THE STYLE OF FRANCIS I. 47 



the greatest spirits of his age, Francois Rabelais and Leonardo da Vinci. 

 " All kings have honoured the arts," says Michelet, " Francis loved 

 them." Never has an artistic movement been more justly identified 

 with the name of a sovereign than in his case. His predilections 

 were for Italian art, and his position as an Italian prince gave him 

 great opportunities for indulging them, but his patronage was extended 

 impartially to artists of merit of any nationality. Throughout his 

 reign he kept colonies of architects, sculptors, and painters in constant 

 employment, and lodged at his expense at Paris and Fontainebleau. 



His building activity was astonishing. The gay and sumptuous Court 

 with its host of retainers must be housed, and that splendidly, as it 

 passed along the banks of the Loire or through the forests of the lie de 

 France from one scene of sport and revelry to another. Yet this en- 

 thusiasm of Francis was often defeated by his lack of steady purpose. 

 His interest was seldom concentrated long enough on one building to 

 ensure its completion, or if completed, it was allowed to fall into decay 

 for lack of care. Du Cerceau, in pointing out the simple means by 

 which the royal castles might be kept in repair, relates that Francis 

 himself used to say, if a well cared for house was spoken off, "That 

 cannot be one of mine." 



ART, SCIENCE, AND LITERATURE. The other arts, though under- 

 going the same impulse from Italy, make a less impressive show than 

 architecture, but, while sculpture and painting were hardly emancipated 

 from their subordinate positions, works of great charm came from the 

 chisels of such men as Ligier Richer and Jean Cousin, and the Clouets 

 formed a delicate, if somewhat timid, school of painting and portraiture. 

 Meanwhile Jean Cousin, Bernard Palissy, and Pinaigrier, as stained 

 glass workers, and Leonard Limousin, Courtois, and Penicaud, as 

 enamellers, brought these genuinely French arts to great perfection. 



The intellectual activity of the reign was as great as the artistic. 

 Rabelais was laying the foundations of modern education and scientific 

 research ; Bude, Estienne, and Dolet rivalling and extending the 

 triumphs of Italian scholarship. Legal, historical, and philosophical 

 studies were pursued with ardour. Literature was illustrated by the 

 tender and graceful verse of Marot and Margaret of Navarre and the 

 racy tales of the " Heptameron," while the pages of Rabelais embodied 

 the whole spirit of the age : its enthusiasm, its eager inquiry, its wide 

 but ill-digested learning, its debt to the world of antiquity, its revolt 

 against monastic ideals, and its joy in life and action. The French 

 language and literature, if as yet unequal to the exposition of the noblest 

 thought and gravest themes, or the treatment of intricate problems, 

 was supple, fanciful, exuberant. Tender and gay by turns, it was a 

 fit exponent of the sparkling esprit Gaulois. It had a close parallel 

 in contemporary architecture. Both reflect the society to which they 



