In 1560, an edict given at Orleans formulated afresh the stern prohibitions of Charlemagne. Once more, the calling of Aspasia was forbidden throughout the whole of France. The difficulties of enforcing this new-old _ordonnance_ were great everywhere, but nowhere so great as in the capital; and the Provost, it is said, was five years in concerting his measures. The statement is easily credited. Paris herself was little in sympathy at that date with laws to restrict the liberty of Aspasia; and it cannot be said that the average citizen had received much encouragement to virtue from the examples of the Court, the nobility, the clergy, or the magistracy itself. Dulaure asserts in his _Histoire de Paris_ that "_La prostitution était considérée à l'égal des autres professions de la société_." The _femmes publiques_, he adds, formed a corporation by themselves, received their patents, as it were, from the hands of Royalty, "_et même étaient protégées par les rois. Charles VI. et Charles VII. ont laissé des témoignages authentiques de cette protection._" The commerce to which was extended the august protection of the throne "_était encore favorisé par le grand nombre de célibataires, prêtres et moines, par le libertinage des magistrats, des gens de guerre, etc. Les femmes publiques, richement vêtues, se répandaient dans tous les quartiers de cette ville, et se trouvaient confondues avec les bourgeoises, qui, elles-mêmes, menaient une vie fort dissolue_." Provosts of Paris sometimes refused to put in force laws which themselves had framed against the "daughters of joy"; and in so refusing they seem usually to have had with them the sympathies of the town. Footnote 24: _Les Prisons de l'Europe._ This being in general the attitude of society in Paris, it might be thought that the attempt to revive the code of Charlemagne would be received with small popular favour. It appears to have been received with no favour whatever. Seven years, from 1560 to 1567, did the Provost prepare his way, and then the edict was launched. It was read aloud at either end of every street in which Aspasia had her dwelling, and in several of these streets a violent resistance was offered, by the women as well as by their friends and protectors, to the not too-willing agents of the law. By main force at length the women were taken as by press-gang, their streets were closed, the temple of Venus was demolished, and there were once more no _femmes publiques_ in Paris.