This great result of a concatenation of circumstances was not, however, brought about without violent struggles and innovations, the effects of which were felt for centuries; but it was probably _the establishment of standing armies_ which had the greatest influence on European civilization. They became indeed the pillars of civil order, but having proceeded immediately from the pernicious mercenary system, they long nourished the seeds of unrestrained depravity, and transmitted to later generations the corruptions of the middle ages. The Lansquenets[402] (Landsknechte) of the emperor, and the mercenaries of the kings of France and England, who, during the war, had joined the smaller branches of the standing army, were homeless adventurers from every country in Europe, and were allured, not by military ambition, but solely by the prospect of booty[403]. In whatever country the drum beat to arms, they flocked together like swarms of locusts—no one knew from whence—and defying the feeble restraints of military discipline, indulged, during the continuance of the war, in all the unbridled licence of a predatory life. Hence the unbounded barbarity of their mode of warfare, which was restrained only by the individual exertions of more humane commanders. There was, however, a decided contrariety between this system and the moral condition of the people of Western Europe: a contrariety which was never entirely removed by the subsequent introduction of a more strict military discipline, and which has been done away only in modern times, by the establishment of regular armies on a system more congenial to the feelings of the people. Hence the consequences were the more pernicious, for when the armies were disbanded on the conclusion of peace, the Landsknechts dispersed in all directions, not to follow the plough again, or to resume their former occupations, but to pass their time in idleness and dissipation, if enriched by booty, and if reduced to poverty by intemperance and gambling, to infest the country as mendicants or robbers, till a new war again summoned them from their dishonourable mode of life[404]. Probably but very few were ever able to rise from such deep degradation, and many fell early victims to their vices[405], while the infection of their example brought fresh accessions from every town and village to the mercenary legions. SECT. 2.—NEW CIRCUMSTANCES.