to an end, than families of simple bourgeois. The difference between the nobility of France and England, which became extremely visible at the time of the French Revolution, was not in their origin but in their employment. The French aristocracy was in that period an idle class enjoying their privileges in Versailles. It was probably the reaction of Louis XIV who witnessed the revolt of the aristocracy, the Fronde, in his youth. He concentrated the nobility in Versailles, under his eyes and supervision. The French aristocracy also inherited the principles of the Roman aristocracy. It said that the only clean occupation for a noble was agriculture, which for the French aristocracy of the 17th -18th centuries meant collecting rents and corvees from the serfs. They were not supposed to be in commerce or in industry; politics was the sole privilege of the King, so they had not much to do except whiling away the time at Versailles, and intriguing to receive more from the royal bounty. The English aristocracy was rather different. First, they were actively involved in politics. They sat in the House of Lords, which at that time was still politically powerful. They were also not locked in a hothouse, like Versailles, so they were free to run and improve their estates. Many of the developments that changed the face of agriculture from subsistence farming to economic enterprise, originated at that time in the manors of the English aristocracy. The opposition between the old el...
