, on
National Apostasy." " I have always," says Newman in his Apologia,
considered and kept that day as the start of the religious movement of
1833." 1 In that month a meeting of some members of the university
took place at the residence of H. J. Rose, with the view of devis-
ing some remedy against the dangers which threatened the very
existence of the Church of England. "It appeared to them that
the action of Parliament " (the repeal of the Test and Corporation
1 Here's " Eighteen Centuries of the Church of England," pp. 553, 554.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 579
Acts, 1828; the Emancipation Act, 1829, and the suppression of two
archbishoprics and eight bishoprics in Ireland, and a threatened
attack upon the Book of Common Prayer), " arose from a mistaken
idea of the character and constitution of the Church, of its legal
independence from the State, and the divine commission and
authority of its clergy, and they agreed that the first step was to
revive a practical recognition of the truths set forth in the preface
to the Ordinal." The first fruits of that meeting were " The Tracts
for the Times." l These Tracts advocated the Apostolical succession
of the clergy of the Church of England, received through the channel
of Rome direct from the Apostles, which constituted them their true
successors, and, together with the Romish clergy, the only legitimate
Christian ministry. All other ministers, of the Nonconformists, Pres-
byterians in England and Ireland, and of the Established Churches
of Scotland and the Continent were simply laymen, having no
rightful authority to administer the sacraments, and all other Churches
except those of Rome and of England were merely SECTS, outside of
the genuine Church, and left to the " uncovenanted mercies " of its
great Head. Their views of the sacraments in these Tracts approxi-
mated closely to those held by the Church of Rome, in opposition
to which the old founders of the English Church died at the stake.
The clergy who adhered to these views were known as the Tractarians,
and were remarkable for their Ritualistic tendencies in the increase
of ceremonials, lighted candles, obsolete vestments, and in some cases
by the use of incense and processions, as in the Romish Church.
The ministers thus sought to be Priests, sacrificing priests, in the
administration of the Lord's Supper, and the tendency towards
Rome was evident. With all this there was much that was good.
They held fast to the doctrine of the Atonement, though its
efficacy was by some confined to the ministrations of the PRIEST.
They were also remarkably consistent in their lives, unremitting in
their labours, especially in extra services and in pastoral visitation.
In fact, the movement was a reaction against the past lukewarmness
of the clericals, the indifference of the laity, and the general careless
irreverence and neglect of order which had crept into the public wor-
ship of all churches, both in the Establishment and among the
Nonconformists. The Tracts were abruptly terminated after the publi-
cation of No. 90, written by J. H. Newman to prove that the Thirty-
nine Articles do not condemn anything Catholic, but only the " later
definite system" in the Church of Rome. The condemnation of
this Tract by the Bishop of Oxford, and the more formal resolution
1 Here's " Eighteen Centuries of the Church of England," pp. 551, 552, and 554.
2 P 2
580 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
of the Vice-Chancellor, Heads of Houses, and Proctors of the
University of Oxford followed March 14, 1841. Newman, Ward,
Faber, Oakley, and others seceded to the Church of Rome in 1845.
The BROAD CHURCH party (the name first used in the Edinburgh
Review, July, 1850) may trace their lineage to the Cambridge
Platonists of the seventeenth century and to the latitudinarian
bishops of the age of William III. and the early Georges — as Tillot-
son, Tenison, Buraet, Hoadly, and others. It is not fair to say that
the Broad Churchism was purely political Churchmanship, and that
" this Neo-Christianity of the nineteenth century was liberal to all
but the Church." l One proof of their true Churchmanship is seen
in their evident distaste for nonconformity in every shape, and their
incapability of comprehending from their liberal standpoint the
sacredness of the scruples which keep so many excellent, able, and
intelligent men from the communion of the Church of England. As a
party they sympathise to a large extent with the " Higher Criticism "
of Germany, and to some extent with the latitudinarianism of the
liberal clergy and others, set forth in Tulloch's " Rational Theology
and Christian Philosophers in England in the Seventeenth Century;"
holding, however, rather too lightly the old creeds and confessions, and
apt to regard the Thirty-nine Articles of their own Church as merely
Articles of peace, the fence against Dissenters and little more. Every
shade of opinion is found in their ranks, from the late Dean Stanley,
whose loving spirit hated controversy, and who, as Dr. Pusey
remarked, " gave up every doctrine as soon as he found there were
objections to it," and the late Baden Powell, and Professor Jowett,
happily yet living, who both have realised in their attenuated theology
the minimum of faith absolutely necessary to a formal union with
the English Church, and yet including men of deep religious fer-
vour and undoubted orthodoxy, some of whom we may venture to
name : — Archbishop WHATELY, the HARES, Bishops HAMPDEN and
THIRLWALL, Dr. ARNOLD (Rugby), Archbishop TAIT, and others,
men distinguished and influential in their several positions, and
identified with this school of thought. There is nothing in this
division of opinion and variety of action in the Church of England
which ought to surprise those who have studied its beginning as a
Reformed Church, and its development since the days of Henry VIII.
It was the result of a compromise which has characterised its entire
career. In throwing off the yoke of Rome, its leaders had no inten-
tion to separate from the Catholic Church of Western Europe, but
to remain a National Church, purified from unseemly and useless
1 Hore, p. 599.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 581
accretions, but yet in communion with the Universal Church (so
considered) of Rome. Hence, with reason, the High Church claim for
their orders the benefit (as it seems to them) of the Apostolic succes-
sion through the Church of Rome (a clear stream, uncorrupted, as
they think, by the impurity of so many centuries); logically regarding
•the dissident communities as mere SECTS, a term which is equally
applicable (on these grounds) to the National Church of Scotland
and Northern Germany. The EVANGELICAL party, on the contrary,
would rather regard their Church as the conserver of the great pro-
test against Romish errors made by small and scattered evangelical
congregations in the middle ages. Their attachment to the hierarchy
and orders of the Established Church is founded on the great
truths set forth in the liturgies and homilies, which they regard as
the true claim of the Church to their adherence. The RITUALISTS
have also a reasonable claim to toleration. The Rubrics, which
legally express the views of the Church of the Reformation, but
which had fallen into partial disuse, are their warrant. Whether it be
wise to disturb the peace of the Church by a zeal in things admitted
to be non-essential is another question. The BROAD CHURCH, care-
less respecting Articles, Homilies, or Rubrics, claims the privilege of
setting forth Christianity on an enlightened and philosophical basis,
adapted to the more clear and thorough perception of Christian
truth in all its depth and comprehensiveness, possessed by the
scholars and divines of the nineteenth century. As St. Paul faced
the prejudiced Hebrew and the sceptical Greek, meeting each on his
own ground, being in a sense all things to all men, so they would
deal with the abstruse and sceptical philosophy of Germany, with its
one-sided criticism, and with the exclusive claims of physical science
to be the only Truth. This is their platform, held and defended
with great ability.
The appointment of Dr. Hampden, in 1836, to the office of Regius
Professor of Divinity, Oxford, by the Liberal Ministry, stoutly
opposed, by the Tractarians especially, on the ground of heterodoxy
in his Bampton Lectures, on Scholastic Philosophy considered in its
relation to Christian Theology, 1833, called forth a powerful defence
by Dr. THOMAS ARNOLD (the Head-Master of Rugby School) in an
article in the Edinburgh Review (April, 1836), entitled by the editor
" The Oxford Malignants," which created a powerful sensation. The
appointment of Dr. Hampden to the bishopric of Hereford, in
1847, called forth renewed demonstrations by the High Church and
Tractarian party, which were treated with contempt by the Liberal
Ministry. The same opposition was made against the appointment
582 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
of Dr. Lee to the bishopric of Manchester, and was equally in-
effectual, "conclusively showing how completely the Church was
subjugated by the state."1 In one case, however, there was no inter-
ference with the exercise of Church discipline in defence of the
received doctrine of future retribution. The Rev. F. D. MAURICE, the
Professor of Divinity in King's College, London, had in his Theological
Essays expressed doubts with regard to the doctrine of the eternity
of future punishments, 1853. For these opinions he was removed
from his professorship, but was still a clergyman and occupied a
high position as an author and a divine. The personal character of
this good man has given an importance to his teachings, whatever
may be our opinion as to their merits. Pure, noble, and unselfish,
approaching as nearly as possible the ideal of a perfect man, his
power of fascination was remarkable. The grave men of our day,
who in their youth had come within the charmed circle of his friends,
have not yet lost the indescribable impression of his power. What
he taught is difficult to gather, beyond his view of Christ as the root
of humanity ; a truth in itself, whether Maurice's explication of it be
true or otherwise. In all his writings, and in the full exhibition of
his views in the Life recently published by his son, the reader revels
in the contact of thoughts noble and beautiful, opinions orthodox and
undeniable, sympathies enlarged and comprehensive, tender and lov-
ing; but, after all, finds it impossible to define his theological stand-
point. The late Canon Mozley remarks, " His strength is that of
vehemence rather than accuracy .... too generally almost as ob-
scure as he is emphatic." Mr. GLADSTONE complains of "his intel-
lectual constitution " as being a " good deal of an enigma " to him
always. If, however, his theology does not leave the impression of
that logical, clear-headed power which generally characterises the
deliverances of the Broad Church leaders, there is in all his writings
that which was evidently the secret of his influence and popularity,
an earnestness and fervour which commended itself to their devout
sympathies. Maurice's theology was critically examined by Dr.
J. H. Rigg, in a volume entitled " Modern Anglican Theology "
(1857), 2 a work which, while doing full justice to the ability
and character of the author, lays open the serious defects
of his theology and that of Archdeacon HARE and of CHARLES
KINGSLEY; all of them personally estimable, and occupying in-
tellectually a high position, and all of them influenced by the philo-
1 W. N. Molesworth, " History of the Church of England," 1882.
2 "Modern Anglican Theology," crown 8vo., 1857, 1880, by Dr. James H. Rigg.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 583
sophy of Coleridge. This work was received with a hearty welcome
by orthodox divines of the Church of England, as well as by the
Presbyterians and Nonconformists; for in it the weak points and
tendencies of the Broad Church Theology of thirty years ago are
faithfully, and in a kindly spirit, described ; the great fear is intimated
that, along with the enlarged and noble catholicity which distinguishes
the great leaders of that school of thought, there is some danger of
keeping in the background the grand doctrine of the Propitiatory
Atonement. With pleasure we admit that this defect is rarely
prominent in the Broad Church Theology of our day, though some
instances have called forth the note of warning from a journal of high
repute and of kindred sympathies : — " Evangelism, however feeble
in the Church, remains a vast force in the religious life of England,
dominating as it does almost entirely the Nonconformist bodies.
The more it decays within the Establishment, the more formidable
will it be found as a hostile force without." 1
The increase of latitudinarian opinions, especially in regard to
Biblical criticism and interpretation, was manifest in the publication
of a volume entitled Essays and Reviews, in 1860, by six clergy-
men and one layman. There was nothing new advanced in this volume
which had not been already taught by Baden Powell, by the late
Dean Stanley, by Professor Jowett in his "Pauline Epistles," and
others. " But what principally attracted attention to this book, and
drew forth the warm eulogium of some, and the indignant denuncia-
tions of others, was the fact that these Essays were the productions of
distinguished members of the National Church — of men holding
high positions in the University of Oxford and in our great public
schools — of men, in short, who might be regarded as placed by their
position at the head of the religious education of the country." 2 No
injury to the orthodoxy of the Churches followed, and in a short
time the voluminous controversial works connected with the Essays,
and the Essays themselves, gave place to a yet more remarkable dis-
play of latitudinarianism in the highest ranks of the Church. The
publication by Dr. Colenso, Bishop of Natal, in 1862, of a series of
treatises, entitled " The Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua critically
^examined" excited more than ordinary attention as the work of a
sceptical bishop, not, indeed, the first of the class, but the first who
had the honesty to avow his position, and to specify the points
wherein his orthodoxy differed from that ordinarily accepted by his
1 The Spectator, July 19, 1884, p. 597.
W. N. Molesworth, "History of the Church of England," 1882.
584 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Church. This work embodied the results, as far as it was possible
to gather them, of the varying, contradictory, and paradoxical criti-
cisms of Germany, with the advantage of Dr. Colenso's plain English
style, and with additions of his own, which were of minor impor-
tance : there was also much that was really valuable to the critic. About
three hundred publications, small and great, of diverse merit appeared
as replies ; and some remain as valuable additions to the critical
library of our divines. The conclusion at which the dispassionate
learned have now arrived is, that the Rationalistic critics were
justified in their assertions of the existence of passages in the Penta-
teuch implying an age much later than the time of Moses ; but that
these passages can be traced to interpolations from notes originally
inserted in the margin by successive redactors (for instance, Ezra),
or from the errors of copyists, to which all old writings are subject ;
and that all external, as well as internal, evidence bears testimony to
the substantial genuineness and authenticity of this, the Sacred Law
of the Jewish Church. The interest created by this controversy
led to the compilation of the Speaker's Commentary on the Bible ;
so called because it originated with Denison, the Speaker of the
House of Commons ; a work which to some extent has redeemed
the character of the British criticism of the ninteenth century.
Outwardly the Church of England prospered. Convocation was per-
mitted to assemble in 1 854, for the first time since 1717, and its powers
were gradually enlarged. Bishops of high respectability and men-
tal power graced the more important sees : — among them BLOMFIELD,
WHATELY, WILBERFORCE, MAGEE, BROWNE, TEMPLE, ELLICOTT,
WORDSWORTH, ERASER, LIGHTFOOT, with such archbishops as TAIT
and THOMSON. First beginning with services in the naves of the
cathedrals in 1853, public appeals to the masses by bishops and
other dignitaries of the Church became frequent, thus manifesting
a growing sense of the claims of the community at large upon what
claimed to be the National Church. The extension of the episcopate
in the colonies and in the missions has been of great benefit to the
Church in the colonies.
Certain legal provision was made for the settlement of disputes
respecting the ritual and the discipline of the Church by the Privy
Council, then to a committee of that Council, and afterwards to a
Supreme Court of Appeal, 1873, and to the Appellate Jurisdiction
Act, 1876. Church-rates were abolished, to the general satisfaction
and to the great increase of the popularity of the Church. In 1871
the Irish Church was disestablished and partially disendowed, but
remained in a position highly favourable to its continued existence
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 585
and extension. In 1878 the clergy of the English Church numbered
about 23,000, proofs in themselves of the awakening energy of the
Establishment.
The NONCONFORMIST CHURCHES have largely increased, and in.
1851 it was estimated that one half of the population of England
and Wales were Nonconformists. Calculations of this sort are not
very reliable, but probably this estimate is not far from the truth.
All the CONGREGATIONAL CHURCHES, the BAPTISTS, the PRESBY-
TERIANS, and the WESLEYAN METHODISTS, with the New Connexion
and the Primitive Methodists, have also largely increased in the
number of the churches erected, in their Church members, and in
the number of attendants upon public worship. The power to raise
money for religious purposes, whether for the home or the foreign
work, has astonished the outside public. It is reckoned by millions
when the foreign missions are included. Never was there a larger
number of men of acknowledged ability in these Churches, whose
labours are as beneficial to the country at large as to their particular
Churches. It would be invidious to mention the names of men,
happily yet spared to labour for the Church and the world. The
UNITARIAN SOCIETIES are much more advanced than the Priestleys,
the Belshams, the Prices, and the Reeces of the last century. The
peculiarities of Christianity, as taught by Paul and the Apostles
generally, are by degrees less visible in the writings of their divines.
James Martineau, well known by his able writings on philosophy
and ethics, is the representative of the new Unitarianism.
By the formation of the Congregational Union, 1830, which meets
annually, choosing some distinguished member as president, the
Independents consolidated their largely-increasing ministry, and
facilitated their united action. In addition, the literary and theo-
logical character of their ministry became more generally known
through the establishment of the Congregational Lectures, 1832, by
which a series of discourses, preached by eminent members, were
published year by year ; the topics discussed with great ability by
such men as Vaughan, Joseph Gilbert, R. Wardlaw, R. Vaughan,
J. Pye Smith, E. R. Conder, T. Binney, Samuel Martin, Newman
Hall, and others, gave the English public a more correct impression
of the literary and theological ability of Dissent.
The Baptists also established a Union (1863). So also the
Unitarians. The Baptists have been much benefited by the
amazing and continued popularity of the Rev. Charles H. Spurgeon,
who, for nearly thirty years, has by his pulpit labours, by his-
writings, and by his college, done great service to Christianity.
586 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
The Wesley an Methodists increased largely between 1815 and 1884,
in spite of sundry disruptions. In 1878 the constitution of the
governing body (the Conference) was wisely modified by the admis-
sion of the lay element into its deliberations. The theological
academies which the Congregationalists had possessed from the very
beginning of their Churches, were not established by the Wesleyan
Conference until 1834. A Fernley Lecture, after the model of the
Congregational Lectures, was established, and the lectures by Dr.
Osborne, Dr. W. B. Pope, William Arthur, Olver, Geden, E. E.
Jenkins, and others, 1870-1884, fairly represent the theology of the
Connexion. In another respect also the Wesleyan body has kept
pace with the educational requirements of the age, in the establish-
ment of four theological institutes and eight high schools or colleges.
These establishments have long existed among the Congrega-
tionalists and Baptists, the Congregationalists having fifteen colleges
and the Baptists ten, besides important schools, to the great benefit
of the Nonconformist community. All the Nonconformist Churches
have their home and foreign missionary agencies, as well as agencies
directed to the spread of Protestantism on the Continent, and to
the preservation, consolidation, and extension of religion in the
colonies. These institutions, with the many societies in the
Church of England and in the Churches of Scotland, together
with the British and Foreign Bible Society in its multifarious
kindred associations, interest England in promoting the spiritual
welfare of the whole world. The SOCIETY OF FRIENDS (Quakers),
while declining in numbers, is as much as ever devoted to labours
philanthropical in England and the world at large. Mrs. ELIZA-
BETH FRY, 1780-1845, was especially distinguished by her labours
among the prisoners in Newgate, London.
