(1) A group of national states in which a distinct feeling of nationality was developing had taken the place of the Roman Empire, which made no allowance in its government for the differences between Italians, Gauls, Germans, and Britons. The makeshift feudal government which had grown up during the dark ages was yielding to the kingly power (except in Germany and Italy) and there was no hope of ever reuniting western Europe into a single empire. [Sidenote: The national states begin to deprive the Church of its governmental powers.] (2) The Church had, in a way, taken the place of the Roman Empire by holding the various peoples of western Europe together under the headship of the pope and by assuming the powers of government during the period when the feudal lords were too weak to secure order and justice. Organized like an absolute monarchy, the Church was in a certain sense far the most powerful state of the Middle Ages. But it attained the zenith of its political influence under Innocent III, at the opening of the thirteenth century; before its close the national states had so grown in strength that it was clear that they would gradually reassume the powers of government temporarily exercised by the Church and confine the pope and clergy more and more to their strictly religious functions. [Sidenote: Appearance of the commons or third estate.] (3) A new social class had come into prominence alongside the clergy and the knightly aristocracy. The emancipation of the serfs, the founding of towns, and the growth of commerce made it possible for merchants and successful artisans to rise to importance and become influential through their wealth. From these beginnings the great intelligent and educated public of modern times has sprung. [Sidenote: Books begin to be written in the language of the people.] (4) The various modern languages began to be used in writing books. For five or six hundred years after the invasions of the Germans, Latin was used by all writers, but in the eleventh and following centuries the language of the people began to replace the ancient tongue. This enabled the laymen who had not mastered the intricacies of the old Roman speech to enjoy the stories and poems which were being composed in French, Provençal, German, English, and Spanish, and, somewhat later, in Italian. [Sidenote: The clergy lose the monopoly of learning.] Although the clergy still directed education, laymen were beginning to write books as well as to read them, and gradually the churchmen ceased to enjoy the monopoly of learning which they had possessed during the early Middle Ages. [Sidenote: Study of law, theology, and philosophy.] [Sidenote: The universities.]