were religiously kept and preserved in families as art hereditary polity, to which they owed their peace and fecurity. But different motives gave rife to different laws. One man, overjoyed at the birth of a firft-born fon, refolved to diftinguish him from his future children, by bestowing on him a more confiderable share of his poffeffions, and giving him a greater authority in his family. Another, more attentive to the intereft of a beloved wife or darling daughter, whom he wanted to fettle in the world, thought it incumbent on him to fecure their rights and increase their advantages. The folitary and cheerlefs ftate to which a wife would be reduced, in cafe she should become a widow, affected more intimately another man, and made him provide, beforehand, for the fubfiftence and comfort of a woman who formed his felicity. In proportion as every family increased, by the birth of children, and their marrying into other families; they extended their little domain, and formed, by infenfible degrees, towns and cities. From these different views, and others of the like nature, arose the different cuftoms of nations, as well as their rights, which are various. These focieties growing, in procefs of time, very numerous; and the families being divided into various branches, each of which had its head, whofe different interests and characters might interrupt the general tran quillity; it was neceffary to intruft one perfon with the government of the whole, in order to unite all thefe chiefs or heads under a single authority, and to maintain the publick peace by an uniform adminiftration. The idea which men ftill retained of the paternal government, and the happy effects they had experienced from it, prompted them to choose from among their wifeft and moft virtuous men, him in whom they had obferved the tenderest and most fatherly difpofition. Neither ambition nor cabal had the leaft fhare in this choice; probity alone, and the reputation of virtue and equity, decided decided on thefe occafions, and gave the preference to the most worthy *. To heighten the luftre of their newly-acquired dig. nity, and enable them the better to put the laws in execution, as well as to devote themselves entirely to the publick good; to defend the ftate against the invasions of their neighbours, and the factions of discontented citizens; the title of king was beftowed upon them, a throne was erected, and a fceptre put into their hands; homage was paid them, officers were affigned, and guards appointed for the security of their perfons; tributes were granted; they were invefted with full powers to adminifter juftice, and for this purpofe were armed with a fword, in order to restrain injustice, and punish crimest. At first, every city had its particular king, who, being more folicitous of preferving his dominion than of enlarging it, confined his ambition within the limits. of his native country. But the almost unavoidable feuds which break out between neighbours; the jealoufy against a more powerful king; the turbulent and reftlefs fpirit of a prince; his martial difpofition, or thirst of aggrandizing himself and difplaying his abilities; gave rife to wars, which frequently ended in the entire fubjection of the vanquifhed,, whofe cities were by that means poffeffed by the victor, and increased infenfibly his dominions. Thus, a first victory paving the way to a fecond, and making a prince more powerful and enterprising, several cities and provinces were united under one monarch, and formed kingdoms of a greater or lefs extent, according to the degree of ardour with which the victor had pufhed his conquefts. The ambition of fome of thefe princes being too vaft to confine itself within a fingle kingdom, it broke over *Quos ad faftigium hujus majeftatis non ambitio popularis, fed fpectata inter bones moderatio provehebat. Justin. 1. i. c. 1. + Fines imperii tueri magis quam proferre mos erat Intra fuum cuique patriam regna finiebantur. Juftin. ibid. Domitis proximis, cum acceffione virium fortior ad alios tranfiret, & proxi ma quaque victoria inftrumentum fequentis effet, totius orientis populos fubegit Justin, ibid. all all bounds, and fpread univerfally like a torrent, or the ocean; fwallowed up kingdoms and nations; and gloried in depriving princes of their dominions, who had not done them the leaft injury; in carrying fire and sword into the most remote countries, and in leav ing, every where, bloody traces of their progrefs! fuch was the origin of thofe famous empires which included a great part of the world. Princes made a various ufe of victory, according to the diversity of their difpofitions or interefts. Some, confidering themselves as abfolute mafters of the conquered, and imagining they were fufficiently indulgent in fparing their lives, bereaved them, as well as their children of their poffeffions, their country, and their liberty; fubjected them to a moft fevere captivity; employed them in thofe arts which are neceffary for the fupport of life, in the loweft and moft fervile