On the other hand, let us carry a burgess of the nineteenth century back to the twelfth, and he will find things under the same double aspect, but the situations changed. Contemplating the general affairs of the age, the state, the government of the country, and society at large, we see or hear nothing of the burgesses; they are altogether without importance in the state. And not only so, but in speaking or thinking of themselves and their situation in relation to the general government of France, their language is timid and humble in the extreme. Their old masters, the lords of fiefs, from whom they wrung their franchises, are found treating them, in words at least, with a pride which surprises us, but was far from astonishing or irritating them.
But entering into the borough itself, and surveying what is there passing, we find the scene changed. We are in a sort of fortified place, defended by the armed burgesses, who tax themselves, elect their own magistrates, sit in judgment, inflict punishments, and assemble to deliberate upon their own affairs; making war even against their lord, and having their own militia. In a word, they govern themselves, and are superior to control.
Here is a contrast of the same order as that which so much surprised the burgess of the twelfth century in the France of the eighteenth, only the parts are reversed. In the latter, the burgher order or nation is everything, the borough nothing; in the former, the degrees of importance are diametrically opposite.
Assuredly many things and many extraordinary events must have passed, and many revolutions have been accomplished between the twelfth and eighteenth centuries, to produce so prodigious a change in the state of one social class. Yet, in spite of this change, there is no doubt that the third estate of 1789 was, politically speaking, the descendant and heir of the burghers of the twelfth century. That haughty and ambitious 'French nation,' which raised its pretensions so high, proclaimed its sovereignty with such pomposity, and pretended not only to regenerate and govern itself, but also to govern and regenerate the world, incontestibly descended from those borough communities, who made their obscure though courageous stands in the twelfth century, with the sole object of throwing off the tyrannical yoke of nameless lords in their respective isolated corners.
Now, although there is no question that the explication of so great a metamorphosis will not be found in the state of the boroughs in the twelfth century, but that it has been effected and has its causes in the events which have occurred between the twelfth and eighteenth centuries, yet the origin of the third estate has been of great consequence in its history; and whilst we shall not therein discover the full secret of its destiny, we may at least discern the germ thereof; for what it was at first, is found again in what it has become, to a much greater extent than appearances would lead us to presume. A survey, although an incomplete one, of the state of the boroughs in the twelfth century, will, I think, be decisive of the fact.
In entering upon an investigation into this state, in order fully to comprehend it, we must consider the boroughs in two main points of view. There are two important questions to resolve: the first, that of the enfranchisement of the boroughs themselves, the inquiry how the revolution operated, and from what causes, what change it produced in the situation of the burghers, and what was its effect upon society at large, upon the other classes, and upon the state. The second question is relative to the government of the boroughs, the internal condition of the enfranchised towns, the relations of the burgesses amongst themselves, and the principles, the forms, and the manners in vogue within the communities.
From these two sources—on the one hand, from the change introduced into the social position of the burghers, and on the other, from their internal or borough government—all their influence on modern civilisation has been derived. That influence has been productive of no one fact which may not be referred to one or other of these two causes. Therefore, when we shall have thoroughly sifted them, and obtained an insight into the circumstances of their enfranchisement on the one hand, and their government on the other, we shall possess, as it were, the two keys to their history.
I will first say a few words on the diversity in the state of boroughs throughout Europe. The facts which I shall bring forward will not apply indifferently to all the Italian, Spanish, English, and French boroughs; some of them are referable to them all; but there are great and important differences. These I will indicate as I go on: we shall subsequently find them in the progress of civilisation, and will then investigate them more narrowly.
To have a proper idea of the enfranchisement of the boroughs, it is necessary to go back to the state of towns from the fifth to the tenth century, from the fall of the Roman Empire to the time at which the borough revolution commenced. The differences were, I repeat, very great; the condition of towns varied extensively in the different countries of Europe, yet there are some general facts which may be affirmed of almost all towns, to which I shall endeavour to restrict myself. When I have done with them, the more special matter will apply to the boroughs of France, and particularly to those in the north of France, above the Rhone and the Loire. These will be prominent points in the picture it is my object to draw.