Alpha Book

French became the language of fashion as well as of diplomacy--
a position it has ever since maintained.
[Sidenote: "Rule of the Robe"]
While the court of Louis XIV was thus the focal point of French--almost
of European--life, the professional and mercantile classes, who
constituted the Third Estate, enjoyed comparative security and
prosperity and under the king held all of the important offices of
actual administration. Because of the judicial offices which the middle
class filled, the government was popularly styled the "rule of the
robe."
[Sidenote: "Colbert"]
Colbert (1619-1683), one of Louis's greatest ministers, was the son of
a merchant, and was intensely interested in the welfare of the class to
which he belonged. Installed in office through the favor of Mazarin, he
was successively named, after the cardinal's death, superintendent of
public works, controller-general of finances, minister of marine, of
commerce and agriculture, and of the colonies. In short, until his
death in 1683, he exerted power in every department of government
except that of war.


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