The English aristocracy being thus forced, by their own weakness, to rely on the people,29 it naturally followed that the people imbibed that tone of independence, and that lofty bearing, of which our civil and political institutions are the consequence, rather than the cause. It is to this, and not to any fanciful peculiarity of race, that we owe the sturdy and enterprising spirit for which the inhabitants of this island have long been remarkable. It is this which has enabled us to baffle all the arts of oppression, and to maintain for centuries liberties which no other nation has ever possessed. And it is this which has fostered and upheld those great municipal privileges, which, whatever be their faults, have, at least, the invaluable merit of accustoming free men to the exercise of power, giving to citizens the management of their own city, and perpetuating the idea of independence, by preserving it in a living type, and by enlisting in its support the interests and affections of individual men.

But the habits of self-government which, under these circumstances, were cultivated in England, were, under opposite circumstances, neglected in France. The great French lords being too powerful to need the people, were unwilling to seek their alliance.30 The result was, that, amid a great variety of forms and names, society was, in reality, only divided into two classes-the upper and the lower, the protectors and the protected. And, looking at the ferocity of the prevailing manners, it is not too

:

in this country." Campbell's Chief-Justices, vol. i. p. 61. Some writers (see, for instance, Dalrymple's Hist. of Feudal Property, p. 332) suppose that burgesses were summoned before the reign of Henry III. but this assertion is not only unsupported by evidence, but is in itself improbable; because, at an earlier period the citizens, though rapidly increasing in power, were hardly important enough to warrant such a step being taken. The best authorities are now agreed to refer the origin of the House of Commons to the period mentioned in the text. See Hallam's Supplement. Notes, pp. 335-339; Spence's Origin of the Laws of Europe, p. 512; Campbell's Chancellors, vol. i. p. 155; Lingard's England, vol. ii. p. 138; Guizot's Essais, p. 319. The notion of tracing this to the wittenagemot, is as absurd as finding the origin of juries in the system of compurgators; both of which were favourite errors in the seventeenth, and even in the eighteenth century. In regard to the wittenagemot, this idea still lingers among antiquaries; but, in regard to compurgators, even they have abandoned their old ground, and it is now well understood that trial by jury did not exist till long after the Conquest. Compare Palgrave's English Commonwealth, part i. pp. 243 seq., with Meyer, Instit. Judic. vol. ii. pp. 152-173. There are few things in our history so irrational as the admiration expressed by a certain class of writers for the institutions of our barbarous Anglo-Saxon ancestors. 29 Montlosier, with the fine spirit of a French noble, taunts the English aristocracy with this: "En France la noblesse, attaquée sans cesse, s'est défendue sans cesse. Elle a subi l'oppression; elle ne l'a point acceptée. En Angleterre, elle a couru dès la première commotion, se réfugier dans les rangs des bourgeois, et sous leur protection. Elle a abdiqué ainsi son existence." Montlosier, Monarchie Fran çaise, vol. iii. p. 162. Compare an instructive passage in De Staël, Consid. sur la Révolution, vol. i. p. 421.

30 See some good remarks in Mably, Observations sur l'Hist. de France, vol. iii. pp. 114, 115.

31

much to say, that in France, under the feudal system, every man was either a tyrant or a slave. Indeed, in most instances, the two characters were combined in the same person. For, the practice of subinfeudation, which in our country was actively checked, became in France almost universal. By this, the great lords having granted lands on condition of fealty and other services to certain persons, these last subgranted them; that is, made them over on similar conditions to other persons, who had likewise the power of bestowing them on a fourth party, and so on in an endless series; 32 thus forming a long chain of dependence, and, as it were, organizing submission into a system. 33 In England, on the other hand, such arrangements were so unsuited to the general state of affairs, that it is doubtful if they were ever carried on to any extent; and, at all events, it is certain that, in the reign of Edward I., they were finally stopped by the statute known to lawyers as Quia emptores.31

Thus early was there a great social divergence between France and England. The consequences of this were still more obvious when, in the fourteenth century, the feudal system rapidly decayed in both countries. For in England, the principle of protection being feeble, men were in some degree accustomed to self-government; and they were able to hold fast by those great institutions which would have been ill adapted to the more obedient habits of the French people. Our municipal privileges, the rights of our yeomanry, and the security of our copyholders, were, from the fourteenth to the seventeenth centuries, the three most important guarantees for the liberties of England. In

31 Hallam's Middle Ages, vol. i. p. 111.

35

32 46 Originally there was no limit to subinfeudation." Brougham's Polit. Philos. vol. i. p. 279.

33 A living French historian boasts that, in his own country, "toute la société féodale formait ainsi une échelle de clientelle et de patronage." Cassagnac, Révolution Française, vol. i. p. 459.

34 This is 18 Edw. I. c. 1; respecting which, see Blackstone's Comment. vol. ii. p. 91, vol. iv. p. 425; Reeve's Hist. of English Law, vol. ii. p. 223; Dalrymple's Hist. of Feudal Property, pp. 102, 243, 340.

