Not only have there been communes everywhere, but the communes of France are not those which, as communes, under that name and in the middle ages, have played the chiefest part and taken the highest place in history.

The Italian communes were the parents of glorious republics.

The German communes became free and sovereign towns, which had their own special history, and exercised a great deal of influence upon the general history of Germany.
The communes of England made alliance with a portion of the English feudal aristocracy, formed with it the preponderating house in the British government, and thus played, full early, a mighty part in the history of their country.

Far were the French communes, under that name and in their day of special activity, from rising to such political importance and to such historical rank.

And yet it is in France that the people of the communes, the burgherdom, reached the most complete and most powerful development, and ended by acquiring the most decided preponderance in the general social structure.