offices of the houfe, in the painful toils of the field; and frequently forced them, by the most inhuman treatment, to dig in mines, and ranfack the bowels of the earth, merely to fatiate their avarice; and hence mankind were divided into freemen and slaves, masters and bondmen. Others introduced the cuftom of transporting whole nations into new countries, where they fettled them, and gave them lands to cultivate. Other princes again, of more gentle difpofitions, contented themselves with only obliging the vanquished nations to purchase their liberties, and the enjoy ment of their lives and privileges, by annual tributes laid on them for that purpose; and fometimes they would fuffer kings to fit peaceably on their thrones, upon condition of their paying them fome kind of homage. But fuch of these monarchs as were the wisest and ableft politicians, thought it glorious to establish a kind of equality betwixt the nations newly conquered, and their other fubjects; granting the former almost alk the rights and privileges which the others enjoyed. And by this means a great number of nations, that were were fpread over different and far diftant countries, conftituted, in fome measure, but one city, at least but one people. Thus I have given a general and concife idea of mankind, from the earliest monuments which history has preferved on this fubject, the particulars whereof I fhall endeavour to relate, in treating of each empire and nation. I shall not touch upon the hiftory of the Jews, or that of the Romans. I begin with the Egyptians and Carthaginians, because the former are of very great antiquity, and as the hiftory of both is less blended with that of other nations; whereas those of other states are more interwoven, and fometimes fuc ceed one another. Reflections on the different Sorts of Government. The multiplicity of governments established among the different nations, of whom I am to treat, exhibits, at firft view, to the eye and to the understanding, a fpectacle highly worthy our attention, and fhows the aftonishing variety which the fovereign of the world. has conftituted in the empires that divide it, by the diverfity of inclinations and manners obfervable in each of thofe nations. We herein perceive the characteristics of the Deity, who ever resembling himself in all the works of his creation, takes a pleasure to paint and display therein, under a thousand shapes, an infinite wifdom, by a wonderful fertility, and an admirable fimplicity: a wifdom that can form a fingle work, and compofe a whole, perfectly regular, from all the different parts of the univerfe, and all the productions of nature, notwithstanding the infinite manner in which they are multiplied and diverfified. In the Eaft the form of government that prevails is the monarchical, which being attended with a majeftick pomp, and a haughtiness almost infeparable from fupreme authority, naturally tends to exact a more diftinguifhed refpect, and a more entire fubmiffion, from thofe thofe in fubjection to its power. When we confider Greece, one would be apt to conclude, that liberty and a republican spirit had breathed themfelves into every part of that country, and had inspired almost all the different people who inhabited it with a violent defire of independence: diverfified, however, under various kinds of government, but all equally abhorrent of fubjection and flavery. In one part of Greece the fupreme power is lodged in the people, and is what we call a democracy: in another, it is vefted in an affembly of wife men, and thofe advanced in years, to which the -name of aristocracy is given: in a third republic, the government is lodged in a small number of select and : powerful perfons, and is called oligarchy: in others again, it is a mixture of all these parts, or of feveral of them, and fometimes even of regal power. It is manifeft that this variety of governments, which all tend to the fame point, though by different ways, contributes very much to the beauty of the uni verfe; and that it can proceed from no other being than him who governs it with infinite wifdom, and who diffufes univerfally an order and symmetry, of which the effect is to unite the feveral parts together, and by that means to form one work of the whole. For although in this diverfity of governments, fome are better than others, we nevertheless may very juftly affirm, that "there is no power but of God; and that the powers that be, are ordained of God *." But neither every use that is made of this power, nor every means for the attainment of it, are from God, though every power be of of him and when we fee thefe governments degenerat -ing, fometimes to violence, factions, defpotic fway, and tyranny, it is wholly to the paffions of mankind that we muft afcribe those irregularities, which are directly oppofite to the primitive inftitution of ftates, and which a fuperior wisdom, afterward reduces to order, always making them contribute to the execution of his designs, full of equity and juftice. VOL. I. Rom. xiii. 1. C This |