The Reform Bill, for a time, widened the differences between the
Church of England and the Nonconformists, more especially the
Congregational Independents and the Baptists, the Wesleyans being
at that time either indifferent or rather inclining towards the Church
of England, though there were some exceptions. In the great
unpopularity into which the Church had fallen, men looked for its
disestablishment and disendowment. The Congregational Inde-
pendents and Baptists established the LIBERATION SOCIETY in 1844,
which has since continued to support every means calculated to
spread opinions of the non-Christian and impolitic continuance of
the union of Christian Churches with the State. In this controversy
much personal feeling exists, arising out of frequent conflict between
.the claims of the vicar, rector, or curates of country parishes with
From the Peace of Pan's, 1815, to 1884. 587
the Independent or Baptist pastor of the locality. There can
scarcely be any cordiality between the man who claims not merely
the prestige arising from his position as the legal clergyman, recog-
nised as such by all classes, but who also, on the ground of his
"Apostolic succession," regards himself as the~ONLY true minister of
Christ. That this foolish notion, for which there exists no shadow
of proof, and which in its implied principle of transmission by
consecration, is utterly alien to the purely spiritual character of
Christianity, should be held even by educated, and, in other
respects, sensible men, .is a proof of the power of the prejudices
which cling to a caste. It implies the transformation of the presbyter
into the priest. No men have more vigorously opposed, and more
contemptuously scouted this notion than a large number of the
more highly educated of the clergy. Witness Archbishop
WHATELY, Dean STANLEY, and Dr. ARNOLD. The one doctrine
which Dr. Arnold regarded as "morally powerless" and "intel-
lectually indefensible " was " the importance of the Apostolical suc-
cession of the clergy, and the consequent exclusive claims of the
Church of England to be regarded as the only true Church in
England, if not in the world."1 And again: "The lawfulness or
expedience of episcopacy I am very far from doubting, not its
necessity ; a doctrine in ordinary times gratuitous, and at the same time
harmless — save as a folly" 2 But it is no longer harmless if it tempts
the clergyman to an arrogancy which rouses in his Nonconformist
neighbour any latent feeling of dislike and opposition to himself and
to his Church. In practically carrying out a notion which has no
existence in the Articles or Homilies of the English Church, a
Romish priest, who conforms and takes a Protestant position, can be
at once permitted to officiate without any renewal of ordination by
a Protestant bishop, while a Nonconformist minister who conforms
must submit to be re-ordained, first as deacon, then, in due time, as
priest. Wherever the clergy stand up for this claim, there can be no
cordiality between them and their Nonconformist brethren. An-
tagonistically, the extreme views of some Nonconformists, who
regard national establishments as national sins, and the views of
those who regard episcopacy as synonymous with popery, are
equally offensive to good taste and kindly feeling. Sensible men
regard these matters from the standpoints of utility and expediency,
with a willingness to agree to differ, while maintaining Christian
union.
1 " Life of Dr. Arnold," vol. i. p. 4. 2 Idem, vol. i. p. 327.
588 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
EDUCATION (national) has been one of the leading questions of
the day during the last generation. Besides the national schools
and those of the British and Foreign School Society, grants for
general educational purposes were made by Parliament for the first
time in 1833 to the amount of .£30,000, gradually increasing in
l859 to £836,000. Then grants were made to denominational
schools, on the principle of payment for results. By the establish-
ment of educational boards of a representative character, education
of an undenominational character is being extensively spread (1870) ;
the aim is the education of the whole of the rising generation in
England. In the HIGHER EDUCATION, the establishment of the
London University in 1829, and the modification of its plan by the
affiliation of University College and King's College, together with
the establishment of the University of Durham (1831), and of Vic-
toria University (Manchester), were steps in the right direction for
England, followed by the establishment of local colleges in the
larger towns. In IRELAND, the four Queen's Colleges and the new
Catholic University of Dublin (1880), are attempts to satisfy the
desire for united general education on the one hand, and of pacify-
ing the more rigid Catholics on the other. In compliance with the
general desire for religious equality, the Universities of Oxford and
Cambridge have been opened to Nonconformists of every class;
and in 1871 the fellowships and tutorships of these Universities were
no longer confined to clerics or members of the Church of England.
There is nothing to prevent men in profession and principle atheists
or agnostics, opposed to revealed religion, holding the position of
influential teachers in our national Universities. Those who value
the Christian principles of their young men will find it necessary
to know the character of the leading minds of the several colleges
before they arrange for the residence of their sons.
THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH OF SCOTLAND for many years had
been troubled by contests respecting the rights of the patrons to
appoint to vacant livings; these were frequently opposed by the
congregations, and very unseemly quarrels and even riots sometimes
occurred. The great disruption of the Church, for which the dis-
cussions had prepared the minds of the people, took place May 18,
1843, when 500 clergy, giving up their livings and their homes,
headed by the great Dr. Chalmers, quitted the General Assembly
and commenced the FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND, which now
comprehends a large portion of the church-going population of
Scotland. THE OLD EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF SCOTLAND, free from
all Jacobinical tendencies, maintains a respectable position as the
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 589
Church of a select class ; but the Queen of England is in Scotland
accustomed to sit under a Presbyterian ministry. A new sect, the
Holy Apostolic Church, chiefly found in England, is strangely con-
nected with the Presbyterian Church through a singularly eloquent
minister, EDWARD IRVING, a colleague of Dr. Chalmers, who, in
1822-1831, was stationed in the Caledonian-road, and afterwards in
Regent-square, London. For some time his extraordinary eloquence
attracted large congregations and many distinguished hearers. He
was led to believe in the revival of the gift of tongues, and was one
of the members of the prophetical students at the seat of Henry
Drummond, at Albury, 1826-1829. Accused of heretical views, he
was deposed by the Presbytery, 1831, and died at Glasgow, 1834.
In his congregation the new sect originated, and yet maintains its
position.
In the United States of America and in the English colonies in
America and Australasia, all the various Christian communions exist
totally disconnected with the State, managing their own affairs, and
prospering greatly. One great scandal to the Christianity of the
nineteenth century has arisen in the United States, the establish-
ment of a professedly religious society, founded on a revelation of
the Book of MORMON to one JOSEPH SMITH, about 1830. A
Church was founded. A Church government was established with
a hierarchy of Elder and Apostles, with a supreme head in the
person of Joseph Smith. Driven from Missouri in 1833 and 1838,
the Mormons took refuge in Illinois, and built there a large temple,
1841-1844. In an attack upon the society by the people, the
temple was destroyed and Joseph Smith killed, 1844. BRIGHAM
YOUNG succeeded to his leadership, and, when driven from Illinois
in 1846, he led the Mormons to Salt Lake, and there founded the
city of Utah, 1847, 1848. Polygamy is the peculiar institution
which justly offends the moral sense of all who look with horror
on this retrograde step in modern civilisation — a step directly opposed
to the plain teachings of our Lord. The MORMONS are almost
entirely composed of emigrants from Great Britain and the continent
of Europe, stimulated to leave their respective countries by
missionaries sent from Utah. Two great facts are revealed to
Christendom by the success of MORMONISM. One is the ignorance
of large numbers of the lower classes, and the absence of right
moral feeling, implying the depraved social state in which so many
are living in the midst of our boasted civilisation ; the other fact is
the necessity of connecting with Christian teaching the practical
brotherhood of all Christians, the right conception of which, with its
590 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
duties and responsibilities, is the true Christian socialism. The
attraction to the thousands who flock to Utah is not the teaching of
the missionary, but the practical carrying out of social principles
which profess to ensure to all the means of a comfortable subsistence.
THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. — By the peace of 1815, the
Pope (Pius VII.) was restored to the possession of Rome and the
States of the Church. The usual misgovernment and discontent
(chronic under papal rule) followed. Under the political revolutions
of Italy, Rome was kept quiet by Austrian power. The election of
Mastai Ferretti as £io Nono (Pius IX.) introduced,^ a brief period,
the reign of a reforming, liberal, constitutional Pope, 1846. The
disorders of 1848 compelled the Pope to take safety in flight. On
his return in 1850, under the protection of the French army, his
views and policy were altered. By the support of a French garrison,
and under the control of the Jesuits, he governed absolutely (in
the person of Cardinal Antonelli). THREE extraordinary events
distinguish the remaining years of Pio Nono's pontificate. T\\z first
was the formal declaration of the immaculate conception of the Virgin
Mary, 1854, December 8, proclaimed in the presence of two hundred
bishops. Thus " a clashing bye-belief was lifted from the humble
posture of pious opinion to that of a dogma binding on all, who
must admit changes in their creed with every change of Rome.
.... A new and mighty advance in the power of the papacy was
achieved, for a formal addition to the creed was made without the
sanction of a general council. Those bishops who attended mani-
festly acted, not as members of a co-ordinate branch of the legislature,
but as councillors of an autocrat. The absent were placed under
the necessity of accepting the/^/V accompli, or of attempting to undo
it in the face of the pontiff, the curia, and the majority of the
prelates." In addition, " an impression of the personal inspiration
of Pius IX. was conveyed with embellishments, so as to prepare the
way for the recognition of his infallibility."1 ("The Pope, the
King, and the People : a History of the Movement to make the
Pope Governor of the World by a Universal Reconstruction of
Society, from the Issue of the Syllabus to the Close of the Vatican
Council." This is the title of a work of laborious research by the
well-known Rev. William Arthur, a work which will be the authority
appealed to by the future historian of the nineteenth century.) The
SECOND event was the publication, at the same time, of the
1 "The Pope, the King, and the People," by William Arthur, 2 vols. Svo.,
1877.
From tlie Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 591
ENCYCLICAL (Quanta Curd], in which the ruinous condition of
political society, of which the bases were shaken by evil principles,
is stated as the occasion which called forth the accompanying
SYLLABUS in which (with many real and admitted evils) all that is
valuable and characteristic of the present civilisation in Europe is
condemned. The literature, the constitutionalism, the toleration, the
liberty of the nineteenth century are to be thrown back three
hundred years. The remedy is pointed out. " The recognition of
a common father (the Pope), who shall teach subjects to obey as
sons and sovereigns to rule as fathers, a supreme judge, to declare and
give sanction to the rights of the one and the other." This is another
instance of the anachronism of action and rule -by which, for a
thousand years past, the Popes have anticipated the millennium.
The THIRD event was the calling of the CECUMENICAL COUNCIL, which
met at Rome, December 8, 1869, and which dispersed, October 20,
1870, soon after the temporal power of the Popes had ceased by the
occupation of the city by the troops of the King of Italy. In this
Council, July 13, by the votes of 513 prelates opposed by 88, the
Pope was declared infallible ! How this declaration is understood
by educated Catholics we cannot tell ; possibly they regard it as
simply ruling the decisions of the Pontiff, to be, in all cases of
dispute, decisive. Pius IX. died in 1878, and was succeeded by
LEO XIII. Though more moderate than his predecessor, he
still maintains the fiction of his captivity and bondage by the
Italian Government, and remains within the precincts of the Vatican,
receiving ambassadors from foreign powers, though legally a subject
of the King of Italy. It is obvious that, while the Catholicism of
Europe had been raised from the dust in FRANCE by Napoleon, and
cherished under the Bourbons of both branches, as well as by the
Empire, the new Republic of 1870 has made war upon it, especially
in its educational action. Singularly the Republican regime, while
supporting, from the funds of the State, a Romish hierarchy and
priesthood, and while protecting the missions of French ecclesiastics
in foreign lands, treats the ministers of the Roman Catholic Church
as conspirators against the State. The fact that 7,000,000 out of
35,000,000 of the population of France have declared themselves
non-Christian testifies to the growth of a fearful apostasy in France.
In GERMANY, both in PRUSSIA and AUSTRIA, as well as in ITALY
and FRANCE, legislation aims at the reduction of the clerical power.
Marriage is, in these countries, a mere civil contract, and education
is being freed from the interference of the clergy. In POLAND,
Roman Catholicism has been at times persecuted by the Russian
592 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Government, while in the Spanish and Portuguese populations in
MEXICO, GUATEMALA, and in all SOUTH AMERICA, the power of the
clergy has been greatly reduced. There can be no doubt but that
these checks upon the clerical order, accompanied by large disso-
lutions of monasteries and convents, have been, on the whole,
beneficial, especially in confining the clergy to their spiritual
teaching, which, however it may fall short of the pure Christianity
of the New Testament, contains truths which even the errors of
the Romish Church cannot entirely neutralise. " The old Catholic
Church," which professes to hold fast ancient Apostolical Christianity,
has for its leader Dollinger of Munich, but it consists of a very
limited number of professors. In IRELAND the endowment of
Maynooth College, perpetuated and secured by an Act of Parliament,
makes provision for the education of the Romish priesthood, and is
exclusively under the management of the Romish episcopacy. In
SPAIN, since 1815, the property of the Church has been sold by the
Government, and professedly vested in the funds. The result is the
general poverty of the clergy.
The GREEK CHURCH is predominant in Russia and in Greece.
In Turkey it is fairly treated, through the influence of Russia and
the great powers. So also with the various branches of Armenians,
Maronites, and Syrian Christians in the Turkish empire.
Literary History.
ENGLISH LITERATURE from 1815 to 1884. — A classification of
topics with a list of some of the leading authors is all we can give.
To do justice to this subject would require the addition of hundreds
of names, which the limits of this work forbid.
SCIENCE in General. — Duke of Argyll, Noel Arnott, Sir D. Brew-
ster (kaleidoscope), C. Babbage, 1792-1871; E. Chadwick, Dallinger,
T. H. Huxley, Sir J. Leslie, 1766-1832; Dion. Lardner (encyclopaedia),
R. Owen (palaeontologist), Baden Powell, 1796-1860; Abraham
Rees (encyclopaedist), 1743-1825; Sedgwick, Mary Somerville, 1780-
1872; Professor Tyndall, William Whewell, 1794-1866; A. R.
Wallace, 1822; Wedgwood, Sir W. Thompson, Clerke Maxwell
(mathematics), Graham Bell (telephone), Matthew Clifford, Dr.
Joule, Tait, W. Spottiswoode. Chemistry: W. J. Brande, John
Dalton (atomic theory), M. Faraday, 1793-1867 ; Leslie, Andrew
Ure, Nicholson, 'Carlisle, Crookes, Sir H. G. Roscoe, Johnstone,
J. Young. Mathematics, Geometry: Bonnycastle, De Morgan, 1806-
1871 ; Olynthus Gregory, Hutton, Henry Smith, J. Todhunter,
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 593
J. B. Young, W. Hipsley, Barnard Smith, G. Boole, S. Parkinson.
Astronomy: Sir George Biddell Airy, J. C. Adams (the planet
Neptune), Sir John Herschel, 1792-1871; Carrington, Hodgson,
Piazzi Smyth, J. Challis, J. R. Hind, J. N. Lockyer, J. P.
Nichol, 1804-1859; R. A. Proctor, Huggins, Miller. Geology:
Buckland, 1784-1856; J. W. Dawson (Canada), J. D. Forbes,
1809-1868; A. Geikie, J. Geikie, Hutton, Sir Charles Lyell, 1797-
1875 ; Hugh Miller, 1802-1856; Sir R. I. Murchison, 1792-1871 ;
John Phillips. Electricity, Magnetism: Sir William Snow Harris,
Edward Sabine (meteorology), Plant, Varley, J. Munro, J. Jamieson.
Optics: C. Wheatstone (telegraph), 1802-1875; Thomas Young,
Wollaston, Sir J. Leslie, Cook, Fox-Talbot, Thomas Wedgwood,
Abney, Graham Bell (telephone), Professor Stokes. Natural
History : Sir James Banks, 1763-1826; Charles DARWIN (develop-
ment theory), 1816-1878; Gould (ornithology), Kitchen Parker
(embryology), F. Balfour (morphology), 1850-1882 ; Sir W. Hooker
and Roget, Loudon, Robert Browne, Baron Miiller (Australia),
Sowerby (botany) ; Jardine, Sir J. Lubbock ; E. B. Tylor, Sir C. W.
Thomson, Andrew Prichard, Charles Waterton, 1782-1865. Phy-
siology : Beal, Carpenter, J. Hinton. Anatomy and Medicine : John
Abernethy, 1765-1831 ; Brodie, Cooper, Sir Charles Bell, J. M.
Gully, Bond, Sir J. Alderson. Ethnology: Brace, Latham, Max
Miiller, J. C. Prichard, 1785-1848. Palaeontology: Monsieur B.
de Perthes, Professor Owen.
PHILOLOGY in General : Garnett, Home Tooke (Diversions of
Purley), Harris (Hermes), Max Miiller, Isaac Taylor, jun. (the
alphabet). Classical: Valpy, Blomfield, W. J. Donaldson, Gaisford,
George Long. Sanscrit: J. Muir, H. H. Wilson, Sir C. Wilkins.
Indian Langttages : Carey, Caldwell, Crawford, Marsden, E. B.
Eastwick, Gogerly, Hoole. Chinese: Robert Morrison, J. Legge,
Edkins, Marshman, Williams. Hebrew: Lee, Pusey, Dr. Yeung,
Grinfield, Jarrett, Driver. Anglo-Saxon : J. Bosworth, J. M. Kemble,
Skeat, Morris, Earle. Scotch: Dr. Jamieson, Pinkerton. Egyptology
and Assyriology : Bird, Hicks, G. Smith, Sayce, E. W. Lane, R. G.
Poole, Todd, Chalmers, Ogilvie, Richardson, Rawlinson, Sharp.
POLITICAL ECONOMY : Babbage, Cobden, Fawcett, Goschen,
Jevons, W. Jones, Sir James Mackintosh, James Mill, John S. Mill,
Mayhew, J. R. McCulloch, Miss Martineau, Lord Overstone, M. T.
Sadler, 1780-1835; N. W. Senior, 1790-1864; Tooke, Henry Price;
D. Ricardo, Charles Perronet Thompson (Catechism of the Corn
Laws), C. P. Villiers, T. E. C. Leslie, Newmarch, E. W. Norman.
STATESMEN AND POLITICIANS : William Cobbett, George Canning,
2 Q
594 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Duke of Wellington, Sir Robert Peel, Daniel O'Connell, Richard
Cobden, John Bright, Earl Grey, Lord John Russell, Lord Mel-
bourne, Lord Palmerston, Earl of Aberdeen, W. E. Gladstone, Earl
of Derby, Benjamin Disraeli (Earl of Beaconsfield), Sir G. Cornewall
Lewis, Lord Clarendon, Lord Granville, Marquis of Salisbury.
FINE ARTS : J. Ruskin, P. G. Hamerton, J. C. Robinson, Professor
Colvin. Painting : J. M. W. Turner, G. Morland, F. Calvert, W.
Blake, D. Wilkie, Sir E. Landseer, B. R. Haydon, J. Martin, W.
Hilton, Sir T. Lawrence, S. P. Jackson, T. Girtin, J. Varley, P. De
Wint, Samuel Prout, David Roberts, Clarkson Stanfield, T. M.
Richardson, W. Muller, Copley Fielding, J. E. Millais, Sir F.
Leighton, Edwin Long, Alma Tadema, V. Prinsep, Albert Moore,
G. A. Storey, W. L. Leitch, W. Hunt, E. Duncan, T. S. Cooper, F.
Goodall, S. Palmer, H. B. Willis, W. Holman Hunt, A. Elmore, J.
