unsympathetic masters. Can we wonder that a relation so unequal should
have been detested by the people when they began to think? Can we wonder
it should have created French Revolutions? When we remember how the
people toiled for a mail-clad warrior, how they fought for his
interests, how they died for his renown, how they were curtailed in
their few pleasures, how they were not permitted even to shoot a
pheasant or hare in their own grounds, we are amazed that such signal
injustice should ever have been endured. It is impossible that this
injustice should not have been felt; and no man ever became reconciled
to injustice, unless reduced to the condition of a brute. Religious
tyranny may be borne, for the priest invokes a supreme authority which
all feel to be universally binding. But all tyranny over the body--the
utter extinction of liberty--is hateful even to the most degraded
Hottentot.

Why, then, was such an unjust and unequal relation permitted to exist
so long? What good did it accomplish? What were its extenuating
features? Why was it commended by historians as a good institution for
the times?

It created a hardy agricultural class, inured them to the dangers and
the toils of war, bound them by local attachments, and fostered a
patriotic spirit. It developed the virtues of obedience, and submission
to evils. It created a love of home and household duties. It was
favorable to female virtue. It created the stout yeomanry who could be
relied upon in danger. It made law and order possible. It defended the
people from robbers. It laid a foundation for warlike prowess. It was
favorable to growth of population, for war did not sweep off the people
so much as those dire plagues and pestilences which were common in the
Middle Ages. It was preferable to the disorders and conflagrations and
depredations of preceding times. The poor man was oppressed, but he was
safe so long as his lord could protect him. It was a hard discipline,
but a discipline which was healthy; it preserved the seed if it did not
bear the fruits of civilization. The peasantry became honest, earnest,
sincere. They were made susceptible of religious impressions. They
became attached to all the institutions of the Church; the parish church
was their retreat, their consolation, and their joy. The priest
tyrannized over the soul and the knight over the body, but the flame of
piety burned steadily and warmly.

When the need of such an institution as Feu