The ambitious chieftain, having acquired greater power than his neighbors, conceives of further aggrandizement, undertakes new conquests, attacks the weak, and adds other states to his own, till in time he may have made himself a great sovereign and won a great kingdom. These new conquests impose additional cares on the ruler; but he uses the tools of his power to execute his will; he governs his kingdoms with absolute sway, as a general governs his army; it is a military despotism of the simplest structure, and all prerogatives and interests are merged in and subservient to this one. The civil function is not yet developed as distinct from the military. Only one idea pervades the government, and that is the idea of absolute rule by brute force. Society has as yet developed few elements, has but few interests and little functional diversity; there are only two classes, the ruler and the ruled, the masters and the slaves. There being but few political and social interests to play among each other, there cannot be development for want of activity; there can be little progress of any kind. Such are the simple, unprogressive, one-idea governments which prevailed in the earliest times of which we have any tolerably authentic record, and which still prevail among half-civilized peoples.
Government is simply a growth, a development, and it must correspond to the character of the people out of whose mental status it has sprung. If the people are homogeneous in their mental structure, their social and political interests must be correspondingly homogeneous and simple. The more rude and primitive the minds of any people, the fewer are the relations external to the individual which obtain among them. But when a people, or a mixture of peoples, have developed great versatility of mind, a great variety of tastes, propensities, aspirations, and interests, their social and political institutions become correspondingly heterogeneous and complex. Such are the social and political systems of Middle and Western Europe. There was nothing of the kind in the ancient world. Then the people were more simple and less versatile in their mental habitudes; and a simple, though despotic government was the inevitable outgrowth. Rome was but a military despotism, and it conquered and ruled with military stringency. It was not till the reign of Diocletian that the civil functions were divorced from the military, and then only to a partial extent. It remained for Constantine to carry out more fully what Diocletian had begun, and to divide, or, if you please, to differentiate the governmental functions to an extent which had been altogether unknown before.
The people of the provinces subject to Roman dominion had no recognized rights, no voice in their own government, but were dominated by the central power at Rome. The right of representation, so sacred in modern times as an element of confederate policy, they did not desire nor appreciate; for, when seven provinces of the south of Gaul were commanded by the emperor Honorius to send a representation of their chief men to the city of Arles for the supervision of interests which concerned themselves, they disregarded the mandate. A central despotism maintained Roman unity; and, whenever its iron arm should by any means become weakened, the empire must fall into fragments.
The dissolution of the Roman Empire in the West was the end of one cycle; thence began another—that in which we now are, and which should be of absorbing interest to us. A state of affairs quite unlike anything known before was then inaugurated. Hundreds of years have been required to develop results so as to enable the human mind to divine at all definitely the law of its movement; and hundreds more may be required to develop the full fruition of what was then so inauspiciously begun.
As we are all aware, the Roman Empire of the West was overrun by hordes of barbarians from the North, who annihilated a great portion of the old population, and changed the character of society. But Rome did not die without bequeathing a legacy to be enjoyed by the descendants at least of those by whose hands she had fallen. There was still some remembrance of what Rome was. Guizot says that 'the two elements which passed from the Roman civilization into ours were, first, the system of municipal corporations—its habits, its regulations, its principle of liberty, a general civil legislation common to all; secondly, the idea of absolute power—the principle of order and the principle of servitude.' These elements, though almost latent for a time, were destined to make up and play a conspicuous part in the war of diversified interests and the adjustment of political relations, hundreds of years afterward.
Another element of society at the time of the Fall, was the Church. The barbarians conquered the empire, but the Church conquered them; without gaining much, however, to show for her victory; for, while the barbarians embraced Christianity, they reduced it to barbarism, and were much the same rude, cruel people, after their conversion, that they were before. The Church, however, in its origin and growth, illustrates the law under consideration, in the gradual development of the distinct specialities of organization; and we are now regarding it at a time when it was one element among others, and destined with them, by the interaction of their various forces, to evolve a still higher unity.
Another element in society, at this time, was that which was brought by the conquerors from their native wilds in the free North. They were a rude, and even savage people, with no fixed ideas of property, but living by hunting and pasturage, and driving their herds from one region to another as necessity required. The most marked and distinctive feature in their character, and that which played the most conspicuous part in the social and political drama of the following centuries of development, was their personal independence—their almost absolute individuality, as the result, we believe, of their superior native physical constitution.
They had little or no coöperation in their own country; no combination of civil interests; no settled government. They were apt for adventure, and readily formed into bands of roving warriors; and when pressed forward by the tide of warlike immigration from the East, they conquered the Roman Empire, and divided the lands among themselves. German magnates courted followers in their own country by hospitality, by presents of horses and arms; but in the conquered countries, by grants of land for military service. These grants were at first made during pleasure, then for life, and at length they became hereditary. (Robertson.) In this manner it appears that the feudal system originated—a system which grew into such magnificent proportions in Middle and Western Europe. It was, however, a growth which was five centuries in maturing. (Hallam.)
A curious circumstance, connected with its development, deserves to be noticed, as showing that certain rights, however desirable, and even sacred they may seem to be, must succumb to the prevailing order, however undesirable that system or order might, under other circumstances, appear to be. Allodial lands, or those held in the right of the individual, and for which there was no obligation of service, except in the general defence, were at length swallowed up by the feudal system. In those days of universal anarchy, rapine, and oppression, the rule of might and unrestrained selfishness prevailed to such an extent, that small proprietors, having no means of defence against the strong, were compelled to surrender their allodial title for a feudal one, and do homage to the neighboring lord for the sake of protection. And to such an extent did the abasement of allodial privileges prevail, that it came at length to be recognized as a principle that the feudal arrangement was the only legitimate one; whereupon allodial lands were seized with impunity, and appropriated by the feudal barons. Even the Church was subordinated by the prevailing system. Bishops became feudal lords. The incomes of religious service were, in some cases, seized upon by the irresponsible barons, and disposed of according to the feudal policy. This, however, is but one example of the struggle of a system or movement to subordinate what stands in its way, and become universal; it is a law of history.
The feudal system was a very complete embodiment of despotism. It grew out of the political circumstances and mental status of the times, and could only exist by the warrant of these conditions. It had its redeeming qualities, however, and, no doubt, promoted the conditions and the spirit which prepared the way for its own overthrow and the inauguration of a better system. The isolated and pent-up condition of all classes, together with such culture as was afforded by their mode of life to the inmates of the baronial castle, made the occasion for that general restlessness in society from which proceeded such ready response to the fanatical appeals of Peter the Hermit. The Crusades lasted two hundred years, and contributed to the overthrow of feudalism by the increase of general intelligence and the diminution of the baronial estates.