[17] On the Seven Deadly Sins, chap. xix (Select English Works of John Wyclif, ed. T. Arnold, vol. iii, 1871, p. 145).
[18] John of Salisbury, op. cit., lib. vi, cap. x: “Tunc autem totius rei publicæ salus incolumis præclaraque erit, si superiora membra se impendant inferioribus et inferiora superioribus pari jure respondeant, ut singula sint quasi aliorum ad invicem membra.”
[19] Wyclif, op. cit., chaps. ix, x, xi, xvii, passim (Works of Wyclif, ed. T. Arnold, vol. iii, pp. 130, 131, 132, 134, 143).
[20] See, e.g., A. Doren, Studien aus der Florentiner Wirthschaftsgeschichte, 1901, vol. i, chaps. v, vii. His final verdict (p. 458) is: “Man kann es getrost aussprechen: es gibt wohl keine Periode in der Weltgeschichte, in der die natürliche Uebermacht des Kapitals über die besitz- und kapitallose Handarbeit rücksichtsloser, freier von sittlichen und rechtlichen Bedenken, naiver in ihrer selbstverständlichen Konsequenz gewaltet hätte, und bis in die entferntesten Folgen zur Geltung gebracht worden wäre, als in der Blütezeit der Florentiner Tuchindustrie.” The picture drawn by Pirenne of the textile industry in Flanders (Belgian Democracy: Its Early History, trans. by J. V. Saunders, 1915, pp. 128-34) is somewhat similar.
[21] In Jan. 1298/9 there was held a “parliament of carpenters at Milehende, where they bound themselves by a corporal oath not to observe a certain ordinance or provision made by the Mayor and Aldermen touching their craft,” and in the following March a “parliament of smiths” was formed, with a common chest (Calendar of Early Mayor’s Court Rolls of the City of London, 1298-1307, ed. A. H. Thomas, 1924, pp. 25, 33-4).
[22] The figures for Paris are the estimate of Martin Saint-Léon (Histoire des Corporations de Métiers, 3rd ed., 1922, pp. 219-20, 224, 226); those for Frankfurt are given by Bücher (Die Bevölkerung von Frankfurt am Main im XIV und XV Jahrhundert, 1886, pp. 103, 146, 605). They do not include apprentices, and must not be pressed too far. The conclusion of Martin Saint-Léon is: “Il est certain qu’au moyen âge (abstraction faite des villes de Flandre) il n’existait pas encore un prolétariat, le nombre des ouvriers ne dépassant guère ou n’atteignant même pas celui des maîtres” (op. cit., p. 227 n.). The towns of Italy should be added, as an exception, to those of Flanders, and in any case the statement is not generally true of the later Middle Ages, when there was certainly a wage-earning proletariat in Germany also (see Lamprecht, Zum Verständnis der wirthschaftlichen und sozialen Wandlungen in Deutschland vom 14. zum 16. Jahrhundert, in the Zeitschrift für Sozial- und Wirthschaftsgeschichte, vol. i, 1893, pp. 191-263), and even, though on a smaller scale, in England.
[23] The Grete Sentence of Curs Expouned, chap. xxviii (Select English Works of Wyclif, ed. T. Arnold, vol. iii, p. 333). The passage contains comprehensive denunciations of all sorts of combination, in particular, gilds, “men of sutel craft, as fre masons and othere,” and “marchauntis, groceris, and vitileris” who “conspiren wickidly togidre that noon of hem schal bie over a certeyn pris, though the thing that thei bien be moche more worthi” (ibid., pp. 333, 334).
Wyclif’s argument is of great interest and importance. It is (1), that such associations for mutual aid are unnecessary. No special institutions are needed to promote fraternity, since, quite apart from them, all members of the community are bound to help each other: “Alle the goodnes that is in thes gildes eche man owith for to do bi comyn fraternyte of Cristendom, by Goddis comaundement.” (2) That combinations are a conspiracy against the public. Both doctrines were points in the case for the sovereignty of the unitary State, and both were to play a large part in subsequent history. They were used by the absolutist statesmen of the sixteenth century as an argument for State control over industry, in place of the obstructive torpor of gilds and boroughs, and by the individualists of the eighteenth century as an argument for free competition. The line of thought as to the relation of minor associations to the State runs from Wyclif to Turgot, Rousseau, Adam Smith, the Act of the Legislative Assembly in 1792 forbidding trade unions (“Les citoyens de même état ou profession, les ouvriers et compagnons d’un art quelconque ne pourront ... former des règlements sur leurs prétendus intérêts communs”), and the English Combination Acts.
[24] Kayser Sigmunds Reformation aller Ständen des Heiligen Römischen Reichs, printed by Goldast, Collectio Constitutionum Imperialium, 1713, vol. iv, pp. 170-200. Its probable date appears to be about 1437. It is discussed shortly by J. S. Schapiro, Social Reform and the Reformation, 1909, pp. 93-9.
[25] Martin Saint-Léon, op. cit., p. 187. The author’s remark is made à propos of a ruling of 1270, fixing minimum rates for textile workers in Paris. It appears, however, to be unduly optimistic. The fact that minimum rates were fixed for textile workers must not be taken as evidence that that policy was common, for in England, and probably in France, the textile trades received special treatment, and minimum rates were fixed for them, while maximum rates were fixed for other, and much more numerous, bodies of workers. What is true is that the medieval assumption with regard to wages, as with regard to the much more important question of prices, was that it was possible to bring them into an agreement with an objective standard of equity, which did not reflect the mere play of economic forces.