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Title: Minerva's Owl
Author: Harold A. Innis (1894-1952)
Date of first publication: 1947
Place and date of edition used as base for this ebook:
   Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1948
Date first posted: 4 March 2008
Date last updated: 4 March 2008
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #92

This ebook was produced by: Iona Vaughan and Mark Akrigg




    _Presidential Address
    Reprinted from the
    Proceedings of the Royal
    Society of Canada, 1947_




    Minerva's Owl


    HAROLD A. INNIS
    Ph.D., D.Ec.Sc., LL.D.




    UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS: 1948




Minerva's Owl

I have taken the title from that striking sentence of Hegel
"Minerva's owl begins its flight only in the gathering
dusk..." in reference to the crystallization of Greek
culture which accompanied major classical writings in the
period that saw the decline and fall of Grecian
civilization. The richness of that culture, its uniqueness,
and its influence on the history of the West suggest that
the flight began not only in the dusk of Grecian
civilization but also in the civilization of the West.

I have attempted to suggest that Western civilization has
been profoundly influenced by communication and that marked
changes in communication have had important implications in
changes in civilization. Briefly this address is divided
into the following periods in relation to media of
communication; clay and the stylus from the beginnings of
civilization in Mesopotamia; papyrus and the brush to the
Graeco-Roman period and the reed pen to the retreat of the
empire from the west; parchment and the pen to the tenth
century or the dark ages, and overlapping with paper, the
latter becoming more important with the invention of
printing; paper and the brush in China, and paper and the
pen in Europe before the invention of printing or the
Renaissance; paper and the printing press under handicraft
methods to the beginning of the nineteenth century, or from
the Reformation to the French Revoluition; paper produced by
machinery and the application of power to the printing press
since the beginning of the nineteenth century to the
manufacture from wood in the second half of the century;
celluloid in the growth of the cinema and finally the radio
in the second quarter of the present century, or the new
outbreak of savagery. In each period I have attempted to
trace the implications of the media of communication for the
character of knowledge and to suggest that a monopoly or an
oligopoly of knowledge is built up to the point that
equilibrium is disturbed.

An oral tradition implies freshness and elasticity but
students of anthropology have pointed to the binding
character of custom in primitive cultures. A complex system
of writing becomes the possession of a special class and
tends to support aristocracies. A simple flexible system of
writing admits of adaptation to the vernacular but slowness
of the adaptation facilitates monopolies of knowledge and
hierarchies. Reading in contrast with writing implies a
passive recognition of the power of writing. Inventions in
communication compel realignments in the monopoly or the
oligopoly of knowledge. A monopoly of knowledge incidental
to specialized skill in writing which weakens contact with
the vernacular will eventually be broken down by force. In
the words of Hume: "As force is always on the side of the
governed, the governors have nothing to support them but
opinion. It is, therefore, on opinion that government is
founded; and this maxim extends to the most despotic and the
most military governments as well as to the most free and
most popular." The relation of monopolies of knowledge to
organized force is evident in the political and military
histories of civilization. An interest in learning assumes a
stable society in which organized force is sufficiently
powerful to provide sustained protection. Concentration on
learning implies a written tradition and introduces
monopolistic elements in culture which are followed by
rigidities and involve lack of contact with the oral
tradition and the vernacular. "Perhaps in a very real sense,
a great institution is the tomb of the founder." "Most
organizations appear as bodies founded for the painless
extinction of ideas of the founders." "To the founder of a
school everything may be forgiven except the school."[1]
This change is accompanied by a weakening of the relations
between organized force and the vernacular and collapse in
the face of technological change which has taken place in
marginal regions which have escaped the influence of a
monopoly of knowledge. On the capture of Athens by the Goths
in 267 A.D. they are reported to have said, "Let us leave
the Greeks these books for they make them so effeminate and
unwarlike."

[Footnote 1: Albert Guerard, _Literature and Society_
(Boston, 1935), p. 288.]

With a weakening of protection of organized force, scholars
put forth greater efforts and in a sense the flowering of
the culture comes before its collapse. Minerva's owl begins
its flight in the gathering dusk not only from classical
Greece but in turn from Alexandria, from Rome, from
Constantinople, from the republican cities of Italy, from
France, from Holland, and from Germany. It has been said of
the Byzantine Empire that "on the eve of her definite ruin,
all Hellas was reassembling her intellectual energy to throw
a last splendid glow."[2] "The perishing empire of the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries especially the city of
Constantinople was a centre of ardent culture, both
intellectual and artistic."[3] In the regions to which
Minerva's owl takes flight the success of organized force
may permit a new enthusiasm and an intense flowering of
culture incidental to the migration of scholars engaged in
Herculean efforts in a declining civilization to a new area
in which enthusiasm and possibilities of protection are
combined. The success of organized force is dependent on an
effective combination of the oral tradition and the
vernacular in public opinion with technology and science. An
organized public opinion following the success of force
becomes receptive to cultural importation.

[Footnote 2: Cited A. A. Vasiliev, _History of the Byzantine
Empire_, II; "University of Wisconsin Studies in the Social
Sciences and History."]

[Footnote 3: _Ibid._, p. 400.]

Burckhardt has stated: "It may be, too, that those great
works of art had to perish in order that later art might
create in freedom. For instance, if, in the fifteenth
century, vast numbers of well-preserved Greek sculptures and
paintings had been discovered, Leonardo, Raphael, Titian and
Correggio would not have done their work, while they could,
in their own way, sustain the comparison with what had been
inherited from Rome. And if, after the middle of the
eighteenth century, in the enthusiastic revival of
philological and antiquarian studies, the lost Greek lyric
poets had suddenly been rediscovered, they might well have
blighted the full flowering of German poetry. It is true
that, after some decades, the mass of rediscovered ancient
poetry would have become assimilated with it, but the
decisive moment of bloom which never returns in its full
prime, would have been irretrievably past. But enough had
survived in the fifteenth century for art, and in the
eighteenth for poetry, to be stimulated and not
stifled...."[4] David Hume wrote that "when the arts and
sciences come to perfection in any state, from that moment
they naturally or rather necessarily decline and seldom or
never revive in that nation where they formerly
flourished.... Perhaps it may not be for the advantage of
any nation to have the arts imported from their neighbours
in too great proportion. This extinguishes emulation and
sinks the ardour of generous youth."[5]

[Footnote 4: Jacob Burckhardt, _Force and Freedom_ (New
York, 1943), pp. 368-9.]

[Footnote 5: David Hume, _Essays, Moral, Political and
Literary_, ed. T. H. Green and T. H. Grose (London, 1875),
I, pp. 195-6.]

Dependence on clay in the valleys of the Euphrates and the
Tigris involved a special technique in writing and a special
type of instrument. The reed stylus and cuneiform writing on
clay involved an elaborate skill, intensive training, and
concentration of durable records. The temple with its
priesthood became the centre of cities. Invasions of force
based on new techniques chiefly centring around the horse,
first in the chariot and later in cavalry, brought the union
of city states, but a culture based on intensive training in
writing rendered centralized control unstable and gave
organized religion an enormous influence. Law emerged to
restrain the influence of force and of religion. Successful
imperial organization came with the dominance of force
represented in the Pharaoh in Egypt though the Egyptian
Empire depended on cuneiform for its communications. It was
followed by the Assyrian Empire, the Persian Empire, and the
Alexandrian Empire.

While political organization of oriental empires followed
the Egyptian model, religious organization was powerfully
influenced by Babylonia as was evident in the traditions of
the Hebrews in the marginal territory of Palestine. With
access to more convenient media such as parchment and
papyrus and to a more efficient alphabet the Hebrew prophets
gave a stimulus to the oral and the written tradition which
persisted in the scriptures, the Jewish, Christian, and
Mohammedan religions. Written scriptures assumed greater
accessibility and escaped from the burdens of the temples of
Babylonian and Assyrian Empires. The influence of religion
in the Babylonian and Assyrian Empires was evident also in
the development of astronomy, astrology, and a belief in
fate, in the seven-day week, and in our sexagesimal time
system.

The Egyptians with an abundance of papyrus and the use of
the brush had worked out an elaborate system of writing and
the Babylonians with dependence on clay and the stylus had
developed an economical system of writing. Semitic peoples
borrowed the Sumerian system of writing but retained their
language and in turn improved the system of writing through
contacts with the Egyptians. The Phoenicians as a marginal
Semitic people with an interest in communication and trade
on the Mediterranean improved the alphabet to the point that
separate consonants were isolated in relation to sounds. The
Greeks took over the alphabet about the ninth century and
included vowels by which it became a flexible instrument
suited to the demands of a flexible oral tradition. The
flowering of the oral tradition was seen in provision for
public recitations in the Panathenea of the _Iliad_ and the
_Odyssey_ and in the birth of tragedy from about 500 to 400
B.C.