Sant, W. P. Frith, G. Cattermole, J. Glover, P. R. Morris, E. W.
Cooke, E. M. Ward, Miss E. Thompson, F. W. Topham, F. Stothard,
J. Constable, G. Lance, J. Holland, F. Tayler, F. Walker, Luke
Fildes, A. Vickers, Sir J. Gilbert, R. Ansdell, T. Creswick, G.
Chambers, E. K. Johnson, J. Linnell, J. Phillip, E. J. Niemann,
J. C. Hook, T. Webster, H. S. Marks, Birket Foster, V. Cole, Briton
Riviere, H. Herkomer, P. Graham, F. M. Brown, J. B. Burgess,
Burne Jones, George Cruikshank, Richard Doyle, John Leech, J.
Tenniel, G. Du Maurier, Charles Keene, Linley Sambourne — to
which a large number of names of excellent artists might be added did
space permit. Engraving : T. Bewick, Heath, Finden, T. Landseer,
G. T. Doo, T. O. Barlow, S. Cousins, C. G. Lewis, F. Stacpoole, R. J.
Lane, Lumb Stocks, R. Graves, J. W. Wilmore, W. H. Simmons.
Architecture : Sir John Soane, W. Wilkins, J. Nash, Sir J. Wyatt-
ville, Sir Charles Barry, C. R. Cockerell, Sydney Smirke, Sir
Robert Smirke, T. L. Donaldson, P. Hardwicke, J. Fergusson, G. E.
Street, A. Pugin, E. M. Barry, Sir G. G. Scott, A. Waterhouse,
George Godwin, R. N. Shaw. Sculpture : J. Flaxman, J. Nollekens,
£ir F. Chantrey, J. E. Boehm, T. Brock, H. Weekes, J. Durham, T.
Woolner, C. B. Birch, W. Calder Marshall. Music: Sir Sterndale
Bennett, Sir John Goss, Sir H. Bishop, Sir M. Costa, Ebenezer Prout,
V. Wallace, Balfe, Goring Thomas, Dr. Bridge, Dr. Stainer, Sir
Henry Smart, J. Barnby, J. Hullah, Sir G. A. Macfarren, Sir J.
Benedict, Sir A. Sullivan, Cowen, J. B. Calkin.
ENGINEERING : G. Stephenson, R. Stephenson, Sir W. Fairbairn,
Sir William Armstrong, Brunei, Telford, Rennie, Scott Russell,
Nasmyth, W. T. Henley (telegraphy).
METAPHYSICS, MORAL PHILOSOPHY. LOGIC : Sir W. HAMILTON,
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 595
Ferrier, J. S. MILL, Sir J. MACKINTOSH, G. H. Lewes, Maurice,
Masson, McCosn, Mansel, G. Combe, 1788-1858; H. Sterling
(Hegel), E. Caird (Kant), A. Bain, Herbert Spencer, CALDERWOOD,
Professor Green, J. Grote, E. Grote, J. D. Morell, Thomas Webb.
LAW : Lords Truro, Selborne, Cockburn, St. Leonards, Lyndhurst,
Coleridge, Westbury, Romilly, Cairns, Chelmsford, Hatherley,
Penzance, Bramwell. The names of Mellor, Lush, Bacon, Malins,
Phillimore, Jessel, Kindersley, Baggallay, Erie, J. F. Stephen, Ballan-
tine, Wilkins, Hawkins, Huddleston, are all space allows to be
given here.
HISTORY in General.— Sir G. C. LEWIS, Buckle, Charles BUTLER,
Creasey, J. Nichols (Gentleman1 s Magazine, Literary History), W. H.
LECKY, J. BRYCE (Holy Roman Empire), Sir J. Stephens, W. Smith,
Dr. Dunham, H. F. Clinton (Grecian and Roman Chronology),
Hales, Russell (Biblical Chronology). Biblical History : MILMAN,
Dean STANLEY, Geo. Smith (Cambourn), Canon Farrar, Sir G.
Grove, Edersheim, Sir Edward Strachey. Biblical Criticism :
Scrivener, Westcott, Tregelles, Blomfield, Bishop Lightfoot, Grinfield,
T. Davidson, W. R. Smith, Alford, Cheyne, Bishop Ellicott, Pro-
fessor Moulton. Antiquities : Fosbrook, W. Cell, W. H. Nicolas,
Britton, Planche, Thomas Wright, H. Ellis, Madden, W. Bentham,
J. Fergusson. Ecclesiastical History : MILMAN (Latin Christianity) ;
MILNER (A History of the Church of Christ), Stebbing, Wadding-
ton ; Maitland (Mediaeval History), Hardwicke ; J. W. Donaldson
(the Ante-Nicene Fathers) ; Burton, Isaac Taylor (Ancient Chris-
tianity) ; Thomas Greenwood (Latin Patriarchate) ; McCrie, John
Nichols (the printer).
HISTORIES. — Greece : Thirlwall, Grote, Coxe, Keightley ; Finlay,
and Freeman (the History of Greece and of the Byzantine Empire).
Mahaffy and the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone have thrown a clearer
light upon the Greeks and their history. Mure and Donaldson
have written the History of Grecian Literature. Rome: Gibbon
Ferguson, Hooke (the Historians of the Last Century) ; Dr. Arnold,
Merivale, Dyer, G. Long, Liddell, Sheppard (the New Nationalities) ;
Thos. Hodgkin (Italy and her Invaders); so also Hallam, and
Robertson's Introduction to the History of Charles V. England:
May, Wade, Lingard, Charles Knight, C. MacFarlane, Robert
Vaughan, J. R. Green, Wade, Sir F. Palgrave, Charles Pearson, Miss
Martineau, Spencer Walpole, Alison, Col. Napier, Kinglake, S. R.
Gardiner, Gairdner, Molesworth, Professor . Stubbs, Lecky, Earl
Stanhope, Dr. Stoughton, Massey, Lord MACAULAY, FYFFE (History
of Europe from 1789), W. H. Russell, A. Forbes, FREEMAN.
2 Q 2
596 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Scotland: J. H. Burton, F. W. Tytler, Cosmo Innes, E. W. Robert-
son, Robert and W. Chambers, Brodie (the critical examiner of
Hume's History of the Stuarts). India : J. Mill, Thornton, Wilson,
Wheeler, Sir J. Kaye, Malleson.
GEOGRAPHY AND GEOGRAPHIC DISCOVERY. — The Arctic voyages
of Ross and Parry, 1818, of Parry, 1824, and the succeeding
voyages of Franklin, Richardson, Back, Beechy, and Scoresby, with
the expedition of McClure and others since, prove the interest felt in
geographical problems. There are hundreds of volumes devoted to
travels in every country in the old and new hemisphere, mainly to
India, China, South Africa, the far west of North America, the
Australian Colonies, New Zealand, and the Pacific, which may be
found in any catalogue, some of which have taken a high position
in our literature.
The possibility of the North-easterly Passage from the North oj
Europe to Behrings Straits has been settled by the voyage of the
Vega, under Capt. NORDENSKJOLD, 1878, 1879, which, after eleven
months' detention a few leagues to the west of Behring's Straits, at
length passed through and returned to Europe by the Indian Ocean
and the Red and Mediterranean Seas ; thus SWEDEN has had the
honour of this great achievement. The area open to discovery
becomes every day more limited. By the efforts now making we may
expect a full exploration of Central Asia, of Central Africa, and of
the Northern Arctic Regions. By the efforts of the agents and
rivals of the International Association, the hitherto unknown regions
between the Congo and the Niger are being, step by step, made
known to geographers. E. H. Palmer, the great Orientalist, was
killed by the Arabs, 1883.
The geographical writers are numerous. W. D. Cooley, Bunbury,
R. F. Burton and also the Reports of the Geographical Society.
BIOGRAPHIES are numerous, and constitute a valuable portion of
our literature. The few which we are able to select are best
arranged alphabetically : — R. Bell (the poets), Lord Brougham
(autobiography), Baron Bunsen's Life, Craik (Swift), Lord Campbell
(the Chancellors), Carlyle (Frederick the Great, and Oliver Cromwell),
Chambers (Scotch biographies) Life of Admiral Collingwood, Sarah
Coleridge, Currie (Burns), W. H. Dixon's (Penn), Lord Bailing and
Ashley (Palmerston), Deutsch's life and remains, Forsyth (Cicero),
Foss (the judges), Forster (English statesmen, O. Goldsmith and
Dickens), Froude (Caesar and Carlyle), Gleig (Clive and Warren
Hastings), Mrs. Everett Green (Princesses of England), Mrs.
Gilbert (Ann Taylor, her autobiography), Thomas Jackson (John
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 597
Goodwin), Charles Kingsley's life, Lockhart (Sir Walter Scott), John
S. Mill (autobiography), Macknight (Bolingbroke and Burke), I).
Masson (Milton), Muir (Mahomet), Thomas Moore (Lord Byron),
Morley (Cobden), Mozley (Reminiscences of Oriel College),
Nasmyth's (autobiography), Mrs. Oliphant (Edward Irving), Paton
(Oliver Cromwell), Sir Robert Peel's life, Lord Russell (Thomas
Moore), Seeley (Stein), Smiles (industrial biographies), Mrs. Somer-
ville's life, Southey's life, Stephenson (Dr. Hook), Southey (Wesley),
Spedding (Lord Bacon), Earl Stanhope (William Pitt), Dean Stanley
(Arnold), Sidney Smith's life, L. Tyermann (Wesley), A. Trollope
(autobiography), Trevellyan (Lord Macaulay, and Charles J. Fox),
Bishop Thirlwall's life ; life of William Wilberforce and of Bishop
Wilberforce ; life of Whewell ; Yonge (Lord Liverpool).
THEOLOGY. — Here is given a mere selection of names; many
more might have been added, but the space is limited.
Church of England. — ARCHBISHOPS : WHATELY (theology, poli-
tical and social economy, logic, rhetoric) ; TRENCH (the miracles and
parables) ; TAIT, the late Primate (one of the most liberal and noble
of all the ecclesiastical dignitaries ; his death an irreparable loss to
the Church of England) ; THOMSON (the Speaker's commentary
and logic). BISHOPS : Brown (the Articles), Hampden (scholas-
ticism), Ellicott (criticism), Lightfoot (criticism and commentaries),
Thirlwall (history of Greece), Wilberforce (divinity and Church
policy) ; Perry, Robertson, Hore (ecclesiastical historians), Frazer
and Magee (able preachers) with Tristram and Fleming. Three
distinguished bishops have been sent to Australia : Bishop MOOR-
HOUSE (Melbourne), Bishop PEARSON (Newcastle), and Bishop BARRY
(the Primate of Sydney) ; Bishop Temple (Sermons) : the late
Bishop of Lichfield, Dr. Selwyn, was the enterprising and gifted
Bishop of New Zealand for many years. Dr. Thomas ARNOLD,
A. W. HARE, Julius HARE, were divines identified with the Broad
Church, but strictly Evangelical. MAURICE (philosophy— his position
as a divine not easy to define ; in character exemplary) ; Dr.
JOWETT (critic and commentator), Charles KINGSLEY (naturalist and
philanthropist), William Rowland (an advanced Broad Church
divine). Of the advanced High Church School are Dr.
Hooke, Blunt, KEBLE (the hymnologist), Dr. PUSEY, Dr. LIDDON
(the first of preachers), H. J. Irons, men by no means agreeing
in all their views of polity or theology; T. W. Birks, Edward
Bickersteth, Melville will be regarded as Evangelical Low Church ;
Nares (the Creeds), ALFORD and Greswell are commentators.
T. W. H. HORNE gave the first important English introduction to
598 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884,
Biblical criticism; Cheyne, Stanley Leathes (Hebrew literature)
Canon Cooke (editor of the Speaker's Commentary), John Hunt
(pantheism, English thought, &c.), F. W. Robertson (a popular
preacher), E. H. Plumptre, C. A. Rowe, Wace (the evidences and
apologetics generally), J. B. Maclellan (the Gospels), Mark Pattison.
The Missionary Bishops were Heber, Wilson, Selwyn, sen., and
Pattison (the martyr). There are other bishops and clergy yet
living and labouring in the colonies and missions. The number of
the English clergy is about 24,000, exclusive of the Church of
Ireland, Sir Edmund Beckett and George Warington are Churchmen
who have done good service in the controversies of the day.
The Presbyterian Churches, including the Established, the Free
Church, and the Nonconformist bodies, are, with the exception of a
small number of Congregationalists (Independents and Baptists,
and Wesleyan Methodists), the churches of the Scotch people. In
the old Church, Tulloch represents a Broad Church party; Andrew
Thomson was the great preacher in Edinburgh in 1820. In the
Free Church Dr. Chalmers, Candlish, and Begg, with Sir H.
Moncrieff, are dead ; Dr. Eadie and J. Brown (commentators), with
Guthrie, McCheyne, Bonar, Norman Macleod and J. Ker, are also
dead. Among the living divines are Fairbairn, W. LINDSAY
ALEXANDER (Independents), and Crawford, Bruce, Caird, Oswald
DIKE; FLINT has taken a distinguished part in the theistical con-
troversy. The DUKE OF ARGYLL has done good service to Chris-
tianity by his thoughtful, philosophical writings. In the mission
work the names of Dr. Wilson, of Bombay, and Dr. Duff, of
Calcutta, cannot be forgotten.
Tfie Congregationalists (INDEPENDENTS). — Bennett, Waugh, Wilks,
Jay, J. A. James, George Lambert, T. Raffles, Spencer, Liefchild, J.
Parsons, Joseph Gilbert (the Atonement), the Claytons, James
Bowden, E. Henderson, Dr. Kitto, Josiah Conder, J. Fletcher,
William Bull, R. Vaughan, A. Raleigh, McAll, Brown (of the Bible
Society), Urwick, R. W. Hamilton, J. Harris, John Campbell, Henry
Rogers, Thomas Binney, Enoch Mellor, J. Baldwin Brown, Dr.
Wardlaw, Samuel Martin, are dead. Among the living, Dr. Allon,
Parker, R. Dale, Dr. Stoughton, J. G. Rogers, J. Kennedy, W. R.
Reynolds, Alfred Cave, A. Morison, E. R. Conder, and Paxton Hood.
In the colonies or in mission work, the names of Robert Morrison,
(China), Moffat and Livingstone, in South Africa, and Williams in
the South Seas, are generally known. The number of the Congre-
gational ministers in the United Kingdom is about 3,000 (2,880 are
ound in the Congregational Year-Book).
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 599
The BAPTISTS have 2,280 ministers. Robert Hall, John Foster,
Christopher Anderson, Dr. Innes, Hon. and Rev. B. W. Noel,
H. Hinton, W. Brock, are dead. Dr. Angus, Dr. Landels3 and the
most wonderful of all modern preachers, C. H. Spurgeon, yet remain
as prominent representatives of the Baptist Churches. On the
mission, were the honoured names of E. Carey, Marshall, and Ward.
" The UNITARIANS have J. Martinean, J. Beard, and others.
The WESLEYAN METHODISTS have 2,192 regular ministers in the
United Kingdom, assisted by about 14,000 class leaders and 24,000
local preachers. Among the departed are Bramwell, Bradbury,
Daniel Isaac, Jabez Bunting, Adam Clarke, Richard Watson, W.
Townley, John Scott, Dr. Hannah, Dixon, Robert Newton, Daniel
McAfee, B. Field, R. Treffrey, jun., Dr. Beecham, Dr. Hoole,
Robert Young, Beaumont, W. L. Thornton, F. A. West, Dr. Waddy,
C. Prest, J. Rattenbury, W. S. Wiseman, G. T. Perks, Dr. Gervase
Smith, Thomas Vasey, Coley, T. Powell, W. Bunting, W. W. Stamp,
and Drs. Jobson and Punshon. Yet living are John Farrar, G.
Osborne, D.D., William Arthur, W. B. Pope, D.D., John H.
Rigg, D.D., E. E. Jenkins, Dr. Rule, Professor Moulton, B.
Gregory, J. O. Geden, M. G. Pearse, J. Agar Beet, the Com-
mentator, R. N. Young, Thornley Smith, Olver, John Burton, Pro-
fessor Dallinger, and others. Among the missionaries, Gogerly and
Spence Hardy, known as Buddhist scholars. Barnabas Shaw and
William Shaw, the fathers of the South African missions, J. W.
Appleyard and W. J. Davis (Kaffir scholars), all of whom are
deceased. John Walton, W. Tyson, and H. H. Dugmore, and
others yet remain.
The METHODISTS OF THE NEW CONNEXION, the PRIMITIVE, and
other bodies of Methodists are each labouring in their several
spheres. Dr. W. Cooke is a leading theologian.
In these lists of Christian ministers of the more important Church
organisations (the various folds which shelter the one flock\ the
intention is to give a specimen of the class of men who are
labouring in the Christian Churches for the benefit of the world
at large. Each denomination is interested in the prosperity
and progress of the other denominations. The rivalry of the
Churches should be confined to a generous emulation to labour the
most abundantly in their respective fields. A time will come (but
it is not yet) when all distinctions, so far as they separate good
men, will disappear, and all the Churches in heart will be one. In
the mean time it is desirable that the Churches should know some-
thing of the literary work of the learned, and of the leaders of
600 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
bought, in other Churches than their own. Such intellectual com-
munion would not affect the grounds of their formal separation,
but they would create mutual kindly and respectful feeling in the
conviction that opinions the opposite of our own may be held by
men as educated and as sensible as ourselves.
THE POETS and writers of verse are numerous. The principal are
George "Crabbe, Samuel Rogers, William Wordsworth, S. T.
Coleridge, R. Southey, T. Moore, T. Campbell, Sir Walter Scott,
Lord Byron, P. B. Shelley, John Keats, R. Pollok, J. Keble,
Alfred (Lord) Tennyson, A. C. Swinburne, Robert and Mrs.
Browning, ^W. Morris. Of Dramatic Verse: Joanna Baillie, J. S.
Knowles, E. L. Bulwer, T. N. Talfourd, Tom Taylor, M. Morton,
J. B. Buckstone, Douglas Jerrold, D. Boucicault, J. R. Planche,
H. J. Byron. Of shorter Poems, lighter Verse, 6°<r. / G.
Canning, Mrs. Barbauld, W. L. Bowles, W. S. Landor, Charles
Lamb, J. H. Frere, C. Wolfe, James Montgomery, Hon. W. R.
Spencer, Leigh Hunt, James and Horace Smith, Mrs. Hemans,
T. B. (Lord) Macaulay, R. H. Home (Orion), Thomas Hood,
T. H. Bayly, Charles Mackay, D. M. Moir (Delta), J. Mayne.
James Hogg, Allan Cunningham, R. Barham (Ingoldsby), B. W.
