formal Church; yet the organs which were necessary for the application of these ideas and enthusiasms were molded in accordance with ecclesiastical institutions, because no other model was at hand. Secular life was too narrow to give either financial support or suggestions. It {195} had so long been accustomed to assign the moral field to religious institutions. In spite of the undercurrent of criticism against the worldliness of the clergy which discovers itself to the historian of the later Middle Ages, the social movements connected with incorporated Christianity were vital enough to justify the existence of the Church. It acted as the traditional center of philanthropy, and its immense wealth made this feature a real force among the poor. But the other associated functions were slowly separating themselves from their original connection and striking roots in the secular life of the time. In place of the cathedral towns clustered around the cathedral and the bishop's palace, the commercial towns pushed to the front both in wealth and importance. The wealthy merchant or banker vied in riches with the churchman. Art and literature passed from the hands of the Church to the laity. This process was very gradual, but steady and persistent. By the time of the reformation, it was in full swing. Beneath the framework of feudalism and the Mediaeval Church, a new society had been forming, far more complex than the old and full of potentialities which we are only now beginning to measure. Industry, commerce, geographical discovery, national literature, guilds, municipal governments, courts, science, secular art, philosophy, all were present either in bud or in full flower. Out of the fertile and fearless life which came from the interplay of these tendencies and activities, new ideas and values were born and soon found or created appropriate organs for their expression apart from the Church. Try as it would, Mother Church could not cover them with her wings. Many of these activities were alien to {196} her genius and, as they waxed in strength and confidence, stepped boldly out into the arena of secular life.