Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 5.djvu/40

 26 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

much relieved by the opening up to colonization of new lands across the sea, while part of the surplus population was killed off in the terrible wars which were now waged on a larger scale, and with more ferocity, than ever before since the fall of the ancient western empire.

Absolutely coincident with the rise of the proletariat was that of the "plutocracy." In the later Middle Ages the rights and liberties of every member of society, however humble, and in however servile a condition, were so protected by an intricate network of laws, and customs, and traditions, which no one could defy with impunity, that mere brute force, whether in the coarser form of arms or the more subtle one of wealth, could not long maintain itself in a preponderating position. But the breaking down of the moral sanctions of the Christian religion by the Renaissance ; the utter annihilation of the church as a free middle power, invested with the guardianship of the Christian law, which the establishment of Protestantism involved ; the relegation of the conscience for guidance to its own individ- ual interpretation of the Bible ; the sweeping away of many time-honored local and institutional liberties, and the explicit revival of pagan theories on every hand — all these things con- spired to leave the weak a helpless prey to the strong, as they had been before the benign influence of Christianity had made itself felt.

While a large proportion of those who shared in the spoils of the church were already of noble or gentle rank, many per- sons of low birth were enriched by this means, and were thus enabled to purchase for themselves honors from the venial princes, or at least some degree of standing among the untitled gentry. As the titles to their possessions seemed likely to be invalidated if a return to the old religion took place, the par- takers in the "fruits of sacrilege" were united in the bond of a common interest. At the same time the greed for gold, grow- ing by what it fed upon, and no longer hampered by the canon law, or the jealousy for personal and local rights which was one of the chief characteristics of the Middle Ages, led to an unprece- dented debasement of coin, the wholesale selling of burdensome