Quotation from: Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period

Written by: Paul Lacroix


As that advanced reformer, Philippe le Bel, died before the institutions
he had established had taken root, for many years, even down to the time
of Louis XI., a continual conflict for supremacy was waged between the
Parliament of Paris and the various courts of the kingdom--between the
counts and the Parliament, and between the latter and the King, which,
without lessening the dignity of the crown, gradually tended to increase
the influence which the judges possessed. Immediately on the accession of
Louis le Hutin, in 1314, a reaction commenced--the higher clergy
re-entered Parliament; but Philippe le Long took care that the laity
should be in a majority, and did not allow that in his council of State
the titled councillors should be more numerous than the lawyers. The
latter succeeded in completely carrying the day on account of the services
they rendered, and the influence which their knowledge of the laws of the
country gave them. As for centuries the sword had ruled the gown, so,
since the emancipation of the bourgeois, the lawyers had become masters of
the administrative and judicial world; and, notwithstanding the fact that
they were still kept in a somewhat inferior position to the peers and
barons, their opinion alone predominated, and their decision frequently at
once settled the most important questions.

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