Théodore was very much enchanted by ancient ideals of heroes as a child, especially by legends of men who did great deeds as recounted to him by his father. It was on their hunting parties and journeys into the capital that Théodore learnt the stories of Julius Caesar, of the Trojan Wars, of the treasures won by Alexander the Great in Persian and India.
As he grew up, Théodore became more interested in history, not only in the speeches of Cicero he was forced to learn, but in actual real things from the past, things that he could touch and feel and, somehow, be part of a past more glorious even than the present.
When the Revolution began and the State began to sell furniture and artefacts and things to fund wars, he begins to hoard things, and losses most of his money in the process. He manages to make his money back, and save his family from bankruptcy, by selling what he's acquired. He gradually begins to buy these sorts of things cheaply to sell in England and Holland and anywhere he can- both for the money and because he believes that "as long as someone appreciates it..."
His morals are, some would say, twisted. He has few loyalties that lay with those in the present, but instead is dedicated to objects and ideas of the past.
