Estates the

basis of

law and

politics.

Schutzherr), pooтárns or patronus. They are part of the nation, and are not on the same level as slaves (die Eigene), but their freedom, their rights, and the value attached to them, are less than those of the freeman proper. Handicrafts are chiefly carried on by them: and freed servants generally pass into this class.

The history of these estates is most closely interwoven with medieval the history of each several State: changes and revolutions of constitutions are very often only the result and the expression of internal and unnoticed changes in the relations and ideas of Estates. The whole structure of law, in the middle ages, takes its character and colour from the idea of Estates. Every Estate had its own special laws and forms of justice, as it had its own costume. The Clergy lived by canon law, Princes by the law of nobles (Herrenrecht), Knights had their feudal law (Lehensrecht), Retainers (Dienstleute) their special law (Dienstrecht), Citizens the law of their city, and Peasants their manorial customs and law (Hofrecht). The political structure of the nation was conditioned by these differences, and its unity broken up.

At first hereditary, they become pro

fessional,

and finally decay.

But during the middle ages these privileged classes (Stände) tended to become less hereditary, and more professional (Berufsstände). In later centuries there are four main Estates-(1) Clergy, (2) Nobles, (3) Citizens or third Estate, (4) Peasants. The two first, aristocratic Estates, won a commanding political position. The third saved civil freedom. The fourth was powerless, and subject.

At the end of the middle ages we find these four Estates have decayed, and in great part dissolved. But isolated remains last on like ruined masonry into the modern world. To understand the modern State aright we must know the meaning of these Estates in the middle ages. It is only by contrast with them that the modern State comes to understand itself.

CHAPTER IX.

THE

I. THE CLERGY.

natural

HE Clergy held the first place among the medieval The Clergy Estates. According to the strict doctrine of the Church nota they were not a national estate at all: they were an ordo order. ecclesiasticus, not an ordo civilis. The State was regarded merely as an organisation of laymen, above whom the priesthood were raised by their consecration. The Christian priests did not, like the Brahmans, rest their claims on divine descent for they did not perpetuate their order by marriagebut rather on divine institution. They are filled by the Holy Spirit, and consecrated by the vows of the Church. The basest and most corrupt Clerk, in virtue of his order, stands high above the most eminent and virtuous laymen, as gold above iron, or the spirit above the body.

State, and

The ideals of the Clergy were near akin to those of the They stand Brahmans. Only the Christian clergy did not give up the outside the secular rule as the Brahmans did, and were less inclined than above it. they to conform to. the ordinance of the State. According to the logical doctrine of the medieval Church the laws of the State were not binding on the clergy: it was for them to examine and judge, and then decide how far they would voluntarily obey them. As soon as the privileges of the clergy or the interests of the Church seemed in danger, the clergy refused all obedience, resting on the word of Scripture, 'We ought to obey God rather than man",' and on their spiritual superiority. On the other hand, they demanded of the secular

Growth of their poli

tical power.

authority that it should obey the laws of the Church without contradiction, and lend its power to carry them out.

They even withdrew themselves from secular jurisdiction in civil as well as in criminal cases. Their pretensions could not tolerate the supremacy of secular judges, of the sheep above the shepherds.' They were not bound to service in war, because weapons of iron did not suit their religious vocation. But they also avoided the obligation to pay taxes, appealing on every occasion to their immunities, in order to shake off every burden the State laid on them. As clergy of Rome they despised the limitations of nationality. They were not citizens of any one nation, or of any definite country; they only recognised the universal bond of Christendom centred in Rome, the capital of the world, the seat of the Popes. The canon law was the law of their life, and they refused to be accountable except to the mild jurisdiction of the Church.

However, even in the time of their greatest power the clergy never completely severed themselves from the State, partly owing to the circumstances of their history, partly from considerations of their own interests.

The Christian Church, with its clergy, had arisen and become great within the old Roman Empire with its world-wide and far-reaching domination; and the political powers of Rome did not resign their authority. They demanded of all inhabitants of the Holy Roman Empire obedience to the laws, to the imperial government, and the imperial courts. The clergy could at most secure isolated privileges from the emperors: their subjection was unquestionable.

