History as past ethics; an introduction to the history of morals

by P. V. N. Myers

I. Determining Influences

The Renaissance: the new intellectual life

Toward the close of the medieval ages came that important movement in European society known as the Renaissance, a main feature of which was the restoration of classical culture. Since the incoming of the northern barbarians with their racial traits and martial moral code there had been no such modifying force brought to bear upon the moral evolution of the European peoples, nor was there to appear a greater till the rise of modern evolutionary science.

The Renaissance exerted its transforming influence on the moral life of the West chiefly through the new intellectual life it awakened by bringing the European mind in vital contact with the culture of the ancient world; for intellectual progress means normally moral progress. Hence as the Renaissance meant a new birth of the European intellect, so did it mean also a new birth of the European conscience. Just as the conscience of the medieval age had its genesis in the new religion which superseded the paganism of the ancient world, so did the common conscience of to-day have its genesis in the new science, the new culture, which in the Renaissance superseded medieval ideas and theological modes of thought. A chief part of our remaining task will be to make plain how the new intellectual life born in the revival of the fifteenth century, and expressing itself since in every department of human life, thought, and activity, has reacted upon the moral feelings and judgments of men and taught them to seek the ultimate sanctions of a true morality in the deep universal intuitions of the human heart and conscience.

The decay of feudalism and the rise of monarchy: court life

Running parallel throughout the later medieval time with the classical revival, whose significance was so great for European morality, there was going on a political and social revolution which exerted an influence on the ethical evolution only less potent and far-reaching than that of the intellectual movement. During this period the petty feudal states in the different countries of Europe were being gathered up into larger political units. The principle of monarchy was everywhere triumphing over that of feudalism. The multitude of feudal castles, in which had been cradled the knightly ideal of manhood, were replaced by the palaces and courts of rich princes and powerful kings. This meant a great change in the social and political environment of the higher classes.

In the first place, in these later courts there was a brilliancy of life, a culture and a refinement rarely found in the earlier feudal castles. In the next place, the relation which every member of the court sustained to the prince or sovereign was fundamentally different from that which the vassal had sustained to his lord under the feudal régime. This relation, it is true, was still a personal one; but independence was gone, and with this were gone the pride and self-sufficiency which it engendered. In these princely courts the knight became a courtier.

The effect of these changes in surroundings and relationships upon the standard of conduct was profound, as we shall see when, a little farther on, we come to inquire what were the ethical feelings and judgments awakened in this new environment.

The growth of the towns: the workshop and the market as molders of morals

Three institutions—the monastery, the castle, and the town—dominated successively the life of the Middle Ages. Each developed a distinct ethical ideal. The monastery cradled the conscience of the monk; the castle, the conscience of the knight; and the town, the conscience of the burgher.

What particular virtues were approved by the moral sense of the town dweller we shall note a little farther on. We here merely observe that in the atmosphere of the town, in the relationships of the workshop and the market, were nourished the lowly lay virtues of the artisan and the trader, virtues which, though disesteemed by classical antiquity, regarded as of subordinate worth by the monk, and held in positive contempt by the knight, were yet to constitute the heart and core of the ethical ideal of the modern world.