Feudalism of this nature has nothing in common with chivalry. If we consider chivalry in fact as a kind of privileged body into which men were received on certain conditions and with a certain ritual, it is important to observe that every vassal is not necessarily a cavalier. There were vassals who, with the object of averting the cost of initiation or for other reasons, remained _damoiseaux_, or pages, all their lives. The majority, of course, did nothing of the kind; but all could do so, and a great many did. On the other hand we see conferred the dignity of chivalry upon insignificant people who had never held fiefs, who owed to no one any fealty, and to whom no one owed any. We cannot repeat too often that it was not the cavalier (or knight), it was the _vassal_ who owed military service, or _ost_, to the _seigneur_, or lord; and the service _in curte_ or _court_: it was the vassal, not the knight, who owed to the "lord" relief, "aid," homage. The feudal system soon became hereditary. Chivalry, on the contrary, has never been hereditary, and a special rite has always been necessary to create a knight. In default of all other arguments this would be sufficient. But if, instead of regarding chivalry as an institution, we consider it as an ideal, the doubt is not really more admissible. It is here that, in the eyes of a philosophic historian, chivalry is clearly distinct from feudalism. If the western world in the ninth century had _not_ been feudalized, chivalry would nevertheless have come into existence; and, notwithstanding everything, it would have come to light in Christendom; for chivalry is nothing more than the Christianized form of military service, the armed _force_ in the service of the unarmed Truth; and it was inevitable that at some time or other it must have sprung, living and fully armed, from the brain of the church, as Minerva did from the brain of Jupiter. Feudalism, on the contrary, is not of Christian origin at all. It is a particular form of government, and of society, which has scarcely been less rigorous for the church than other forms of society and government. Feudalism has disputed with the church over and over again, while chivalry has protected her a hundred times. Feudalism is force--chivalry is the brake.