action which characterized the different parts of Europe after the
downfall of the Carolingian empire, it might well have seemed that
political society had reverted towards a primitive type of structure. In
truth, however, the retrogradation was much slighter than appeared on
the surface. Feudalism itself, with its curious net-work of fealties and
obligations running through the fabric of society in every direction,
was by no means purely disintegrative in its tendencies. The mutual
relations of rival baronies were by no means like those of rival clans
or tribes in pre-Roman days. The central power of Rome, though no longer
exerted politically through curators and prefects, was no less effective
in the potent hands of the clergy and in the traditions of the imperial
jurisprudence by which the legal ideas of mediaeval society were so
strongly coloured. So powerful, indeed, was this twofold influence of
Rome, that in the later Middle Ages, when the modern nationalities had
fairly taken shape, it was the capacity for local self-government--in
spite of all the Teutonic reinforcement it had had--that had suffered
much more than the capacity for national consolidation. Among the great
modern nations it was only England--which in its political development
had remained more independent of the Roman law and the Roman church than
even the Teutonic fatherland itself--it was only England that came out
of the mediæval crucible with its Teutonic self-government substantially
intact. On the main-land only two little spots, at the two extremities
of the old Teutonic world, had fared equally well. At the mouth of the
Rhine the little Dutch communities were prepared to lead the attack in
the terrible battle for freedom with which the drama of modern history
was ushered in. In the impregnable mountain fastnesses of upper Germany
the Swiss cantons had bid defiance alike to Austrian tyrant and to
Burgundian invader, and had preserved in its purest form the rustic
democracy of their Aryan forefathers. By a curious coincidence, both
these free peoples, in their efforts towards national unity, were led to