live under the priest's
protection. If the animal impulse of rage, or of primitive lusts, leads
him to murder or to rob, later, after satiety, in times of sickness or
of misfortune, taking the advice of his concubine or of his wife, he
repents and makes restitution twofold, tenfold, a hundredfold, unstinted
in his gifts and immunities.[1103] Thus, over the whole territory the
clergy maintain and enlarge their asylums for the oppressed and the
vanquished.--On the other hand, among the warrior chiefs with long hair,
by the side of kings clad in furs, the mitered bishop and abbot, with
shaven brows, take seats in the assemblies; they alone know how to use
the pen and how to discuss. Secretaries, councilors, theologians, they
participate in all edicts; they have their hand in the government;
they strive through its agency to bring a little order out of
immense disorder; to render the law more rational and more humane, to
re-establish or preserve piety, instruction, justice, property, and
especially marriage. To their ascendancy is certainly due the police
system, such as it was, intermittent and incomplete, which prevented
Europe from falling into a Mongolian anarchy. If, down to the end of
the twelfth century, the clergy bears heavily on the princes, it is
especially to repress in them and beneath them the brutal appetites,
the rebellions of flesh and blood, the outbursts and relapses
of irresistible ferocity which are undermining the social
fabric.--Meanwhile, in its churches and in its convents, it preserves
the ancient acquisitions of humanity, the Latin tongue, Christian
literature and theology, a portion of pagan literature and science,
architecture, sculpture, painting, the arts and industries which aid
worship. It also preserved the more valuable industries, which provide
man with bread, clothing, and shelter, and especially the greatest of
all human acquisitions, and the most opposed to the vagabond humor of
the idle and plundering barbarian, the habit and taste for labor. In the
districts depopulated through Roman exactions, through the revolt of
the Bagaudes, through the invasion of the Germans, and the raids of
brigands, the Benedictine monk built his cabin of boughs amid briers and
brambles.[1104] Large areas around him, formerly cultivated, are nothing
but abandoned thickets. Along with his associates he clears the ground
and erects buildings; he domesticates half-tamed animals, he establishes
a farm, a mill, a