Page:Outlines of European History.djvu/581

 CHAPTER XXI MEDIEVAL TOWNS -THEIR BUSINESS AND BUILDINGS Section 87. The Towns and Guilds In discussing the Middle Ages we have hitherto dealt mainly with kings and emperors, and with the popes and the Church of which they were the chief rulers ; we have also described the monks and monasteries, the warlike feudal lords and their castles, and the hard-working serfs who farmed the manors ; but nothing has been said about the people who lived in the towns. Towns have, however, always been the chief centers of Towns the progress and enlightenment, for the simple reason that people of progresY^ must live close together in large numbers before they can develop business on a large scale, carry on trade with foreign countries, establish good schools and universities, erect noble public buildings, support libraries and museums and art galleries. One does not find these in the country, for the people outside the towns are too scattered and usually too poor to have the things that are common enough in large cities. One of the chief peculiarities of the early Middle Ages, from the break-up of the Roman Empire to the time of William the Conqueror, was the absence of large and flourishing towns in western Europe, and this fact alone would serve to explain why there was so little progress. » 497