Procter (Barry Cornwall), F. Mahoney (Father Prout), Miss Landon
(L. E. L.), W. Aytoun, T. Pringle, Ebenezer Elliott (Corn Laws),
Hon. Mrs. Norton, Mary Howitt, C. Patmore, Eliza Cook, S.
Dobell, M. Arnold, R. Buchanan, Austin Dobson, M. Praed, L.
Blanchard, C. Shirley Brooks, W. S. Gilbert, and very many others.
AMONG THE NOVELISTS, whose name is legion, the following
names may be mentioned : Sir Walter Scott, W. Godwin, Mrs.
Shelley, J. G. Lockhart, Miss Mitford, Sir E. L. Bulwer (Lord
Lytton), Maria Edgeworth, Michael Scott, Miss Ferrier, J. Banim,
J. B. Frazer, John Gait, T. Hope, J. Morier, Theodore Hook,
Mrs. Opie, W. H. Ainsworth, Mrs. S. C. Hall, W. Carleton, Mrs.
Trollope, Benjamin Disraeli (Lord Beaconsfield), Mrs. Gore, Capt.
Marryat, G. P. R. James, C. Lever, Capt. Mayne Reid, E.
Bradley (Cuthbert Bede), S. Lover, D. Jerrold, S. Warren, Miss
Braddon, J. S. Le Fanu, Charles and Henry Kingsley, George
MacDonald, Mortimer Collins, Dutton Cook, Mrs. Oliphant, Annie
Thomas, Mark Lemon, Mrs. L. Banks, Laurence Oliphant,
Rhoda Broughton, Helen Mathers, Mrs. Parr, Mrs. Henry Wood,
Miss C. M. Yonge, Mrs. Cashel Hoey, Miss Mulock, Mrs. Lynn
Linton, Mrs. Gaskell, T. Hughes, E. Jenkins, Capt. Whyte-Melville,
Hamilton Aide', Miss Macquoid, Mrs. Riddell, J. McCarthy, Sir G.
Dasent, J. Sturgis, Mrs. Eiloart, J. Grant, W. H. G. Kingston,
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 60 r
G. Manviile Fenn, Hawley Smart, Walter Besant, J. Rice, George
Eliot (Miss Evans), Charles Dickens, W. M. Thackeray, G. A. Sala,
Anthony Trollope, James Payn, Wilkie Collins, F. C. Burnand,
W. Charles Reade, H. C. Merivale, Thomas Hardy, Edmund Yates,
Black, R. D. Blackmore. A great many others might readily be added!
IN GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS LITERATURE are found many
respectable and a few great names.
Mrs. AUSTIN, J. S. Blackie, W. Bagehot, P. Bayne, Canon Boyd,
H. T. Buckle, C. Cohort, Crabbe Robinson, Miss F. P. Cobbe,
Lord Cockburn, T. DE QUINCEY, Isaac D'Israeli, C. W. DILKE, W.
Hepworth Dixon, Dr. Doran, H. S. Edwards, Mrs. Ellis, A. D.
Fonblanque (the Examiner}, John Forster, G. R. Gleig, G. Gilfillan,
W. R. GREG, C. C. F. Greville, W. Hazlitt, W. Hone (parodies),
R. H. HUTTON (journalist), Sir A. Helps, Sir B. Head, Sir G. Head,
T. C. Haliburton (Sam Slick), William and Mary HOWITT, Mrs.
Jameson, Lord JEFFREY (Edinburgh Revieiv), Dr. Kitto, Charles
KNIGHT (a man to whom the literature of England is highly in-
debted, Charles LAMB (Elia), M. G. Lewis (Monk Lewis), W. E. H.
LECKY, Lord Macaulay, W. Maginn, W. H. Mallock, E. Miall,
Hannah More, Robert Mudie (Babylon the Great), George
Macdonald, John Oxenford, Samuel Phillips, W. R. S. Ralston,
S. Smiles, Sydney SMITH, Professor SHAIRP, Leslie STEPHEN,
Nassau SENIOR, Isaac Taylor, sen. (Essays), J. Timbs, W. J. Thorn
(Notes and Queries], Blanco WHITE, F. Martin (Year-Book), John
Brown (Rab.), Thomas Carlyle.
PHILOSOPHY in England has been discussed by about 130 writers
since 1815, a few of which have been noticed in connexion with
Metaphysics. The philosophy of LOCKE, explained by Reid, Dugald
Stewart, Sir W. Hamilton, Sir J. Mackintosh, and McCosh is
generally accepted, and is sometimes called the Scottish philosophy.
The writers of this school have been affected by the teachings of
the Eclectic philosophy (an offshoot of Locke's), as taught by Royer
Collard and Victor Cousin in France. Meanwhile, the German
philosophy of KANT and HEGEL especially has exercised a consider-
able influence over the opinions of English students, through the
warm advocacy of that philosophy by S. T. COLERIDGE in his " Aids
to Reflection," published in 1825. In this work, and in all his
prose writings, "he took an attitude of contemptuous hostility
towards the philosophical writers of his time, and aroused a belief
in, and a longing for, what were supposed to be the profounder and
more elevated views of the great German masters of speculation." *
1 Ueberweg, vol. ii. p. 485.
602 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
KANT has been translated by Mahaffy, Caird, and others ; HEGEL
by J. H. Sterling. Traces of Kant's teaching may easily be recog-
nised in Sir W. Hamilton, Dean Mansell, J. D. Morell, and many
others of our philosophical writers. LOCKE'S principles have been
modified by Brown, Harris (Hermes), and Ferrier, but remain, on
the whole, the most generally accepted of all the rival systems. The
a s so ciational psychology of Hartley and Priestley has been revived by
James Mill, stripped of its materialistic adjuncts, in which he has
been followed partially by JOHN STUART MILL, by GEORGE GROTE
(the historian), by GEORGE H. LEWES, and by ALEXANDER BAIN.
HERBERT SPENCER has aimed to widen the psychological principles
of the associational psychology into a universal doctrine of evolu-
tion, which should not only provide for the evolution of all forms
of being, material and spiritual, but should also provide for the
evolution of the fundamental principles of philosophy itself.1 Philo-
sophy has of late passed into cosmology, the mere science of
the physical universe. It is busying itself with the beginnings of
all material existences, the gradual formation of the solar system,
the history of our own earth when preparing to be the abode of life,
and the processes by which the cruder forms of life advanced to the
highest exemplar of life in man.2 To sketch the several systems
would require a large volume, and to understand the novel phrase-
ology necessary to do justice to the opinions of the writers would
require a dictionary of special words and terms. Common sense
revolts at the waste of brain labour and of time. It will be suffi-
cient briefly to notice the philosophy of John Stuart Mill, Alexander
Bain, and Herbert Spencer, who may be regarded as the philo-
sophers of the day. John Stuart Mill "reasserts the psychological
theory of empiricism against the opposite theory of trans-
cendentalism. Its very purpose is to reassert Locke's principle in
a form adapted to the latest development of opinion, and to exhibit
afresh its universal competency."3 "After a long and laborious
analysis, he reaches the conclusion that matter must be denned as a
permanent possibility of sensation, and that mind is resolved into
a series of feelings with a background of possibilities of feeling.
In reference to the belief in the real existence of the external world,
he concedes that it cannot be proved philosophically, and can only
be justified by the consideration that the world of possible sensations,
succeeding one another according to laws, is as much in other
beings as it is in me. It has, therefore, an existence outside me :
1 Ueberweg, ii. p. 422. 2 David Masson, pp. 275, 276. 3 Ibid., p. 234.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 603
it is an external world." ALEXANDER BAIN: "His writings treat
mental phenomena on the theory of Hartley and James Mill, with
this difference, that Bain makes much of the discoveries and analyses
of modern physiology He does not deny the existence of a
spiritual principle in man independently of a cerebral organisation,
nor does he positively affirm it Though not an avowed
materialist, his explanations all rest upon materialistic analogies."
HERBERT SPENCER : " The starting-point of his system is the doc-
trine of evolution All organic development is a change from
homogeneity to heterogeneity Matter and mind are simply
bundles or series of phenomena, and nothing besides The
persistence of force is assumed to be a universal and necessary
axiom, applied to the persistence of phenomenal force, and also to
the unknown and unknowable Being or force which is behind all
phenomena. Science and religion are at one, as both assume a one,
a cause, a permanent all-prevailing force. But revealed religion or
scientific theology is impossible.'"'1 A writer in the Edinburgh
Review (No. 325) remarks that " Mr. Spencer's prime object is to
prove that the universe has evolved itself out of a first cause, which
does not add intelligence, or will, or any kind of personality to those
imposing epithets which he applies to it ; that his whole system is
simply a play upon words, a verbal conjuring, a philosophy of
epithets and phrases, concealing the loosest reasoning and the
haziest indefiniteness on every point except the bare negation of any
knowable or knowing author of the universe, which, of course, is the
reason why this absurd pretence of a philosophy has obtained the
admiration of a multitude of people who will swallow any camel
that pretends to carry the world, standing on the tortoise that stands
on nothing, provided only it has been generated by a man out of
his own brains, and asserted in imposing language with sufficient
confidence." '2 To plain common-sense people it seems strange that
an able, respectable man should so thoroughly persuade himself
that these assumptions and contradictions, running through hundreds
of pages, may claim the title of a philosophy ! There is a very able
critique on Herbert Spencer in the London Quarterly , No. 120,
July, 1883, entitled "The Synthetical Philosophy Examined."
Scarcity and cost of books from 1815 to 1829. — There were plenti-
ful supplies of books of all sorts, from the quarto at five guineas to
the octavo at ten or twelve shillings, for the wealthier classes, and
libraries from which in large towns the middle classes could obtain
1 Ueberweg, ii. pp. 432>433-
* Edinburgh Jteview, No. 325, pp. 42-81, abridged.
604 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
the current literature, and, after some delay, obtain a copy ot the
more recent publications. A cheap serial, the Mirror, com-
menced about 1820, which had a large circulation. The rage to
obtain a copy of one of the three volumes of the Waverley Novels was
extraordinary : thousands were willing to pay threepence the volume
for a day's perusal. These fascinating works led to a great increase
of readers. In 1827, Constables Miscellany of useful and entertaining
works appeared in monthly volumes, the price, about three shillings
and sixpence : the series completed eighty volumes. Murray's
Family Library commenced 1829, and was equally successful. Then
followed the Edinbrtf Cabinet Library in 1831 ; Chambers' s Journal
in 1832. The publications of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful
Knowledge had commenced in 1827 ; but, though excellent in their
kind, they were mainly scientific, and unattractive to the masses.
But this Society did much for the education of the middle classes,
especially in the preparing and editing the Penny Encyclopedia
(published by the Society in twenty-seven volumes, edited by G.
Long), which yet remains an invaluable book of reference : so also
the Penny Magazine. The Society for Promoting Christian Know-
ledge published the Saturday Magazine. The Quarterly Reviews,
i.e., the Edinburgh ; the Quarterly (Murray), Westminster, British
Quarterly, North British Review, the British and Foreign Evangelical
Review, the London Quarterly Review, the Church of England
Review, the National, represent the opinions of distinct political and
religious parties: so also the monthlies, i.e., Blackwood, Macmillan,
Contemporary, Fortnightly, Nineteenth Century. The London
daily papers now in circulation are — the Times, the Daily News,
the Telegraph, Standard, Post, Chronicle, St. James's Gazette, Globe,
Pall Mall Gazette, Evening News, and Echo. The old Courier, the
Morning Chronicle, and the Sun have ceased to exist ; as also
Cobbett's Register, which was a weekly pamphlet. The leading
weekly papers are — the Spectator, the Saturday Review, the Observer,
the Illustrated London News, the Graphic, Truth, the World, Punch,
and John Bull. The literary papers are — the Literary World,
Athenaeum, and Academy. The Church of England, the Non-
conformists, and the Methodists have their weekly papers, which
are not generally purely sectarian.
A series of invaluable dictionaries, biblical, classical, historical, and
biographical, have been published by Murray, with histories edited
carefully by writers of well-known competency. A series of small
works on ancient and modern history and the history of England
have been issued by Longmans. Each volume contains matter
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 605
equal to an ordinary octavo volume, and the writers are men ot
ability in their several departments.
The Encyclopedia Metropolitan (48 vols. 4to., 1818-1845) nas not
been continued by supplements, or reprinted in a new edition. The
Encyclopedia Britannica has been repeatedly reissued in new editions
since its first appearance in 1778. The present is the ninth edition.
Reefs Encyclopedia (45 vols. 4to.) was compiled early in the century,
and was published in 1802 and following years. Other encyclo-
paedias have been published, as Brewster's (18 vol?. 4to.),
Encyclopedia Perthensis ; Encyclopedia Londinensis (24 vols. 4to.,
1810-1829); London Encyclopedia (22 vols. 8vo., 1829); English
Encyclopedia (12 vols. 4to., 1856-1872); Chambers' s Encyclopedia
(10 vols. royal 8vo.). Many Dictionaries of the English Language
have been re-edited, i.e.. Dr. Johnson by Todd and by Latham, in
4to. ; Richardson, Nuttall, Chambers, Stormonth, Roget, and
Ogilvie. A new dictionary is publishing by Cassell, and another
on a larger scale, edited by Dr. Murray, publishing by the
Clarendon Press, which will rival Grimm's Dictionary of the Ger-
man Language.
Two SOCIETIES established within this period have done, and are
doing, good service to the community. THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL
SOCIETY, which is connected with similar societies on the Con-
tinent. It was established 1807, and has published a valuable
series of reports, translations, and journals, all of prominent
interest. THE VICTORIA INSTITUTE, established in 1866, by the
untiring persistent efforts of the Rev. Robert Mitchell and Messrs.
James Reddie and Alexander McArthur, Lord Shaftesbury being
the president. Its object is to oppose those teachings of the
science of the day which are alike scientifically and theologically
untrue, while ready to receive thankfully the facts which almost
daily add to our knowledge of the inexhaustible wonders of
our world. The Transactions of this Society contain much
that is highly instructive and specially interesting to all classes
of the clergy. Another circumstance is characteristic of the im-
proved character of our age — the establishment of a Committee to
prepare a new translation of the Holy Scriptures of the Old and
New Testaments, selected from all the Protestant communions (187 8).
As the first-fruits of the labours of this Committee we have already
a new version of the New Testament (1881), which is a valuable
help to the Christian public, though not likely to supersede the
old version. It is, however, a contribution to the English Bible
of the future.
606 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Literature of the United States of America, from 1815 to 1884.
The literature of the United States has now taken its proper
position in the world. It has not only a character of its own,
but that character is a very high one.
SCIENCE : Dana, Audubon, Agassiz, Schoolcraft, Morton, J. W.
Draper, Asaph, Hall, and Watson (astronomy.)
MENTAL PHILOSOPHY : Noah Porter, McCosh, Upham, Wayland,
Marsh, Henry, Bowen, Brownson, Hickok, Asa Mahan, Day,
Haven, Lieber, Cocker, H. B. Smith.
PHILOLOGY : Whitney, Marsh.
LEXICOGRAPHERS : Worcester, Webster.
CLASSICAL LITERATURE: Felton, Woolsey, Anthon, Everett, Lewis.
GENERAL LITERATURE : Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Dr. Holmes,
J. K. Paulding, Lowell, Tuckerman, Follen, J. Quincy Adams, R.
C. White, H. N. Hudson, Dr. Child, W. G. Simms, F. Hodge, C. T.
Brooks, Edison, Horace Mann.
FICTION : C. B. Brown, R. H. Dana, E. A. Poe, J. F. Cooper,
William Ware, Mrs. Stowe, Lydia Child, Verplank, T. S. Fay, W. D.
Howells, N. P. Wilkie, Hawthorne, C. F. Browne (Artemus Ward),
Henry James, C. F. Hoffman, F. B. Harte, J. K. Paulding, T. B.
Thorpe, John Neal, H. Melville.
TRAVELS : G. W. Curtis, Fremont, Winthorp, Robinson, T. Starr,
King, Thoreau, Hayes, J. A. MacGahan.
ARTISTS : Copley, West, Austin, Leslie.
POETRY : Mrs. Sedgwick, Mrs. Sigourney, Longfellow, Bryant,
Whitman, Lowell, Whittier, Holmes, E. C. Steadman, Alice Carey.
HISTORIANS : Bancroft, Hildreth, Washington Irving, W. H.
Prescott, Motley, Ticknor, John F. Kirk, Horace Greely, Oilier,
Edward King, Marshall.
THEOLOGY: Timothy D\vight, Channing, Moses Stuart, Beecher,
Todd, Finney, Bush, Atwater, Park, Jacob Abbott, Noyes, C. Hodge,
Shedd, Woolsey, Schaaf, Bushnell, G. P. Fisher, H. James.
LAW: Marshall, Kent, Storey, Wheaton, Tayler, Lewis.
MISCELLANEOUS : Marshall, Jewell.
French Literature from 1815-1884.
Next to England and Germany the literature of France is the
most important and the most extensive. In Natural Science,
Mathematics, Philosophy, and Philology, the French writers occupy
a leading position. The language of France is well adapted for
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 607
narration and political discussions and general literature. Most
of the recent publications have in them little of European interest,
but they are adapted to Parisian tastes, and some of them highly
popular. The following list is confined to the most celebrated
names : —
SCIENCE. — Chemistry: Thenard, 1777-1851; Chaptal, 1756-
1832; Gay-Lussac, 1775-1850; Cailletet, and others. Astronomy:
Arago, 1786-1853; Leorcabault; Leverrier. Zoology: Isidore,
G. S. St. Hilaire, 1805-1861; Etienne Geoffry St. Hilaire, 1773-
1844. Natural History: Desmarets, 1725-1815. Entomology:
La Marck, 1744-1829. Fishes: Lacepede, 1756-1825. Botany:
Jussieu, 1748-1836, the founder of the Natural System, opposed to
that of Linnaeus. Physiology of Botany : Morbel ; Biot (Meteors)^
1803; Phynes Foucault. Polarisation of Light: Malus; Fremel.
Electricity: Ampere. Heat: Se'guin ; Cloquet (Anatomy).
PHILOSOPHY: Royard Collard, 1761-1846; Jeoffry, 1796-1847;
Joubert, 1750-1824 (equal to Pascal); Damiron, 1794-1862;
Vacherot, 1809; Victor Cousin, 1794-1867; Auguste Comte,
1793-1857; Quinet, 1803-1875; Taine.
POLITICAL ECONOMY: Bastiat; DeLavergne; Blanqui; Chevalier
De Tocqueville ; Say.
