became manifested by events important, closely connected,

and clear.

After the death of Louis le Debonnaire, during the state of disorder into which Europe fell, the three kinds of monarchy almost equally disappeared: everything became confounded. At the end of a certain time, when the feudal system had prevailed, a fourth kind of monarchy presented itself, differing from all those which had been hitherto observed: this was feudal monarchy. It is confused in its nature, and cannot easily be defined. It has been said that the king, in the feudal system of government, was the suzerain over suzerains, the lord over lords; that he was connected by firm links, from degree to degree, with the whole frame of society; and that, in calling around him his own vassals, then the vassals of his vassals, and so on in gradation, he exercised his authority over the whole mass of the people, and showed himself to be really a king. I do not deny that this is the theory of feudal monarchy but it is a mere theory, which has never governed facts. This pretended influence of the king by means of a hierarchical organization, these links which are supposed to have united monarchy to the whole body of feudal society, are the dreams of speculative politicians. In fact, the greatest part of the feudal chieftains at that period were completely independent of the monarchy; many of them hardly knew it even by name, and had few or no relations with it: every kind of sovereignty was local and independent. The name of king, borne by one of these feudal chiefs, does not so much express a fact as a remembrance.

Such is the state in which monarchy presents itself in the course of the tenth and eleventh centuries.

In the twelfth, at the accession of Louis le Gros, things began to change their aspect.21 The king was more frequently spoken of; his influence penetrated into places which it had not previously reached; he assumed a more active part in society. If we inquire into this title, we recognise none of those titles of which monarchy had previously been accustomed to avail itself. It was not by inheritance from the emperors, or by the title of imperial monarchy, that this institution aggrandized itself, and assumed more consistency.

21 Louis the Fat came to the throne 1108,

Neither was it in virtue of election, or as being an emanation from divine power: every appearance of election had vanished; the principle of inheritance definitively prevailed; and notwithstanding the sanction given by religion to the accession of kings, the minds of men did not appear to be at all occupied with the religious character of the monarchy of Louis le Gros. A new element, a character hitherto unknown, was introduced into monarchy; a new species of monarchy began to exist.

Society, I need hardly repeat, was at this period in very great disorder, and subject to constant scenes of violence. Society, in itself, was destitute of means to struggle against this situation, and to recover some degree of order and unity. The feudal institutions, those parliaments of barons, those seignorial courts,-all those forms under which, in modern times, feudalism has been represented as a systematic and orderly state of government,-all these things were unreal and powerless; there was nothing in them which could afford the means of establishing any degree of order or justice; so that, in the midst of social anarchy, no one knew to whom recourse could be had, in order to redress a great injustice, remedy a great evil, to constitute something like a state. The name of king remained, and was borne by some chief whose authority was acknowledged by a few others. The differ

ent titles, however, under which the royal power had been formerly exercised, though they had no great influence, yet were far from being forgotten, and were recalled on various occasions. It happened that, in order to re-establish some degree of order in a place near the king's residence, or to terminate some difference which had lasted a long time, recourse was had to him; he was called upon to intervene in affairs which were not directly his own; and he intervened as a protector of public order, as arbitrator, as redresser of wrongs. The moral authority which continued to be attached to his name gained for him, by little and little, this great accession of power.

Such was the character which monarchy began to assume under Louis le Gros, and under the administration of Suger. Now, for the first time, seems to have entered the minds of men the idea, though very incomplete, confused, and feeble, of a public power, unconnected with the local powers which had possession of society, called upon to render justice to

those who could not obtain it by ordinary means, and capable of producing, or at least commanding, order ;-the idea of a great magistracy, whose essential character was to maintain or re-establish the peace of society, to protect the weak, and to decide differences which could not be otherwise settled. Such was the entirely new character, in which, reckoning from the twelfth century, monarchy appeared in Europe, and especially in France. It was neither as barbarian monarchy, as religious monarchy, nor as imperial monarchy, that the royal power was exercised; this kind of monarchy possessed only a limited, incomplete, and fortuitous power;-a power which I cannot more precisely describe than by saying that it was, in some sort, that of the chief conservator of the public peace.

This is the true origin of modern monarchy; this is its vital principle, if I may so speak; it is this which has been developed in the course of its career, and, I have no hesitation in saying, has ensured its success. At different periods of history we observe the re-appearance of the various characters of monarchy; we see the different kinds of monarchy which I have described, endeavoring, by turns, to recover the preponderance. Thus, the clergy have always preached religious monarchy; the civilians have labored to revive the principle of imperial monarchy; the nobility would sometimes have wished to renew elective monarchy, or maintain feudal monarchy. And not only have the clergy, the civilians, and the nobility, attempted to give such or such a character a predominance in the monarchy, but monarchy itself has made them all contribute towards the aggrandizement of its own power. Kings have represented themselves sometimes as the delegates of God, sometimes as the heirs of the emperors, or as the first noblemen of the land, according to the occasion or public wish of the moment; they have illegitimately availed themselves of these various titles, but none of them has been the real title of modern monarchy, or the source of its preponderating influence. It is, I repeat, as depositary and protector of public order, of general justice, and of the common interest, it is under the aspect of a chief magistracy, the centre and bond of society, that modern monarchy has presented itself to the people, and, in obtaining their adhesion, has made their strength its own.

You will see, as we proceed, this characteristic of the

monarchy of modern Europe, which began, I repeat, in the twelfth century, and in the reign of Louis le Gros, confirm and develop itself, and become at length, if I may so speak, the political physiognomy of the institution. It is by this that monarchy has contributed to the great result which now characterizes European society, the reduction of all the social elements to two-the government and the nation.

Thus it appears, that, at the breaking out of the crusades, Europe entered upon the path which was to conduct her to her present state: you have just seen monarchy assume the important part which it was destined to perform in this great transformation. We shall consider, at our next meeting, the different attempts at political organization, made from the twelfth to the sixteenth century, in order to maintain, by regulating it, the order of things that was about to perish. We shall consider the efforts of feudalism, of the Church, and even of the free cities, to constitute society according to its ancient principles, and under its primitive forms, and thus to defend themselves against the general change which was preparing.

18*

VARIOUS ATTEMPTS

LECTURE X.

TO FORM

THE SEVERAL SOCIAL ELE

MENTS INTO ONE SOCIETY.

Ar the commencement of this lecture I wish, at once, to determine its object with precision. It will be recollected, that one of the first facts that struck us, was the diversity, the separation, the independence, of the elements of ancient European society. The feudal nobility, the clergy, and the com mons, had each a position, laws, and manners, entirely different; they formed so many distinct societies, whose mode of government was independent of each other. They were in some measure connected, and in contact, but no real union existed between them; to speak correctly, they did not form a nation—a state.

The fusion of these distinct portions of society into one is, at length, accomplished; this is precisely the distinctive organization, the essential characteristic of modern society. The ancient social elements are now reduced to two-the government and the people; that is to say, diversity ceased and similitude introduced union. Before, however, this result took place, and even with a view to its prevention, many attempts were made to bring all these separate portions of society together, without destroying their diversity and independence. No positive attack was made on the peculiar position and privileges of each portion, on their distinctive nature, and yet there was an attempt made to form them into one state, one national body, to bring them all under one and the same government.

cess.

All these attempts failed. The result which I have noticed above, the union of modern society, attests their want of sucEven in those parts of Europe where some traces of the ancient diversity of the social elements are still to be met with, in Germany, for instance, where a real feudal nobility and a distinct body of burghers still exist; in England, where we see an established Church enjoying its own revenues and