European life: the enlightenment and science, representative government,
and the industrial revolution.

Enlightenment broadened the social basis of knowledge and learning.
During the Dark Ages, knowledge and learning were a monopoly of a tiny
privileged minority composed of priests, scholars and a segment of the
aristocracy. Monasteries, great houses and trading cities sheltered this
monopoly. The countryside was a sea of ignorance, superstition,
oppression and exploitation. With the printing press came books. Books
promoted literacy and curiosity. Literacy and curiosity led to
speculation, experiment, discovery and the formulation and spread of
ideas. The product of these forces was science, which had had a long
period of gestation in North Africa and Asia.

Dark Ages of localism, with landlords, priests and soldiers directing
public affairs led to the concentration of wealth and power in the
landed aristocracy and the church. But traders in the countryside and
merchants in the centers of commerce held a talisman that opened before
them ever increasing sources of wealth. Country dwellers harvested one
crop a year. When crops were poor they starved. At best the margin of
profit was thin. Traders and merchants made a profit every time they
found a customer. The countryside lived on a use economy supplemented by
barter. As money increased in quantity it was loaned at rates of
interest by merchants and bankers who owned it and used it for their
purposes. Accumulating wealth and money enabled the traders, merchants,
bankers and manufacturers to out-buy and out-point landlords and
churchmen. Politically, these changes reduced the authority of absolute
monarchies. In their places representative governments made their
appearance.