An intense and sustained interest in Greek civilization by a
wide range of scholars has pointed to numerous factors
leading to its cultural flowering. Ionian culture reflected
the contact of a vigorous race with the earlier rich Minoan
civilization and the emergence of a potent oral tradition.
This tradition absorbed and improved the instruments of a
written tradition built up on the opposite side of the
Mediterranean. Toynbee has emphasized the limitations of
migration across bodies of water and the significance of
those limitations to cultural borrowing.

In the written tradition the improved alphabet made possible
the expression of fine distinctions and light shades of
meaning. Opening of Egyptian ports to the Greeks in 670 B.C.
and establishment of Naucratis in 650 B.C. made papyrus more
accessible. The burst of Greek lyric poetry in the seventh
century has been attributed to the spread of cheap papyrus.
Jaeger has shown the significance of prose to law and the
city state. The flexibility of law shown in the major
reforms centring around the names of Dracon (621 B.C.),
Solon, and Cleisthenes was possible before a written
tradition had become firmly entrenched, but written codes
not only implied uniformity, justice, and a belief in laws
but also an element of rigidity and necessity for revolution
and drastic change. No effective device was developed to
facilitate the constant shifting power and as in present-day
Russia ostracism was essential. Laws weakened the interest
in punishment in another world for those who escaped justice
in this. Solon reflected the demands of an oral tradition
for flexibility by providing for the constitution of
judicial courts from the people, and Cleisthenes gave the
whole body of citizens a decisive part in the conduct of
human affairs. Political science became the highest of the
practical sciences. Political freedom was accompanied by
economical freedom particularly with the spread in the use
of coins after 700 B.C. To quote Mirabeau: "The two greatest
inventions of the human mind are writing and money--the
common language of intelligence and the common language of
self-interest."

Encroachment from the centralized empires of the east
through the Persians led to the flight of Ionians, who had
inherited to the fullest degree the legacies of earlier
civilizations, from Miletus, and to an interest in science
and philosophy in Athens. Ionians developed the great idea
of the universal rule of law, separated science from
theology, and rescued Greece from the tyranny of religion.
The self was detached from the external object. With this
came limitations reinforced by an interest in music and
geometry which implied concern with form and measure,
proportion and number in which relations between things in
themselves were neglected. But in spite of this neglect an
appeal to atomism and science had been made and through this
Europeans worked themselves out of the formal patterns of
the Orient. The Ionian alphabet was adopted in Athens in
402-3 B.C. suggesting the demands of the city for greater
standardization in writing. Prose was brought to perfection
by the middle of the fourth century and Plato sponsored its
supremacy by ruling out the poets and by his own writing.
When Athens became the centre of the federation in 454 B.C.
the way was opened to greater flexibility in law notably
through the contributions of orators to the improvement of
prose from 420 to 320 B.C. By 430 a reading public had
emerged in Athens and Herodotus turned his recitations into
book form. The spread of writing checked the growth of myth
and made the Greeks sceptical of their gods. Hecateus of
Miletus could say, "I write as I deem true, for the
traditions of the Greeks seem to me manifold and laughable."
Xenophanes wrote that "if horses or oxen had heads and could
draw or make statues, horses would represent forms of the
gods like horses, oxen like oxen." Rapid expansion in the
variety and volume of secular literature became a check to
organized priesthood and ritual.

Socrates protested against the materialistic drift of
physical science and shifted from a search for beginnings to
a search for ends. Concentrating on human life he discovered
the soul. Absolute autocracy of the soul implied self-rule.
Virtue is knowledge. "No one errs willingly." After the fall
of Athens and the death of Socrates, Plato turned from the
state. Socrates had been profoundly influenced by the
advance of medical science but Plato gave little attention
to experimental science. Collapse of the city state and of
religion attached to the city state was followed by
conscious individualism. The results were evident in
complexity, diversity, and perfection in a wide range of
cultural achievements. The significance of the oral
tradition was shown in the position of the assembly, the
rise of democracy, the drama, the dialogues of Plato, and
the speeches including the funeral speech of Pericles in the
writings of Thucydides. Hegel wrote regarding Pericles: "Of
all that is great for humanity the greatest thing is to
dominate the wills of men who have wills of their own." The
Greeks produced the one entirely original literature of
Europe. The epic and the lyric supported the drama.
Democracy brought the comedy of Aristophanes. Poetics and
the drama had a collective purgative effect on society but
with decline of the stage, oratory and rhetoric reflected
the influence of an individual.

The oral tradition emphasized memory and training. We have
no history of conversation or of the oral tradition except
as they are revealed darkly through the written or the
printed word. The drama reflected the power of the oral
tradition but its flowering for only a short period in
Greece and in England illustrates its difficulties. A
simplified and flexible alphabet and the spread of writing
and reading emphasized logic and, consequently general
agreement. The spread of writing widened the base by which
the screening of ability could take place. The feudal
hierarchy of Greece was weakened by an emphasis on writing
which became a type of intelligence test. A writing age was
essentially an egoistic age. Absorption of energies in
mastering the technique of writing left little possibility
for considering the implications of the technique.

Richness of the oral tradition made for a flexible
civilization but not a civilization which could be
disciplined to the point of effective political unity. The
city state proved inadequate in the field of international
affairs. Consequently it yielded to force in the hands of
the Macedonians though the genius of Greek civilization was
again evident in the masterly conquests of Alexander. The
heavy infantry of Greece and the navy were no match for the
light infantry and cavalry which struck from the rear. The
first of the great sledge-hammer blows of technology in
which force and the vernacular hammered monopolies of
knowledge into malleable form had been delivered. The
Alexandrian Empire and its successors favoured the
organization of Alexandria as the cultural centre of the
Mediterranean.

Aristotle bridged the gap between the city state and the
Alexandrian Empire. He rejected the dualism of Plato and
affirmed the absolute monarchy of the mind. He marked the
change "from the oral instruction to the habit of reading."
The immortal inconclusiveness of Plato was no longer
possible with the emphasis on writing. It has been said that
taught law is tough law so taught philosophy is tough
philosophy. The mixture of the oral and the written
tradition in the writings of Plato enabled him to dominate
the history of the West. Aristotle's interest in aesthetics
reflected a change which brought the dilettante, taste,
respectability, collectomania, and large libraries. As an
imperial centre Alexandria emphasized the written tradition
in libraries and museums. The scholar became concerned with
the conservation and clarification of the treasures of a
civilization which had passed. Minerva's owl was in full
flight. Other imperial centres such as Pergamum (197-159
B.C.) became rivals in the development of libraries and in
the use of parchment rather than papyrus. The period had
arrived when a great book was regarded as a great evil.
Books were written for those who had read all existing books
and were scarcely intelligible to those who had not.
Literature was divorced from life. In the words of Gilbert
Murray, Homer in the Alexandrian period came under "the
fatal glamour of false knowledge diffused by the printed
text." Alexandria broke the link between science and
philosophy. The library was an imperial instrument to offset
the influence of Egyptian priesthood. Greek advances in
mathematics were consolidated and the work of Aristotle as
the great biologist extended.

Writing with a simplified alphabet checked the power of
custom of an oral tradition but implied a decline in the
power of expression and the creation of grooves which
determined the channels of thought of readers and later
writers. The cumbersome character of the papyrus roll and
its lack of durability facilitated revision and restricted
the influence of writing at least until libraries were
organized under an imperial system. Greece had the advantage
of a strong oral tradition and concentration on a single
language. With the strong patriarchal structure of European
peoples she resisted on the one hand the power of the
Babylonian priesthood and goddesses and on the other of the
Egyptian monarchy as reflected in the pyramids.

As the Greeks had absorbed an earlier culture and adapted it
to their language so the Latins absorbed Etruscan culture.
The absorptive capacity of language was significant in the
history of Greece, Rome, and England. The contact of
language with an earlier developed culture without its
complete submergence implied an escape from the more subtle
aspects of that culture. It facilitated the rise of
philosophy and science in Greece in contrast with religion.
The civilization of Greece emphasized unity of approach but
Rome absorbed rhetoric and excluded science. In the East,
Persian and Arabic literature excluded the influence of
Greek literature but absorbed science. Pervasiveness of
language becomes a powerful factor in the mobilization of
force particularly as a vehicle for the diffusion of opinion
among all classes. Language exposed to major incursions
became more flexible, facilitated movement between classes,
favoured the diffusion of technology, and made for rapid
adjustment.

