The Mercantile System and its Historical Significance [5]
its own centre of gravity, was conscious of it, and acted as a unit in accordance therewith. No doubt this policy was pursued with varying vigour and success in the different territories. Where the impulse was given by a highly-developed and all-powerful industrial or commercial town, - as in the cases of Florence, Milan, and Venice,- there we very early find an economic policy pursued with great success; a policy which rose out of the older municipal interests, and which performed wonders. The House of Luxemburg, in Bohemia, and the House of Burgundy, in Flanders and on the lower Rhine, were, also, both of them able at an early period to guide their lands in the direction of a territorial policy on a large scale. But, in Germany, most of the princes were without the extensive dominions necessary for the purpose: in some places the towns, in other the knights, remained outside the new territorial commonweal. The most distinguished princes at the beginning of the sixteenth century, those of the Saxon house, were the lords of lands scattered in fragments all along the military thoroughfare of central Germany, from Hesse to Silesia; and, to make things worse, frequently partitioned these lands among the various branches of the family. And even what one of the Saxon princes happened to rule at any particular time was made up of a number of separate districts, geographically distinct. The situation of the other territories had much the same disadvantages. Yet grave as were these difficulties, and obstinate as was the conservative opposition of the older economic institutions, especially those of the towns, we cannot help seeing, in all directions, that the necessities of real life were relentlessly driving society toward the territorial organisation. The old forms of loose combination characteristic of the Middle Ages, like the town-leagues and alliances to maintain the public peace, the town toll-system and staple, the town currency, the everlasting hostility of town and country, all the old mediaeval corporations, these became every day greater hinderances in the way of trade and economic progress. People had to get free from them and make their way to larger unities, to associations of districts, and to more far-sighted coalitions of interests, such as were to be found in the territorial assemblies (Landtage) and at the courts of the princes. The more completely the princely territories coincided with old boundaries and primitive tribal feelings; the stronger happened to be the system of parliamentary Estates binding, first, towns together and nobles together, and then the whole municipal estate to the whole estate of the nobles; the more intelligent and forceful were the princes who guided the movement, with frugal and competent officials to help them; the quicker proceeded the process of economic assimilation. To be sure it never ran its course without meeting with the bitterest opposition. What trouble the Hohenzollern princes in Brandenburg had before they subjected to themselves, even externally and in military matters, the nobles and towns of the land! The severance of the Brandenburg towns from the Hanseatic League and the abolition of their independent right of alliance were barely accomplished during the years 1448 to 1488. The towns did not, however, surrender the right to pursue an independent commercial policy till long after this. The very important treaties with regard to the Frankfurt Staple (1490-1512) were certainly afterwards confirmed by the princes concerned. But the initiative still came from the towns; and this independence was retained as late as the Thirty Years' War, though in a lessened measure, and with increasing moderation and prudence in its exercise. Throughout the sixteenth century we find the princes of Brandenburg and their neighbours giving their attention more and more closely to matters of this kind. In the commercial controversies between Pomerania and Brandenburg (1562 and 1572), both the princely and the municipal authorities took part, although it was Frankfurt and Stettin