Note 533 — Chapter VI
Reading edition
On this, Arnold says, truly enough, ‘Comines's Memoirs are striking from their perfect unconsciousness: the knell of the Middle Ages had been already sounded, yet Comines has no other notions than such as they had tended to foster; he describes their events, their characters, their relations, as if they were to continue for centuries.’ Arnold's Lectures on Modern History, p. 118. To this I may add, that whenever Comines has occasion to mention the lower classes, which is very rarely the case, he speaks of them with great contempt. See two striking instances in Mémoires de Philippe de Comines, vol. ii. pp. 277, 287, edit. Paris, 1826.