Baltimore daily commercial. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1865-1867, 1865-12-01
THE pnwASCE OF THE MIDDLE AGES
THE CONDITIONS OF MODERN PRO,


daavor Of one portion Of the population to get
rich nv trading with the other,-the one great
essential. ,rorh, is sadly neglected. without
which neither individuals or commonwealth
can expect success. In Virginia, especially
tboi- weakness is the tournament an in
.titu,iou of the Middle Ages, the remcm
br,ncc of which should be kept alive only in
romances as p costly and trifing pastime Of
those titled robbers. whose sole business when
moi at their wild revels or at war with each
other, was to plumber and maltreat the toliug
masses. the ''ycomanry. Distance has soft
cucd wonderfully the horrors enacted by these
mailed oppressors; and yet, what We're their
castles, their strongholds, the ruins of which
cumber to day the banks of the Rhine, and all
central Europe, hut dcnS for every excess;
places where the means wrung from the hard
hands of the toiling thousands were madly
wasted, to the encouragement Of all industry
aud commerce, and to the crushing ont of
everything that resembled equal rights? With
these grim tax-gatherers located at every com
handing point on the Rhine, the Seine, or the
Danube, with every great road watched by
gangs who laid under contribution the peaceful
trader to supply the prodigai banguets OF their
leaders, duke, earl, baron or knight, as the
case might be, is it any wonder now that Eu-
rope made little progress IN arts, or science,
or literature, except i'll her secluded and PRIV
legged monastercs: is it wonderful that learn
ing was kept alive only by the obscure Of the
earth, when these mobiles oltentimes prided
themselves on being unable to read, of know
ing little or nothing of what they contempt
uously termed ''monkish lore"
Only that the feudal system was at last
broken up, only that the encroachments Of the
spirit of liberty and the invention Of gun
powder was mighty to the pulling down of
these knightly strongholds, Europe to-day
would have been the victim still of what was
little better three or four centuries ago than
barbarism; and if that age Of darkness was
relieved here and there by brighter spots, by
the refinement and courtesy Of those about the
capitals, the world around was little the better
for it. for all over the land rapine and wrong
carried bit with a high hand. An English
writer of our day tells the whole story of cas-
tied grandeur, of knightly greatness, of that
spirit, the decay of which is thoughtleSsly
mourned by young gentlemen and misses ro-
mantically inclined, who may chance to see in
painting or in verify the gray ruin once alive
with '.joust' and tournament. II never,
says Leitch Ritchie-''look on the remains
'of one of these old castles, but that feel as
''if | were surveying the bones and teeth of
''some great wild beast And yet the age
so dark with ignorance and so soiled with OPP
preston and wrong is fixed upon by our
modern kid gloved ''chvalry,' as the pattern
for them to follow in an attempt to revive
the tournament, all sham at that because
a tilt AT the ring Is no sort of parallel to
that pcrious thrust of a lance, which not un
frequently sent the litter to his long account.
We have INDUCED in the expression Of these
thoughts, because we perceive by the papers.
that the Tournament folly is still vicimizne
our ncighhor Virginia; that her sons still in
dulgc the hallucmation, and try to make others
share it, that they are the ''chvalry." But
1t is good sign down there when the press
shows a disposition to frown upon it, remind
ing them that ii is time TO forcgo such follics
and 90 to porh
The editor Of the Fredericksburg Ledgcy-
the ueighborhond of which has recently been
visited by the tournament epidemic, has
lately been to New York. trip which has
suggested the following sensible rebukc TO the
people of his own State. Writing from and
of New York he says
Watch it's busy streets and real moving
people; see its handsome palatial stores and
residences and its thousand stoeples pointing
''heavenward; cross its ferries or ride in its
''street cars, and YOU everywhere see the one
great spirit of the age uppcrmost-I mean
'qo.ahedd -HireaeSS. Why cant we Southern
people emulate it? Let the negro go. Give
''him protection, and let him do as better
white men have to do, shift for himself, and
''thcn let u.s. with heart and soul seek to build
up the waste places Of our Zion, and they
''are indeed many. THE North has no idle
''toWnayS. II is q real ring they are contend
''iag t0r The sweat of the seed and the up
fright carnage and mien of their riders or
''drivers, denote the order of their aspira-
''tlons, and the purpose to achieve success
''1f the same spirit animated US, we should
she great and happy and prosperous. Shall
1--WE live in the future, in the light Of great re-
''sults accomplished, or shall Virginia,
generation hence, when asked for her jewels,
point to the achievements of those who lived
"a century ago? God forbid Rather let us
''hope that the question then WILDE not who
"a man is, but tchat he is. Until that day,
Virginia must be a mere newer of wood and
''drawer of water; when that day comes, she
will indeed be the new Dominion, the
''Old Dominion is buried among the things
"that were
These are timely and noble sentiments: but
will the young men of Virginia heed them, or
will they 60 on trifiing and living upon the
dreams and romance of the dead past? The
modern world-let them rcmember-gets ON
ward by labor This it is which builds rail
roads and establishes lines of telegraph to
span the globc which creates commerce,
through lines of steamships which mines, and
hammers, and weaves, and erects cities, and
fosters science and art. And the humblest
actor in the great movement forward. whether
he WELD spade, or axe, or sledge, is more than
The peer Of the p,oudeSt idler who IN times like
these cumbers the ground. Let Virginia, and
other States which have so much to accom-
phsh toward emulating more advanced com
munitles, think of this, act upon it, profit by
1t. Rich i'll natural resources. spangled all
over with mines Of iron, and coal, ana lead,
with fertile soil, and splendid water power,
why should she lag in the great race; why
should not her sons realize forthwith the great
laws of modern progress, and let the dead
past bury its dead?
Finally, they must fully realize the situation,
and when they work, do ii IN earnest. They
must not initiate the decayed Spanish grandee,
who cultivates onions in ragged slashed doublet
and with court rapier by his side. Let them
labor as earnestly in mining, Or manufacturing,
or raising corn and wheat, as they did of late
in building earthworks, manufacturing artil-
lery, and supplying armies with rations,
them, we say, only ,rork as they fought, and
Virginia and the whole South will achieve