Chapter XXII

) the rise of strong governments and centralized states in western Europe.

FORCES OPPOSED TO FEUDALISM: THE CITIES

As a system of local industry, feudalism could not survive the great changes of the later Middle Ages, when reviving trade, commerce, and manufactures had begun to lead to the increase of wealth, the growth of markets, and the substitution of money payments for those in produce or services. Flourishing cities arose, as in the days of the Roman Empire, freed themselves from the control of the nobles, and became the homes of liberty and democracy. The cities, like the kings, were always anti- feudal. We shall deal with their development in a subsequent chapter (