75 



seem to have been confined exclusively to these classes of 

 people, who endeavoured, to secure their ascendancy over 

 the minds of men, by preserving to themselves a monopoly 

 of the small portion of knowledge and accomplishments, 

 which then existed. 



" There is an ultimate point of depression," (says Hume,) 

 "■ as well as of exaltation, from which human affairs aia- 

 " turally return, in a contrary progress; and beyond which 

 " they seldom pass, either in their advancement or de- 

 " cline." There is, in fact, in nature a constant and uni- 

 versal effort, and tendency to rectification. The tree, which 

 is planted in a crooked position, endeavours to make it- 

 self upright. Out of the very obliquities, errors and vices 

 of man, springs the endeavour to correct them. What 

 happened, after the destruction of the Roman empire, il- 

 lustrates fully this wise order of guiding providence. Out 

 of the state of chaos we have described, arose, not a cure, 

 but a palliative, the feudal system; the existence of which 

 is a most signal fact in historj'. The feudal system, which 

 began in the ninth century, continued in full vigour, to 

 the middle of the twelfth. This system was perfectly mi- 

 litary; out of it sprung the institution of chivalry, which 

 is referred, by the best writers, to tlie eleventh century.* 

 Romance was the offspring of chivalry. These three causes 

 had a powerful influence, to generate the character and 



K 2 manners 



* See St. Pala5-e, Memoires de Chevalerie, Memoirs of the Academy of 

 Inscriptions, the preface to Fabliaux e Contes. 



