Читать книгу Economic Development in Denmark Before and During the World War онлайн
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It would not be correct to consider the changes in the structure of society as chiefly responsible for our present social ideas, since the latter would certainly have sprung up even if the classes had remained in the apparent relative conditions of 1787. But these changes must necessarily have influenced our present problems and their solution, giving them a different character and greater dimensions.
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The Rise of the Lower Classes
The class distinctions of to-day are essentially different from those of the past, and the difference is manifest in all countries. The social gap separating the peasant and the noble in the eighteenth century was enormous; and under lying it was a deep-rooted conviction that every man was born into his class, whether that of noble, peasant, or plain citizen. There might be a feeling of dissatisfaction among the poor, and this feeling might even, under special circumstances, lead to revolt. Almost all countries have known peasant revolts. But in spite of dissatisfaction and revolt the conviction persisted that every man must remain in the class into which he was born. In the same way it was an idea inherited from the Middle Ages that the conditions in which an artisan or peasant lived must also be satisfactory to his children and his children's children.