 WingedHussar.orgThe Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth  |
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Abandonment of Religious Freedom
Inferior manufacturing capability
Warnings and Lessons for the United States
"The
walls of the town were well built, yea, so fast and firm were they
knit and compact together, that, had it not been for the townsmen
themselves, they could not have been shaken or broken for ever. For
here lay the excellent wisdom of him that builded Mansoul, that the
walls could never be broken down nor hurt by the most mighty adverse
potentate, unless the townsmen gave consent thereto."
John Bunyan's The Holy War
"Khmyelnitski is not the worst enemy but the internal discord, the license of the nobility, the want of training and discipline of the forces, the stormy Diets, the quarrels and the love of dispute, the confusion, the internal weakness, the selfishness and want of discipline-- especially the want of discipline, the tree rots and dies from the heart, the first storm easily breaks it down..." Henryk Sienkiewicz, With Fire and Sword (Binion translation), p. 422
"Khmyelnitski is not the worst enemy but the internal discord, the license of the nobility, the want of training and discipline of the forces, the stormy Diets, the quarrels and the love of dispute, the confusion, the internal weakness, the selfishness and want of discipline-- especially the want of discipline, the tree rots and dies from the heart, the first storm easily breaks it down..." Henryk Sienkiewicz, With Fire and Sword (Binion translation), p. 422
Proposition: a great nation is rarely destroyed by external enemies until it has collapsed from within
The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, which was once the most free and perhaps the most powerful nation in Europe, could not have been destroyed by external enemies (Austria, Prussia, and Russia) without the effective consent of its own citizens. The Commonwealth did not fall because of any defects in its original values and principles; it fell because its leaders ceased to adhere to those principles over the years. This is the danger that confronts the United States.
Abandonment of Religious Freedom
The Commonwealth enjoyed complete religious freedom during the 16th century, when it was rising to the height of its power.
In 1668, however, the Sejm ruled that conversion from Catholicism was punishable by exile. In 1673, only Catholics could be made members of the szlachta (gentry). (Adam Zamoyski, The Polish Way, p. 145.) The Sejm's decisions may have been influenced by the fact that some Protestants and Calvinists (e.g. Janusz Radziwill) colloborated with the Swedish invaders in 1655 but Catholics also were among the guilty.
The same reference (Zamoyski, 146-148) suggests that the Commonwealth was ruined by Jesuit influences. The Jesuits used their educational system (colleges they established throughout the Commonwealth) to encourage students to abjure their parents "errors" by embracing Catholicism. "Although it would be dangerous to suggest that they managed to indoctrinate people, it is impossible to ignore the Jesuits' influence on thought and behavior, and this had a drastic long-term effect on the course of history, for the way in which the constitution was used depended on the rational integrity of the whole body politic. The minor szlachta were the first to fall back into bigotry, but the magnates also showed a marked decline from the standards of their fathers and grandfathers." Henryk Sienkiewicz's Trilogy illustrates the religious intolerance of that era, with Catholic characters referring not only to enemies (e.g. Janusz Radziwill) but also their own non-Catholic comrades-in-arms as "heretics" or "in error."
The Jesuit triumph was merely temporary, though, because instead of fostering a secular society that would have assured the security of the Catholic Church side by side with other religions, they weakened the nation to the point where it fell into the hands of Protestant Prussians and Eastern Orthodox Russians. The Germany of Bismarck had to tolerate Catholics (since southern Germany is heavily Catholic) but the Tsars probably had little use for the Catholic Church.
Inferior Manufacturing Capability
"To sell raw materials and buy
finished goods makes one poor; to buy raw materials and sell finished
goods makes one rich."
--Chancellor of the Convocation
Sejm of 1764. (Zamoyski, pp. 238-139)
Manufacturing is the backbone of economic and military power. Zamoyski (p. 175) points out that the Commonwealth remained an agrarian society that exported food and raw materials while importing manufactured goods. Western Europe, meanwhile, developed its manufacturing capability. "It was essentially the sort of trading pattern that places third-world countries at the mercy of the industrialized nations today. This was pointed out as early as 1543 by the Polish economist Andrzej Glaber and by foreign travellers, who saw the extreme cheapness of food in Poland as a sign of an unhealthy economy." The goods were carried almost exclusively by Dutch, Frisian, and English ships.
Loss of manufacturing capability also destroyed Spain as a first-class power during the very time it was rolling in treasure from the New World. The treasure allowed Spain to buy manufactured goods instead of making them, which conceded manufacturing capability (and maritime supremacy) to its rivals, England and Holland. The result was the annihilation of the Spanish Armada by the technologically-superior Royal Navy at Gravelines in 1588.
The United States is now allowing its manufacturing jobs to go offshore, including to hostile foreign nations like China. Lean manufacturing, which makes one American worker as productive as ten or twenty of his/her foreign counterparts, is the key to reversing this dangerous trend