who shall prevail
in the Race for the
Sole True Trillionaire?

will they be a
Benevolent
Ruler?

cross
your digits!
it's our Only Hope

Delft was also, a little later, the home to a university founded to train Dutch colonial bureaucrats and rulers headed for the Indies, a few decades after the VOC fell (due to corruption, greed, and overexpansion). The VOC had the power to mint money, sign treaties and make war (and was responsible for genocide in Banda, the origin of nutmeg and mace), and was, of course, a privately held company supported by investors. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Pure Dutch born in the Indies could send their children to Delft, the only way to rise in the colonial bureaucracy, but protested over the expense and time away from their children. The authorities in Holland, however, were suspicious of Hollanders raised in the Indies and tainted by the tropics, so the policy was fine with them if it discouraged the rabble -- "middle class bourgeosie" -- from attending.

Charles, would it kill you to just link directly to the pages of the Rijksmuseum website and paraphrase their comments, rather than thread us through that abominable social media platform? How hard can it be, really?

Or do you claim some sort of neo-nihilistic philosophical position that shucks (shrug), the tyrants have already triumphed; what's the use of resisting? If so, I expect you also make use of Bezos's services, too; behavior which can only be explained by the aforementioned nihilism.