The history of the decay of that once most important class, the English yeomanry, is an interesting subject, and one for which I have collected considerable materials; at present, I will only say, that its decline was first distinctly perceptible in the latter half of the seventeenth century, and was consummated by the rapidly increasing power of the commercial and manufacturing classes early in the eighteenth century. After losing their influence, their numbers naturally diminished, and they made way for other bodies of men, whose habits of mind were less prejudiced, and therefore better suited to that new state which society assumed in the last age. I mention this, because some writers regret the almost total destruction of the yeoman freeholders; overlooking the fact, that they are disappearing, not in consequence of any violent revolution or stretch of arbitrary power, but simply by the general march of affairs; society doing away with what it no longer requires. Compare Kay's Social Condition of the People, vol. i. pp. 43, 602, with a letter from Wordsworth in Bunbury's Correspond. of Hanmer, p. 440; a note in Mill's Polit.

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France sucn guarantees were impossible. The real division being between those who were noble, and those who were not noble, no room was left for the establishment of intervening classes; but all were compelled to fall into one of these two great ranks. The French have never had any thing answering to our yeomanry; nor were copyholders recognized by their laws. And, although they attempted to introduce into their country municipal institutions, all such efforts were futile; for, while they copied the forms of liberty, they lacked that bold and sturdy spirit by which alone liberty can be secured. They had, indeed, its image and superscription; but they wanted the sacred fire that warms the image into life. Every thing else they possessed. The show and appliances of freedom were there. Charters were granted to their towns, and privileges conceded to their magistrates. All, however, was useless. For it is not by the wax and parchment of lawyers that the independence of men can be preserved. Such things are the mere externals; they set off liberty to advantage; they are as its dress and paraphernalia, its holiday-suit in times of peace and quiet. But, when the evil days set in, when the invasions of despotism have begun, liberty will be retained, not by those who can show the oldest deeds and the largest charters, but by those who have been most inured to habits of independence, most accustomed to think and act for themselves, and most regardless of that insidious protection which the upper classes have always been so ready to bestow, that, in many countries, they have now left nothing worth the trouble to protect.

And so it was in France. The towns, with few exceptions, fell at the first shock; and the citizens lost those municipal privileges which, not being grafted on the national character, it was found impossible to preserve. In the same way, in our country, power naturally, and by the mere force of the democratic movement, fell into the hands of the House of Commons;

Econ. vol. i. pp. 311, 312; another in Nichols's Lit. Anec. vol. v. p. 323; and Sinclair's Correspond. vol. i. p. 229.

36 This is stated as an admitted fact by French writers living in different periods, and holding different opinions; but all agreed as to there being only two divisions: comme en France on est toujours ou noble, ou roturier, et qu'il n'y a pas de milieu." Mem. de Rivarol, p. 7. "La grande distinction des nobles et des roturiers." Giraud, Précis de l'Ancien Droit, p. 10. Indeed, according to the Coutumes, the nobles and roturiers attained their majority at different ages. Klimrath, Hist. du Droit, vol. ii. p. 249 (erroneously stated in Story's Conflict of Laws, pp. 56, 79, 114). See further respecting this capital distinction, Mem. de Duplessis Mornay, vol. ii. p. 230 (“agréable à la noblesse et au peuple"); Euvres de Turgot, vol. viii. pp. 222, 232, 237; Bunbury's Correspond. of Hanmer, p. 256; Mably, Observations, vol. iii. p. 263; and Mercier sur Rousseau, vol. i. p. 38: "On étoit roturier, vilain, homme de néant, canaille, dès qu'on ne s'appelloit plus marquis, baron, comte, chevalier, etc."

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whose authority has ever since, notwithstanding occasional checks, continued to increase at the expense of the more aristocratic parts of the legislature. The only institution answering to this in France was the States-General; which, however, had so little influence, that, in the opinion of native historians, it was hardly to be called an institution at all.37 Indeed, the French were, by this time, so accustomed to the idea of protection, and to the subordination which that idea involves, that they were little inclined to uphold an establishment which, in their constitution, was the sole representative of the popular element. The result was, that, by the fourteenth century, the liberties of Englishmen were secured; and, since then, their only concern has been to increase what they have already obtained. But, in that same century, in France, the protective spirit assumed a new form; the power of the aristocracy was, in a great measure, succeeded by the power of the crown; and there began that tendency to centralization which, having been pushed still further, first, under Louis XIV., and afterwards under Napoleon, has become the bane of the French people.39 For, by it the feudal ideas of superiority and submission, have long survived that barbarous age to which alone they were suited. Indeed, by their transmigration, they seem to have gained fresh strength. In France, every thing is referred to one common centre, in which all civil functions are absorbed. All improvements of any importance, all schemes for bettering even the material condition of the people, must receive the sanction of government; the local authorities not being considered equal to such arduous tasks. In order that inferior magistrates may not abuse their power, no power is con

