Excerpt from The French Renaissance<br><br>The government of Charles VIII. And Louis XII. Was patriarchal rather than despotic, but the essential absolutism of both monarchs is shown by the fact that their Italian expeditions were undertaken against the real interests of the nation, and at the prompting of favourite ministers.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.