Roman force supported the extension of the Republic to
Carthage and Corinth in 146 B.C. and was followed in turn by
the Hellenistic cultural invasion of Rome after 159 B.C.
Inclusion of Egypt in her possessions widened the gap by
which Eastern influences penetrated Rome. Greek literature
collected and edited in Alexandria had its impact on Rome.
Roman literature was "over-powered by the extremely isolated
and internally perfect Greek literature." Greek became a
learned language and smothered the possibilities of Latin.
Access to supplies of papyrus brought the growth of
libraries, and of offices of administration. Hellenistic
civilization warped the development of Rome toward an
emphasis on force, administration, and law. While Cicero
contributed to the perfection of Latin prose he followed the
model set up by Isocrates. As the Empire followed the
Republic, restrictions were imposed on the Senate and on the
oral tradition. Disappearance of political activity through
censorship meant the increased importance of law and
rhetoric. The literature of knowledge was divorced from the
literature of form which eventually became panegyric.
Oratory and history were subordinated to the state, the
theatre was displaced by gladiatorial games. "It was
jurisprudence, and jurisprudence only which stood in the
place of poetry and history, of philosophy and science."[6]
Interest in Greek in Rome halted literature and accentuated
the interest in the codification of law.

[Footnote 6: H. S. Maine, _Ancient Law_, pp. 351-2.]

The spread of militarism implied an emphasis on territorial
rather than personal interests. It meant a release of
individual self-assertion and the temporary overthrow of
customary restraints. Blood relationship and the dominance
of the group over the individual were not suited to the
military efficiency of the Roman legion. The extent of the
Roman Empire in contrast with the city state necessitated
written law as a means of restraining the demands of force.
The patriarchal society of people along the north shore of
the Mediterranean had withstood the effects of the earlier
civilizations in the case of the Greeks who solved their
problems partly by colonization. In Rome the rise of a
professional legal class particularly with the decline of
the Republic and the Senate, and the separation of judicial
power from legislative and executive powers, was marked by
systematic development of law which weakened the power of
_patria potestas_. Force and law weakened the patriarchal
system. Family relations were created artificially, a
development concerning which Maine wrote that there was
"none to which I conceive mankind to be more deeply
indebted." Legal obligation was separated from religious
duty. The contract was developed from the conveyance and as
a pact plus an obligation was, again in the words of Maine,
"the most beautiful monument to the sagacity of Roman
jurisconsults." Written testimony and written instruments
displaced the cumbersome ceremonies of the oral tradition.
It has been said of Roman law that the indestructibility of
matter is as nothing compared to the indestructibility of
mind. While Roman law was flexible in relation to the
demands of Mediterranean trade and in the hands of the bar
and the lecturers rather than the bench it began to harden
under the influence of Greek scholars and commentators and
eventually was subjected to elaborate codes. "It is only
when people begin to want water that they think of making
reservoirs, and it was observed that the laws of Rome were
never reduced into a system till its virtue and taste had
perished."[7] Papyrus and the roll limited the possibilities
of codification of Roman law.

[Footnote 7: Thomas Constable, _Archibald Constable and His
Literary Correspondents_, (Edinburgh, 1823), I, p. 261.]

The increasing rigidity of law and the increasing influence
of the East shown in the emergence of the absolute emperor
opened the way to the penetration of Eastern religions. The
political animal of Aristotle became the individual of
Alexander. Roman architecture, Roman roads, and Roman law
enhanced the attraction, accessibility, and prestige of
Rome. The Alexandrian tradition of science and learning
implied not only a study of the classics of Greece but also
a study and translation of the Hebrew scriptures. Hebraic
literature had arisen among a people who had been trampled
over by the armies of oriental empires and exposed during
periods of captivity to the influence notably of Persian
religion with its conceptions of immortality and of the
devil. The law and the prophets had been incorporated in
holy scriptures. Under the influence of monotheism writings
had become sacred. The written bible assumed monotheism,
doctrine, and priesthood. "No book, no doctrine, no
doctrine, no book" (De Quincy). Pagan cultures lacked the
act of thanksgiving and the act of confession. Greece and
Rome as polytheistic cultures had supported an empire.
Bibles were not suited to empires. Greek philosophy was
represented by the teacher and Eastern religions by the
priests and the prophets. "Thus saith the Lord." Zeno the
Stoic had introduced the latter note into Greek philosophy
and its influence was evident in the absorption of Stoicism
in Roman law. "The exile of the Jews and the defeat of
Greece brought Christianity and Stoicism. All great
idealisms appear to spring from the soil of materialistic
defeat."[8]

[Footnote 8: R. T. Flewelling, _The Survival of Western
Culture_ (New York, 1943), p. 26.]

The development of the Empire and Roman law reflected the
need for institutions to meet the rise of individualism and
cosmopolitanism which followed the break-down of the
_polis_ and the city state. The Roman Empire opened the way
to a rich growth of associations and the spread of religious
cults. Organized religion emerged to prevent the sense of
unity implied in Greek civilization. A relatively inflexible
alphabet such as Hebrew and limited facilities for
communication narrowed the problem of education to a small
highly-trained group or special class. Its capacities were
evident in the literary achievements of the Old Testament.
The dangers became apparent in the difficulty of maintaining
contact with changes in the oral language. The people spoke
Aramaic and Hebrew became a learned language. Christianity
was saved from being a Jewish sect by the necessity of
appealing to the spoken Greek language. "It is written ...,
but I say unto you." The New Testament was written in
colloquial Greek.

Christianity capitalized on the advantages of a new
technique and the use of a new material. Parchment in the
codex replaced papyrus in the roll. The parchment codex was
more durable, more compact, and more easily consulted for
reference. The four Gospels and the Acts could be placed in
four distinct rolls or a single codex. Convenience for
reference strengthened the position of the codex in the use
of the scriptures or of codes of law. The codex with
durability of parchment and ease of consultation emphasized
size and authority in the book. Verse and prose which had
been read aloud and in company to the third and fourth
centuries declined. Reading without moving of the lips
introduced a taste and style of its own. The ancient world
troubled about sounds, the modern world about thoughts.
Egoism replaced an interest in the group. A gospel corpus of
powerful coherent pamphlets written in the Greek vernacular
had emerged as the basis of the New Testament by 125 A.D.
and with the Old Testament constituted a large volume which
became a dominant centre of interest in learning.

Pressure from the barbarians to the north led to a search
for a more secure capital than Rome, to the selection of
Constantinople in 330 A.D., and to the fall of Rome in 410
A.D. The court had cut itself off from the centre of legal
development and turned to organized religion as a new basis
of support. Christianity based on the book, the Old and New
Testaments, absorbed or drove out other religions such as
Mithraism and lent itself to co-operation with the state. In
the East the oriental concept of empire developed in Egypt,
Babylonia, Assyria, and Persia was restored. In the West law
tempered the influence of Christianity and in the East
particularly after the Justinian codes the influence of the
absolute emperor. To quote Maine again: "It is precisely
because the influence of jurisprudence begins to be powerful
that the foundation of Constantinople and the subsequent
separation of the western empire from the eastern are epochs
in philosophical history." "Of the subjects which have
whetted the intellectual appetite of the moderns, there is
scarcely one, except physics, which has not been filtered
through Roman jurisprudence."[9] Unequal to Greek
metaphysical literature the Latin language took it over with
little question. The problem of free will and necessity
emerged with Roman law.

[Footnote 9: Maine, _Ancient Law_, p. 352.]

The Roman Empire failed to master the divisive effects of
the Greek and Latin languages. Inability to absorb Greek
culture was evident in movement of the capital to
Constantinople and the tenacity of Greek language and
culture supported the Byzantine Empire to 1453. Greek
disappeared in Rome under pressure from the vernacular as
did Latin in Constantinople. The alphabet had proved too
flexible and too adaptable to language. Language proved
tougher than force and the history of the West was in part
an adaptation of force to language. The richness of Greek
civilization, the balance between religion, law, and emperor
which characterized the Byzantine Empire, enabled it to
withstand the effects of new developments in the application
of force.

Ridgeway has shown the significance of the crossing of the
light Libyan horse with the stocky Asiatic horse in the
development of an animal sufficiently strong to carry armed
men, and in turn, of the cavalry. Oman has described the
defeat of the Emperor Valens at Adrianople in 378 A.D. by
heavy Gothic cavalry, the reorganization of the armies of
the Byzantine Empire, the defeat of the barbarians following
that reorganization, and the movement of the barbarians,
successfully resisted in the East, to the conquest of the
West. Dependence on roads in the Roman Empire, as in the
Persian Empire, facilitated administration and invasion. In
the West in the face of barbarian encroachment the hierarchy
of the Roman Empire became to an important extent the
hierarchy of the church. Monarchy in the Eastern empire was
paralleled by monarchy in the Western papacy. In the East
the position of the emperor and his control over the state
were followed by religious division and heresy. The
political monarchy of the East meant ecclesiastical division
whereas in the West the position of the papacy was followed
by political division.

