hat he could only have been inspired to dictate his
theoretical teachings by the practical experience which he must have
gained for the most part among the middle class to which he belonged, we
must conclude that in those days the bourgeoisie possessed considerable
knowledge of moral dignity and social propriety.

It must be added that by the side of the merchant and working
bourgeoisie--who, above all, owed their greatness to the high functions of
the municipality--the parliamentary bourgeoisie had raised itself to
power, and that from the fourteenth century it played a considerable part
in the State, holding at several royal courts at different periods, and at
last, almost hereditarily, the highest magisterial positions. The very
character of these great offices of president, or of parliamentary
counsel, barristers, &c., proves that the holders must have had no small
amount of intellectual culture. In this way a refined taste was created
among this class, which the protection of kings, princes, and lords had
alone hitherto encouraged. We find, for example, the Grosliers at Lyons,
the De Thous and Seguiers in Paris, regardless of their bourgeois origin,
becoming judicious and zealous patrons of poets, scholars, and artists.

A description of Paris, published in the middle of the fifteenth century,
describes amongst the most splendid residences of the capital the hotels
of Juvenal des Ursins (Fig. 62), of Bureau de Dampmartin, of Guillaume
Seguin, of Mille Baillet, of Martin Double, and particularly that of
Jacques Duchie, situated in the Rue des Prouvaires, in which were
collected at great cost collections of all kinds of arms, musical
instruments, rare birds, tapestry, and works of art. In each church in
Paris, and there were upwards of a hundred, the principal chapels were
founded by celebrated families of the ancient bourgeoisie, who had left
money for one or more masses to be said daily for the repose of the souls
of their deceased members. In the burial-grounds, and principally in that
of the Innocents, the monuments of these families of Parisian bourgeoisie
were of the most expensive character, and were inscribed with epitaphs in
which the living vainly tried to immortalise the deeds of the deceased.
Every one has heard of the celebrated tomb of Nicholas Flamel and Pernelle
his wife (Fig. 63), the cross of Bureau, the epitaph of Yolande Bailly,
who died in 1514, at the age of eighty-eight, and who "saw, or might h