ion; he had no sense of life, of colour, of
literary style; he was a thinker, who saw the life of the past through
the medium of ideas; he does not in his pages evoke a world of animated
forms, of passionate hearts, of vivid incidents; he distinguishes
social forces, with a view to arrive at principles; he considers those
forces in their play one upon another.

The _Histoire Generale de la Civilisation en Europe_ and the _Histoire
de la Civilisation en France_ consist of lectures delivered from 1828
to 1830 at the Sorbonne.[1] Guizot recognised that the study of
institutions must be preceded by a study of the society which has
given them birth. In the progress of civilisation he saw not merely
the development of communities, but also that of the individual. The
civilisation of Europe, he held, was most intelligibly exhibited in
that of France, where, more than in other countries, intellectual
and social development have moved hand in hand, where general ideas
and doctrines have always accompanied great events and public
revolutions. The key to the meaning of French history he found in
the tendency towards national and political unity. From the tenth
to the fourteenth century four great forces met in co-operation or
in conflict--royalty, the feudal system, the communes, the Church.
Feudalism fell; a great monarchy arose upon its ruins. The human mind
asserted its spiritual independence in the Protestant reformation.
The _tiers etat_ was constantly advancing in strength. The power of
the monarchy, dominant in the seventeenth century, declined in the
century that followed; the power of the people increased. In modern
society the elements of national life are reduced to two--the
government on the one hand, the people on the other; how to harmonise
these elements is the problem of modern politics. As a capital example
for the French bourgeoisie, Guizot, returning to an early work, made
a special study of the great English revolution of the seventeenth
century. In Germany, of the preceding century, the revolution was
religious and not political. In France, of the succeeding century,
the revolution was political and not religious. The rare good fortune
of England lay in the fact that the spirit of religious faith and
the spirit of political freedom ruled together, and co-operated
towards a common result.

[Footnote 1: The _History of Civilisation in France_ closes with the
fourteenth century.]

The work of FRANCOIS MIGNET