The Jews in France had been permitted to settle in the country only for a specified time, and, although this term was frequently extended, their thoughts were necessarily always directed towards possible banishment. They were compelled to amass and keep in readiness sufficient money to enable them, at any moment, to start life afresh in another land. Like their ancestors in Egypt, they were ready for an exodus, their loins girded, their shoes on their feet, and their staffs in their hands. Although the acquisition of land was allowed them, they were obliged to concentrate themselves on the money business, and pursue the advantages offered by each moment. Necessity made them usurers. Some among them charged a higher rate of interest than permitted by the privileges granted them, and exacted even compound interest from dilatory debtors. But it was the king himself who forced them to immoderate, exasperating usury, by the extravagant demands he made upon their purses to meet the expenses of his wars, and the Jews could fulfill his demands only by transgressing the laws, but their exactions naturally rendered them hateful in the eyes of the general public. That Jewish creditors frequently had ill-intentioned or tardy Christian debtors imprisoned to force them to discharge their liabilities tended to increase the bitterness. The exercise of this right was regarded as a triumph of "the children of the devil over the children of heaven." The public became so angered at their possessing the privilege that the king, Charles VI, was obliged to abolish it. On the other hand, the necessity of maintaining the privilege was shown to be so imperative--the Jews being threatened with the entire loss of their outstanding debts--that the king and parliament had to grant it a month later in a modified form. They permitted the Jews to imprison only the debtors who, in their bonds, made themselves answerable with their bodies.