The popes, after having weakened the power of the emperors, wished to dispose of the broken sceptre of Charlemagne, and offered it to all who appeared likely to promote their scheme of vengeance. A crowd of princes then started up as pretenders to the empire thus held out by the popes, and the greater the number of these, the more rapidly the empire declined. Amidst civil discords, Germany completed the loss of its political unity, and at last its religious unity.
In order to judge to what a degree it was difficult to put in motion that enormous mass called the German confederation, it is only necessary to contemplate, in the history of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, those numerous diets which assembled to deliberate upon the war against the Turks, in which the presence of imminent peril even was never able to produce one energetic decision for the safety of Germany.
The popes sometimes made use of the pretext of the crusades to drive the emperors to a distance, and to precipitate them into disastrous expeditions; thus the enthusiasm for the holy wars, which had a tendency to establish union among Christian nations, had no power to bring together the members of the German nation, and only served to keep up trouble and disorder in the bosom of the empire. We must, however, repeat here what has been read in this history; it was under the auspices and by the influence of the court of Rome, when occupied seriously by a crusade, that the family of Rodolph of Hapsburg arose, a family whose power restored the empire to something of its ancient splendour, and saved Europe from the invasion of the Turks.
We have likewise to add that, at the period of the crusades, Germany augmented its territories and its population. The expeditions against the infidels of the East gave birth to the idea of attacking the pagans and idolaters, whose hordes inhabited the banks of the Vistula and the coasts of the Baltic. These races, when subdued by the Crusaders, entered into the Christian republic, and formed part of the German confederation. At the aspect of the cross, such cities as Dantzic, Thorn, Elbing, Kœnigsberg, &c., sprang up from the bosom of forests and deserts. Finland, Lithuania, Pomerania, and Silesia became flourishing provinces; new nations arose, new states were formed, and, to complete these prodigies, the arms of the Crusaders marked the spot in which a monarchy was to appear that did not exist in the middle ages, but which the present age has seen all at once take its place in the rank of the great powers of Europe. At the end of the thirteenth century, the provinces from which the Prussian monarchy derives both its name and its origin, were separated from Christendom by idolatry and savage manners; the conquest and the civilization of these provinces were the work of the holy wars.
If from Germany we pass into Italy, we there meet with other forms of government, and other revolutions.
When the last columns of the Roman empire crumbled away, Italy was covered with ruins. The Huns, the Franks, the Vandals, the Goths, the Germans, and the Lombards, held over this beautiful country, in turns, the scourge of their domination, and all left behind them traces of their manners, their legislation, and their character.
In the tenth century, the emperors of Constantinople being unable any longer to retain Italy, other powers arose, some from conquests, others by good fortune, and others from circumstances which history has much difficulty in indicating. The influence of the popes sometimes defended the independence of Italy against the invasions and the yoke of the German emperors; but the struggle was so long, and the war between the two powers exhibited so many vicissitudes, that it only served to perpetuate trouble and discord; during several centuries, the Guelphs and the Ghibellines desolated Italy without defending it.
In every nation of Europe there was then a power, or rather a preponderating authority, which was as a rallying-point, or centre, around which society formed and united its forces to defend its political existence.
Italy had not, like France and other countries, this precious means of conservation. Nothing proves better the dissolution in which this rich country was plunged, than the manner by which it endeavoured to establish its independence in the middle ages. That division into many states, that parcelling out of territory, that numerous population split into a thousand fractions, all announced the absence of any tie, of any common centre. Italy comprised many nations; twenty republics had each their own laws, their own interests, and their own history. Those perpetual wars between the citizens of the same cities; those animosities between republic and republic; that necessity of the inhabitants for calling in strangers in their internal quarrels; those mistrusts which bore harder upon the citizens than upon the stipendiary adventurers, tended to efface the true sentiment of patriotism, and at length caused even the name of the Italian nation to be forgotten.
The feudal system was abolished earlier in Italy than elsewhere; but with feudalism departed the ancient honour of brave knights, and the virtues of chivalry. In republics defended by mercenaries, bravery, and all the generous sentiments that accompany it, ceased to be esteemed. Violent passions had no longer any check, either in the laws or in the opinions of men; it was at this unhappy period that those hatreds and vengeances displayed themselves which appear so improbable to us in our tragedies; no spectacle can be more afflicting than that of Italy in the fourteenth century; and we may safely say that Dante had but to look around him to find the model for his Hell.