PHILOLOGY : Remusat (Chinese, Thibet) ; Renan (Hebrew) ;
Cheny, Bornoeuf, Lassen (Sanscrit) ; Champollion (hieroglyphics) ;
S. de Sacy (Arabic) ; S. Julian, Wolf, Diez (Roman languages) ;
Lanze (Arabic).
LAW. — Leromoiner, 1805-1857 ; Baron de Gerando, 1772-1842 ;
Lachaud.
SOCIAL REFORMERS. — Lamennais, 1787-1854; Lacordaire, 1802-
1806; Pere Felix, Pere Hyacinthe, Le Play; Coqucrel, 1820-1875;
St. Simon, 1772-1837; Fourrier, 1772-1837; New System of
Society, Cabet, 1788-1856; Communism.
POLITICAL LITERATURE. — Chateaubriand, 1768-1848; Madame
de Stael; Lamartine ; Paul Louis Courier, 1722-1821; Joseph
de Maistre (Absolutist Ultramontane), 1754-1821; Volney, 1757-
1820; De Bonald, 1754-1845; (Royalist and Absolutist), Monta-
lembert (royalist and Catholic, not Ultra), 1814-1870; Louis
Veuillot (Absolutist, Ultramontane), died 1883 ; Bishop Dupanloup
(Ultra-Catholic); Benjamin Constant (Constitutionalist) 1767-1830 ;
Edmund About, 1828-1880; A. Carrel, 1800-1836; Jules Simon;
Du Pin, 1783-1865; Martigniac, 1778-1832; Percier, Odillon
Barrot, Manuel, General Foy, Laboulaye, Reynald.
HISTORIANS.— Louis Blanc; Raynal; SISMONDI, 1773-1842;
608 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
De Barante, 1782-1866; Jomini; Amedee THIERRY, 1787-1873;
Augustus THIERRY, 1795-1856; P. Segur, 1780-1875; Henry
MARTIN, 1810; THIERS, 1797-1878; Mignet, 1796-1883; Michelet,
1798-1873; QUINET, 1803-1875; LANFREY, 1828-1871; Michaud,
1767-1839; GUIZOT, 1787-1876; Ampere (Roman History);
Beugnot; Duruy, 1840; Laborde, 1801-1832; Michiels, 1813;
Dumont D'Urville ; Bonnechose, Buchons, Daru, TAINE ; Du
Laure, 1755-1815; Nettement, 1815-1869; Ternaut, 1808;
Vapereau, 1790-1870; Lacratelle, 1761-1855 ; Bourrienne (Memoir
of the Emperor Buonaparte), 1769-1834; Las Casas (Count)
1766-1842; the memorial of St. Helena, and the Historical Atlas
published in 1802; Capefigue ; Barbaroux (O.) 1794-1867;
Histories of the Wars of Napoleon are numberless ; so also personal
memoirs relating to the period of the Revolution.
POETRY.— Beranger, 1780-1857; J. de Chenier, 1764-1833; A.
de Che'nier, 1762-1794; Casimir Delavigne, 1793-1843; Ducis
(Shakespeare), 1731-1816; Ponsard, 1804-1867 ; Gautier, 1811-
1872; Lamartine; Victor Hugo.
LITERATURE. — Littr£, Saint Beuve, 1804-1869; G. Sand, 1793-
1876; Balzac, jun., 1799-1850; Villemain, Gustav Flaubert
(critics), 1799-1870; Nisard, 1806; St. M. Girardin, 1800-1873;
Gustav Plaun, Buloz, Henry Etienne, S. Rene, Taillandu (critics,
Revue du Monde) Demogeot, 1828; Merimee, Jules Verne, 1828;
Madame de Genlis, 1746-1830.
FICTION. — DeMaistre; DeVigny; Dumas; Erckmann-Chatrian, &c.
THEOLOGY. — De Pressense*; Vinet (Swiss); Bersier, Lichten-
berger, and others.
ARTISTS. — Painters: G. Dore*, Horace Vernet, Rosa Bonheur,
Corot.
Philosophy in France, 1815-1884. — Since the beginning of the
present century two philosophical tendencies opposed the sensualism
and materialism which reigned from long before the Revolution to
the conclusion of the first Empire. The one was the eclectic and
spiritual school founded by Royard COLLARD, which was built up by
COUSIN, who added to the views of Locke and Reid some of those
of the German philosophers ; the other was the result of Hegel-
anism, which found a few disciples. A system of " POSITIVISM,
which refuses, in principle, to make affirmation respecting anything
that is not a subject of exact investigation, but which yet, for the
most part, makes common cause with materialism, was founded by
COMTE." It denies all metaphysics and all search for first or final
causes, and accepts neither Atheism, nor Theism, nor Pantheism.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 609
The grand doctrine is IMMANENCE, which, according to Comte, is
the watchword of science, explaining the universe by causes within
the universe. Man has advanced necessarily through three estates,
from the credulous, superstitious, theological state, through the
abstract, scholastic, or metaphysical state, to the experimental or
POSITIVE, which leads from the domain of metaphysics to the
domain of positive science. In the classification and co-ordination
of the sciences we are required to advance from the simple to the
complex. At the basis are the Mathematics, then come in turn
Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and Sociology. These
are the six fundamental Sciences. Recently Comte has arrived
at a certain conception of religion and a real form of worship,
of which humanity is the object ; but this part of his philosophy is
repudiated by his most eminent disciples. LAMENNAIS attempted
to form a new school of philosophy, 1841-1846. The essay
Esquisse (Tune Philosophic is perhaps the most vast synthesis,
which has been attempted in France in the nineteenth century.
He applied the principle of evolution to the philosophy of Nature
{as Schelling) ; he has found no followers.1
Literature of Germany from 1815 to 1884.
German literature, even when limited to the period since 1815,
Is a vast and illimitable field, difficult even for literary Germans
to master, and all but impossible to a foreigner. Of all the
publications in English which attempt to do something like justice
to the activity and depth of the German intellect the work of
Gostwick and Harrison is undoubtedly the most satisfactory, and //
may be read with pleasure? The following very imperfect list of
authors (which does not include a large number of valuable new
writers who have sprung up within the last few years) may serve to
give some idea of the variety and extent of German literature.
SCIENCE in general.— A. V. Humboldt (Kosmos), Goethe (the poet),
Oken, Helmholtz, Marno, H. Miiller, Dopier, Seebeak, Chladni.
Astronomy : Encke, Schwabe, Biela, Lament, Clausen. Chemistry :
Liebig, Wohler. Botany: Sacks, Moldenhauer. Optics: Frauen-
hofer. Photography: Ritter, Kirchoff. Heat: Mayer, Him.
Protoplasm: Von Mohl. Physiology and Embryology : Von Baer,
Schwann, Bourdach, Carus, Virchou, Schleiden, Vogt. Materialist
Philosophy : Haeckel.
1 Abridged from Ueberweg, vol. ii. pp. 337~343-
8 Crown 8vo. 1883., p. 642.
2 R
6io From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
GEOGRAPHY AND TRAVELLERS. — Treatises : Schutz, Berghaus,
Ritter, Perthes, Spriiner, Oesterley, Arendts, Balbi, Peterman, Weber.
The leading Travellers are : Riippel, Richtofen, Kreitner, Schwein-
furth, Lichtenstein, Earth, Krapf, Fritsch.
LAW, POLICE, AND NATIONAL ECONOMY. — Hugo, Savigny Gans,
Feuerbach, Von Berger, Stahl, Gagern, Eichhorn ; Lassalle and Karl
Marx (Socialists), Schultze-Delitztch (Associationism), and many
others ; J. Goerres, F. J. Jahn, E. M. Arndt, were political writers
in the German reaction of 1812-1815; Justus Perthes.
EDUCATION. — Von Raumer, Herder, F. Jahn, Diesterweg.
Music. — Wagner, Weber, Kostlin, Mozart, Spohr, Mendelssohn,
Kullak, Carl Engel, Flotow.
HIEROGLYPHICS, &c. — Seyffarth, Klaproth, Grotefend, Lepsius.
CLASSICAL LITERATURE. — J. G. H. Hermann, F. A. Wolf, Bcekh,
K. O. Miiller, Cramer, Wachsmuth, Hermann (K. F.), Dindorf,
Bekker.
PHILOLOGY. — Bunsen, K. W. F. Schlegel, Bopp, Rosen,
Lassen, W. V. Humboldt, Thiersch, Pott, J. Grimm, W.
Grimm, Graf, Matzner, Stralman, Sanders, Wiegaud, Lazarus, and
others.
HISTORY. — Biography: Von Ense, Pertz, Mayerhoff, Pfizer, Justus
Perthes, Droysen Gregorovius, Adolph Stahr, Gottschall (German
Plutarch), Wiirzbach (Austrian Biographical Lexicon). Literary
History, &c. : Ritter, Staekl, K. Michelet, Kuno Fischer, Ueberweg,
K. Vehse (civilisation), Klemm (civilisation), Schon (European
civilisation), Gulich and Hoffman (trade and agriculture),
Wachsmuth (European morals). General History : J. Miiller,
Rotteck, Becker, Bottiger, Schlosser, Heeren and Ukert, Riehl,
Corwen and Dieffenbach. Ancient Oriental Nations: Bunsen,
Heeren, Diimichen. Greece: Curtius, Schorne, K. Lachmann,
Droysen. Rome: Niebuhr, Drumann, F. Kortiim, Ihne, Schwegler,
Mommsen. The Middle Ages: Pertz, H. Leo, F. Rehm, Hull-
man, Wilkens and Kugler. The Papacy : Ranke, R. Pauli, Harter
on Innocent III. Germany: Giesebrecht, J. Chouel, Schlosser,
Mailath, Wachsmuth, Spittler, Gagern, Haussen, Menzel, Kohl-
rausch, Archenholtz, Beitzke, Van Raumer and Benfy, Gindley,
Droysen. Oriental History: Von Hammer, G. Weil. French
Revolution : Von Sybel, Stein. English History : Lappenburg,
Dahlmann, Fischel, Hermes, Honegger. Ecclesiastical History:
H. Ewald (the Biblical period), Neander, Guericke, Hagenbach,
Ullmann, Giesler, Hase, Dormer, Schwartz, Baur, Ditmann. The
Romish Historians are: Hefele, Dollinger, and Mohler. The
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 611
Reformation: Ranke, Hagen, Oechsle, Bensen, and Zimmermann
(the Peasants' War).
POETRY. — Biirger, L. Borne (the German Voltaire), Claudius,
Chamisso, Fouque, Heine, Korner, Kotzebue, Lafontaine, Miiller,
Helfmann, Count Stolberg, F. Stolberg, Tieck, Voss, Werner,
Uhland; Jahn and Arndt, with Korner, were the patriot poets
of 1813.
PHILOSOPHY. — The philosophy of Germany is an unmanageable
subject, whether treated with brevity or in all its fulness, scarcely
understandable by the English mind ; for which reason it often
appears to the English reader to be altogether irreconcilable with
common sense. It may be that "no metaphysical system has had
in it a principle of vitality ; none has succeeded in establishing
itself, because none deserved to succeed," according to Lewes.
In his opinion, with which many will agree, "philosophy itself,
in all its highest speculations, is but more or less ingenious playing
upon words. From Thales to Hegel verbal distinctions have
always formed the ground of philosophy, and must ever do so as
long as we are unable to penetrate the essence of things." Philo-
sophy has ever been a movement, but the " movement has been
circular." l The real value of the speculations in the metaphysical
sciences is to be found in the exercise of the mental faculties;
the danger is lest intellectual subtleties displayed in puzzling para-
doxes should, by degrees, lessen the moral sense.
HERDER, J. G., 1744-1803, endeavoured "to comprehend Chris-
tianity as the religion of humanity, man as the final development of
nature, and human history as progressive development into humanity."
He declares that the noblest aim of human life, and the one most
difficult to realise, is to learn from youth up what is one's duty, and
how in the easiest manner, and in every moment of life to perform
it as if it were not a duty.3 Herder was chiefly remarkable for the
animating influence he exerted on the minds of several of his
contemporaries.3 SCHLEGEL, F., 1722-1829, is the philosopher of
culture. He sees in art the true means of rising above the vulgar
and commonplace ; 4 he is the founder of literary history in the
higher sense.5 NOVALIS — /.*., F. Von ffardenberg, 1772-1802, was
like Herder and F. Schlegel, rather poetical and literary than
philosophic. He was devoted in theory to the Roman Catholic
1 Lewes, vol. xv. p. 613. * Ueberweg, vol. ii. p. 201.
3 Gostwick & Harrison, p. 240. « Ueberweg, vol. ii. p. 212.
* Gostwick & Harrison, p. 389.
2 R 2
612 From the Peaee of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
Church and mediaeval institutions. RICHTER, J. P. F., 1763-1825,
was distinguished by his hearty sympathy with life. He wrote
sixty-five volumes, which are distinguished by their moral tone.
HAMAN, J. G., 1730-1788, the friend of Kant, Herder, and Jacobi,
was called the Magus of the North. He took pleasure in holding
up for special honour the mysteries or pudenda of Christian faith,
illuminating them with flashes of thought, which, though original,
often degenerated into the far-fetched and fanciful.1 These five
popular writers belong more to General Literature than to Philosophy.
This is not the case with the following, who, whatever else they may
have been, are philosophers, and fit representatives of the varied
phases of German thought.
FICHTE, J. G., 1762-1814, has left a remark which is worth all
his philosophy : — " The philosophy that one chooses depends on the
kind of man one is." The problem which he attempts to solve is
the relation of object to subject. To solve this it was necessary to
penetrate the essence of things — to apprehend noumena. The Ego
was the necessary basis of his system. Consciousness, as alone cer-
tain, was the ground upon which absolute science must rest. It was
within him that he found, deep in the recesses of his soul, beneath
all understanding, superior to all logical knowledge, there lay a
faculty by which truth, absolute truth, might be known. The great
point which he endeavoured to establish is the identity of being
and thought, of existence and consciousness, of object and subject ;
and he established this by means of the Ego, considered as essenti-
ally an activity.3 Lewes remarks " That the opinions are not those
of ordinary thinkers, we admit. That they are repugnant to all
common sense we must also admit : that they are false we believe ;
but we also believe them to have been the laborious products of an
earnest mind, the consequences of admitted premises drawn with
singular audacity and subtlety.'' 3
SCHELLING, F. W. J., 1775-1854, was a pupil of Fichte, but his
Ego was not that of Fichte (the human soul) ; it was the Infinite,
the Absolute, the All (which Spinoza called substance), which
manifests itself in the form of Ego and non-Ego — as nature and
mind. Nature is spirit visible ; spirit is invisible nature ; the abso-
lute Ideal is at the same time the absolute Real. The souls of men
are but the innumerable individual eyes with which the Infinite
World-Spirit beholds Himself. The Absolute is God. He is the
1 Ueberweg, vol. ii. p. 201. * Lewes, abridged, pp. 576-579.
3 Idem, p. 576.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 613
All in All ; the eternal Source of all existence. He realises Himself
under one form as an Objectivity, and under a second form as a Sub-
jectivity. He becomes conscious of Himself in man; and this man,
under the highest form of his existence, manifests Reason ; and by
this reason God knows Himself. Such are the conclusions to
which Schelling's philosophy leads us. And now we ask, In what
does this philosophy differ from Spinozism ? l
JACOBI, F. H., 1743-1819, describes himself "a heathen in the
understanding, but a Christian in the Spirit." He rests all
philosophical knowledge on belief, which he describes as an instinct
of reason — a sort of knowledge produced by an immediate sensation
of the mind — a direct recognition, without proof, of the True and
Insensible : drawing at the same time a deep distinction between
such belief and that which is positive. The external world is
revealed to us by means of the senses ; but objects imperceptible to
the senses, such as the Deity, Providence, Free Will, Immortality,
and Morality, are revealed to us by an internal sense, the organ of
Truth, which assumes the title of Reason, as being the faculty
adapted for the apprehension of Truth.2
HERBART, J. F., 1776-1841, founded a philosophy on the basis
of Kant, but opposed to that of Fichte and Schelling. Philosophy
with him is "the elaboration of conceptions. ". . . . All ideas (repre-
sentations) endure even after the occasion which called them forth has
ceased .... When, at the same time, in the soul there are several
ideas which are either partially or totally opposed to each other, they
cannot continue to subsist together without being partially arrested,
i.e., become unconscious to a degree measured by the sum of the
intensities of all these ideas, with the exception of the strongest
.... on the intensitive relation of ideas, and on the laws of the
changes of these ideas, are founded the possibility and the scientific
necessity of applying mathematics to psychology The con-
ception of God — in defence of the validity of which Herbart
develops the teleological argument — gains in religious significancy
in proportion as it becomes more fully determined by ethical
predicates.3
HEGEL, W. F., 1770-1831, invented a New Method, the result
being always the same repugnant Idealism or Scepticism. Ac-
cepting as indisputable the identity of object and subject, he was
1 Lewes, abridged, p. 598.
2 Tennemann's " History of Philosophy," p. 458-
3 Ueberweg, vol. ii. p. 266.
6 14 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
forced also to accept the position that whatever was true of the
thought was true of the thing. Yet there is considerable differ-
ence between thinking of a hundred dollars and possessing them.
