Of the four master cathedrals of France, that of Paris was begun first. Thirty years later, in 1194, the cornerstone of Chartres was laid, that of Rheims in 1211, and that of Amiens in 1220. In the case of Chartres, Rheims, and Amiens, rebuilding was undertaken when fire had destroyed their Romanesque cathedrals. All four of these great churches have the same patroness, Our Lady, "the glorious mother of God, our advocate against our enemy of hell"--thus those generations spoke of her of whom Dante chanted: "Lady, thou art so great, and hast such worth that if there be who would have grace, yet betaketh not himself to thee, his longing seeketh to fly without wings."[104] It is difficult for many a modern mind to understand the passion of spiritual chivalry felt by the generations that built cathedrals for her whom they called their sovereign lady, but unless some comprehension of that mystic ideal is grasped no complete sympathy for mediæval art is possible. Mr. George Santayana, who would renew our sense of the moral identity of all the ages, may see in the mediæval devotion to Our Lady a development of Platonic love, which he calls the transformation of the love of beauty into the worship of an ideal beauty, the transformation of the love of a creature into the love of God. All love is to lead to God. All true beauty leads to the idea of perfection, said Michael Angelo, who practiced Platonism, even as had Dante, who was of the very essence of the great scholastic century that built Chartres, Rheims, and Amiens. THE CATHEDRAL OF CHARTRES[105] Discipline is indispensable to art.--GEORGE SANTAYANA.[106] Chartres was Our Lady's shrine in a peculiar way, her "special chamber." A local tradition, so old that it reached back to the dimmest past, told of a prophecy concerning a virgin mother, pronounced by the Druids, a hundred years before the Christian era on the site where Chartres now stands, and in the cathedral first built on the revered spot the bishop retained a pagan well which from time immemorial had been honored by the populace. That Puits des Saints-Forts has been included in the crypt of each succeeding cathedral of Chartres. Finally some priggish XVII-century prelates looked with disfavor on the policy, advocated by the apostle of the gentiles, to make use of the ancient superstition for the spread of the true faith. So the pagan well was filled in, and trace of it was lost till M. René Merlet discovered it in 1900 and had it excavated.