“Nonsense, Father James. No nobleman will move against the burgesses, for the simple reason that the townsmen of the burghs now generate more riches with their local industry than all the nobles together can raise from their vast estates. And so the nobility borrows from the wealthy burgesses and becomes ever more indebted to them. They cannot move against them, for they would be depriving themselves of their main source of income.
“And besides, it is already far too late for them to alter any of what I have described. All they can do now is wait, like every other living soul of us, for the changes that must surely come, for the world of Christendom will never revert to what it once was.” He stood up suddenly and shook out the skirts of his robe, rearranging them more comfortably before sitting down again. “The system under which we all live now will wither and die and be replaced by another, just as did Rome, the supposedly eternal city, and the empire it created.”
“Aye, but Rome was pagan and benighted. We are speaking here of Christendom, Father Lamberton. How can you—?” I paused, seeking the words to express my fear and confusion, and stooped to retrieve my cup, raising it to my mouth only to discover that it was empty, and I bent quickly and put it down again by my feet more forcefully than I intended. “How can you say such a thing, when you have barely finished saying that not one person in a hundred knows what is happening?”
The chancellor gazed at me levelly. “Fewer than that,” he said. “One in ten thousand might be closer to the truth at this time, but nevertheless, the changes are happening. You are a priest, Father. Need I remind you that in the days when our Blessed Jesus walked the earth there were not twenty men in all the world who knew Him as the Son of God? Yet there He was, and the changes He had wrought were already all in place. I believe we are experiencing something similar today. For His own good reasons, my friend, God has decided that this world must change. And therefore, change it will.”
“And what about the King? Does he know about these changes?”
“Ah, the King. King John, may God bless him, should he live and prosper and emerge the victor in his struggle with the King of England, may end up absorbing the wisdom and long-headedness of the King of France on such matters. Philip has known of it for years, since soon after he assumed the French throne. His kingdom is tiny, although it is growing constantly these days. And he is bankrupt, several times over, if one is to heed his critics. Were it not for the largesse of the Templars and their inexhaustible wealth, the realm of France would be incapable of functioning in any manner.”
He stood up again and arched his back, massaging his behind with both hands.
“Do you not find these logs supremely uncomfortable? I know they are logs, and not chairs, and I generally have little trouble with them. Then again, though, I seldom sit like this for hours at a time, and I have little padding on my bones at the best of times … and virtually none on my buttocks, where I could most use it. Will it vex you if I stand for a while?”
“Vex me? Not at all. In fact, if you wish to walk and stretch your legs I will come with you. We’ll throw some fresh logs on the fire and then walk the camp’s perimeter, checking the guards for vigilance along the way. It takes about an hour to make the circuit and we can talk as we walk. By the time we get back, the fire should be at its prime. Shall we?”
The night grew noticeably cooler once we had left the fire, and we were soon walking briskly against the chill in the air, each of us well wrapped up in our long cloaks.
“You were talking about France,” I resumed as we approached the nearest edge of the tree line around the camp and the first guard post on our route. “You say it is growing. How can that be?”
“By absorption.” He was looking at the ground ahead of him in the darkness “Philip Capet is a hard man to deny. He believes God truly wants him to consolidate under one crown the entire territory of what once was Roman Gaul. France, as you know, is but one of many duchies, and not at all the largest of them. Their names are lustrous, some of them more famous, even, than the name of France itself: Burgundy, Aquitaine, Languedoc, Flanders, Champagne, Anjou, Poitou, Picardy, Lorraine, and the rebellious Gascony, of course, currently the cause of so much grief to King Edward. All of them are in turmoil today, and Philip is determined to unite them all beneath his banners. He sees himself as King of one great entity that he has named the Nation State.”
That term meant nothing to me and I said as much, and for the ensuing part of our walk my companion held forth on the wonders of this nation state that Philip Capet dreamed of ruling. We visited two more sentries in the course of that time, but I was barely aware of them, so completely was I caught up in what I was hearing. It was a vaunting vision that my new friend described for me in sweeping words, entailing elements of politics that sounded revolutionary and impossible to me: talk of a unified state built along new and radical lines, where the state itself would become an active entity in its own governance, and the people of the state would come to think of themselves as something new—a nation, a single people united by ties of race, language, government, and common interests. They would forge this nation out of Philip’s dream, and in time their new creation, their new nation state, would dictate the behaviour of all of Christendom, for Christendom itself would be unable to withstand the threat posed by the united resources of the new nation state.