NOTES.

[The Notes are always taken from Note-books that were laid on the
table of the Lecture Room.]

I.

SAVAGE and civilized life may each exhibit the disgusting extremes of opposite evils; but it is in vain to fly from the one, to be lost in the still more frightful degradation of the other; not to say that the propensities, and capacities, and irresistible impulses of our nature seem clearly to indicate that we are not intended for solitude and torpor, but for society and improvement.

II.

Ir is not easy to lay down maxims in politics. Man is such a compound being of reason and feeling, so alive to the impression of the moment, so entirely at the mercy (in his political capacity, at least,) of the present uneasiness.

The political discourses of Hume are the best models we have of the reasoning that belongs to subjects of this nature. They best admonish us of the slow step with which we should advance, and the wary distrust with which we should look around, before we think that we have reached a maxim in politics, that is, a general principle, on the steady efficiency of which, in real practice, we may always depend.

"Civil knowledge," says Lord Bacon, "is conversant about a subject, which of all others is most immersed in matter, and hardliest reduced to axiom."

III.

Recueil des Historiens des Gaules et de la France.

RELIGIOUS Societies, like those of the Benedictines, have been often stigmatized as the abodes of laziness and superstition; but sweeping accusations are seldom just. To this society, for instance, literature is indebted for works of the most serious importance; works of such labor and extent, that they have been begun by one generation of men, and left to be prosecuted and finished by those which succeeded.

This is a sort of service which could not well have been rendered to mankind but by those who did not labor for profit, and who were always in a state of continued existence, by being linked together as members of the same society.

IV.

CHARLEMAGNE undertook, at his leisure, to learn to write. What a characteristic of the age!

"Sed parùm prosperè successit," says Eginhart. "Labor præposterus ac serò inchoatus."

Of such a man, so unlettered, the merit is the greater, as we are told, at the same time,

That he attended to the liberal education of his children.

That he had books read to him while at table.

That he acquired the Latin language, and a knowledge of the Greek.

That he zealously cultivated the liberal arts, and bestowed on the professors every mark of respect and honor.

That he studied the sciences of rhetoric, logic, and astronomy.

That he ordered the laws of his subject nations to be drawn up and reduced to writing.

His great merit seems to have been, that he knew his best interests and duties, and, therefore, felt for the people, and patronized the free assemblies of the state.

V.

Prologus Legis Salica.

PLACUIT atque convenit inter Francos, et eorum proceres, ut propter servandum inter se pacis studium, omnia incrementa veterum rixarum resecare deberent: et quia cæteris gentibus juxta se positis præeminebant, ita etiam legum auctoritate præcellerent; ut juxta qualitatem causarum, sumeret criminalis actio terminum. Exstiterunt igitur inter eos electi de pluribus quatuor viri his nominibus, Wisigastus, Bodogastus, Salogastus, et Widogastus, in villis quæ ultra Rhenum sunt Salehaim, et Bodehaim, et Widohaim. Qui per tres mallos (markets) convenientes omnes causarum originem solicitè discutiendo tractantes, de singulis judicium decreverunt hoc modo:

:

Anno ab incarnatione Domini nostri Jesu Christi DCCXCVIII. sexta, dominus Carolus Rex Francorum inclytus hunc libellum, tractatus legis Salicæ scribere ordinavit.

VI.

THE Conquered Romans were indulged by the Barbarians in the free use of their own law (the Theodosian Code), especially in the cases of marriage, inheritance, and other important transactions of life.

VII.

WITH respect to property, the student will learn the situation of the Romans by consulting the thirtieth book of Montesquieu, from the fifth chapter to the sixteenth.

The Franks seem to have seized only on a part of their lands, probably because, in the then existing state of society, they had no occasion for the whole. Those of the northern nations who settled near Italy were induced or obliged to treat them more liberally.

The Burgundians, for instance, took two thirds of the land, and one third of the bondmen.

The slaves were not Romans, but those unhappy men who were carried into captivity by a conquering army, retiring (as was often the case) from a province or a kingdom, which it had overrun.

Freemen among the Barbarians seem to have paid no taxes themselves. Of the Romans, some seem to have been proprietors, and some tributaries: by which term was probably meant those who paid rent.

When the Burgundian empire was attacked by Clovis, its fall was delayed by the assistance which the Burgundians received from their conquered subjects, the Romans; one instance among many of the policy of all mild government, so often exhibited, but in vain, to the humanity of those, who direct the counsels of states and empires.

The Burgundians, the Lombards, and the Visigoths, had been more connected with the Romans; and their laws and their codes are, therefore, favorably distinguished from the codes of the more simple and rude barbarians.

VIII.

MANY efforts seem to have been made by these Barbarians to procure integrity and despatch in the judges, and other officers connected with the administration of justice. This is the great difficulty. "Custodes ipsos quis custodiet?"

The judges must be few, the bar intelligent, the public interested in their own political happiness: that is, the judges of a country, like all other human beings, can only be kept virtuous by being subjected to the criticism of their fellow-creatures.

