ABSTRACT
a feature which plainly distinguishes modern from medieval times is the renewal in the former of a vigorous political and economic life and of all forms of art. This is not to say that there was no political and economic or artistic life in the Middle Ages; indeed, by speaking of a more vigorous renewal we imply the opposite. As no man can entirely lack both these mental capacities, neither can any period, even those most barbaric and primitive, when, in fact, there were eminent achievements in poetry and art. All that is intended is to draw attention to the fact that in the complex medieval society the emphasis was not on these activities. Anyone who desires a prima facie preliminary proof of this need only glance at the books or architectural remains of this society which survive, particularly from its flourishing time. Let him compare its churches, monasteries and castles with the features of the modern landscape dotted with factories, stores, banks, exchanges, parliament-houses, government offices, and also with museums, picture galleries, exhibitions, theatres, schools and the like. The same conclusion might be similarly drawn from a bird’s eye view of the general character of medieval poetry, literature and art. In the main they were didactic, and propagandist, or narrative and allegorical, very seldom personal or lyric. As to the politics of the times, when not governed by the elementary necessities of life and self-defence, they were directed to unworldly ends, as 141were the crusades for the recovery of the holy sepulchre and the disputes between the Church and the Holy Roman Empire. The economic life was mainly on a ‘subsistence’ basis, with little industrialism or commerce. The change began when the Italian cities and great Norman and Suabian monarchies tried to exercise a national or state policy consciously aimed at prosperity and civilisation, under which arts and commerce flourished. This ambition closely followed and sometimes obscured their less worldly plans and sympathies. Finally, with the Renaissance and Reformation began the distinctively modern age; for these two movements, apparently opposed, were in reality complementary, since the Renaissance, seeking Greco-Roman antiquity, discovered the truths of nature, while the Reformation, seeking evangelical Christianity, discovered freedom of thought and criticism. It is because of these differences of emphasis and rhythm that the distinction and contrast between medieval and modern times keeps its place in history, where it serves the purpose of accentuating them. But, as always in history, these distinctions must not be made with a knife; rather must they be thought of as both posited and negated, both sharpened and blurred, in that continuous course of history which exhibits the moving drama of humanity in its passages, at once gradual and revolutionary, from the Middle Ages to the modern world. If these differences of character were denied or underestimated, or if the values we set on the two characters were interchanged, either the word ‘medieval’ would disappear from our histories or it would be our own days that would be called ‘medieval’ in the depreciatory sense of ‘the dark ages’, which is pretty nearly the verdict of reactionary historians and of ascetically religious temperaments.
