title: Why can't my public class extend an internal class?
body: <p>I really don't get it.</p>
  
  <p>If the base class is abstract and only intended to be used to provide common functionality to public subclasses defined in the assembly, why shouldn't it be declared internal?</p>
  
  <p>I don't want the abstract class to be visible to code outside the assembly. I don't want external code to know about it.</p>