f general violence, there rose into some
consideration a body of men, which usually makes no figure in public
transactions, even during the most peaceful times; and that was the
university of Paris, whose opinion was sometimes demanded, and more
frequently offered, in the multiplied disputes between the parties.
The schism by which the church was at that time divided, and which
occasioned frequent controversies in the university, had raised the
professors to an unusual degree of importance; and this connection
between literature and superstition had bestowed on the former a weight
to which reason and knowledge are not of themselves anywise entitled
among men. But there was another society, whose sentiments were much
more decisive, at Paris,--the fraternity of butchers, who, under the
direction of their ringleaders, had declared for the duke of Burgundy,
and committed the most violent outrages against the opposite party.
To counterbalance their power, the Armagnacs made interest with the
fraternity of carpenters; the populace ranged themselves on one side
or the other; and the fate of the capital depended on the prevalence of
either party.

The advantage which might be made of these confusions was easily
perceived in England; and, according to the maxims which usually
prevail among nations, it was determined to lay hold of the favorable
opportunity. The late king, who was courted by both the French parties,
fomented the quarrel, by alternately sending assistance to each; but
the present sovereign, impelled by the vigor of youth and the ardor of
ambition, determined to push his advantages to a greater length, and to
carry violent war into that distracted kingdom. But while he was
making preparations for this end, he tried to effect his purpose by
negotiation; and he sent over ambassadors to Paris, offering a perpetual
peace and alliance; but demanding Catharine, the French king's daughter,
in marriage, two millions of crowns as her portion, one million six
hundred thousand as the arrears of King John's ransom, and the immediate
possession and full sovereignty of Normandy, and of all the other
provinces which had been ravished from England by the arms of Philip
Augustus; together with the superiority of Brittany and Flanders.[*]
Such exorbitant demands show that he was sensible of the present
miserable condition of France; and the terms offered by the French
court, though much inferior, discover their consciousness of the