the
regulation of common interests, obtained charters of rights from
seigneur or king, and on the Continent even succeeded in establishing
complete independence. Even in England, where from the Conquest the
central power was at its strongest, the corporate towns became for many
purposes self-governing communities. The city state was born again, and
with it came an outburst of activity, the revival of literature and the
arts, the rediscovery of ancient learning, the rebirth of philosophy and
science.

The mediaeval city state was superior to the ancient in that slavery was
no essential element in its existence. On the contrary, by welcoming the
fugitive serf and vindicating his freedom it contributed powerfully to
the decline of the milder form of servitude. But like the ancient state
it was seriously and permanently weakened by internal faction, and like
the ancient state it rested the privileges of its members not on the
rights of human personality, but on the responsibilities of citizenship.
It knew not so much liberty as "liberties," rights of corporations
secured by charter, its own rights as a whole secured against king or
feudatory and the rest of the world, rights of gilds and crafts within
it, and to men or women only as they were members of such bodies. But
the real weakness of the city state was once more its isolation. It was
but an islet of relative freedom on, or actually within, the borders of
a feudal society which grew more powerful with the generations. With the
improvement of communications and of the arts of life, the central
power, particularly in France and England, began to gain upon its
vassals. Feudal disobedience and disorder were suppressed, and by the
end of the fifteenth century great unified states, the foundation of
modern nations, were already in being. Their emergence involved the
widening and in some respects the improvement of the social order; and
in its earlier stages it favoured civic autonomy by suppressing local
anarchy and feudal privilege. But the growth of centralization was in
the end incompatible with the genius of civic independence, and perilous
to such elements of political right as had been gained for the
population in general as the result of earlier conflicts between the
crown and its vassals.

We enter on the modern period, accordingly, with society constituted on
a thoroughly authoritarian basis, the kingly power supreme and tending
towards arbitrary despotism, and b