The Frankish monarchy still held fast to the subordination of bishops and priests to the king, and to the imperial laws. and courts, although now the power of the State had diminished, and the Church had become more independent. Under the German princes the immunities of the Church were extended by slow degrees, at first more by grace and favour of the king than by any recognition of the ecclesiastical law, which now began to assert its own authority with arrogance. Even when the rights of the Church had gradually won their

way against contradiction and resistance, their authority was not everywhere the same.

Interest also united the clergy most closely with the laity Italy. and the State. During the middle ages the head of the Church, the Pope of Rome, acquired a political sovereignty over the so-called Patrimonium Petri. Partly by royal grant, partly by the gifts of princes, there arose a Church-State governed by clergy. The highest spiritual authority thus came to be associated in Rome and the Roman territory with secular sovereignty. Not merely were the Popes called upon, as supreme bishops, to represent the interests of the Church, if need were, before the Emperor and the various States, but being among the first of Italian princes they were deeply involved in the interests of Italian policy. This was indeed 'the ruin of Italy.' (Machiavelli, Discorsi, i. 12). They were strong enough to keep divisions alive in Italy, but not to unite Italy under their sovereignty, nor to defend it from the inroad of hostile armies, though they were always ready to call in foreign powers to their help if their policy required it.

They raised Rome again to the position of the first city in Christendom, and adorned it with churches and works of art; but the gifted Romans, under their Church government and discipline, fell behind the citizens of the Italian republics in civil virtues and achievements, and the Church-State became the warning instead of the pattern of higher political development. The modern world has learnt that ecclesiastical rule is not fitted for the sound government of the State, and the secularisation of the States of the Church has proved a great political gain to the Romans.

Next to Italy, Germany did most to raise the political power Germany. of ecclesiastical princes. Even under the Frankish monarchy the bishops held a prominent place in the national assemblies, sometimes associated with the great laymen, especially the counts of districts (Gaugrafen), as an assembly of Majores or Seniores, sometimes in separate ecclesiastical assemblies. But (1) The imperial their contact with secular power and dignity comes out most constituclearly in the constitution of the German Empire. There we tien. find three out of the seven electors are ecclesiastical princes,

(2) Provincial constitutions.

the Archbishops of Mainz, Köln and Trier; and the archbishop of Mainz, as Arch-Chancellor of Germany, votes first. They held the first place in the Electoral College, and at the same time as territorial princes they early acquired an almost sovereign independence.

Besides these there was a large number of Archbishops, Bishops, and Abbots, who had acquired rights of territorial sovereignty over definite districts, and who sat and voted at the imperial diets, either giving a vote each (eine Virilstimme) as proper princes of the Empire-e. g. the Archbishops of Bremen, Magdeburg and Salzburg, and the Bishops of Augsburg, Würzburg and Basel; or taking part in a collective vote (Curiatstimme), and sitting together on the so-called 'Prelatesbenches' (Prälatenbänke) which corresponded to the benches of the Counts. In the heraldic order (Heerschildsordnung) of the law-books, the ecclesiastical princes ranked next to the king. The secular princes, though equal with them in the constitution of the Empire, were placed third, because they might conceivably become vassals of the ecclesiastical princes, while the converse would be unseemly.

In the great contest of Investitures between the Popes and the Saxon emperors, it was proposed that the princes of the Church should give up their secular sovereignty and devote their life to the Church, but in vain. Such a suggestion, even when it came from the Pope, was indignantly rejected by the ecclesiastical princes of Germany. The consequence was that in Germany too ecclesiastical offices became involved with political offices and political interests.

The same thing happened in the provinces of the Empire. The local prelates-bishops, abbots, priors, masters of religious orders-formed a separate estate, with a right to sit in the provincial assembly (Landtag), either as a separate Curia (Prälatencurie) or along with the nobles, and exercised a more or less extensive jurisdiction on their domains. Their rights in the provincial estates (landständische Rechte) were generally based on their position as territorial lords. Hence, although they might secure their own immunity from taxes and military service, they could not urge the same claims for