dministration of justice. Rude and
ignorant warriors were no longer adequate to this function; civil
processes required a distinct organ; the profession of law arose, and
commanded its share of public attention and respect. With the rise of
commerce, there was developed a commercial class, which acquired wealth,
power, distinction, and a demand for rights. With the revival of
learning and philosophy, however unpromising at first, there arose a
literary class, which attracted notice and acquired influence.

In the view given of the earlier stages of modern civilization, we
perceive, first, a social chaos which obtained for some time after the
fall of the empire in the West; secondly, the development out of this
chaos, in the course of centuries, of various political and social
powers, classes, and interests, which were differentiated from the
unorganized mass; thirdly, all these diversified elements, classes, and
interests, gradually tending to the formation of more comprehensive
relations with each other. There was no general organization of these
several elements, in the early periods of the modern cycle. There were
what were called kings and kingdoms, but it was not till a comparatively
recent period that the government became an integer, a complete
organism, with a sensorium and will-power, and a mutual interrelation
and dependence of parts and functions. During the prevalence of the
feudal system and the rise of the independent communities, European
society was composed of innumerable fragments, isolated from each other,
and each caring for itself only, looking to no centre as the source of
political order and vitality, without organization or head. The king did
not rule the barons any more than the barons ruled the king--they were
rival powers; the barons and the cities were rival powers; the kings and
barons played off the cities against each other. The Church, by the
peculiarity of its constitution and character, was related to them all.
The clergy were the subjects of the king, the vassals of the baron, and
yet the spiritual lords of both, as well as of their feudal peers. And
when the Church effected the separation of her own from the political
power, she sought, in turn, to subordinate the latter; and secular
rulers were obliged to resist her encroachments to save themselves. The
kings had no fixed revenue adequate to government, and were the sport of
the capricious elements within their own realms. But the Cru