Non-existence — the Nothing — exists because it is a thought. Being
and non-Being are the same. Force is impotence ; light darkness,
and the contrary. These enigmas, which common sense rejects, are
the result of Hegel's identity of contraries, which he declares to be
the very condition of all existence. (In these views he had been
forestalled by Heraclitus and Empedocles.) The Absolute Idea
(God) is revealed in Nature and Spirit (mind), and thus becomes
the other of itself in nature, and returns from its otherness or self-
estrangement into itself in spirit. It is for the sake of developing,
by means of a strong disunion, a richer and deeper life and union,
that the free and absolute Idea represents itself in nature,
and returns to itself through the progressive development of
the mind. Hegel's logic requires prodigious effort of thought to
understand it, so difficult and ambiguous is the language, and so
obscure the meaning. But the boasted system of absolute Idealism
turns out to be only a play upon words as soon as it is dragged
from out the misty terminology in which it is enshrouded. Unlike
many of his fellow- philosophers, he always speaks of Christianity
with reverence, as " revealing Truth in the form in which it must
appear for all mankind." He speaks of a rejection of what he calls
the fundamental doctrines of Christianity on account of some asso-
ciated doubts and difficulties as foolish and pitiable.1 Another view
of the Hegelian philosophy is found in David Masson's " Recent
British Philosophy." "Hegel, the terrible Hegel .... whose
entire system no German soul even is believed to have yet fathomed
or got round : who himself said . . . . ' There is only one man liv-
ing that understands me ; and he doesn't.' What Hegel gave to the
world, as principally wanted, and as the foundation of all else, was
a new logic, or science of the necessary laws of Thought ; and
in this logic the foundation principle was the identity, the in-
separability in thought of the idea of Being, and the idea of
Nothing The universe is a thought, a beat, a pulse of the
Absolute mind. The apprehension of the logical law of this thought
constitutes our Metaphysic ; and, again, this Metaphysic reappears
as the logic of our own minds, and of each of their minute acts. In
the minutest act of our minds is the same secret logical, physical, meta-
physical, as in the entire universe." Mr. J. H. Sterling thinks
. ' Abridged from Lewes, pp. 600-613. Gostwick & Harrison, pp. 466-468.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 615
that " there have been three, and only three, all-comprehensive
philosophical minds in recent Europe — Hume, Kant, and Hegel." He
has published a work entitled " The Secret of Hegel," respecting
which the British public will say, " If this is Hegel in English,
he might as well have remained in German/'' Mr. Sterling's
translation of Hegel, and even some parts of his exposition of
" Hegel in his own words, may seem more Hegelian than Hegel
himself .... as presented by this book, Hegel's Philosophy, I
should say, will appear among us with such welcome as might be
given to an elephant, if, from the peculiar shape of the animal, one
were uncertain which end of him was his head."1
SCHOPENHAUER, A., 1788-1860, is the philosopher of pessimism.
The world (with him) is not the best, it is the worst of all possible
worlds. The fault is in the Will of man, which withstands reason
and right. His system supposes human nature to be as man would
have been apart from the influence of the Divine Spirit — " the Light
enlightening every man coming into the world" (John i. 9). He
does not see the possibility of this evil will being changed by divine
influence. BAADER, 1765-1841, "holds the doctrine of the fall of
man, and the consequent degradation of physical life. He maintains
that moral and physical evil are inseparably united, and sees in all
the evils of the material world the result of an insurrection against
divine authority." 2
HARTMANN, E. VON, is the founder of the Philosophy of the Un-
conscious. " The Unconscious is the name given by Hartmann to
the 'will in nature,' as described by Schopenhauer."3 "He
endeavours to show that phenomena of the whole universe of
brute matter, of vegetable and animal life, and of the human mind
.... are to be explained by the principle of the Unconscious — a
something which (though unconscious) is a combination of will (i.e.,
desire) and idea, the latter including unconscious volition and action.
The hypothesis of its existence he maintains, as the underlying cause
of all phenomena, forms the core of all great philosophies, — the
' substance ' of Spinoza, the ' absolute Ego ' of Fichte, the ' absolute
subject-object ' of Schelling, the ' absolute Idea ' of Plato, the ' Will '
of Schopenhauer, besides unmistakable analogies to it in the
thoughts of many others, European and Oriental. The ' Uncon-
scious ' is, of course, psychical, possessing the positive attributes of
1 " Recent British Philosophy," by David Masson, third edition, crown 8vo.
1877, PP. 177-179. 2 Ibid'» P- 484-
3 Gostwick & Harrison, p. 488.
616 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
1 willing and representing.' // is one and universal, having for its
purpose the formation, reparation, and preservation of all things ac-
cording to their type ; and, when it gets to the higher grades of
organic life, the raising-up of consciousness, which requires the for-
mation of the higher nervous centres or true brain, when conscious
individuality conies into being. The Unconscious never is morbid,
never errs, unless, in the case of conscious beings, it is misled
through erroneous presentations by the conscious intellect
The Hartmann philosophy is thus a species of Pantheism ; its tone,
toto coslo, removed from the lowest phase of materialistic thought of
the day, which contents itself with mere sequence of phenomena,,
or, at the best, with the causality of blind forces .... the real
strength of this system lies in its unhesitating recognition of the
purposeful nature of all things, and of that great principle that force
really means will .... so far the philosophy of Von Hartmann is
Theistic, or at least ^//«j/-Theistic .... of course, in its utter
ignoring of all grounds of hope beyond the death of the body, and
of personality in a future life, Von Hartmann is pessimist indeed." 1
BENEKE, 1798-1854, on the basis of the English and Scotch philoso-
phy, developed a system resting exclusively on internal experience.
But of philosophical systems in Germany we may say their name is
legion. What we have given is a fair sample of intellectual labour
without profit — the gyrations of a squirrel in its cage, motion with-
out progress. Materialism is rife in Germany, but not without
opposition. A specimen of the teaching of this school is found in
Karl Vogt, whose teaching is that " the brain secretes thought just
as the liver secretes bile," and in Moleschott, whose axiom is that
" no thought is possible without phosphorus." Fichte (the younger),
Ulrici, Fechner, Kirchmann, with LOTZE, are the able opponents of
this school. It is impossible to attempt to do justice to the views of
this profound teacher, who has pointed out the boundaries of actual
knowledge and the essential conditions of human thought. " The
final conception in which Lotze's speculation culminates is that of a
personal Deity. Nothing is real but the living Spirit of God, and
the world of living spirits He has created. The things of this
world have only reality in so far as they are the appearance of spiritual
substance, which underlies everything. That only beings who have
mental life have independent existence ; and that things without
mental life, or the material things outside of us, exist in virtue of the
universal substance, and are only manifestations of its activity, are
1 Spectator, August 23, 1884.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 617
the main metaphysical conclusions of Lotze. Other results are given
by a friendly reviewer in the Spectator, September 13 :— "We know,
for example, that he regards self-consciousness as being fully true in
all the fulness of meaning of that word, only of the Infinite. We know
that with him the absolute is not a vague, blank form, or an
abstraction, but a living word, which becomes more vital and full of
meaning as our experience widens. The supreme source, substance,
and goal of things is not an ' Unknowable,' but is replete with moral
attributes, and is the perfect realisation of the true, the beautiful, and
the good. Lotze's work needs and will repay repeated perusal, for
its metaphysical and speculative worth ; but even more because of
the value it sets on personal life, and the worth it attaches to creation,
and the significance it gives to the moral and spiritual elements of
the universe. Above all, we find here philosophy in close contact
with life, not dealing with abstractions, nor employed with phrases
which have lost or never had a meaning. He brings philosophy
into immediate relation with the common interests of man, and
brings into its service the science, the poetry, and the general culture
of humanity."
THEOLOGY. — Few works of practical theology come to England
from Germany. Krummacher'!s Elijah and Elisha, and Sticrs1 Words
of Jesus are exceptions. But there is a large supply of works,
critical and exegetical, which are translated and circulated. The
spread of Rationalism in the Churches, through the old Rationalistic
literature of the past and present century, by Baur and the Tubingen
school, and more especially by Strauss, has called forth the writings
of Neander, Hengstenberg, Tholuck, and others. Among the
Roman Catholics Mohler, Hettinger, and Sepp have ably defended
Christian truth. The exegetical and controversial literature is most
voluminous, but it belongs rather to Biblical criticism and theology
than to literary history. The semi-Rationalistic theology of Germany
has to some extent helped to emasculate our English devotional
poetry. The grand German hymns found in the Wesleyan hymn-
book and in other collections, are weakened in certain popular
lyrical poems, in which vague theosophy finds no room for the great
fundamental doctrine of the propitiatory Atonement, or for the
necessity of the exercise of heart repentance towards God, or for
the privilege of heart trust in Christ. In these lyrics there is no
formal opposition to evangelical truth, it is simply lost in an ocean
of indefinite phraseology. They are popular where religion is re-
garded mainly as one of the decencies and proprieties of fashionable
life, while it is not recognised as a power or a stay.
618 From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884.
GENERAL LITERATURE. — Fiction: Writers in these departments
abound, but they are little known beyond Germany. The manu-
facture of light reading, calculated to amuse, is so prolific in England
and France that this class of German literature is not in demand
in either country. Auerbach is the most popular of this class of
writers.
ITALIAN LITERATURE FROM 1815-1884. — Historical: Count
Troya, Cesare Balbo, Carlo Botta, Cusco, Louigi Bossi, Farina, Cas-
tellani, Ugoni, Pirou, Lombardi, Micali, Cardinal Mai (the five
last antiquarians), Cantu, Micali, Mazzoldi, Lamperdi, Berchetti,
Sacchi, Farini, Rossi, Denina, P. Verri, Gregorio, P. Verrari.
POLITICAL WRITERS. — Giacomo Leopardi (poet), Gioberti (a cleric,
poet, and bibliographer, and once prime minister), Count Cavour,
Azeglio, Mazzini, Minghetti (statesman and philosopher), Mario,
Lanza.
JURISTS. — Romagnori (philosopher), Sclopis, Medici (soldier and
politician).
POLITICAL ECONOMY. — A. Rossi, Ortes, Valeriani, Count Pecchio.
HIEROGLYPHICS. — Marquis Spineto.
GENERAL LITERATURE. — Ugo Foscolo, Vincent Monti, A. Man-
zoni, Silvio Pellico, Lambruschini, Guerazzi, Azeglio, Niccolini.
PHILOSOPHY. — Gioja, Galuppi, Rosmini, Perbalozza, Tommaseo,
G. Cavour (brother of Count Cavour), Bonghi, Raynezi, Minghetti
(statesman), Berti, Vera, Ventura, and Libertore are scholastic
philosophers,
POETS. — Parini, Giusti, Rossetti, Mammiani, Caetani, and others.
SCULPTURE. — Monti, Dupre.
Music. — Rossini.
PAINTERS. — Rossetti (poet).
SCIENCE. — Piazzi, Schieperelli (astronomy), Avogadro (chemistry),
Melloni (heat), Galvani, Volta (electricity), Nageli (botany).
HOLLAND : LITERATURE FROM 1815-1884. — D. J. Von Lennep
(poet and philologist), Jacob Von Lennep (poet and novelist), Dekker
(author of Max-Havilar), Ledegavek (Flemish poet), H. Conscience
(novelist), Perponder, Vander Palm, Lorsjee, Bogaers, Staring, and
Vosmeer (general literature), Dozy (Orientalist).
DENMARK : LITERATURE FROM 1815-1884. — Oersted (science),
Martensen (theology), J. E. Moe (literature), Hans Andersen.
SWEDEN: LITERATURE FROM 1815-1884. — Berzelius (science),
Fryxell, Geijer, Otto (historians), Tegner (poet), . Miss Bremer
(novelist). The passage north-east to Behring's Straits was accom-
plished 1878, 1879, in the Vega, by Captain Nordenskjold.
From the Peace of Paris, 1815, to 1884. 619
RUSSIAN LITERATURE FROM 1815-1884. — Karl Von Baer
(anatomy), Poushkin, Lermantoff, Nekrasoff (poetry), Gogol (Tales
of Russian Life), Count Krasinski (Pole), (historian), Gerbel (poet),
Skobeloff (soldier), Gortchakoff (statesman), Basil Bajanoff (trans-
lator of the Bible into Russian), Turguenieff (whose writings in-
fluenced Alexander II. to emancipate the serfs), Krashevsky (Pole),
poet. The most satisfactory account of Dutch, Spanish, Hungarian,
Bohemian, Servian, Polish, and Russian poetry will be found in
Sir John Bowring's "Anthologies," published in nine small 241110.
volumes (1821-1834).
SWITZERLAND : LITERATURE FROM 1815-1884.' — Vinet (theology),
Keim, Badomer (Biblical criticism), Pictet (chemistry), Agassiz
(ichthyology), De Saussure (natural science), Pestalozzi (education),
Zimmermann (essayist), Escher (St. Gothard Railway), P. Merian
(science).
NETHERLANDS, BELGIUM. — Geets (sculptor), Cardinal Deschamps
(theologian).
SPAIN.— Martinez de la Rosa, Hartzenbush, Principe (drama),
Zorilla, Quiroja. Garcia, Tassaco (poets), Lasso, Mesonero (satire),
Toreno (history), Moracas, Salamanca (politicians), Moratin (the
Spanish Moliere), Quintana (poet).
The account here attempted to be given of the literature of
Europe from 1815-1884 is, as stated in page 592, necessarily con-
fined to a selection of the leading authors, and even in this respect
is very imperfect. It would require a large addition to a work
already too bulky to give a full list of the literary celebrities of the
age. What is here given must be regarded as mere specimens or
samples of the intellectual leaders of our age.
INDEX,
ABELARD, Peter (Philosophy), 278
Abraham, the Patriarch, 32
Abyssinia, 132, 453, 558, 573
"Acta Diurna," the Roman daily
journal, 165
Addingtcn, Lord Sidmouth, English
minister, 506, 531
Addison, essayist and politician and
poet, 442
yEneas Sylvius (Pius II. ), Piccolomini,
3i6
Agrarian laws, Roman history, m-
"5
Akkadians, Chaldea, 20
Akkadians, their connexion with China,
21, 45, 49
Alaric, the Gothic conqueror, 169-171
Alberoni, Cardinal, Spanish minister,
403
Albertus Magnus, the encyclopaedia of
the Middle Ages, 277
Albigenses, a sect opposed to Rome,
260, 271, 275
Alexander the Great, conqueror of
Persia, 91-93
Alexander I., Emperor of Russia, 499,
502, 503, 509
Alfred the Great, King of England, 233
Algiers, 237, 247, 282, 324, 365, 391,
453, 573
Alphabet, origin of the, 29
America, discovery of, by the North-
men, 234
America, discovery of, by Columbus,
302-304, 324
America, European colonies in, 366,
4 368,392, 5H,558, 574
Annam, empire of, 565
Anselm, Archbishop, "Cur Deus
Homo ? " 243, 244
Antiquarian historians of Greece and
Rome, 36. 37, 65, 66
Antonines, the, Emperors of Rome, 137
Antony, Marc (Rome), 122, 123
Apostolic Church, the Holy (Irvinsr-
ites), 588
Apostolical succession, claim to. £70,
58o, 587
Aquinas, St. Thomas, the Romish
theologian, 277
Arabia, 42, 51, 187, 247, 391, 452, 521
Archangel, Russia, first discovered by
the English, 358
Argentine Confederation, 575
Argonauts, the, Grecian history, 38
Ariosto, Italian poet, 320
Aristotle, Greek philosopher, 98
Arminians, the, a Protestant sect op-
posed to Calvinism, 377
Arnold of Brescia, Italian reformer,
259
Arnold, Dr. Thomas, historian and
divine, 66, 108, 121
Arthur, William, theologian and his-
torian, 590
Aryan races, 1 1, 12
Asia Minor, 23, 131
Asmoneans (Maccabees), 128
Assyria, 21, 23, 50, 52, 54
Assyriologists, 17
Astrachan, first collision of Russia and
Turkey, 343, 358
Athanasius, the great controversial
theologian against Arianism, 163
Athens, 62, 63, 83, 85, 87
Attila, the Huns, 172, 173
Augustus, Octavius, first Roman em-
peror, 122-125
Augustine, St., Hippo (City of God),
206
Auricular Confession, 275
Australia, 366, 367, 511, 523, 549, 574
Australia, gold discovery in, 541, 549
Austria, 291, 296, 297, 400, 403, 404,
451
Austria, emperors of, 501, 525-529,
545. 548, 553, 556, 557, 562, 569
Avars, the, 193, 197
Avignon, the seat of the papacy, 315
BABER, Shah, Mogul conqueror of
India, 313
622
Introduction to the Study of History,
Babylon, Babylonia, 19, 23, 50, 55, 57,
59. 60
Babylonian captivity of the Jews, 58
Bacon, Friar, philosopher, 276
Bacon, Lord, the English philosopher,
382, 388
Bactria, 43, 101, 102, 128
Bagdad, the Khalifat of, 189, 209, 264
Balboa, Isthmus of Darien, 366
Bampton Lectures, 436
Banda Oriental, 575
Banking-houses in Italy, 305
Baptists, the, 379, 433, 513, 585, 599
Baptists, first advocates of toleration,
379
Barbarians outside the Roman empire,
151, 175, 182, 183
Barbarossa (Algiers) pirates, 343
Barbarossa, Emperor of Germany, 268
Barbour, Scotch poet, omitted, 321
Baronius, Cardinal, the ecclesiastical
historian, 387
Barrow, Isaac, divine and mathe-
matician, 384
Bartholomew, St., day, 337
Basil, the Macedonian, 236
Basle, council of, 315
Basques, the, 42
Batavian Republic, 496
Baxter, Richard ("The Saints' Rest"),
384
Bayle, Peter, " Philosophical Dic-
tionary," 386
Beccaria, legislator, 447
Belgium, kingdom of, 537, 569, 619
Bellarmin, Cardinal, the controver-
sialist, 387
Benedict, St., of Aniane, monastic in-
stitution, 204
Benedict, St., of Nursia, monastic in-
stitution, 204
Benedictines, the, clergy, 244
Benedictines of St. Maur, their lite-
rary labours, 385
Bentley, the critic, 437, 440
Berbers, the, 12, 36, 42, 51, 77, 100,
132
Berlin, treaty of, 562, 565
Bernadotte, King of Sweden, 509
Bernard, St., of Clairvaux, 250, 275
Biarmeland, 197, 235
Bible Society, 512
Black Death, the 285, 289, 308
Boccacio, Italian novelist, 319
Boece, Hector, Scotch historian,
omitted, 321
Boetius, the philosopher, 206
Bogue, Dr., Independent minister, 523
Bohemia, 197, 234, 245, 270, 323, 347,
390
Boileau, French poet and critic, 385
Bolivia, 575
Bombay, the first English possession in
India, 367
Boniface, St. Winfred (Germany), 201
Boniface VIII., Pope, 285, 314, 315
Borgia, Pope Alexander VI., 316
Bossuet, the controversialist, 374, 375,
385
Boyle lectures, 436
Brahminism, 44, 69
Brandenburg purchased by the Hohen-
zollerns (the beginning of Prussia),
358
Brazil, 324, 534, 536, 575
Brick tablets of Chaldea and Assyria, 21
Britain, 49, 99, 131, 177
Britain, Great — England and Scotland
united under James I., 339
Broad Church, the, 579
Brownists, the, 378
Buccaneers, the, 368
Buddhism, 69, 96, 128, 151
Buenos Ayres, 575
Buffon, French naturalist, 446
Bulgaria — the first kingdom, 197; the
second, 274, 282
Bulgaria in 1878, 562, 570
Bunsen, Baron, Egyptologist, historian,
&c., 2, 4, 14, 32
Bunyan, John (" Pilgrim's Progress "),
38o
Buonaparte (See Napoleon Buona-
parte.)