IX.

THESE ancient codes and capitularies remained long in force in Germany, longer in Italy, still longer in France. Their authority was shaken by the incursions of the Normans, and by the weakness of government under the successors of Charlemagne.

Curious particulars occur in these capitularies.

The influence of the clergy more especially, the deep and dark superstition of the people, and on the whole, the unhappy state of society.

The clergy, however, were considered as the patrons and guardians of justice and humanity, as far as justice and humanity were then understood. "Sacerdotes Dei," says one of the laws (30th) of the Visigoths," quibus pro remediis oppressorum vel pauperum, divinitùs cura commissa est," &c.

&c.

This was a law of one of their princes in the year 670.

X.

SYMPTOMS of the feudal system appear in these laws.

Of the 9th law of the 9th book, the title is,-"De his, qui in exercitum constituto loco, vel tempore finito non successerint, vel quæ pars servorum

unicujusque in eadem expeditione debeat proficisci." But quite distinctly about the year 801, in the edicts of Charlemagne, cap. 1.

Imprimis," quicunque beneficia habere videntur, omnes in hostem veniant." So the second. And again, -"Omnis liber homo," &c. &c.

XI.

PARTICULARS of an amusing nature are sometimes found in these ancient documents. "Si quis medicus," says one of the laws of the Visigoths who possessed Spain, "dum phlebotomum exerceat, et ingenuum debilitaverit centum solidos coactus exsolvet. Si vero mortuus fuerit, continuo propinquis trahendus est, ut quod de eo voluerint, habeant potestatem."

The Sangrados of Spain seem to have made their appearance early.

XII.

THE superstition of the age, as may be supposed, furnishes many laws and observances and ceremonies that may make the reader in his happier state of religious knowledge "smile or sigh," according to his particular temperament.

The intolerance of these lawgivers is such as might be expected: for the barbarian of the seventh century speaks thus, alluding to unbelievers (a title in all probability then easily acquired), " in virtute Dei aggrediar, hostes ejus insequar, æmulos ejus prosequar," &c. &c., till he renders them like the 66 pulverem aut luteum solidum platearum," &c. &c.

The reason why his fellow-creatures are to be thus trampled into the dust, is much the same that would have been given by the barbarians of all subsequent centuries; "ut fideles populos in religionis sacræ pace possederem, atque infideles ad concordiam pacis adduxerim, et mihi crescat in gloria præmium, ut virtutem Dei dilatem atque augeam regnum."

XIII.

AGAINST the poor Jews there was an edict; "Ne Judæi sectam suam defendere audeant," which it seems was "religioni nostræ insultantes," &c.

Yet were lawgivers like these able to express themselves, as may be seen in the 16th law, with all the fervor of eloquence and piety :-" Juro et per Jesum," &c. &c. p. 232.

XIV.

In these codes and capitularies may be seen evidently the origin of many of the peculiarities of our own laws and customs: and the practice of all the more distinguishing rites of the Roman Catholic communion: the services, even as here given, are solemn and affecting.

Lindenbrogius and Baluze are the authors, where every thing that concerns these subjects is to be found.

On the feudal system I have made a few observations and bound them up separately with Mr. Butler's note, and they lie on the table.

XV.

Progress of Society.

It is to be feared, that Stuart, in his criticisms on Dr. Robertson, was but too much affected by feelings of personal animosity: he was a man of powerful but irregular mind, and, in his differences with such a man as the Principal, must have been in the wrong. I have understood this to be the case.

XVI.

Mahomet.

THE dreadful alliance of military and religious enthusiasm has been often exhibited on the theatre of the world: but the fact is, that the military spirit is easily associated with any strong passion.

The soldiers of the Roman republic in ancient times, and of the French nation in our own times, are instances to this effect; and the rulers of any state should be very careful how they place their enemies within the reach of any union of this kind.

For the life of Mahomet we have to depend on Abulfeda, who did not reign till 1310, and who cannot appeal to any writer of the first century of the Hegira. This is a disagreeable circumstance. See Gibbon, note, chap. 50.

XVII.

THE French peers seem never to have been satisfied, unless the origin of their distinction was lost in the obscurity of the earliest ages.

A reasonable opinion is delivered by the president Hénault in the life of Hugh Capet: Montesquieu may be consulted, and Mably.

XVIII.

THE rise of the Norman empire in Sicily, in the relation of which history becomes romance, should also be considered. It may be read in Gibbon.

XIX.

THE history of the Albigenses, and the crusade against them, are deserving of attention. An account may be found in Père Daniel, or rather in Velly. But the French writers must always be read with due allowance, when the principles of civil and religious liberty are concerned.

These heretics, the Albigenses, were among the precursors of the Reformation.

Their manners and opinions have been probably misrepresented and vilified. Their fate and history is melancholy and interesting.

The subject seems properly stated by Dr. Rankin, in his late History of France; and it is here, that the student will in the most ready manner acquire a proper idea of it.