Principles of western civilisation

378 WESTERN CIVILISATION CHAP.

encourage local trade, or to stimulate local industries.” '

The soul of this policy of the town of the Middle Ages may be perceived at a glance. It aimed at preserving the economic life of the town as a protected area existing apart from, and in opposition to the rest of the world. It always, says Schmoller, consisted simply in this—‘‘ the putting of fellow-citizens at an advantage, and of competitors from the outside at a disadvantage.” * In the furtherance of this policy every weapon that could be employed was pressed into the service of the town. Restrictive taxes, differential tolls, and the coercive regulation of exports, imports, and currency were continually resorted to. All the resources of municipal diplomacy, of constitutional struggle between the political orders, and, in the last resort, of violence, were employed by the towns to gain their ends.2 The economic town of the Middle Ages throughout Europe formed, in short, says Schmoller, ‘‘a complete system of currency, credit, trade, tolls, and finance, shut up in itself.” It was managed as a united whole, its centre of gravity was exclusively in local interests, and the policy which it pursued with all its strength was to maintain the area of its interests at war with, and strictly protected from the competition of all the outside world.*

This is the real starting-point of the economic life of the civilisation of our era—a starting-point at which we may distinguish that the ruling principle is still the same as that upon which the whole

1 The Mercantile System and its Historical Significance, by Gustav Schmoller (ed. W. J. Ashley), pp. 7, 8. 2 Jbid. * [bid., p. 10. 4 Joid., p. 11.