lantic Ocean. As the magnetic
needle, which a Venetian traveller brought from Asia, gave a new
direction to commerce, so the new stimulus to learning which the Grecian
philosophy effected led to the necessity of an easier form of writing;
and printing appeared. With the shock which feudalism received from the
Crusades, central power was once more wielded by kings, and standing
armies supplanted the feudal. The crusaders must have learned something
from their mistakes; and military science was revived. There is scarcely
an element of civilization which we value, that was not, directly or
indirectly, developed by the Crusades, yet which was not sought for, or
anticipated even,--the centralization of thrones, the weakening of the
power of feudal barons, the rise of free cities, the growth of commerce,
the impulse given to art, improvements in agriculture, the rise of a
middle class, the wonderful spread of literature, greater refinements in
manners and dress, increased toleration of opinions, a more cheerful
view of life, the simultaneous development of energies in every field of
human labor, new hopes and aspirations among the people, new glories
around courts, new attractions in the churches, new comforts in the
villages, new luxuries in the cities. Even spiritual power became less
grim and sepulchral, since there was less fear to work upon.

I do not say that the Crusades alone produced the marvellous change in
the condition of society which took place in the thirteenth century, but
they gave an impulse to this change. The strong sapling which the
barbarians brought from their German forests and planted in the heart of
Europe,--and which had silently grown in the darkest ages of barbarism,
guarded by the hand of Providence,--became a sturdy tree in the feudal
ages, and bore fruit when the barons had wasted their strength in Asia.
The Crusades improved this fruit, and found new uses for it, and
scattered it far and wide, and made it for the healing of the nations.
Enterprise of all sorts succeeded the apathy of convents and castles.
The village of mud huts became a town, in which manufactures began. As
new wants became apparent, new means of supplying them appeared. The
Crusades stimulated these wants, and commerce and manufactures supplied
them. The modern merchant was born in Lombard cities, which supplied the
necessities of the crusaders. Feudalism ignored trade, but the baron
found his rival in the merchant-prince. Fe