GUILD. 



583 



enact bye-laws. In the later times of the republic, 

 these societies not unfrequently appeared as political 

 parties ; and, on this account, their influence was 

 restrained, and they were partly abolished after the 

 establishment of the monarchy. In Italy, the cradle 

 of the class of free citizens in the middle ages, and 

 particularly in the Lombard cities, those connecting- 

 links between the ancient and modern civilization, 

 some remains of these Roman institutions, or recol- 

 lections of them, probably contributed to revive the 

 guilds, which naturally presented themselves as an 

 excellent means of supporting the citizens against 

 the nobility, by uniting them into powerful bodies. 

 With the increasing importance of the cities, which 

 became the seats ot industry, and with the establish- 

 ment of their constitutions, begins also the extension 

 of guilds. The chief reason that mechanical indus- 

 try was freely developed in the middle ages, at the 

 same time with agricultural, which had been exclu- 

 sively cultivated by the Greeks and Romans, was the 

 independence which the mechanics acquired with the 

 growth of municipal and civil liberty. Mechanical 

 industry has always been essentially of a democratic 

 character, and would never have flourished under the 

 feudal system. It is not possible now to give the 

 exact date of the origin of these societies in upper 

 Italy. Traces of them are found in the tenth cen- 

 tury. Thus, in Milan, we find the mechanics united 

 under the name credentia. It is certain that small 

 societies existed as early as the twelfth century, 

 which appear, in the following century, to have been 

 in the possession of important political privileges. 

 We even meet with abuses in these bodies as early as 

 this period ; and, several centuries later, the guilds 

 became the subject of bitter and just complaint, par- 

 ticularly those in Germany. When the advantages 

 of these associations became known and felt, they 

 rapidly increased ; and, in the struggles of the citi- 

 zens and the nobility, the principal resistance against 

 the latter was made by the corporations. As soon 

 as the citizens acquired an influence on the admini- 

 stration, the guilds became the basis of the municipal 

 constitutions, and every one, who wished to partici- 

 pate in the municipal government, was obliged to 

 become the member of a guild. Hence we find so 

 often distinguished people belonging to a class of 

 mechanics, of whose occupation they probably did 

 not know any thing. This mixture of social and 

 political character, as well as the insignificance of 

 the individual, considered merely as such, is a natural 

 consequence of the rudeness of the period. Just prin- 

 ciples are the work of time. It is only by slow de- 

 grees that the true is separated from the false, the 

 essential from the unessential. Political, like religious 

 and scientific principles, are at first always vague and 

 incoherent. Men must have long experience of the 

 concrete before they form just notions of the abstract. 

 Thus it is a characteristic of the middle ages, that 

 political rights were considered as arising from spe- 

 cial privileges. All that men enjoyed was looked 

 upon as a gift from the lord paramount. In fact, the 

 idea of the rights of man, as an individual, has been 

 developed only in very recent times. Even the 

 ancient republics had no just conception of it. In 

 G ermany, the establishment of guilds was also inti- 

 mately connected with that of the constitutions of 

 the cities, (q. v.) The latter were different accord- 

 ing as the ancient Roman, or the old German or- 

 ganization of the community prevailed ; the relations 

 among the mechanics were also very different. The 

 mechanical arts were at first chiefly practised by the 

 villeins ; and, even in the time of Charlemagne, they 

 appear to have been pursued on the estates of the 

 feudal lords, by the bondsmen, as is still the case on 

 the great possessions of Russian noblemen. Com- 



merce could not, however, be carried on by bonds- 

 men (in Russia they are permitted to trade). Al- 

 though there early existed free mechanics, yet they 

 were also under the protection and jurisdiction of the 

 feudal lord, before the privileges of the cities were 

 acknowledged, except in cities of Roman origin (for 

 instance, Cologne). These privileges early secured 

 to them, as a distinct class of vassals, a sort of or- 

 ganization under the direction of the masters of each 

 trade, as appears from the oldest law of the city ot 

 Strasburg, which seems to belong to the fifteenth 

 century ; and out of this the guilds in G ermany may 

 have originated. See Kichhorn's Deutsche Staats- 

 und Rechtsgeschichte, vol. ii.; and his Treatise on 

 the Origin of the Constitutions of German cities, in 

 the Zeitschrift fur Geschichtliche Rechtswisscnschaft, 

 vol. i., No. 2, and vol. ii., No. 2 ; and Hullmann's 

 Geschichte des Ursprungs der Stiidte in Dcutschland. 

 The full development of the guilds in Germany 

 falls in the last half of the twelfth century, and the 

 oldest examples are those of the cloth-shearers and 

 retailers in Hamburg (1152), the drapers (1153), and 

 shoemakers in Magdeburg (1157). But they pos- 

 sessed no political importance in Germany before the 

 thirteenth century, when a struggle arose between 

 them (the labouring classes) and the citizens belong- 

 ing to ancient families, the civic aristocracy. The 

 guilds were victorious, and became so powerful, that 

 even persons of "free occupations" joined these- 

 associations, as the allodial possessors of land some- 

 times placed themselves under feudal lords. The 

 corporations of merchants and mechanics became 

 more and more confirmed in their privileges and 

 monopolies, whilst the country people suffered by 

 being made, in many respects, the slaves of the 

 guilds. Particular branches of industry were f.ften 

 subject to restrictions in favour of the guilds, which 

 were sometimes of a most offensive nature. The 

 guilds became insupportable aristocracies, sometimes 

 allowing only a certain number of master mechanics 

 in the place, and seldom admitting any one into their 

 associations except favourites of the masters. The 

 examinations for the admission of a journeyman ta 

 the rank of a master were used as a means of extort- 

 ing money, and were often combined with the most 

 absurd humiliations. In some parts of Germany, 

 there were from four to five different guilds of smiths, 

 which did not allow each other the use of certain 

 tools. The guilds are now abolished in a consider- 

 able portion of Germany; and yet many persons 

 wish to restore the ancient order of things, as a sup- 

 port of aristocratical distinctions, and as tending to 

 repress that free exercise of industry which is so 

 favourable to the growth of the democratic spirit. 

 Attempts were made to check the insolence of the 

 guilds by laws of the empire, as in 1731, but without 

 success. In France, the guilds also originated with 

 the increasing importance of cities, and became 

 general in the reign of Louis IX.; but they became 

 subject to abuses, as in Germany, and were abolished 

 at the time of the revolution. Their restoration was 

 also desired by those who wished for the return of 

 the Bourbons. In Britain, the societies of mecha- 

 nics are important principally in a political respect, 

 on account of their connexion with the democratic 

 element of the constitution. These societies origin- 

 ated in Britain, as on the continent, at the time of 

 the development of the importance of the cities. In 

 the towns where they still exist, they have an im- 

 portant influence in the election of representatives, 

 and in the municipal administration. The rights of 

 a "freeman," with which is associated the privilege 

 of voting in the cities or boroughs, are often confined 

 to the members of these societies, of which the mem- 

 bership is obtained by serving an apprenticeship, or 



