Page:The State Its Historic Role.djvu/20

18 England and a great number of writers have done it for Germany,—and we see that the work of the artisan, and even of a simple day-labourer, was remunerated at the time by a wage not even reached by skilled workmen nowadays. The account-books of the University of Oxford and certain English estates, also those of a great number of German and Swiss towns are there to testify to it.

On the other hand, consider the artistic finish and the quantity of decorative work which a workman of those days used to put into the beautiful work of art he did, as well as in the simplest thing of domestic life,—a railing, a candlestick, an article of pottery—and you see at once that he did not know the pressure, the hurry, the overwork of our times; he could forge, sculpture, weave, embroider at his leisure—as but a very small number of artist-workers can do nowadays. And if we glance over the donations to the churches and to houses which belonged to the parish, to the guild or to the city, be it in works of art—in decorative panels, sculptures, cast or wrought iron and even silver works—or in simple mason's or carpenter's work, we understand what degree of well-being those cities had realized in their midst. We can conceive the spirit of research and invention that prevailed, the breath of liberty that inspired their works, the sentiment of fraternal solidarity that grew in those guilds in which men of a same craft were united, not only by the mercantile and technical side of a trade but also by bonds of sociability and fraternity. Was it not, in fact, the guild-law that two brothers were to watch at the bedside of every sick brother? or that the guild would take care of burying the dead brother or sister—a custom which called for devotion, in those times of contagious diseases and plagues,—follow him to the grave, and take care of his widow and children?

Black misery, depression, the uncertainty of to-morrow for the greater number, which characterize our modern cities, were absolutely unknown in those "oases sprung up in the twelfth century in the middle of the feudal forest." In those cities, under the shelter of their liberties acquired under the impulse of free agreement and free initiative, a whole new civilization grew up and attained such expansion, that the like has not been seen up till now.

All modern industry comes to us from those cities. In three centuries, industries and arts developed there to such perfection that our century has been able to surpass them only in rapidity of production, but rarely in quality, and very rarely in beauty of the produce. In the higher arts which we try to revive in vain to-day, have we surpassed the beauty of Raphael? the vigour and audacity of Michel Angelo? the science and art of Leonardo da Vinci? the poetry and language of Dante? or the architecture to which we owe the cathedrals of Laon,