"Les états-généraux sont portés dans la liste de nos institutions. Je ne sais cependant s'il est permis de donner ce nom à des rassemblemens aussi irréguliers.” Montlosier, Monarchie Française, vol. i. p. 266. "En France, les états-généraux, au moment même de leur plus grand éclat, c'est à dire dans le cours du xiv siècle, n'ont guère été que des accidents, un pouvoir national et souvent invoqué, mais non un établissement constitutionnel." Guizot, Essais, p. 253. See also Mably, Observations, vol. iii. p. 147; and Sismondi, Hist. des Français, vol. xiv. p. 642.

38 This is frankly admitted by one of the most candid and enlightened of all the foreign writers on our history, Guizot, Essais, p. 297: "En 1307, les droits qui devaient enfanter en Angleterre un gouvernement libre étaient définitivement re

connus.

39 See an account of the policy of Philip the Fair, in Mably, Observations, vol. ii. pp. 25-44; in Boulainvilliers, Ancien Gouvernement, vol. i. pp. 292, 314, vol. ii. pp. 37, 38; and in Guizot, Civilisation en France, vol. iv. pp. 170-192. M. Guizot says, perhaps too strongly, that his reign was "la métamorphose de la royauté en despotisme." On the connexion of this with the centralizing movement, see Tocque ville's Démocratie, vol. i. p. 307: "Le goût de la centralisation et la manie réglementaire remontent, en France, à l'époque où les légistes sont entrés dans le gouvernement; ce qui nous reporte au temps de Philippe le Bel." Tennemann also notices that in his reign the "Rechtstheorie" began to exercise influence; but this learned writer takes a purely metaphysical view, and has therefore misunderstood the more general social tendency. Gesch. der Philos. vol. viii. p. 823.

40

ferred upon them. The exercise of independent jurisdiction is almost unknown. Every thing that is done must be done at head-quarters. The government is believed to see every thing, know every thing, and provide for every thing. To enforce this monstrous monopoly, there has been contrived a machinery well worthy of the design. The entire country is covered by an immense array of officials ;" who, in the regularity of their hierarchy, and in the order of their descending series, form an admirable emblem of that feudal principle, which, ceasing to be territorial, has now become personal. In fact, the whole business of the state is conducted on the supposition, that no man either knows his own interest, or is fit to take care of himself. So paternal are the feelings of government, so eager for the welfare of its subjects, that it has drawn within its jurisdiction the most rare, as well as the most ordinary, actions of life. In order that the French may not make imprudent wills, it has limited the right of bequest; and, for fear that they should bequeath their property wrongly, it prevents them from bequeathing the greater part of it at all. In order that society may be protected by its police, it has directed that no one shall travel without a passport. And when men are actually travelling, they are met at every turn by the same interfering spirit, which, under pretence of protecting their persons, shackles their liberty. Into another matter, far more serious, the French have carried the same principle. Such is their anxiety to protect society against criminals, that, when an offender is placed at the bar of one of their

40 As several writers on law notice this system with a lenient eye (Origines du Droit Français, in Euvres de Michelet, vol. ii. p. 321; and Eschbach, Etude du Droit, p. 129: "le système énergique de la centralisation"), it may be well to state how it actually works.

Mr. Bulwer, writing twenty years ago, says: "Not only cannot a commune determine its own expenses without the consent of the minister or one of his deputed functionaries, it cannot even erect a building, the cost of which shall have been sanctioned, without the plan being adopted by a board of public works attached to the central authority, and having the supervision and direction of every public building throughout the kingdom." Bulwer's Monarchy of the Middle Classes, 1836, vol. ii. p. 262.

M. Tocqueville, writing in the present year (1856), says, "Sous l'ancien régime, comme de nos jours, il n'y avait ville, bourg, village, ni si petit hameau en France, hôpital, fabrique, couvent ni collége, qui pût avoir une volonté indépendante dans ses affaires particulières, ni administrer à sa volonté ses propres biens. Alors, comme aujourd'hui, l'adminision tenait donc tous les Français en tutelle, et si l'insolence du mot ne s'était pas encore produite, on avait du moins déjà la chose." Tocqueville, l'Ancien Régime, 1856, pp. 79, 80.

t

The number of civil functionaries in France, who are paid by the government to trouble the people, passes all belief, being estimated, at different periods during the present century, at from 138,000 to upwards of 800,000. Tocqueville, de la Démocratie, vol. i. p. 220; Alison's Europe, vol. xiv. pp. 127, 140; Kay's Condition of the People, vol. i. p. 272; Laing's Notes, 2d series, p. 185. Mr. Laing, writing in 1850, says: In France, at the expulsion of Louis-Philippe, the civil functionaries were stated to amount to 807,030 individuals.”

66