Ecclesiastical division in the East weakened political power
in that heresies reinforced by regionalism saw the loss of
Egypt and other parts of the Byzantine Empire to the
Mohammedans. With the fanaticism of a new religion based on
a book, the Koran, with polygamy, with the opening of new
territory to crowded peoples, and with the division of
Christendom, Mohammedanism spread to the east and to the
west. Defeated at Constantinople in 677 its followers
concentrated on the West until they were halted by Charles
Martel in 732. Again following Ridgeway, the heavier
cross-bred horses of the Franks defeated the lighter cavalry
of the Mohammedans. Military pressure from Spain brought the
growth of centralization which culminated in Charlemagne and
the rise of the German emperors. "Without Islam the Frankish
Empire would probably never have existed and Charlemagne,
without Mahomet, would be inconceivable" (Pirenne). In 800
the Byzantine Empire was ruled by an empress Irene and the
emphasis on the male line in the West strengthened the
position of Charlemagne, crowned by the papacy. A new empire
in the West was followed by the Carolingian renaissance.

The position of the Emperor in the East led to a clash with
monasticism, the iconoclastic controversy, and separation of
the Eastern from the Western church. In the West monasticism
with little check accentuated the influence of celibacy and
of Latin in the church. In the East monasticism was brought
under control but in the West it strengthened its position
to the point that political history has been powerfully
influenced by the struggle between church and state to the
present century. The power of monasticism in the West was
enhanced by the monopoly of knowledge which followed the
cutting-off of supplies of papyrus from Egypt by the
Mohammedans. "The Mediterranean had been a Roman lake; it
now became, for the most part, a Muslim lake" (Pirenne). In
the East the last of the schools of Athens were closed by
Justinian in 529 and new centres of learning were
established in Constantinople, but in the West an interest
in classical studies was discouraged by the monastic
tradition of learning which began in Italy. Monasteries
concentrated on the scriptures and the writings of the
Fathers. The classics were superseded by the scriptures. The
blotting out of the learning of Spain by the Mohammedans and
restricted interest in learning in Europe meant that the
most distant area of Europe, namely Ireland, alone remained
enthusiastic for knowledge and from here an interest in
learning spread backwards to Scotland and England and to
Europe. Alcuin was brought from the north of England to
strengthen the position of learning under Charlemagne. A
renewed interest in learning brought an improvement of
writing in the appearance of the Carolingian minuscule. Its
efficiency was evident in a spread throughout Europe, in
ultimate supremacy over the Beneventan script in the south
of Italy, and a supply of models for the modern alphabet.

The spread of learning from the British Isles to the
continent preceded the invasions of the Scandinavians to the
north. Pressure from this direction was evident in the
emergence of the Duchy of Normandy in 911 and the
reorganization of European defence. By the eleventh century
the invasions of the Vikings and the Magyars had left
cavalry and the feudal knights in supremacy. The cultural
tenacity of language was shown in the conquest of the
conquered, the adoption of the French language in Normandy
and eventually of the English language in England by the
Normans. Military reorganization in Europe, the ascendancy
of the papacy, and the break between the Eastern and the
Western church in 1054 were followed by the Crusades, the
Norman conquest of Apulia and Sicily after 1061, and of
England in 1066, and the driving of the Moors out of Spain.
The energies of the West were turned against the Mohammedans
in the Holy Land and against the schismatic church of the
Byzantine Empire. The capture of Constantinople in 1204 was
the beginning of the end of the Eastern Roman Empire.
Minerva's owl began its flight to the West.

Decline in the use of papyrus particularly after the spread
of Mohammedanism necessitated the use of parchment. The
codex was suited to the large book whether it was the Roman
law or the Hebrew scriptures. In the Byzantine Empire
successive codifications of Roman law were undertaken.
Caesaropapism and the iconoclastic controversy assumed
control over the church by the emperor. In the West the law
of the barbarians was personal and the church emphasized the
scriptures and the writings of the Fathers. With the Greeks
virtue is knowledge, particularly the knowledge that we know
nothing, and with the Hebrew prophets, perhaps in protest
against the monopoly of knowledge held by the scribes of
Egypt and Babylonia, knowledge is evil. The emphasis on the
authority of the scriptures and the writings of the Fathers
in the West was supplemented by ceremonial, and allegorical
writings. The metre of classical poetry was replaced by
accent and rhyme. Reading assumed submission to authority.

But long before, the influence of Grecian culture was being
filtered through Persian and Arabian civilization in the
south to Spain and Europe. The process was hastened by a new
medium, namely paper, from China. The invention of the
manufacture of paper from textiles in China in the early
part of the second century A.D., the adaptation of the brush
used in painting to writing, and the manufacture of ink from
lamp black marked the beginnings of a written tradition and
a learned class. In the Chinese language the pictograph
survived though most of the characters were phonetic. With a
limited number of words, about 1,500, it was used with
extraordinary skill to serve as a medium for a great
diversity of spoken languages. But its complexity emphasized
the importance of a learned class, the limited influence of
public opinion, and the persistence of political and
religious institutions. The importance of Confucianism and
the classics and worship of the written word led to the
invention of devices for accurate reproduction. Neglect of
the masses hastened the spread of Buddhism and the
development of a system for rapid reduplication,
particularly of charms. Buddhism spread from India where the
oral tradition of the Brahmins flourished at the expense of
the written tradition and proved singularly adaptable to the
demands of an illiterate population. Printing emerged from
the demands of Buddhism in its appeal to the masses and of
Confucianism with its interest in the classics, the
literature of the learned. Complexity of the characters
necessitated the development of block printing and
reproduction of the classics depended on large-scale state
support. The first printed book has been dated 868 A.D.
Severe limitations on public opinion involved a long series
of disturbances in the overthrow of dynasties and in
conquest by the Mongols but the tenacity of an oral
tradition gave enormous strength to Chinese institutions and
to scholars.

Expansion of Mohammedanism and the capture of Turkestan by
the Arabs in 751 was followed by the introduction of paper
to the West. It was produced in Baghdad as early as 793 and
its introduction corresponded with the literary splendour of
the reign of Harun al Raschid (786-809). It was used in
Egypt by the middle of the ninth century, spread rapidly in
the tenth century, declined sharply in the eleventh century,
and was produced in Spain in the twelfth century, and in
Italy in the thirteenth century. By the end of the
fourteenth century paper in Italy had declined to one-sixth
the price of parchment. Linen rags were its chief cheap raw
material. In the words of Henry Hallam, paper introduced "a
revolution ... of high importance, without which the art of
writing would have been much less practised, and the
invention of printing less serviceable to mankind...." It
"permitted the old costly material by which thought was
transmitted to be superseded by a universal substance which
was to facilitate the diffusion of the works of human
intelligence." With a monopoly of papyrus and paper the
Mohammedans supported an interest in libraries and in the
transmission of Greek classics, particularly Aristotle and
science. Prohibition of images in the Mohammedan religion
facilitated an emphasis on learning. From libraries in Spain
a knowledge of Aristotle spread to Europe and became
important to the works of Albert Magnus and Thomas Aquinas.
Arabic numerals, and a knowledge of mathematics and
astronomy, of science and medicine found their way through
Sicily and Spain to Europe. Writing developed beyond
monastic walls and in the twelfth century numerous attacks
were made on ecclesiastical corruption. Sombart has
emphasized the importance of Arabic numerals to the spread
of exact calculations, the growth of business, and the
commercial revolution from 1275 to 1325. Cursive handwriting
emerged in the thirteenth century. Expansion of commerce
favoured the growth of lay schools and closing of the
monasteries to secular students increased the importance of
cathedral schools and universities. The rural interest of
the monasteries was succeeded by the urban interest of the
university. Knowledge of architecture imported from
Constantinople and adaptation of buildings to northern
conditions led to the wave of construction of Gothic
cathedrals from 1150 to 1250. With the cathedral came an
improvement in various arts such as stained glass and
counterpoint music. The University of Paris was started
about 1170 and as a master's university its model was
followed in later institutions.

The spread of paper from China hastened the growth of
commerce in Italy and northern Europe. It supported an
increase in writing beyond the bounds of the monasteries. It
was a medium for the spread of Greek science through
Mohammedan territory and through it Arabic numerals and more
efficient calculation were introduced into Europe. Aristotle
became accessible through Arabic and Greek and attempts to
reconcile his writings with the scriptures were evident in
the work of Maimonides and St. Thomas Aquinas. Universities
emerged in cathedral centres and supported an interest in
the oral tradition, dialectic, and scholasticism.
Establishment of the Dominicans and the Franciscans was
designed to curb the spread of heresy in the vernacular and
in educational centres. The Byzantine Empire disappeared as
a balance between papacy and empire and left them to destroy
each other. The papacy became more involved in problems of
territorial rights. As a result of the Babylonian captivity
in Avignon it incurred the antagonism of England. The papacy
was no longer able to check the spread of translations of
the scriptures in the vernacular, and the spread of Roman
law from the Byzantine Empire strengthened the new
monarchies in France and England. Concentration on the
vernacular produced a new and powerful literature.

