INSTITUTIONS OF LEARNING.
The intellectual condition of the Middle Ages was far inferior to that of their material prosperity, though the latter eventually reacted favorably upon the former. The Church was the only educational power. At first the work of education was confined to the monastery. We have already seen (p. 253) how in the ninth century the cloister of St. Gall was pro vided with two schools, one for its novices and the other for lay pupils. Not until a later period did the secular clergy participate in the work, either by direct teaching or through the supervision of schools connected with the parishes. Notwithstanding all the deficiencies of the medimval clergy (we may cite, for instance, the recorded fact that in the year 1291 neither the abbot nor the members of the chapter of St. Gall knew how to write), it shows a complete lack of the historic sense to assert that the Church kept the people in ignorance. Far more training is required to lead a people in a primitive state, even though endowed with great native talents, from the gross requirements of material life and the pursuit of practical purposes to abstract conceptions and logical thought, than even so well organized an institution as the old Church could exercise in the time given. It must not be forgotten that it requires centuries for the develop ment of a people to that point where isolated individuals begin to recog nize the superiority of intellectual culture; and a further period must elapse before such views pervade the entire social body.
Universities.—The instruction given in the parish schools did not extend beyond reading, writing, and a few liturgical and doctrinal teach ings, to which afterward a little Latin was added. The universities, how ever, did more to win respect for science. These institutions had their origin in Italy and France, where the universities of Salerno and Bologna, of Paris and Montpellier, were the earliest. In Germany the University of Prague was founded in 1348, and that of Vienna in 1365. These establishments were not yet universities in the modern sense, for they cultivated special branches of knowledge; thus, Salerno was devoted to medicine, Bologna to jnrisprudence, and Paris to theology, other supple mentary branches of course being added. In modern usage the word
" university " refers to the totality of the branches taught, but in those ages it had reference rather to the community of professors and students. Such centres of learning were few, and students gathered to them from all countries, the universal use of the Latin language doing away with all distinctions of nationality. At the same time, the feeling of patriot ism played an important part in the institutions of learning; societies composed of compatriots of the different countries were formed, and con stituted bonds of greater or less intimacy between their members: these associations were the origin of the later students' clubs, which exercised an important influence upon the constitution of the universities as late as the eighteenth century.
The salaries of the professors were paid from the tuition-fees of the students; the income from this source was very considerable, so much so that foundations for needy students could be established therefrom even at an early date. These foundations were termed Nurses, whence the German term Pztrsch, "student." Students' universities were endowed with many privi leges, especially that of jurisdiction over their own members. From this circumstance arose a condition of great disorder. Those to whom the students were responsible for misdemeanors had themselves the greatest interest in shielding the culprits, for the reputation of the institution was bound up with their own. This was doubtless the cause of the constantly increasing lawlessness which prevailed in the academic communities, and which increased during the sixteenth century, until it culminated in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in an organized system, banding the students in corps and associations of diverse nationalities, and defying all attempts to suppress disorder. It was only by freeing the pursuit of knowledge from external restrictions—which was the issue of all academic reforms in Germany—that a way was at last opened for internal agencies to bring about a regeneration.