primary cause of the capitalistic
revolution appears to have been a purely mechanical one, the increase
in the production of the precious metals. Wealth could not be stored
at all in the Middle Ages save in the form of specie; nor without it
could large commerce be developed, nor large industry financed, nor was
investment possible. Moreover the rise of prices consequent on the
increase of the precious metals gave a powerful stimulus to manufacture
and a {517} fillip to the merchant and to the entrepreneur such as they
have rarely received before or since. It was, in short, the
development of the power of money that gave rise to the money power.

In the earlier Middle Ages there prevailed a "natural economy," or
system in which payments were made chiefly in the form of services and
by barter; this gave place very gradually to our modern "money economy"
in which gold and silver are both the normal standards of value and the
sole instruments of exchange. Already in the twelfth century money was
being used in the towns of Western Europe; not until the late
fourteenth or fifteenth did it become a dominant factor in rural life.
This change was not the great revolution itself, but was the
indispensable prerequisite of it, and in large part its direct cause.

[Sidenote: Money-making kings]

Gold and silver could now be hoarded in the form of money, and so the
first step was taken in the formation of large fortunes, known to the
ancient world, but almost absent in the Middle Ages. The first great
fortunes were made by kings, by nobles with large landed estates, and
by officers in government service. Henry VII left a large fortune to
his son. Some of the popes and some of the princes of Germany and
Italy hoarded money even when they were paying interest on a debt,--a
testimony to the increasing estimate of the value of hard cash. The
chief nobles were scarcely behind the kings in accumulating treasure.
Their vast revenues from land were much more like government imposts
than like rents. Thus Montmorency in France gave his daughter a dowry
amounting to $420,000. The duke of Gandia in Spain owned estates
peopled by 60,000 Moriscos and yielding a princely revenue. Vast
ransoms were exacted in war, and fines, confiscation and pillage filled
the coffers of the lords. After the atrocious war against the
Moriscos, the duke of {518} Lerma sold their houses on his estates for
500,000 ducats.

[Sidenote: Officials]

In