And yet the other Latin countries did not lag much behind Italy and were fair rivals of the Teutonic countries in scholarship at this time. Queen Isabella herself learned Latin when she was already a queen on the throne. Court fashions are sure to spread and this did. Besides the queen encouraged Cardinal Ximenes in the production of that magnificent monument of scholarship the Complutensian Polyglot Bible. The development of the universities in Spain only parallels the corresponding movement in the rest of Europe, but there were probably more higher institutions of learning founded and above all more refounded and re-established on a broader {xxxvi} basis at this time than at any other corresponding period of history. In France the index of scholarly accomplishment is the foundation of the Collège de France, which was to mean so much for French intellectual life. It made it possible for scholars to pursue their work unhampered by the fossilized University of Paris, which had become cramped in old-fashioned ways and for the time being was incapable of doing great intellectual work itself and yet, owing to the charters and privileges granted it in its flourishing period, was still capable of crushing out the true spirit of knowledge and preventing real development. There was never a time in the world's history when scholarship, in so far as that term means knowledge of the great books of the past, occupied so prominent a place in men's minds or had so much influence. Nor has there ever been a time when so many of those in power felt that the very best thing that they could do for their people as well as for their own fame was the encouragement of learning. Scholars were more highly honored than at any period in the world's history. Even ruling princes and the higher nobility felt that they owed it to themselves to be acquainted with the great works of literature or pretend at least to a knowledge of them and that a portion of their policy must be to patronize teachers and scholars of the New Learning. To be a patron of scholars was considered quite as important as to act in a similar capacity for painters, sculptors and architects, though there might be more personal fame attached to securing the works of the great masters in art. Fortunately these scholars were encouraged in their labors, and we have a whole series of wonderful editions of the old classics accomplished at a cost of time and labor and patience that only a few of those who have labored at such work under ever so much more favorable circumstances can properly appreciate. Their editions were issued as beautiful books in this wonderful time, and so they have remained as precious treasures for us down to our own day.