pulse given to learning and civilization. Earnestness and
self-devotion such as were shown by Godfrey de Bouillon, St. Louis of
France, and no doubt by many more amongst the Crusaders, were rewarded
and blessed, though not in what might have seemed at first sight the
only way of success.

{115}

Section 5. _State of Religions Relief and Practice during the Middle
Ages._

[Sidenote: Popular idea of the Middle Ages,]

There is a wide-spread notion that the Middle Ages were also "Dark
Ages," full of ignorance and superstition, with hardly a ray of
knowledge or true religion to enlighten the gloom, and also that the
Church was the great encourager of this state of things; indeed, that
it was mainly due to the influence of the monks and of the Clergy
generally.

[Sidenote: not founded in history.]

This belief is however quite unhistorical. No doubt there was
abundance of ignorance as well as of superstition, its natural
consequence, but there are ample means of accounting for both in the
political condition of Europe at that time, nor is it needful to blame
the Church for what was in fact due to the sins and errors of the world.

[Sidenote: Real causes of ignorance and vice in the Middle Ages.]

The confusion incident to the breaking up of the old Roman empire, and
the occupation of its different provinces by less highly-civilized
nations, had been followed by other disorders after the death of
Charlemagne and the partition of his dominions; and the constant state
of warfare and aggression in which most of the princes of that time
lived, was not calculated to leave their subjects much leisure for
intellectual culture. Besides this, we must take into account the
crushing influence of the feudal system, which gave the nobles almost
absolute power over their serfs or dependants, thus encouraging
lawlessness on the one hand, and causing degradation on the other. The
scarcity and costliness of books before the invention of printing was
another {116} formidable obstacle to any universal spread of education,
all which causes tended to bring learning into contempt amongst the
restless barons and their followers, restricting it chiefly to the
Clergy and the monks. Thus not only theology, but secular knowledge
besides, found a home in the Church, which was at once the guardian and
the channel of literature.

[Sidenote: No scarcity of the means of grace in Mediaeval times.]

There are also good grounds for believing