be rewarded, the females again appeared, and mingled in the contest; being often chosen as umpires in disputed cases, and invariably as the bearers of the prize, and the superintendents of the pageants. The tournaments were succeeded by a series of entertainments, in which the females occupied a conspicuous position, as the centre of conversations, and the interchangings of compliments and courtesies. Milton describes this in

the following lines.

"While throngs of knights and barons bold
In weeds of peace high triumphs hold,

With stores of ladies whose bright eyes
Rain influence, and judge the prize
Of wit or arms, while both contend

To win her grace when all commend."*

Viewing the form of chivalry as a political instrument, and a direct incentive to political literature, we must take into consideration its refining and civilizing character. To those who look upon politics as simply a branch of ethical philosophy, then chivalry, as enforcing a strict observance of all the public and private virtues, imparting health and strength to the body politic, must be considered as an efficient and active organ of human improvement. Those theoretical writers who adopt Plato's idea of government as depending chiefly on the due cultivation of the moral faculties of man, in all their varied phases, are constrained to allow a positive value to chivalry, in stimulating political inquiries and speculations; and of leading and directing the minds of public men to the recognition of many important truths connected with the science of government. Though not in abstract

• See Gibbons' Decline and Fall, vol. 6, pp. 27, 28.

form, chivalry was nevertheless, in practical application the same as political Platonism. Both were modes of educating and fitting men for public life and duty; both founded political science on morality, and both considered that the good of the commonwealth was promoted by the general cultivation and extension of all those sentiments, opinions, and principles, which are calculated to soothe and harmonize the naturally conflicting ebulitions of social life.

Independent, however, of the mere outward influence of the rules of chivalry, on the civil institutions of Europe, no inconsiderable praise is due to them from the direct and powerful stimulus they gave to the poetic and imaginative powers of the European mind. They were the great and efficient cause of inspiring a taste in every country, for poems and metrical romances, animated by public spirit, and founded on the broad and universal sympathies and feelings of mankind. The number of writers of such productions who flourished during, or immediately following the foundation of chivalry, is very considerable. A collection of Spanish poetry, called the Cancioners General, contains the productions of one hundred and thirtynine poets, before the commencement of the fifteenth century; * and in Italy, Flanders, and Germany, we find a proportional number of the same class of literary effusions. It is not assuming too much to affirm, that the general effect of such light and imaginative productions, would be more or less that of a political one; inasmuch as all such productions must have touched upon the leading events of the times and have chimed in with the current of political feeling, in

Hallam, Bouterwek.

whatever direction it was then running. The general frame-work of these poetical pieces was composed of good materials, and made appeals to the high and honourable feelings of human nature; and apart from direct allusions to public matters, their ordinary tendency would be, to elevate and nourish those internal sympathies, from which public opinion takes its rise, and which are in unison with the welfare and best interests of the community. The heroes and knights who figure so conspicuously in the early productions of the romancers and poets, were continually engaged in redressing political and social grievances, inveighing with bitterness against tyrrany and oppression, and in devoting their lives and fortunes to the supposed interests of the community at large. All such sentiments, conveyed though they were in hyperbolical and extravagant language, had, nevertheless, a direct tendency to fix in the public mind, the grand outlines or boundaries of civil right and freedom.

CHAPTER XVII.

ON THE PROGRESS OF POLITICAL LITERATURE CONNECTED WITH THE CIVIL AND STATE AUTHORITY OF THE PAPACY, FROM THE CLOSE OF THE TENTH CENTURY, TO THE YEAR 1400.

OPINIONS on the temporal power of the church, and the rights of private judgment, after the year 1000, of which we have already spoken, assumed a more decided form in the period of history now under consideration. We shall endeavour to present the reader with a brief sketch of both these branches of political speculation, so that we may be suitably prepared to enter into future discussions on the subject in subsequent parts of this work, when we come to notice the productions of more recent political writers.

Pope Nicholas II. is cited by Gratian as declaring, "That the Church of Rome instituted all patriarchal supremacies, all metropolitan primacies, all episcopal sees, all ecclesiastical orders, and dignities whatsoever."

Hildebrand, or Gregory VII. was appointed to the Pontificate in 1370, and soon after took upon him to depose Henry IV. The following are the terms he employs. "For the dignity and defence of God's Holy Church, in the name of Almighty God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, I depose your imperial and royal

administration, King Henry, son of Henry, some time emperor, who too boldly and rashly both laid hands on the church and I absolve all christians, subject to the empire, from that oath whereby they are wont to plight their faith unto true kings; for it is right that he should be deprived of dignity, who endeavours to diminish the majesty of the church."

"Go, therefore, most holy Princes of the Apostles, and what I have said, by interpreting your authority, confirm; that all men may now at length understand, if you can bind and loose in heaven, that you can also upon earth take away and give empires, kingdoms, and whatsoever mortals can have; for if you can judge things belonging to God, what may be considered concerning these inferior and profane things? And if it is your part to judge angels, who govern proud princes, what becometh it you to do toward their saints? Let kings now, and all secular princes, learn by this ruinous example, what you can do in heaven, and in what esteem you are with God; and let them thenceforth fear to slight the commands of the Holy Church; but put forth suddenly this judgment, that all men may understand, that rest casually, but by your means, this son of iniquity doth fall from his kingdom."*

The same doctrine was promulgated, a few years afterwards, by Urban II. He recommends, in his decrees, "that subjects are by no authority constrained to pay the fidelity which they have sworn to a christian prince, to one who opposeth God and his saints, and violateth their precepts."

At the close of the eleventh century, Pope Paschal 2nd deprived Henry IV. of political power, and excited

*Concilia. Tom. 26. fol. Paris, 1644.