Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 53.djvu/250

236 and ecclesiastical powers, intertwined almost inextricably, had to be overthrown. All the theories of Nature and society, all the absurd and hideous superstitions that disgraced the medieval intellect, had to be modified or destroyed. To prevent such a revolution, which was certain not only to wipe out the moral abuses but to reduce the enormous power and revenue of the state and church, the fiercest conflict of modern times was precipitated. Although the battle was a drawn one and brought about a reversion to intellectual and political despotism, the human mind was not destined to be reduced to its old enslavement. It had made acquisitions in freedom and knowledge that subsequent wars, subversive as they were, could not take away.

The social revolution that accompanied the action of the forces set in operation by peace and industry was as great and far-reaching as the political and intellectual. It swept away that vast, complicated, and artificial system of class distinctions that prevailed in every feudal country. Birth ceased to be the only title to rank, and the profession of the soldier the only profession of a gentleman. The creation of wealth outside of land, which was the only form of property that could not be destroyed or carried away, brought a new standard of social worth into the world. Other pursuits besides the noble one of murder and pillage established a claim to social consideration. Men of character and ability engaged in industrial and professional occupations began to rank with the warrior and noble. Merchants, bankers, and lawyers that rose to wealth and eminence received the same honors that were bestowed upon men that won renown on the field of battle. Like the Fuggers in Germany and Jacques Cœur and Jean Ango in France, they became the friends and confidants of kings and princes. "Louis XI, like Charles VIII," says Pigeonneau, "surrounded himself with men of the middle class; he knew that they had more special knowledge, more docility, more fidelity, 'because they could not outrank him.'" So great was the esteem in which industrial pursuits were held in the Netherlands that even Philip II created the Order of the Golden Fleece to reward the men that had achieved eminence in them. Alarmed at the havoc that industrialism was working with the social hierarchy in France, the Due de Sully, the chief minister of Henry IV, complained that "the confusion of ranks" and "the degradation of people of quality" were among the evils that endangered the monarchy. As early as the reign of Francis I, which had been preceded by the great outburst of national prosperity that followed the close of the Hundred Years' War, a similar complaint had been made. Because of the opulence and peace that prevail in France," says a writer of the time, "the pride of all classes has increased more and