Commercial activity in Italy assumed a renewed interest in
law. The barbarian invasions had meant an emphasis on
personal law and through this Roman law persisted in a
modified form. At the beginning of the twelfth century there
emerged at Bologna an intensified interest in the study of
Roman law and the student type of university. Weakening of
the Byzantine Empire was followed by the struggle between
church and empire in the West and the latter seized upon
Roman law as a powerful instrument with which to reinforce
the position of the emperor. Its influence spread in Italy
and in southern France and was evident in the development of
canon law in the church. "The worst corruption of the middle
ages lay in the transformation of the sacerdotal hierarchy
into a hierarchy of lawyers" (Rashdall). In the words of
Frederic Harrison: "The peculiar, indispensable service of
Byzantine literature was the preservation of the language,
philology, and archaeology of Greece." But it had perhaps no
influence in any field greater than in that of Roman law.

The strength of the church in the north where the traditions
of Roman municipalities and Roman law were weak was shown in
the University of Paris. In France and particularly in
England the weakness of the written tradition favoured the
position of custom and the common law. Law was found, not
made, and the implications were evident in the jury system,
the King's Court, common law, and parliament. In England,
law and religion were not fortified by universities since
these were not located at the capital or in cathedral
cities. Law and religion were responsive to the demands of
an oral tradition. The flexibility of the English language
as a result of the invasion of successive languages from
Europe made for common law, parliamentary institutions, and
trade. In Scotland the universities were typically urban
and, located in large cities, became the basis for the rich
development in philosophy in the eighteenth century. The
variety of types of university and geographical isolation
provided the background for the diversity of interest which
characterized the intellectual activity of Europe. The
increasing strength of the vernaculars weakened the position
of the University of Paris. The Franciscans in Oxford
revived an interest in Plato in contrast with the Dominican
interest in Aristotle in Paris. The councils of the church
became ineffectual and the monarchy of the papacy became
more absolute. The supremacy of celibacy favoured the
concentration of power in Rome, prevented the establishment
of ecclesiastical dynasties, and facilitated constant appeal
to intellectual capacity. Concentration of power in Rome
hastened the development of the Gallican church.

In Europe the rise of commerce, of cities, and of
universities brought conflict between monasticism and the
secular clergy, and between the church and the state
particularly in the control over education. Introduction of
paper and the spread of writing hastened the growth of the
vernacular and the decline of Latin. Control of the church
was inadequate to check the oral tradition, and the spread
of heresies which followed the growth of trade and the
weakening of the Byzantine Empire. But the church undertook
its first counter-reformation. In a letter of 1199 Innocent
III frowned on translations of the scriptures, writing that
"the secret mysteries of the faith ought not therefore to be
explained to all men in all places." Translation and lay
reading of the New Testament by the Waldensians, and the
rise of romantic poetry in Provence probably under the
influence of the Mohammedans and the Byzantine Empire, were
ruthlessly stamped out. Establishment of new orders, the
Dominicans and the Franciscans, and of the Inquisition was
designed to check the spread of heresy incidental to the
emergence of translations in the vernacular and of oral
discussions in universities. The new courts of Europe were
strengthened by the lawyers and writers in the vernacular.
Dante wrote that "a man's proper vernacular is nearest unto
him as much as it is more closely united to him, for it is
singly and alone in his mind before any other." "Since we do
not find that anyone before us has treated of the science of
the Vulgar Tongue, while, in fact, we see that this tongue
is highly necessary for all, inasmuch as not only men, but
even women and children strive, in so far as Nature allows
them, to acquire it ... we will endeavour by the aid of the
Wisdom which breathes from Heaven to be of service to the
speech of the common people."[10] The power of the
vernacular was evident in the growth of nationalism and the
rise of universities particularly in Germany. Wycliffe's
translation of the Lollard Bible and his influence on Huss
in Bohemia pointed to the breaking of the power of the
church on the outer fringes of Europe. Opposed to the
influence of the University of Paris and its interest in
councils the papacy favoured the establishment of
universities in Germany and in Spain. The republican cities
of Italy, particularly Venice and Florence, prospered with
the decline of Byzantine commerce and the Hohenstaufen
court. The migration of Greek scholars from the East
contributed to an intense interest in classical
civilization. Florence became a second Athens in its concern
for letters and the arts. Learning had been banked down in
the Byzantine Empire and broke out into new flames in the
Italian Renaissance. The vitality of the classics of Greece
which reflected the power of civilization based on an oral
tradition gradually weakened the monopoly of knowledge held
by the church. "Nothing moves in the modern world that is
not Greek in its origin" (Maine).

[Footnote 10: Dante in _De vulgari eloquentia_; cited in
Vernon Hall, Jr., _Renaissance Literary Criticism_ (New
York, 1945), p. 17.]

As the prejudice against paper as a product of Jews and
Arabs had been broken down with the spread of commerce the
position of parchment as a medium for the scriptures and the
classics was enhanced. The product of the copyist and the
miniaturist increased in value. The monopoly of the
manuscript and its high value intensified an interest in the
development of a technique of reproduction in areas in which
the copyist had limited control, namely in Germany. The use
of oil in painting and its extension to ink, the development
of an alloy which could be melted at low temperatures and
remained consistent in size with changes in temperature, the
growth of skill in cutting punches, the invention of an
adjustable type mould, and the adaptation of the press were
brought into a unified system as a basis for printing.
Production of a large volume such as the Bible assumed
concentration of capital on a substantial scale and a
continued output of books. Limited transportation facilities
and a limited market for books hastened the migration of
printers particularly to Italy, a region with abundant
supplies of paper, a commodity which proved more adaptable
to the printing press than parchment. Migration to new
markets compelled the adoption of new types. The Gothic
black-letter type which characterized German printing was
replaced by the Roman type in Italy. Resistance of copyists
delayed the spread of printing in France, but the delay
possibly facilitated artistic development in French type.
The demands of the press for manuscripts and the necessity
of creating new markets favoured extension to the production
of the classics in Greek, the use of more compact type for
smaller portable volumes in italic, and the emphasis on the
vernacular. The technique of printing crossed the water of
the English Channel and Caxton with a concern for the market
concentrated on English and avoided the depressed market for
books in the classical languages.

An enormous increase in production and variety of books and
incessant search for markets hastened the rise of the
publisher, an emphasis on commerce at the expense of the
printer, and a neglect of craftsmanship. As the supply of
manuscripts in parchment which had been built up over
centuries had been made available by printing, writers in
the vernacular were gradually trained to produce material.
But they were scarcely competent to produce large books and
were compelled to write controversial pamphlets which could
be produced quickly and carried over wide areas, and had a
rapid turnover. The publisher was concerned with profits.
The flexibility of the European alphabet and the limited
number of distinct characters, capable of innumerable
combinations, facilitated the development of numerous
printing plants and the mobilization of a market for a
commodity which could be adapted to a variety of consumers.
Knowledge was not only diversified, it was designed by the
publisher to widen its own market notably in the use of
advertising.

The monopoly position of the Bible and the Latin language in
the church was destroyed by the press and in its place there
developed a wide-spread market for the Bible in the
vernacular and a concern with its literal interpretation. To
quote Jefferson, "The printers can never leave us in a state
of perfect rest and union of opinion." In the words of
Victor Hugo the book destroyed the "ancient Gothic genius,
that sun which sets behind the gigantic press of Mayence."
Architecture which for six thousand years had been "the
great handwriting of the human race" was no longer supreme.
It was significant that printing spread most rapidly in
those regions in Europe in which the cathedral was not
dominant and in which political division was most
conspicuous--in Italy and in Germany. In Italy, with its
access to Constantinople, emphasis had been given to the
classics; in Germany emphasis was given first to bulky
theological volumes and in turn, with the shift of the
industry to Leipzig, to the small polemical publications
which characterized the writings of Luther and his
successors of the Reformation and to the Bible in High
German dialect. In the words of Hume, "The growth and
surprising progress of this bold sect [Lutherans] may justly
in part be ascribed to the late invention of printing and
revival of learning." "The books of Luther and his
sectaries, full of vehemence, declamation and rude eloquence
were propagated more quickly and in greater numbers." "One
of the first effects of printing was to make proud men look
upon learning as disgraced by being brought within reach of
the common people" (Southey).