Burgundians in Gaul, 176
Burgundy, dukedom of, 286, 287
Burke, Edmund ("Reflections on the
French Revolution "), 473, 488, 509,
5"
Burns, Robert, the Scotch poet, 443,
444
Busher, Leonard, the advocate of
toleration, 379
Butler, Bishop ("Analogy of Natural
and Revealed Religion "), 437, 442
Buxtorffs, the, Hebraists of the
seventeenth century, 387
Byzantine emperors, the Eastern Greek
empire
CADMUS brings the alphabet to Greece,
Galas family, case of the, 43 1
California goldfields, 541
Calvin, John, the reformer, 365
Cambray, League of, 311
Camoens ("The Lusiads"), 387
Canada (see Dominion), 341, 368, 392
Canning, George, 507, 531, 536
Canon, the Jewish, 71
Index.
623
Cape of Good Hope, discovery of the,
5", 573
Capet, Hugh, 227
Carey, Dr., 513
Carnot, military engineer, 486, 488,
491, 492
Carraras of Padua, 311
Carthage Republic, 51, 64, 67, 77, 86,
93, 100, 108
Carthage, the new city, 132
Casaubon, the scholar, 386
Caesar, Julius, 118, 121, 122
Caste, 43, 44
Catherine II. of Russia, 408, 409, 427,
428
Catholic Church suppressed in Paris,
483; re-established by Napoleon
Buonaparte, 497
Cecil, Richard, 512
Central Africa (Congo), 573
Cervantes ("Don Quixote"), 387
Chaldea, 19
Chalons, battle of, defeat of Attila, 191
Chambers' Encyclopaedia (1729), 444
Champollion, hieroglyphics, 14
Charlemagne (Karl der Grosse),
supposed grant to the papacy, 201
Charles Martel repelled the Saracens,
190
Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy,
286
Charles V. of Germany and I. of Spain,
287, 291, 292, 325-328
Charles XII. of Sweden, the Madman,
402
Chaucer, early English poet, 320
Chili, 536, 575
China, 21, 45, 51, 68, 69, 76, 96, 100,
128, 132, 151, 198, 209, 237, 247,
275. 313, 365, 39i> 429, 5io, 54i,
553, 568, 572
Cholera in Europe (1830-1832), 537
Christianity adopted by Constantine,
141, 142
Christian Knowledge, Society for Pro-
moting, 435
Chronology, I, 3, 32
Chrysostom, St., the preacher, 207
Churches, Protestant, 375-380, 432-
435,437,442,511-514
Churches, Romish, at the Reformation,
373
Cicero, the orator, 122
Cid, the Spanish hero, 320
Cisalpine Republic, 489
Claytons, the, 513
Cleopatra, 1 20, 123
Clovis, King of the Franks, 176, 191
Clubs in Paris and France in Revolu-
tion, 466, 471, 482, 485
Code Napoleon, 496, 497
Coinage, the first, 29
Colenzo, Dr., 583
Columban, St., 201
Columbia, 536, 575
Columbus, discoverer of America, 302,
303
Commerce, 28, 29, 59, 60, 153
Conder, E. R. and C. R., 32
Confederation of the Rhine under
Napoleon, 498
Confucius, the Chinese philosopher, 69
Congregational lectures, 585
Congregational Union, 585
Constance, Council of, 290, 315
Constantine the Great, the first Chris-
tian emperor, 141-143, 157
Constantinople taken by the Turks,
294, 295
Convocation revived, 584
Cook, Captain James, circumnavigator,
417
Cordova, Khalifat of, 208, 233
Corn Laws, repeal of, 538
Corneille, 385
Cortez, conqueror of Mexico, 366
Corsairs (Barbary) enter the Atlantic,
324
Council, first general (325 A.D.), 161
Council, second general (380 A.D.), 161
Council, third general (421 A.D.), 202
Council, fourth general (451 A.D.), 202
Council, fifth general (553 A.D.), 202
Council, sixth general (680 A.D. ), 202
Council, seventh general (787 A.D. ), 203
Council of Trent, 372
Couperie, Terrien de la, 21, 45
Cowper, William, the poet, 443
Crescentius, the Roman tribune, 230
Crimean War, 550-552
Croatia, Croats, 197, 232, 246
Cromwell, Oliver, 340
Crusades, the, 248-254
Crusades against the Albigenses, 261
Ctesias, 21
Cudworth, the divine, 389
Culdees, 202
Cuneiform characters, 14
Curtius, the Greek historian, 36, 37
Cushites, n
Cyrus, King of Persia, 60, 79
Cyrus the Younger, 87
DANIEL, the prophet, 58
Dante, the great Italian poet, 310, 319
Danton, the revolutionary leader, 477,
478, 479, 483
David, King of Israel, 33
Decretals, the, 239, 240
De Foe (" Robinson Crusoe"), 442
624
Introduction to the Study of History.
D'Este in Ferrara, 311
Delphin classics, the, 386
Demosthenes, the Greek orator, 91,
102
Democracy (the Demos), 62, 82, 83
Denmark, 207, 234, 245, 266, 308, 359,
368, 402, 422, 423, 447, 499, 519,
525, 540, 548, 556, 571, 618
De Rouge, chronologist, 14
Descartes, 388
Diaz, Bartholomew, passed the Cape of
Good Hope, 302
Dioclesian, the Roman emperor, 140
Directory, the, revolutionary Govern-
ment of France, 486
Dispersion of the Jews, 58
Dispersion of the human race, 10
Dobrudscha, 562
Doddridge, the divine, 442
Dominion, the (Canada, &c.), 558, 574
Dordt, synod of, to condemn the Ar-
minians, 377
Douglas, Gavin, poet, Scotland (omit-
ted), 321
Draco, the Athenian legislator, 62
Dravidian races, 43
Dryden, John, the poet, 384
Dupin, the ecclesiastical historian,
446
EASTERN EMPIRE, THE, Greek, By.
zantine, 184-187, 195, 196, 208, 235,
246, 251, 274, 282, 293, 312
East India Company, English, 367
Eastern plains of Europe, 75, 99, 219,
234, 245, 246
Eccelino da Romano, Verona, 311
Ecclesiastical history, 154, 198, 238,
275, 3H, 370, 430, 5"
Education, 513, 565, 587, 588
Egypt, 23, 51, 52, 54, 55, 57, 77, 100,
101, 132, 237, 247, 275, 282, 324,
452, 490, 522, 538, 563, 564, 573
Egyptologists, 14, 17
Eighteenth century — its importance,
422, 439
Elani, Persia, 50, 79
Elizabeth, Queen of England, 339
Elzevirs, the famous editors of the
classics, 386
Emancipation of slaves in English
. Colonies, 1833-4, 537
Emancipation of slaves in United
States, 555
Emancipation of serfs in Russia, 554
Encyclical, the, 590
Encyclopaedia, French, 447
England, 177, 208, 233, 245, 267, 284,
330, 338, 353, 367, 377, 382, 395,
399, 403, 406, 413, 416, 426, 439,
505, 515, 526, 530, 537, 549, 552,
554, 557, 565
ENGLAND, the Established Church of,
377,432, 5.1 1» 577, 597
English invasions of France, 284
Epaminondas, the Theban warrior, 88
Epictetus, the great moral teacher of
Rome, 1 66
Epicureans, the, a philosophical sect,
98, 130
Episcopacy, 163
" Epistolse Obscurorum Virorum," a
German satire, 321
Equador, 575
Erasmus, the literary reformer in the
sixteenth century, 386
Erigena, John Scotus, the philosopher,
243
Essays and reviews, the, 583
Ethiopia, 51, 55, 77, 100, 132
Etruscans, 40, 41
Evangelicals, the, 417,435, 511, 512,
577, 58i
Ezra, the reformer of Judaism, 89
FENELON, "Telemaque," 374, 385,
386
Ferdinand and Isabella, 287, 303
Fernley lecture, 586
Feudal system, 218
Fine Arts in Greece, 96
Firearms used by Moguls, 262
Florence, 311, 322
Fleury, Cardinal, French Minister,
France, 226, 246, 258, 261, 271, 285,
322, 325, 330, 337, 353, 367, 385,
396, 400, 403-407, 413, 420, 445,
451 ; Revolution, 454-464, 465-485 ;
the Consulate, 494, 495 ; the Em-
pire, 497-504 ; Bourbons, 405, 517;
526, 541, 553, 554, 557 ; Republic,
540; Empire, 543, 559, 564; Re-
public, 567, 605
Francis I., King of France, the rival of
Charles V., 325, 328
Franks, the, in North-East Gaul,
176 ; the Emperor Karl der Grosse,
190-195; decline, 216; ravages of
Normans, Huns, and Saracens, 223
Frederick I. (Barbarossa), Emperor,
268
Frederick II., emperor, 268
Frederick III., King of Denmark, made
absolute by the people, 360
Frederick the Elector Palatine and
King of Bohemia, 347
Frederick the Great of Prussia, 405-
408
Index.
62 :
Freeman, E. A., 37 ; vindicator of the
Eastern Empire, 185, 186
GALLA PLACIDIA, 171, 172
Galilean Church— its liberties affirmed,
374
Gaul, 49, 75,99, no, 176, 208
Gauls, the, 40, 41 ; destroying Rome,
,94
Geneva, the refuge of Protestantism in
the sixteenth century, 365
Genoa, 273-274, 310, 311, 322, 365,
427, 451
Genseric, King of the Vandals, 174
German Confederation, 525, 537, 545,
„ 549, 556
Germany, ancient, 75, 99, 208
Germany, North, support of Prussia,
557
Germany, the Empire, 227, 246, 264,
267, 288, 325, 328, 341, 345, 353,
375-377, 386, 389, 414, 417, 423,
448, 498, 501, 503, 519, 533, 545-
548, 559, 56o, 561, 568, 609
Germany, the New Empire, 560, 561,
568, 569
Ghengis Khan, the Mogul Emperor,
261, 265
Ghibellines, the Imperial parly in Italy
opposed to the Pope, 268
Ghizni, Mahmoud of, 237
Gibraltar taken by England, 400
Girondists, party of, in the Revolution
of France, 474, 476, 477, 479, 480,
482
Gladstone, 37
Gnosticism, 160
Goddess of Reason, the, 483
Gold in California and Australia, 541,
549
Golden Bull, the, 289
Goldsmith, Oliver, poet and essayist,
443
Gonzangas, the, at Mantua, 311
Goodwin, John, the Arminian, 380
Goths, 152, 169, 171, 172
Gracchi, the, 112, 113, 114
Greece, 36, 37, 51, 60, 71, 76, 81, 90,
100, 102, 103, 109, no
Greece, modern kingdom, 428, 534,
54i, 559, 562, 570
Greek and Latin Churches— schism,
239
Greek and Persian Wars, 81, 82, 85
Greek Colonies, 29, 63
Greek Emperor at Nice, 251, 274, 293
Greek Empire at Trebizond, 251, 293
Greek games, 61
age cultivated
Greek literature and language ct
in Italy and the West,
319
Greeks, cruelty of the ancient, 87
Greeks, learned, go to Italy, 319
Gregory VII. (Pope Hildebrand),
Gregory the Great, 200
Grotefend, cuneiform inscriptions, 14
Grotius, the scholar and legist, 386
Guelphs opposed to the emperors in
Italy, 268
Guicciardini, the Italian historian, 387
Guises, the, heads of the Catholic party
in France, 337
Gunpowder and firearms used in Eu-
rope, 300
Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden,
leader of the Protestant party in the
Thirty Years' War in Germany, 348,
349
HADRIAN, the Emperor, 137
Hales' chronology, 2, 32
Halyburton, Thomas, 385
Hannibal, the Carthaginian general,
105, 107
Hanno, the Carthaginian explorer,
67- 70
Hanseatic League, 258, 305, 314
Hardenberg, the Prussian legislator,
508
Hawaii (Owhyhee), 574
Heeren, the historian, 14
Hellenic races, II, 36
Helvetic Republic, 489 ; League, 496
Henry IV., King of France, 330, 337
Henry VIII., England, 327, 330, 339
Henry, Matthew, the commentator,
385
Henry, Prince, of Portugal (his mari-
time discoveries) 301
Henry the IV. Emperor, opposed to
the papacy, 231
Henry the Fowler, Emperor of Ger-
many, 228
Heraclidse, return of the, 38
Heresy, first execution, 164
Herod the Great (Judea), 128
Herodotus, the Greek historian, 22, 96
Hieroglyphics, 13
High Church party, the, 377, 432,
433, 512, 580
Hildebrand, Gregory VII., Pope, 232,
241
Hobbes, the English philosopher, 437
Hohenstaufen, the, emperors, 261,
267, 268, 270
Holbein, Hans, painter, 388
Holland, kingdom of, 537, 569, 618
Holland, the Seven United Provinces,
334. 340, 353, 354, 361, 3^7, 377,
386, 400, 403, 407, 425, 447, 452,
488, 509, 520
2 S
626
Introduction to the Study of History.
Homer, Greek poet, "Iliad" and
"Odyssey," 71
Hooker, "Ecclesiastical Polity," 380,
383
Huguenots, the French Protestants, 338
Hungarian inroads in Europe, 225
Hungary, 234, 245, 264, 270, 323,
T34L 388, 389, 406
Huns, the, 152, 153, 173
Huss, John, 317
Hutton, Ulric Von, 321
Hyksos, Shepherd Kings of Egypt,
23, 24
IBERIANS, 42
Iconoclastic customs, 195, 238
Idumeans, 42
Igours (Issedones), 198
Immaculate Conception, the, 590
Independents, the, 179, 380, 433, 51},
584, 585, 598
India, 42, 51, 68, 76, 92, 95, 100,
128, 132, 151, 1 68, 198, 209, 237,
247, 274, 282, 313, 365, 367, 391,
429, 454, 510, 541, 552, 553, 565,
571
India, passage to, by the Cape of Good
Hope, 301
Infallibility of the Pope decreed, 591
Innocent III., Pope, 260
Inquisition, 260
International Exhibition (the first in
London) 1851), 549
Investitures, contest respecting, between
Pope and Empire, 254, 257
Iran, Persia, 51
Ireland, 208, 234, 245, 267, 340, 506,
565, 566
Israelites, 23, 31, 50, 52, 54; their
captivity by the Assyrians, 55
Italian Republics, 181, 232, 246, 272,
310, 311, 365
Italic races, II, 36
Italy, 231, 246, 272, 292, 310, 364,
387, 419, 427, 447, 454. 489, 5°8,
518, 526, 532, 541, 545, 549, 552,
553, 569, 618
Italy, Ancient, 40, 49, 65, 75, 95, 100
Italy before Charlemagne, 179,208
JACOB entered Egypt, 32
Jacobin clubs, French Revolution, 471,
479, 485
Jacquerie in France, 285
Jains, 69
Jansenists, 374, 430
Japan, 26, 100, 129, 132, 168, 237,
247, 275, 282, 314, 366, 391, 430,
452, 5io, 572
lapetan races (Indo-European), II
[erome of Prague, 317
[erome St. (Latin Vulgate), 171, 205
'erusalem destroyed by Titus, 136
Jesuits, 372, 420, 430
Jews return from captivity, 89, 127,
128
Johnson, Dr. Samuel, the lexico-
grapher, 442
Jomsburg, the pirate city of the Baltic,
245, 266
Joseph II., Austria, the reformer, 417,
418
Josephus, Jewish historian, 90
Jubilee, the first, at Rome by Boniface
VIII., 1300 A.D., 314
Judea and Israel separate kingdoms,
52
Judea, kingdom of, destroyed by
Babylon (the Captivity), 58
Jugurtha, the Numidian, no
Julian the Apostate, the Roman em-
peror, 143
Justinian, the Great, Emperor of the
East, legislator, 186
KANT, Ivnmanuel, the metaphysician,
449
Karl der Grosse, Charlemagne, 192-
195, 210, 212, 213, 217
Keltic races, Mommsen's opinion of,
ir, 12, 36, no
Khalifat, Damascus-Bagdad, 189 ;
supports literature, 244, 278
Khalifat transferred to Ottoman Turks,
310
Khazars, the, 197
Khita, Hittites, 22, 23, 27, 55, 60
Kimmerians, 55
Kipshack, Mogul Khan of, 264-271,
295, 312
Klopstock, German poet, 448
Knights of St. John, 365, 451, 497
Knights Templars, 251, 261, 285
Knights Teutonic, 261, 271, 309
Knox, John, the Scotch reformer, 330
Korea, 573
LAFAYETTT, French Revolution, 475,
476, 533
Landgrave of Hesse a polygamist,
weakness of Luther and Melancthon,
333
Lanfranc, Archbishop, 242
Language, 12
La Plata, 536
Lardner, ecclesiastical history, 442
Las Casas, a benevolent bishop in
Mexico, 367
Indev.
627
Lateran Council, Investiture Contro-
versy settled, 256
Latifundia, 112, 145
Latin Empire of Constantinople, 251,
274
Latins, 40
Layard, 14
Leibnitz, philosopher, 389
Lelancl, deistical controversy, 442
Leo I., the Great, Pope, the treatise on
the Incarnation, 173, 199, 206
LeoX., the Pope of the Renaissance,
317
Leopold I., of Tuscany, the reformer,
419
Lepanto, battle of, 344
Lepsius, Egyptology, 14
Lessing, the reviver of German litera-
ture, 448
Lewis, Sir G. C., archaeologist, states-
man, 37
Liberation Society, 586
Liberia, Black Republic in West Africa,
573
Libyans, 25, 51
Liguria, 40, 42
. Linnaeus, the botanist, 447
Literature, 21, 23, 26, 34, 47-49, 56,
63, 70, 7i, 96, 129, 130, 165, 167,
205-207, 242-244, 276-281, 296,
319-322, 381, 439-45°, 5H-520,
592-619
Lithuania, 197, 235, 245, 271, 309
Lithuanians, 12, 40
Liverpool, Lord, 507
Livonia, 270
Locke, John, philosopher, 389, 444
Lollards in England, 317
Lombards, 181, 192
Lotze, philosopher, 615
Louis, St., IX., 258, 271
Louis XL, the cralty tyrant, 286
Louis XIV., the Great, 353, 400
Louis XVI., 460, 472, 475-479,480,
481
Louis XVII I., 504, 512
Louis Philippe (Orleans family), 533,
539
Louis Napoleon III., 539, 543-544,
559
Louis the Pious, forged charters of,
discovered by Otho III., 232
Luther, Martin, THE REFORMER, 329,
370
Lycurgus, Spartan legislator, 61
Lydia, 28, 57
Lyric poetry in Greece, 96
MACCABEUS, the Asmonean patriot of
Judea, 128
Macedonia, 60, 89, 101, 102, 109, no
Madagascar, 564, 568, 574
Magdeburg centuriators, 448
Magellan, first navigation by these
straits to Japan and China, 304
Magi, 69
Magna Charta, 267
Magnetic needle, 280
Magyars in Hungary, 197
Maha Barata, Indian poem, 68
Mahaffy, Greek literature and history,
39, 108
Mahdi, the, 573
Mahomet Ali, Pacha of Egypt, 570
Mahomet the Prophet, 187-190 (sec
Saracens).
