property--private prevailed over public life. Such was
the first effect, and it was an effect purely material, of the
establishment of the feudal system. But other effects, still more
material, followed, of a moral kind, which have exercised the most
important effects on the European manners and mind.

"The feudal proprietor established himself in an isolated place,
which, for his own protection, he rendered secure. He lived
there, with his wife, his children, and a few faithful friends,
who shared his hospitality, and contributed to his defence.
Around the castle, in its vicinity, were established the farmers
and serfs who cultivated his domain. In the midst of that
inferior, but yet allied and protected population, religion
planted a church, and introduced a priest. He was usually the
chaplain of the castle, and at the same time the curate of the
village; in subsequent ages these two characters were separated;
the village pastor resided beside his church. This was the
primitive feudal society--the cradle, as it were, of the European
and Christian world.

"From this state of things necessarily arose a prodigious
superiority on the part of the possessor of the fief, alike in
his own eyes, and in the eyes of those who surrounded him. The
feeling of individual importance, of personal freedom, was the
ruling principle of savage life; but here a new feeling was
introduced--the importance of a proprietor, of the chief of a
family, of a master, predominated over that of an individual.
From this situation arose an immense feeling of superiority--a
superiority peculiar to the feudal ages, and entirely different
from any thing which had yet been experienced in the world. Like
the feudal lord, the Roman patrician was the head of a family, a
master, a landlord. He was, moreover, a religious magistrate, a
pontiff in the interior of his family. He was, moreover, a member
of the municipality in which his property was situated, and
perhaps one of the august senate, which, in name at least, still
ruled the empire. But all this importance and dignity was derived
from without--the patrician shared it with the other members of
his municipality--with the corporation of which he formed a part.
The importance of the feudal lord, again, was purely
individual--he owed nothing to