308 



SOLDIER. 



vassals, us no resolve of the nation was necessary 

 to call them to arms. The vassals, in their differ- 

 ent degrees, formed a sort of standing army, ready 

 to obey every call of the superior lord ; and thus 

 all remains of popular liberty were extinguished, 

 and a feudal nobility, that is, nobility of a military 

 character, dependent on Ihe monarch, sprang up. 

 Hi- who was not a vassal of the crown, or of a 

 powerful lord, became lost in the mass of the peo- 

 ple, who were sunk in bondage. At a later period, 

 the spirit of feudalism changed, and so did the mili- 

 tary service connected with it ; but the oppression 

 of the people, that is, of the mass of the people, 

 continued, nay, became still severer. Vassals be- 

 came more and more powerful ; fiefs became here- 

 ditary, and the richer vassals almost independent of 

 their feudal lord. They obeyed when it was for 

 their interest, or when they were compelled. The 

 only security for the existence of the governments, 

 whose defence consisted in the feudal militia, was 

 the state of weakness common to them all. Law- 

 lessness and brutal tyranny now raged in each state 

 for several centuries, until the power of the feudal 

 aristocracy was broken by a union of the monarchs 

 desirous of extending their authority with the third 

 estate (deriving its origin from the growth of cities 

 (q. v.), the great source of modern civilization), 

 which was desirous to protect itself against the in- 

 supportable arrogance of the nobility. Then a 

 militia, consisting of citizens, was formed in the 

 cities warriors who fought for their hearths and 

 their commonwealth ; and the kings (Philip Augus- 

 tus of France, from 1180 to 1223, was the first) 

 established armies of mercenaries, to protect their 

 thrones against their vassals. The people, groan- 

 ing under the oppression of the nobles and the 

 priests, considered all the power that the throne 

 gained as an advantage to themselves, without 

 suspecting the pernicious consequences which were 

 to result from the establishment of armies composed 

 of mercenaries. Though feudal service continued, 

 the standing troops came more and more into use ; 

 and even cities, republics and confederacies (as the 

 Hansa, q. v.), kept armies on foot according to their 

 means. An increase of these forces seemed neces- 

 sary, on account of the increasing power of the 

 Turks. Amurath I. (from 1360 to 1389) founded 

 the standing army of janizaries (q. v.), so peculiar 

 in their organization, and through them obtained 

 great advantages over the neighbouring states, which 

 fvere unable to oppose to him an equally strong and 

 well-organized force. But the formation of stand- 

 ing armies was difficult. If they were to continue 

 without limitation of the term of service, they must 

 be composed of volunteers. To induce these to 

 enlist, pay was necessary, and the troops seemed to 

 be rather in the service of the monarch than in that 

 of the nation, while the revenues of the former did 

 not allow them to keep large armies on foot. In 

 peace, therefore, only a small number of soldiers 

 was maintained for the preservation of internal 

 tranquillity ; and, in time of ^war, large bodies of 

 troops, under commanders called condottieri in 

 Italy, were taken into pay. On the close of the 

 war, they were dismissed, and offered their services 

 in other quarters. This system led to great abuses. 

 The condottieri, when they met, frequently spared 

 each other, having no mutual enmity, and commit- 

 ted the greatest outrages against the subjects of 

 the prince for whom they nominally fought. Their 

 bands were schools of licentiousness and cruelty. 

 During the same period, the princes found out a 



popular mode of raising taxes. The deputies of 

 the people were assembled, and, by all kinds of in- 

 fluence, bribery, grants of titles, &c., were induced 

 to assent to the taxes proposed by the princes. 

 The nations now thought they had gained much in 

 the important right of self-taxation. Supplies for 

 increasing the number of troops were willingly 

 granted, to obtain long-desired privileges ; but, 

 while the people suffered themselves to be disarmed, 

 and furnished the means of supporting standing 

 armies, all the barriers were overthrown which 

 had limited the arrogance of princes, their thirst 

 for conquest, and the oppression of the people. In 

 proportion as the power of the monarchs was 

 augmented by the increase of their armies, they be- 

 came able to add continually to the weight of the 

 taxes. The kings of France, who had been the 

 first to establish a standing army, also preceded the 

 other princes in increasing the same, and in re- 

 stricting the power of the great vassals, in the 

 grant of considerable privileges to the communities, 

 and the subsequent oppression of them, in the in- 

 crease of taxes, and in all the measures of domestic 

 despotism and foreign ambition. About 100 years 

 after Philip Augustus, who had surrounded his 

 throne with mercenaries, Philip IV., or the Fair 

 (from 1285 to 1314), followed closely in his steps, 

 so that the French throne became more powerful 

 than any other. (See Army, Standing.') At last, 

 the unscrupulous policy of Richelieu completed the 

 French system of foreign aggrandizement ; and all 

 restraints on the increase of the standing army were 

 removed, as Europe learned in the pernicious wars 

 of Louis XIV. As soon as France had completely 

 established a military power independent of the 

 citizens, other states did the same, some from ne- 

 cessity, some dazzled by her example, some merely 

 for the gratification of the monarch. At the same 

 time, in all countries, even in the smallest, the 

 army became the receptacle of the idle and arrogant 

 nobility, who, since the expiration of the feudal 

 times, had lost their original occupation, and yet 

 were, for the most part, too indolent and proud to 

 follow occupations honourable to a citizen. Through 

 a variety of misconceptions, the governments, par- 

 ticularly after the time of Frederic the Great, came 

 to the monstrous conclusion that a great military 

 state was the perfection of political society. The 

 benefits which Europe has so long derived from the 

 political example of Great Britain, have been pe- 

 culiarly great since that period; for, notwithstand- 

 ing the abuses in our famed administration, the 

 chief objects of its government have always been 

 of a civil character, while on the continent of 

 Europe, a military spirit came to pervade the whole 

 system. The greater states considered their armies 

 as the main pillar of their strength ; the small ones 

 imitated them, if from no other motive, from that 

 of show and splendour. The sufferings arising from 

 this state of things are much too numerous to be 

 mentioned here : it affected society in all its rami- 

 fications: war increased, because the instruments 

 for war had increased ; neitherin the times of the 

 allodial nor of the feudal system did such general 

 and protracted conflicts desolate Europe as during 

 this last period : taxes and all kinds of political 

 burdens were fearfully augmented : the magnitude 

 of armies and the system of military subordination 

 had a decidedly bad effect on the citizens at larpe, 

 corrupting their morals, and blunting their sensibi- 

 lity for justice and right : the frauds and violence 

 employed to recruit the armies can be compared 