Mahrattas, Indian race, 365, 429, 521
Maimonides, Jewish philosopher, 278
Malebranche, French philosopher, 388
Malta, 365, 451, 497
Mamelukes, Egyptian soldiers, 275.
282, 324, 452, 490, 522
Manetho, Egyptian chronology, 3
Manu, Code of India, 68
Marathon, 82
Marcus Aurelius, the philosophic em-
peror, 137, 138
Margaret, the Union of Calmar, 308
Maria Theresa, Austria, 404, 406, 409
Mariette Bey, Egyptologist, 14
Mariner's compass, 300
Marino Faliero, the Doge of Venice-.
312
Maritime discovery, 301 ; begun in
Portugal, 366, 367, 440
Marius and Sylla, 116-118
Maryborough, Duke of, 399
Martin V., Pope, 315
Mary, Bloody, of England, 339
Mary, Queen of Scots, 339
Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 337
Maurice, theologian, 582
Max-Duncker, German historian, 36
Maximilian, Emperor of Germany, 291
Mazarin, Cardinal, French minister.
338
Medes and Persians, 57, 60, 76
Media, 50, 55, 57
Medici of Florence, 311, 319
Mendicants, orders of, 261, 275, 276
Meroe, Ethiopia, 51, 77
Methodism, 417, 437, 5J3> 585» 586-
599
Mexico, 324, 534, 53<5, 555, 575
Michael Angelo, the sculptor, &c., 387
Milton, John, the great English poet,
179, 384
Mirabeau, the French Revolutionary
statesman, 465, 468, 471
Missions and Missionary Societies, 438
2 S 2
628
Introduction to the Study of History.
Mitford, Greek historian, 36, 37
Mithridates of Pontus, 1 10
Mizraim, 1 1
Moldavia (Roumania), 535
Moliere, dramatic poet, 385
Monastic institutions, 162, 204, 239
Money first coined, 29
Mongul (Mogul) Tartars (Ghengis
Khan), 261, 275, 284
Monguls restrain Russia two and a
half centuries, 264
Monguls (Tartars), irruption upon
Southern Asia and Eastern Europe,
under Ghengis Khan, 261-265
Monguls, second irruption under Tamer-
lane, 312
Monguls in India, 313, 365, 521
Montaigne, French essayist, 385
Montenegro, 451, 561, 570
Montesquieu, French philosopher, 446
Moors in Spain, subject to Spain, 189,
190* 233, 281, 287
Moors expelled from Spain, 335
Moral condition of Europe end of
eighteenth century, 413, 416
Moravia, 197, 245
Mormonisrn, 589
Morocco, 237, 247, 282, 324, 365, 392
Moses, the Jewish lawgiver, 33
Mosheim, ecclesiastical historian, 448
Mountain, the, French Republican
party, 479
Municipalities in Europe, 257-259
Municipality of Paris, the, 466, 477,
478,481,486
Muscat, Imaum of, 573
Mystics, the, 318
NANTES, Edict of, 357 ; abrogated, 355
Naples, 231, 241, 273, 312, 323, 427,
451, 490, 508, 526, 534, 541, 545,
554
Napoleon Buonaparte, 486, 489, 490,
492-495, 497, 503, 504, 5°5, 527
Navigation and discovery, 234, 244,
^ 366, 367, 368, 440, 595
Nearchus, voyage of, 92
Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian con-
queror, 57, 59
Necker, Swiss financier in France,
421, 422, 457, 469
Nehemiah, the Jewish reformer, 89
Nelson, Lord, English admiral, 498
Neo-Platonism, 166, 207
Nero, the Roman emperor, 136
Netherlands, the kingdom of the (Bel-
gium), 526, 527, 537
Netherlands (the Spanish Netherlands),
306, 322, 330, 334
New South Wales, 511, 523, 574
New Testament, revised version of the,
604
Nicholas V., Pope, 316
Niebuhr, the traveller, 448
Nineveh, 55, 56
Nirwana, the (Indian philosophy), 69
Nominalism and Realism, scholastic
philosophy, 279
Non-conformity, 434, 436
Non-jurors, 434
Normans, inroads of the, 223
North- East passage, 368, 596
North German Confederation, 557
Norway, 207, 234, 245, 265, 308, 509
NovogorodjVarangarian and Ruric,235
OCTAVIUS, Augustus, 122-125
(Ecumenical Council, 596
Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of
England, 340
Oliver, Thomas, 443
Oppert, Jules, Egyptologist, 14
Origin and primeval condition of
man, speculations respecting, 14
Original seat of the human race, 5
Ossian's poems, 443
Otho, the Great, Germany, 229
Otho II. and III., Germany, 230
Ottoman Turks (see Turkey), 293-295
OUR LORD, 154
Owen, Dr., theologian, Puritan, 384
PAINTING, fine arts, 96, 320, 387
Palatinate ravaged by Louis XIV.,
355-356.
Paley, William, Philosophy and Evi-
dences, 442
Palmerston, Lord, 550-558
Papacy (Popedom), always opposed to
a powerful kingdom, in Italy, 192
Papal states, 526, 541, 545, 590
Papyri, Egyptian MSS., 26
Paraguay, 575
Parsees, Indian sect, 69
Parthenopean republic (Naples), 490
Parthia, 101, 151
Pascal, "Provincial Letters," 374,
385, 386
Paston "Letters," English history, 320
Patzinacites, 197
Paulicians, a sect in Asia Minor, 239
Paul Sarpi, Father Paul (Council of
Trent), 373, 374, 387
Peace of 1815, 527, 528
Pelagian controversy, 202
Pelasgic races, 11-12
Peloponnesian War, 86-87
Penn, William, founder of Pennsyl-
vania, 380
Pepin, the Carlovingian, 190, 191
Index.
629
Pericles, the Athenian leader, 86
Persia, 51, 57, 151, 168, 282
Persian Empire of Cyrus, 78 ; con-
quered by Alexander, 92
Persia, modern, 313, 323, 365, 391,
429, 5io, 571
Peru, 536, 575
Peter the Great, Russia, 358, 402
Peter the Hermit (the Crusades), 250
Petrarch, Italian poet, 319
Phalaris, tyrant of Agrigentum, 76
Pharaoh Necho, circumnavigation of
Africa, 70
Philip II. of Spain, the bigoted perse-
cutor, 334, 337, 361
Philip IV., the Fair (France), the op-
ponent of the Pope, 285, 315
Philip of Macedon, 90
Philosophy, 71, 97, 130, 166, 207,
278, 388, 444, 447, 449, 60 1, 608,
609-616
Phoenicia, 23, 29, 50, 92
Phrygia, 28
Pietists, the, Germany, 432
Pio Nono, 590, 591
Piracies by Barbarossa in the Mediter-
ranean, 343
Pisa, council of, 315
Pitt, William, 416, 426, 505, 506
Pitt, William, Earl of Chatham, 416,
426
Pizarro, conqueror of Peru, 366
Plato, the Greek philosopher, 98
Plebs, plebeians (Roman history), 66
Pliny, the Elder, 165
Poitiers, defeat of the Saracens, 191
Poland, 234, 245, 263, 270, 309, 323,
330, 364, 391, 404, 408, 424, 452,
537
Pompey and Coesar, 118, 121
Pontius Pilate, 134
Pope, Alexander, the poet, 44
Popedom, 163, 199, 201, 232, 241,
259, 261, 364, 373, 430
Popedom, the, removed to Avignon,
and then back to Rome, 315
Populus, the Roman, 66
Porte, Ottoman (see Turkey).
Portugal, 233, 246, 272, 322, 362, 366,
367, 387, 390, 418, 42 7» 500. 5°8,
526, 534, 536, 570
Prayer-book and Homily Society, 512
Predestination, Gottschalk, 238
Presbyterianism, 376, 377, 380, 433,
514, 588, 598
Price, Dr., 511
Printing, invention of, 298
Proletaria, 112, 146
Propagation of the Gospel, Society
for the, 435
Prophets of Israel and Judah, 54, 70
Proscriptions in Rome, 116, 118, 122
Protestantism, Luther, 329, 371, 375
Prussia, 245, 309, 323, 357, 358, 400,
403, 405, 407, 424, 451-499, 508,
525, 545, 549, 556-557
Prussia, proper, united to Brandenburg,
359
Puftendorf, "Law of Nations," 387
Punic War, 105-108
Puranas, the Indian, 68
Purgatory, doctrine of, 238, 316
Puritans, the, English history, 378
Pythagoras, Greek philosopher, 64, 72
QUAKERS, the, Friends, 380, 433, 514,
586
RACINE, French dramatic poet, 385
Radabat, founder of the Hapsburg,
231
Raphael, the painter, 387
Rapin, English historian, 446
Rawlinsons, the, 14
Reformation, the, 328, 331
Reform Bill (1832) in England, 537
Reform Bill (New) in England, 558
Religion, 21, 26, 30, 45, 46, 61, 68, 69,
80
Religious Tract Society, 512
Renaissance, the revival of letters, 296,
319
Revival of letters, 296, 319
Rees's Encyclopaedia, 444
Reuchlin, German scholar before the
Reformation, 321
Revolution, the, in France (1789-93),
454, 456-464
Revolution, the, in France (1830), 533
Revolution in France, the (1848), 539,
540
Richelieu, Cardinal, Minister of France,
338, 349, 35°
Rienzi, the Roman Tribune, 311
Rigg, Dr., 98, 99, 582
Rights of Man, the, 468
Rig-veda (Indian), 43
Ritualists, 579
Robespierre, 465, 477-478, 482, 4831
484, 485
Rollin, the historian, 446
Roman Empire, 124-144
Roman Republic (1849), 545
Roman Republic, causes of its decline,
144 ; its cruelty in war, 126
Romanoff Dynasty in Russia, 358
Rome, 65, 94, 104, 109, 111-115
Rome, for six weeks uninhabited, 181
Rosetta stone, 13
Roumania, kingdom of, 562, 570
630
Introduction to ttie Study of History.
Roumelia, East, self-governed province
of Turkey, 562, 570
Rousseau, the mad genius, 446
Rubens, painter, 388
Rudolf of Hapsburg, founder of the
Austrian family, 269
Ruric, the Varangarian founder of the
Russian Empire, 235
Russell's chronology, 2
Russia, 197, 235, 263, 271, 282, 295,
310, 312, 323, 343, 357, 358, 367,
391, 401, 404, 427, 428, 438, 452,
496, 499, 501, 503, 525, 526, 535.
55°, 56i, 570, 576, 619
Russia, first collison with Turkey, 343,
358
SALADIN, Sultan of Egypt, 250, 282
Samaritans, the, 90
Saracens (Mahomedans), 187-190, 236,
264
Sardinia (Savoy), 232, 246, 312, 322,
365> 399, 405, 427, 45 1 1 5°8, 526»
534, 54i, 545, 549, 553
Satire and comedy in Greece, 96
Savonarola, the patriotic friar, 316
Scaliger, the great critic, 387
Scandinavia, 49, 75, 99, 131, 168, 196,
207, 245
Scapula, the lexicographer, 386
Schiller, J. F. C. Von, poet and his-
torian, 448
Schism Act, 434
Schism, the Great, 315
Schleswig-Holstein, 359, 546, 548, 556,
557
Schliemann, excavator of Troy, &c., 39
Scholastic philosophy, schoolmen, 278,
280, 318
Schools, national, 513
Schools, British and foreign, 513
Schools, Sunday, 514
Sclavonians, 12, 36, 197, 450
Scotland, 208, 234, 245, 267, 339,
433
Sefi (Sophi) Dynasty in Persia, 313
Seiks (India), 365, 429, 521, 541
Seljuk Turks, 237, 274, 293
Sepoy Mutiny in India, 552
Serfdom abolished gradually, 258
Servia, the Serbs, 157, 246, 515, 562
Sesostris (Rameses II. of Egypt), 25
Seven United Provinces, the (Holland
the chief), 334 (See HOLLAND.)
Sevigne, Madame de (Letters), 385
Sforzaat Milan, 311
Shemitish races, n
Siberia added to Russia, 358
Siccardi Law (Italy), 549
Sicily, 76, 96, ioo, 281
Simeon (Divinity), 512
Slavery abolished in English Colonies,
537
Slave trade, 367, 401, 506, 527, 537
Sobieski John, King of Poland, 344-345,
364, 424
Socrates, the Greek philosopher, 87, 97
Solomon, King of Israel, 34, 50
Solon, the Athenian legislator, 62
Solyman II., Sultan of Turkey, 341,
343
Soudan, the (Ethiopia), 573
South Africa and South - Western
Africa, 573
Spain, 42, 49, 75, 99, no, 177, 189,
208, 233, 246, 272, 287, 325, 334,
349, 363, 366, 387, 390, 400, 403,
407, 418, 426, 500, 502, 526, 534,
538, 540, 557, 570, 619
Sparta, 61, 82, 85
Sparta, and Thebes, contest for su-
premacy, 88
Speaker's Commentary, the, 584
Spinoza, philosopher, 388
Stein, Prussian Minister, 508
Stephens' (the) Lexicography, 386
Stoicism, 98, 150
Strabo, geographer, 165
Sully, French ministei-, 337
Sunday-schools, 436
Sweden, 207, 234, 245, 265, 308, 348,
359, 36o, 401, 423, 447, 502, 509,
519, 525, 540, 57i, 618
Swift, Dean, political writer, 442
Switzerland, 288, 289, 323, 330, 363,
366, 390, 425, 447, 537, 545, 549
Sylla and Marius (Roman Civil War),
116, 117, 118
Syllabus of Pio Nono, the, 590
Sylvester II. (Gerbert), the learned
Pope, 230
Syracuse, Athenian expedition to, 86
TAIT, Archbishop, 580 ; his irreparable
loss, 597
Talleyrand, French politician and
minister, 469, 489, 492, 503
Tamerlane, the Mongul conqueror,
312
Tartessus, Spain, 42
Tasso, Italian poet, 387
Teutonic Knights, 261, 271, 309
Teutonic races, 10, n, 36, 42
Thebes, the Seven against Thebes,
38 ; contest with Sparta, 88
Theodosius the Great, the division of
the Roman empire, 144
Thermopylae, resistance to the Persians,
85
Thirlwall, "History of Greece," 13, 37
Index.
631
Thirty Years' War in Germany, 345-35 3
Thomas a Kempis, " Imitation of
Christ," 318, 321
Thomson, James, English poet, 443
Thrace, 101
Tilly, Count, the Thirty Years' War, 348
Titian, painter, 387
Toleration principles, 379 ; the Act,
433
Tonga, 574
Tonquin, French colony, 504, 538,
565, 568
Torres Straits discovered, 304
Tractarians, 154
Tracts for the Times, 578, 579
Trade, agriculture, &c., 305, 314, 369
Tragic Greek poets, 96
Trajan, Roman emperor, 137
Translation of the Scriptures, new
English, 604
Transubstantiation promulgated, 228,
275
Trent, Council of, 372
Tripoli, 390, 453
Triumvirates in Rome, 119, 122, 123
Troy, Grecian history, 28, 38
Tunis, 209, 237, 247, 282, 324, 365,
390, 453, 573
Turanian races, 10, 1 1, 16, 42
Turkey, 293, 310, 312, 313, 323, 341,
391, 428, 438, 452, 509, 534, 535,
538, 541, 551, 554, 561, 570
Turkey, first collision with Russia, 343
Tyrants, the Greek, 62
ULPHILAS, the Gothic bishop, 152
Union of Calmar, Scandinavia, 308
Unitarians, 433, 585, 599
United States of America, 410-413,
430, 510, 516, 550, 555, 558, 574,
606
Unity of the human race, 8
Universal suffrage, a failure in the
French municipalities, 470
Universities, 165, 205, 242, 244, 276,
319, 588
Uruguay (Banda Oriental), 575
Usher, Archbishop, chronology, I, 2
Utopia, Sir Thomas More, 320
Utrecht, peace of, 401
VANDALS in Spain and North Africa,
170, 171 ; at Rome, 174
Vasco de Gama reached India by Cape
of Good Hope, 302, 313
Vattel, Law of Nations, 447
Vaudois, the, Waldenses, 317, 375
Vedas, the, India, 49
Vehmgericht, German secret courts,
270
Venice, 246, 273, 311, 322, 344, 365,
427, 526, 489, 545, to Italy in 1886
Venezuela, 575
Venn, 442, 572
Vico, Italian philosopher, 447
Victoria, Australia, 574
Victoria Institute (London), 604
Vienna besieged by Turks, 342, 344
Vienna Congress of Vienna, 525
Vikings, the Northmen, 197
Village communities, 44
Visigoths in Gaul and Spain, 176
Visconti at Milan, 311
Voltaire, 431, 447, 468
Voss, German poet, 448
WALES, 267
Waldenses, Vaudois, 260, 317
Wallachia, 535
Wallenstein, the Thirty Years' War,
Germany, 348, 349
Walpole, Horace, letters and memoirs,
443
Walpole, Sir Robert, English minister,
404, 426
Warren Hastings, English governor
of India, 429, 510
Warsaw, Grand Duchy of, 499
Wars of the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries, 415
Washington, General, United States of
America, 411, 430
Waterloo, battle of, 504
Watts, Isaac, hymns and theology,
442
Waugh, Dr., Independent, 513
Wellington, Duke of (the Iron Duke),
5°8, 53 i
Wesley, John, founder of Methodism,
442, 5*3
Western Empire of Rome, 169-175
West Indies, 575
Westphalia, kingdom of, 499
Whitfield, George, the great revivalist,
437
Wieland, German poet, &c., 448
Wilberforce, William, the philanthropic
M.P., 512
William III. of England, 362, 395,
399
William of Orange, the Silent, 340
William the Conqueror, 233
Wolfenbiittel, Fragments, 449
Wren, Sir Christopher, the architect,
388
Wycliffe, John, the English reformer,
317, 319
632
Introduction to the Study of History.
XENOPHON, retreat of the ten thou-
sand, 87, 96
Xerxes, the Persian king, 266
Ximenes, Cardinal, Spanish minister,
319
YOUNG, Dr. Thomas, Egyptologist,
14
Young, Edward D., "Night Thoughts,"
443
ZANZIBAR, Arab kingdom in East
Africa, 573
Zend-Avesta, Indian history, 43, 69
Zoroaster, Persian legislator, 43
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