As in the paper revolution the church was compelled to
mobilize its resources in counter-attack, notably in the
Council of Trent and the establishment of the Jesuit order.
In Italy the power of law and of the church and division
among the republics checked the spread of the Reformation
and produced Machiavelli. He wrote: "We Italians then owe to
the church of Rome and to her priests our having become
irreligious and bad; but we owe her a still greater debt,
and that will be the cause of our ruin namely, that the
church has kept and still keeps our country divided." In
France the restricted influence of Greek and the supremacy
of Latin favoured an outburst of literary activity in the
vernacular in Montaigne and Rabelais. With the suppression
of Protestantism Estienne and Calvin fled to Geneva and by
the end of the sixteenth century the great scholars of
France left for Holland. In Germany political division laid
the basis for the bitter religious wars of the seventeenth
century. The arguments of William of Occam and of Wycliffe
had gained in England with the decline of Italian
financiers. Weakness of the church, of monasticism, and of
the universities enabled the crown to break with the papacy.
The rise of the printing industry had its implication in
technological unemployment shown in part in the decline of
monasticism.

The success of the Counter-Reformation reflected the
influence of force. The growth of industrialism, the
interest in science and mathematics, and the rise of cities
had their effects in the use of gunpowder and artillery. The
application of artillery in destroying the defences of
Constantinople in 1453 was spectacular evidence of the
decline of cavalry and systems of defence which had
characterized feudalism. The instruments of attack became
more powerful than those of defence and decentralization
began to give way to centralization. The limitations of
cavalry had been evident in the mountainous region of
Switzerland and the low country of the Netherlands and in
the success of movements toward independence in those
regions. The military genius of Cromwell and of Gustavus
Adolphus in utilization of new instruments of warfare
guaranteed the position of Protestantism in England and
Germany.

A revolution in finance accompanied change in the character
of force. In Italy independent republics had continued the
traditions of Rome in the emphasis on municipal
institutions. The importance of defence in construction of
city walls necessitated development of municipal credit and
responsibility of citizens for the debt of a corporate
entity. In the struggle of the Netherlands against Spain the
principle was extended and the republic became an instrument
of credit. In England the ultimate supremacy of parliament
in 1688 meant further elaboration, and recognition of the
role of public debts was shown in the establishment of the
Bank of England in 1694. Extension of the principle of
corporate entity from Roman law eventually clashed with the
traditions of common law in the revolt of the American
colonies in the eighteenth century. The growth of public
credit increased the importance of information, of organized
news services, and of opinion. Organized exchanges emerged
in Antwerp, in Amsterdam, and in London. The importance of
opinion in relation to finance accentuated the significance
of the vernacular.

The effects of the Counter-Reformation in France were shown
in the suppression of printing, the massacre of St.
Bartholomew in 1572, and finally in the revocation of the
Edict of Nantes in 1685. Suppression of printing in response
to ecclesiastical demands was accompanied by an interest in
the increased production and export of paper by the state.
As a result of this conflict between restriction of
consumption and increase of production and exports, cheaper
supplies were available in the Netherlands, Geneva, and
countries in which printing remained free. From these
marginal areas printed material was smuggled back into
France. Freedom of the press in marginal free countries was
sponsored by repression in France. In the eighteenth century
evasion of censorship was shown in the preparation and
printing of the Encyclopedia, and the writings of Voltaire
and Rousseau.

Abolition of the monasteries and celibacy in the Church of
England, the reform of education in the first half of the
sixteenth century, and censorship of the press in the second
half of the century had their effects in the flowering of
the drama in the plays of Shakespeare. Weakening of the
monarchy under the Stuarts was accompanied by the
publication of the King James version of the Bible and the
prose of Milton and the sharp decline of the theatre. The
impact of the Bible was shown in the separation of church
and state as enunciated by the Puritans. It recognized the
clash between the written and the oral tradition, the latter
persisting in parliament and the common law, and the former
in the scriptures. In the Restoration Dryden supported the
interest of the court and after the revolution of 1688 and
the lapse of the licensing act in 1695 the demands of
political parties were met by the writing of Addison,
Steele, Swift, and Defoe. Suspension of printing had brought
news-letters and discussion in the coffee-houses. Revival of
the classics by Dryden and Pope was the prelude to financial
independence of Pope, Johnson, and Goldsmith. The
restrictive measures of Walpole and the increasing
importance of advertising as a source of revenue for
newspapers directed the interest of writers to compilations,
children's books, and novels and the interest of readers to
the circulating library. The position of the church with the
supremacy of parliament and constitutional monarchy favoured
an interest in deism on the one hand and Methodism on the
other.

In the colonies books were imported on a large scale from
England and Europe by booksellers and the colonial printer
turned his attention to newspapers. In the eighteenth
century the energetic writing in London papers before their
suppression by Walpole and after the success of Wilkes and
others in securing the right to publish parliamentary
debates served as an example to colonial journalists. The
printing industry crossed the water of the Atlantic Ocean
and changed its character. The prominent role of the
newspaper in the American Revolution was recognized in the
first article of the Bill of Rights. The movement toward
restriction of the press by taxes in the latter part of the
eighteenth century and the early part of the nineteenth
century in England was paralleled by an insistence on
freedom of the press in the United States. The results were
shown in the rapid expansion in exports of rags from Italy
to the United States.

From the invention of printing to the beginning of the
nineteenth century the manufacture of paper and the
production of the printed word were handicraft processes.
The invention of the paper machine and the introduction of
the mechanical press involved a revolution in the extension
of communication facilities. In England taxes on paper and
advertising favoured the monopoly of _The Times_ to the
middle of the century and removal of these taxes by 1861 was
followed by a rapid increase in the number of newspapers and
in their circulation and in the demand for raw material. In
the United States the demands of large numbers of newspapers
hastened the introduction of the fast press, the spread of
advertising, inventions such as the telegraph and the cable
and the linotype, and a rapid shift from rags to wood as a
source of raw material. English authors such as Dickens
emphasized the importance of sentimentalism and
sensationalism in part through the demands of a new reading
class and of an American market. In the words of Barrie,
"Dickens introduces children into his stories that he may
kill them to slow music." American authors with lack of
copyright protection turned to journalism. Artemus Ward
stated that "Shakespeare wrote good plays but he wouldn't
have succeeded as the Washington correspondent of a New York
daily newspaper. He lacked the reckisit fancy and
imagination." Extension of the newspaper in the United
States had its implications for Great Britain in the rise of
the new journalism particularly after the South African War.
Hearst, Scripps, Northcliffe, and Beaverbrook became
dominant figures. In the United States the political
ambitions of journalists were checked by competition, in
England by nomination to the House of Lords, in Canada by an
LL.D. In the twentieth century the power of English
journalists was evident in restrictions imposed on the radio
through government ownership while limitations on the power
of American journalists in the United States was indicated
by the effective use of radio by Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

In Anglo-Saxon countries the impact of technological
advances on the frontier in the course of which Hearst and
Pulitzer from San Francisco and St. Louis introduced
revolutionary changes in New York and J. G. Bennett, Jr. and
Whitelaw Reid hastened revolutionary changes in Great
Britain and Europe, involved an irregular interest on the
part of governments in communication and education.
Extension of the franchise and the problems of military
organization with its demands for technical knowledge and
trained men contributed to the improvement of postal
facilities and the extension of compulsory education. In
Europe the dominance of the book meant less rapid extension
of newspapers and restriction in such countries as Germany,
Italy, and Russia, and personal and political journalism in
France. The varied rate of development of communication
facilities has accentuated difficulties of understanding.
Improvements in communication, like the Irish bull of the
bridge which separated the two countries, make for increased
difficulties of understanding. The cable compelled
contraction of language and facilitated a rapid widening
between the English and American languages. In the vast
realm of fiction in the Anglo-Saxon world, the influence of
the newspaper and such recent developments as the cinema and
the radio has been evident in the best seller and the
creation of special classes of readers with little prospect
of communication between them. Publishers demand great names
and great books particularly if no copyright is involved.
The large-scale mechanization of knowledge is characterized
by imperfect competition and the active creation of
monopolies in language which prevent understanding and
hasten appeals to force.

