nd about the tenth century. The
re-establishment of civilization and the revival of learning was still
more manifest during the eleventh century, and soon university life
became possible. The time was evidently ripe for Europe to awake from
its intellectual sleep and begin a new educational development. The
general causes which contributed to give fresh impulse to higher
education at this time were the growing tendency to organization, the
Saracen influence and the desire for higher learning in the more
important centers. "The universities were founded," says Professor
Laurie, "by a concurrence of able men who had something they wished to
teach, and of youth who desired to learn. * * * It was the eternal
need of the human spirit in its relation to the unseen that originated
the University of Paris. We may say then that it was the improvement
of the professions of medicine, law and theology which led to the
inception and organization of the first great schools."

The people felt the need of providing and obtaining instruction beyond
the monastic and episcopal schools. By the natural development of
these, a number of high-grade schools were established which
afterwards gave rise to the universities. They came into existence
without charter from either ecclesiastical or civil power, and were
not controlled or directed by either. The importance of these
institutions was soon discovered by both Pope and Emperor, who
cultivated friendly relations with these free, voluntary and
self-supporting centers of learning and gave them special privileges
and encouragement.

Among the first European schools was that of Salerno, in Italy, which
was known as a school of medicine as early as the ninth century. The
University of Bologna arose at the close of the twelfth century. In
1211 the University of Paris became a legal corporation. Oxford began
as a secondary school, and passed to the rank of a university in 1140,
and Cambridge was established in the year 1200. Professor Laurie says
that "in the course of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries there grew
up in Europe ten universities; while in the fourteenth century we find
eighteen added; and in the fifteenth century twenty-nine arose,
including St. Andrew's (1411), Glasgow (1454), Aberdeen (1477). The
great intellectual activity of the fourteenth century, which led to
the rise of so many universities, coincides with the first revival of
letters, or rather was one manifestation of th