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Excerpt from An Essay on Western Civilization: In Its Economic Aspects (Mediaeval and Modern Times)
The very name by which we speak Of this new social system calls attention to its Christianity as the trait which distinguishes it most clearly from the civilisation Of the ancient world. The Roman Empire had been created by military prowess; the military organisation, with the military roads which connected its various provinces, was the e¿'ective ele ment by which it was maintained. Christendom on the contrary, under its spiritual head the Pope, expended its material energies in the raising Of magnificent churches and the endowing Of religious houses; it devoted its resources to aggressive struggles with the infidel. Religious aspirations and motives found expression in the magnificent buildings Of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; these ideas and sentiments permeated all social institutions; though they lie on the sur face they were not merely superficial. War was practically unintermittent in the early middle ages, but it was rarely a combining force; and however much the swords Of the Franks may have contributed to the rise Of the papacy, the secret of its power lay far deeper. It was not by military force, but by religious authority, that the foundations of civilised society were laid anew in the dark ages; in SO far as Old institutions reappear in mediaeval Christendom, they were for the most part modified or remodelled under religious in¿uence.
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