Let us step away from the vertiginous chasms of speculation about historical causation and turn our attention back to Paris in the Age of Revolution and to the lives and work of some of the most accomplished people of that place and time. To examine these models of excellence biographically and taxonomically, that is, in the context of the separate evolutions of their respective arts, has been the purpose of the first half of this study. To examine their modes of excelling situationally, in the context of the general social and cultural characteristics of Paris in the Age of Revolution, will be the purpose of the second half. Such an examination may reveal the outlines of an unplanned, underground community.