I have tried to show that, in the words of Mark Pattison,
"Writers are apt to flatter themselves that they are not,
like the men of action, the slaves of circumstance. They
think they can write what and when they choose. But it is
not so. Whatever we may think and scheme, as soon as we seek
to produce our thoughts or schemes to our fellow-men, we are
involved in the same necessities of compromise, the same
grooves of motion, the same liabilities to failure or
half-measures, as we are in life and action."[11] The effect
of the discovery of printing was evident in the savage
religious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Application of power to communication industries hastened
the consolidation of vernaculars, the rise of nationalism,
revolution, and new outbreaks of savagery in the twentieth
century. Previous to the invention of printing the
importance of Latin and the drain on intellectual energies
of a dual language had been evident in the problems of
scholastic philosophy. After the invention of printing,
interest in the classics in Italy and France and in the
Bible in Protestant countries divided the Western world.
Hebraism and Hellenism proved difficult to reconcile as did
Aristotle and Plato. Roman law and the classics in Italy and
the cathedrals in France checked the influence of the Bible
and in France emphasized an interest in literature. In
Germany the influence of the Bible strengthened the power of
the state and favoured the growth of music and letters
independent of political life. In England division between
the crown, parliament, law, the universities, and trade
checked the dominance of single interests, but favoured
mediocrity except in finance and trade. In England
monasticism delayed education and printing and strengthened
the position of the vernacular to the point that violence
broke out in destruction of the monasteries in the sixteenth
century, civil war in the seventeenth century, and the
American Revolution in the eighteenth century.

[Footnote 11: Mark Pattison. _Isaac Casaubon_ (1559-1614)
(London, 1875), p. 383.]

In the free countries of Europe revival of the classics and
the demands of printing on logic had their effects in the
powerful impact of mathematics on philosophy in Descartes
and on political science in Hobbes. The application of power
to the communication industries after 1800 hastened the
spread of compulsory education and the rise of the
newspaper, and intensified interest in vernaculars, in
nationalism, and in romanticism. Mechanized communication
divided reason and emotion and emphasized the latter.
Printing marked the first stage in the spread of the
Industrial Revolution. "The influence of passion over any
assembly of men increases in proportion to their numbers
more than the influence of reason" (J. Scarlett). It became
concerned increasingly with the problem of distribution of
goods, and with advertising. Its limitations became evident
in the decline of the book to the level of prestige
advertising, in the substitution of architecture in the
skyscraper, the cathedral of commerce, and in simplified
spelling and semantics. Ernst Cassirer, a German refugee
scholar, has described the word-coiners as masters of the
art of political propaganda. _Nazi-Deutsch_, a glossary of
contemporary German usage, included a long list of words
which he found it impossible to render adequately into
English. Cassirer claimed that he no longer understood the
German language as a result of the new words coined to
support the Hitler-fascist myth.

Since its flight from Constantinople Minerva's owl has found
a resting-place only at brief intervals in the West. It has
flown from Italy to France, the Netherlands, Germany and
after the French Revolution back to France and England and
finally to the United States. These hurried and uncertain
flights have left it little energy and have left it open to
attack from numerous enemies. In the words of the Parnassus
Plays:

    Let schollers bee as thriftie as they maye
    They will be poore ere their last dying daye;
    Learning and povertie will ever kisse.

Or, as Johnson put it:

    There mark what ills the scholar's life assail
    Toil, envy, want, the patron and the jail.

The Industrial Revolution and mechanized knowledge have all
but destroyed the scholar's influence. Force is no longer
concerned with his protection and is actively engaged in
schemes for his destruction. Enormous improvements in
communication have made understanding more difficult. Even
science, mathematics, and music as the last refuge of the
Western mind have come under the spell of the mechanized
vernacular. Commercialism has required the creation of new
monopolies in language and new difficulties in
understanding. Even the class struggle, the struggle between
language groups, has been made a monopoly of language. When
the Communist Manifesto proclaimed. "Workers of the world
unite, you have nothing to lose but your chains!" in those
words it forged new chains.

I have attempted to show that sudden extensions of
communication are reflected in cultural disturbances. The
use of clay favoured a dominant role for the temples with an
emphasis on priesthood and religion. Libraries were built up
in Babylon and Nineveh to strengthen the power of monarchy.
Papyrus favoured the development of political organization
in Egypt. Papyrus and a simplified form of writing in the
alphabet supported the growth of democratic organization,
literature, and philosophy in Greece. Following Alexander
empires returned with centres at Alexandria and elsewhere
and libraries continued as sources of strength to
monarchies. Rome extended the political organization of
Greece in its emphasis on law and eventually on empire.
Establishment of a new capital at Constantinople was
followed by imperial organization on the oriental model
particularly after official recognition of Christianity.
Improvement of scripts and wider dissemination of knowledge
enabled the Jews to survive by emphasis on the scriptures
and the book. In turn Christianity capitalized on the
advantages of parchment and the codex in the Bible. With
access to paper the Mohammedans at Baghdad and later in
Spain and Sicily provided a medium for the transmission of
Greek science to the Western world. Greek science and paper
with encouragement of writing in the vernacular provided the
wedge between the temporal and the spiritual power and
destroyed the Holy Roman Empire. The decline of
Constantinople meant a stimulus to Greek literature and
philosophy as the decline of Mohammedanism had meant a
stimulus to science. Printing brought renewed emphasis on
the book and the rise of the Reformation. In turn new
methods of communication weakened the worship of the book
and opened the way for new ideologies. Monopolies or
oligopolies of knowledge have been built up in relation to
the demands of force chiefly on the defensive, but improved
technology has strengthened the position of force on the
offensive and compelled realignments favouring the
vernacular. Cultural disturbances are accompanied by periods
in which force occupies an important place and are followed
by periods of quiescence in which law establishes order. The
disturbances of the Macedonian and Roman wars were followed
by the growth of Roman law, the end of the barbarian
invasions by the revival of Roman law, the end of the
religious wars by the development of international law under
Grotius, and the end of the present wars of ideology by a
search for a new basis of international law.

Perhaps we might end by a plea for consideration of the role
of the oral tradition as a basis for a revival of effective
vital discussion and in this for an appreciation on the part
of universities of the fact that teachers and students are
still living and human. In the words of Justice Holmes, "To
have doubted one's own first principles is the mark of a
civilized man" but the same wise man in _Abrams_ v. _United
States_ stated "that the best test of truth is the power of
thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the
market" without appreciating that monopoly and oligopoly
appear in this as in other markets.




APPENDIX A[12]

[Footnote 12: Extracts from a paper presented to the
Conference of Commonwealth Universities at Oxford. July
23rd. 1948.]

Mechanisation has emphasised complexity and confusion; it
has been responsible for monopolies in the field of
knowledge; and it becomes extremely important to any
civilisation, if it is not to succumb to the influence of
this monopoly of knowledge, to make some critical survey and
report. Science, technology and the mechanisation of
knowledge are in grave danger of destroying the conditions
of freedom of thought, and, in destroying the conditions of
freedom of thought, bringing about the collapse of what we
like to think of as western civilisation.

My bias is with the oral tradition, particularly as it has
been reflected in Greek civilisation, with the necessity of
recapturing something of its spirit. For that purpose we
should try to understand something of the importance of life
or of the living tradition which is peculiar to the oral as
against the mechanised tradition, and we should pay greater
attention to the contributions of Greek civilisation. Much
of this will smack of Marxian interpretation but I have
tried to use the Marxian interpretation to interpret Marx;
that is to say, there has been no systematic pushing of the
Marxian conclusion to its ultimate limit, and in pushing it
to its limit, showing its limitations.

I propose to adhere rather closely to the terms of the
subject of this discussion, namely, "a critical review, from
the points of view of an historian, a philosopher and a
sociologist, of the structural and moral changes produced in
modern society by scientific and technological advance". I
ask you to try to understand what that means.

In the first place, the phrasing of the subject reflects the
limitations of Western Civilisation. An interest in
economics implies neglect of the work of professional
historians, philosophers and sociologists. Knowledge has
been divided in the modern world to the extent that it is
apparently hopeless to expect a common point of view. In
following the directions of those responsible for the
wording of the title of this discussion, I propose to ask
why Western civilisation has reached the point that a
conference largely composed of University administrators
should unconsciously assume division in points of view in
the field of learning and why this conference, representing
the Universities of the British Commonwealth, should have
been so far concerned with political representation as to
forget the problem of unity in Western civilisation, or, to
put it in a general way, why all of us here together seem to
be what is wrong with Western civilisation. Some of you may
remember James Thurber's story of the University professor
pointing to a student and saying to him: "You are what is
wrong with this institution".

