of a circumstance in the history of the Lombard
subjugation of the Italian towns, which without consideration of this
fact would appear almost incomprehensible. I refer to the utter
passivity of the inhabitants, not only in the matter of resistance to
attack, which the greater strength and courage of the invaders perhaps
rendered useless, but in what is more surprising, the fact that after
the easy conquest was completed, we hear nothing of the manner in
which the people adapted themselves to the totally new condition of
life and of government to which they were subjected. Even if we can
understand hearing nothing of what the people did, at least we should
expect to hear what was done with it, what it became. The story of its
resistance might be short and soon forgotten, but the story of its
sufferings, of its complaints, of struggle against the entire change
in the order and character of its life, should be a long one.

But of this no record, hardly mention even appears. When the central
government falls and the last of its legions are destroyed or have
departed, there seems to be no thought of any other element in
society. If the evidence of the law codes did not tell us that a Roman
population existed, history would record little to indicate its
presence. Not only is even the slightest trace of nationality effaced,
but the merging of the old conditions of life into the new seems of
too little consequence to merit even an allusion. This state of
affairs, as said above, is caused by the annihilation, by the despotic
power of the central government, of that middle class which in times
of prosperity formed the sinews of the state. Of the other classes,
the privileged class, with the exception of the clergy, fell of course
with the government which supported it, and the common people
possessed no individuality, no power, and hardly any rights. Such,
then, was the condition of the towns at the time of the Lombard
invasion, a condition of such abasement and such degradation as
literally to have no history; a condition which indeed can truthfully
be said to merit none.

History tells the story of every great nation on the face of the earth
in three short words, growth, supremacy, decline. Vary the theme as
you may in the countless histories of countless peoples; subdivide the
course of its progress as you will, allowing for different local
causes and different local phenomena, the true philosophy of history
teaches that no