In the remainder of this paper I shall be concerned with an
interest in the economic history of knowledge in which
dependence on the work of Graham Wallas will be evident. He
pointed to the danger that knowledge was growing too vast
for successful use in social judgment, since life is short
and sympathies and intellects are limited.[13] To him the
idol of the pulpit and the idol of the laboratory were
hindrances to effective social judgment, arising, as they
do, from the traditions of organized Christianity and the
metaphysical assumptions of professional scientists.[14] He
assumed that creative thought was dependent on the oral
tradition and that the conditions favourable to it were
gradually disappearing with the increasing mechanisation of
knowledge. Reading is quicker than listening and
concentrated individual thought than verbal exposition and
counter exposition of arguments. The printing press and the
radio address the world instead of the individual. The oral
dialectic is overwhelmingly significant to subjects whose
subject matter is human action and feeling and is important
in the discovery of new truth, but is of very little value
in disseminating it. The oral discussion inherently involves
personal contact and a consideration for the feelings of
others, and it is in sharp contrast with the cruelty of
mechanised communication and the tendencies which we have
come to note in the modern world. Quantitative pressure of
modern knowledge has been responsible for the decay of oral
dialectic and conversation. The passive reading of
newspapers and newspaper placards and the small number of
significant magazines and books point to the dominance of
conversation by the newspaper and to the pervasive influence
of discontinuity, which is, of course, the characteristic of
the newspaper, as it is of the dictionary. Familiarity of
association, which is essential to effective conversation,
is present but is not accompanied by the stimulus which
comes from contacts of one mind in free association with
another mind in following up trains of ideas. As Graham
Wallas pointed out, very few men who have been writing in a
daily newspaper have produced important original work. We
may conclude with the words of Schopenhauer, "To put away
one's thoughts in order to take up a book is the sin against
the Holy Ghost".

[Footnote 13: Graham Wallas, _Social Judgment_, (London,
1934), p. 29.]

[Footnote 14: _Ibid._, p. 161.]

The impact of science on cultural development has been
evident in its contribution to technological advance,
notably in communication and in the dissemination of
knowledge. In turn it has been evident in the types of
knowledge disseminated, that is to say, science lives its
own life not only in the mechanism which is provided to
distribute knowledge but also in the sort of knowledge which
will be distributed. As information has been disseminated
the demand for the miraculous, which has been one of the
great contributions of science, has increased. To supply
this demand for the miraculous has been a highly
remunerative task, as is evidenced by the publications of
publishing firms concerned with scientific works. The
average reader has been impressed by an emphasis on the
miraculous and the high priests of science, or perhaps it
would be fair to say the pseudo-priests of science, have
been extremely effective in developing all sorts of
fantastic things, with great emphasis, of course, on the
atomic bomb. I hoped to get through this paper without
mentioning the atomic bomb, but found it impossible.

Geoffrey Scott has stated that the instinct of reverence for
science dislodged it from the supernatural world and
attached it to the natural world, with the result that the
interest in religion has been greatly weakened. Bury
described the rapidly growing demand in England for books
and lectures, making the results of science accessible and
interesting to the lay public, as a remarkable feature of
the second half of the nineteenth century. Popular
literature explained the wonders of the physical world and
at the same time flushed the imaginations of men with the
consciousness that they were living in the era "which, in
itself vastly superior to any age of the past, need be
burdened by no fear of decline or catastrophe but, trusting
in the boundless resources of science, might surely defy
fate".[15] "Progress itself suggests that its value as a
doctrine is only relative, corresponding to a certain not
very advanced stage of civilisation, just as Providence in
its day was an idea of relative value corresponding to a
stage somewhat less advanced".[16] We may well heed the
words of Geoffrey Scott when he said: "It is thus the last
sign of an artificial civilisation when nature takes the
place of art".

[Footnote 15: J. B. Bury, _The idea of progress, an inquiry
into the origin and growth_, (London, 1920), pp. 345-6.]

[Footnote 16: _Ibid._, p. 352.]

The effects of obsession with science have become serious
for the position of science itself. It has been held that
the scientific mind can adapt itself more easily to tyranny
than the literary mind, since "art is individualism and
science seeks the subjection of the individual to absolute
laws",[17] but Casaubon was probably right in saying that
"the encouragement of science and letters is almost always a
personal influence". The concept of the State in the
Anglo-Saxon world has been favourable to the suppression or
distortion of culture, particularly through its influence on
science. Science has been under the influence of the State
and it has become more difficult for scientists with the
same political background to communicate among themselves,
and for those with a different political background it is
practically impossible, because of the importance attached
to war. Mathematics and music have been regarded as
universal languages, particularly with the decline of Latin,
but even mathematics is a tool and has become ineffective
for purposes of communication in a highly technical
civilisation concerned with war.

[Footnote 17: A. L. Guerard, _Literature and Society_
(Boston, 1935) 80.]

I can refer only briefly to the significance of mechanised
knowledge, as affected by science, to the Universities.
Reliance on mechanised knowledge has increased with the
demands of large numbers of students in the post-war period.
Henry Adams wrote: "Any large body of students stifles the
student. No one can instruct more than half a dozen students
at once. The whole problem of education is one of its cost
in money".[18] We have been compelled in the post-war
period, with the larger number of students, to depend on
textbooks, visual aids, administration and conferences of
University administrations such as we have here. They imply
increasing concern with the written mechanised tradition and
the examination system, of which Mark Pattison remarked that
"the beneficial stimulus which examination can give to study
is in inverse ratio to the quality of intellectual exertion
required".[19] We can subscribe to his reference to "the
examination screw which has been turned several times since,
till it has become an instrument of mere torture which has
made education impossible and crushed the very desire of
learning".[20]

[Footnote 18: _The Education of Henry Adams_, (Boston,
1918) 302.]

[Footnote 19: _Essays by the late Mark Pattison_, (Oxford,
1889).]

[Footnote 20: Mark Pattison, _Memoirs_, (London, 1882)
305.]

Finally we must keep in mind the limited role of
Universities and perhaps recall the comment that "the whole
external history of science is a history of the resistance
of academies and Universities to the progress of knowledge".
Leslie Stephen, referring to the period in the late 18th and
early 19th centuries in England, when there was no system of
education, said: "There is probably no period in English
history at which a greater number of poor men have risen to
distinction". "Receptivity of information which is
cultivated and rewarded in schools and also in Universities
is a totally different thing from the education, sometimes
conferred even by adverse circumstances, which trains a man
to seize opportunities either of learning or of
advancement," to mention only the names of Burns, Paine,
Cobbett, William Gifford, John Dalton, Porson, Joseph White,
Robert Owen, and Joseph Lancaster.[21] Compulsory education
increases the numbers able to read but does not contribute
to understanding. Some of you may remember the comment in a
discussion on literature by University graduates:
"Literature? Sure; we took it in the senior year. It had a
green cover".[22] Education is apt to become "merely the art
of reading and writing, without training the mind to
principles of any kind, and destitute of any regard for
virtue or even decency".[23]

[Footnote 21: A. V. Dicey, _Lectures on the Relations
between Law and Public Opinion in England during the
Nineteenth Century_ (London, 1914) 114.]

[Footnote 22: H. W. Boynton, _Journalism and Literature_
(Boston, 1904).]

[Footnote 23: Cyrus Redding, _Fifty Years Recollections_
(London, 1848) _11_, p. 316.]

We are compelled to recognise the significance of mechanised
knowledge as a source of power and its subjection to the
demands of force through the instrument of the State. The
Universities are in danger of becoming a branch of the
military arm. The problem of Universities in the British
Commonwealth is to appreciate its implications and to attack
in a determined fashion the problems created by a neglect of
the position of culture in Western civilisation.
Centralisation in education in the interests of political
organisation has disastrous implications. This becomes one
of the dangers of a conference of British Commonwealth
Universities, since, as Sir Hector Hetherington pointed out,
the search for truth is much broader than that which can be
undertaken by any political organisation. Referring to the
dangers of centralisation, Scott wrote over a century ago:
"London licks the butter off our bread, by offering a better
market for ambition. Were it not for the difference of the
religion and laws, poor Scotland could hardly keep a man
that is worth having".[24] The problem is perhaps even more
acute for the broader English-speaking world, with its
common law traditions. The overwhelming influence of the
United States as the chief centre of power emphasises the
serious limitations of common law in making politics part of
law and of emphasising the position of the State,
particularly in those nations with written constitutions. In
Roman law countries, notably France, culture has had an
opportunity to expand, politics have become less of an
obsession and leadership has been given to Western
civilisation. Culture survives ideologies and political
institutions, or rather it subordinates them to the
influence of constant criticism. Constant whining about the
importance of our way of life is foreign to its temper.

The Universities should subject their views about their role
in civilisation to systematic overhauling and revise the
machinery by which they can take a leading part in the
problems of Western culture. For example, we should extend
our scholarships to Universities on the Continent. Lecturers
should be encouraged to write books as a means of compelling
them to give new lectures. The Universities must concern
themselves with the living rather than with the dead.

[Footnote 24: _The Journal of Sir Walter Scott_ (Edinburgh,
1890) _11_, 256.]




[End of _Minerva's Owl_ by Harold A. Innis]