executive the organ. The difference in the result has corresponded with the difference in the process. We have been made fit for political power, by the long exercise of civil rights. They, neglecting the exercise, think they can at once begin with the power. We have always shown a determination to uphold our liberties, and, when the times are fitting, to increase them; and this we have done with a decency and a gravity natural to men to whom such subjects have long been familiar. But the French, always treated as children, are, in political matters, children still. And as they have handled the most weighty concerns in that gay and volatile spirit which adorns their lighter literature, it is no wonder that they have failed in matters where the first condition of success is, that men should have been long accustomed to rely upon their own energies, and that before they try their skill in a political struggle, their resources should have been sharpened by that preliminary discipline, which a contest with the difficulties of civil life can never fail to impart.

These are among the considerations by which we must be guided, in estimating the probable destinies of the great countries of Europe. But what we are now rather concerned with is, to notice how the opposite tendencies of France and England long continued to be displayed in the condition and treatment of their aristocracy; and how from this there naturally followed some striking differences between the war conducted by the Fronde, and that waged by the Long Parliament.

When, in the fourteenth century, the authority of the French kings began rapidly to increase, the political influence of the nobility was, of course, correspondingly diminished. What, however, proves the extent to which their power had taken root, is the undoubted fact, that, notwithstanding this to them unfavourable circumstance, the people were never able to emancipate themselves from their control.46 The relation the nobles bore to the throne became entirely changed; that which they bore to the people tanéité, qui caractérise les institutions de la France moderne." Meyer, Instit. Judic. vol. iv. p. 536. It is also this which, in literature and in science, makes them favour the establishment of academies; and it is probably to the same principle that their jurists owe their love of codification. All these are manifestations of an unwillingness to rely on the general march of affairs, and show an undue contempt for the unaided conclusions of private men.

Mably (Observations, vol. iii. pp. 154, 155, 352-362) has collected some striking evidence of the tyranny of the French nobles in the sixteenth century; and as to the wanton cruelty with which they exercised their power in the seventeenth century, see Des Réaux, Historiettes, vol. vii. p. 155, vol. viii. p. 79, vol. ix. pp. 40, 61, 62, vol. x. pp. 255-257. In the eighteenth century, matters were somewhat better; but still the subordination was excessive, and the people were poor, ill-treated, and miserable. Compare Euvres de Turgot, vol. iv. p. 139; Letter from the Earl of Cork, dated Lyons, 1754, in Burton's Diary, vol. iv. p. 80; the statement of Fox, in Parl. Hist. vol. xxxi. p. 406; Jefferson's Correspond. vol. ii. p. 45; and Smith's Tour on the Continent, edit. 1793, vol. iii. pp. 201, 202.

remained almost the same. In England, slavery, or villenage, as it is mildly termed, quickly diminished, and was extinct by the end of the sixteenth century." In France, it lingered on two hundred years later, and was only destroyed in that great Revolution by which the possessors of ill-gotten power were called to so sharp an account.48 Thus, too, until the last seventy years, the nobles were in France exempt from those onerous taxes which oppressed the people. The taille and corvée were heavy and grievous exactions, but they fell solely on men of ignoble birth; for the French aristocracy, being a high and chivalrous race, would have deemed it an insult to their illustrious descent, if they had been taxed to the same amount as those whom they despised as their inferiors.50 Indeed, every thing tended to nurture this general contempt. Every thing was contrived to humble one class, and exalt the other. For the nobles there were reserved the best appointments in the church, and also the most important military posts.51 The privilege of enter

47 Mr. Eccleston (English Antiq. p. 138) says, that in 1450 "villenage had almost passed away;" and according to Mr. Thornton (Over-Population, p. 182), "Sir Thomas Smith, who wrote about the year 1550, declares that he had never met with any personal or domestic slaves; and that the villains, or predial slaves, still to be found, were so few, as to be scarcely worth mentioning." Mr. Hallam can find no "unequivocal testimony to the existence of villenage" later than 1574. Middle Ages, vol. ii. p. 312: see, to the same effect, Barrington on the Statutes, pp. 308, 309. If, however, my memory does not deceive me, I have met with evidence of it in the reign of James I., but I cannot recall the passage.

4 M. Cassagnac (Causes de la Révolution, vol. iii. p. 11) says: "Chose surprenante, il y avait encore, au 4 août 1789, un million cinq cent mille serfs de corps;" and M. Giraud (Précis de l'Ancien Droit, Paris, 1852, p. 3), jusqu'à la révolution une division fondamentale partageait les personnes en personnes libres et personnes sujettes à condition servile." A few years before the Revolution, this shameful distinction was abolished by Louis XVI. in his own domains. Compare Eschbach, Etude du Droit, pp. 271, 272, with Du Mesnil, Mém. sur le Prince Le Brun, p. 94. I notice this particularly, because M. Monteil, a learned and generally accurate writer, supposes that the abolition took place earlier than it really did. Hist. des divers Etats, vol. vi. p. 101.

"Cassagnac, de la Révolution, vol. i. pp. 122, 173; Giraud, Ancien Droit, p. 11; Soulavie, Mem. de Louis XVI, vol. vi. p. 156; Mém. au Roi sur les Municipalités, in Euvres de Turgot, vol. vji. p. 423; Mem. de Genlis, vol. i. p. 200.

Further information respecting the amount and nature of these vexatious impositions will be found in De Thou, Hist. Univ. vol. xiii. p. 24, vol. xiv. p. 118; Saint Aulaire, Hist. de la Fronde, vol. i. p. 125; Tocqueville, Ancien Régime, pp. 135, 191, 420, 440; Sully, Economies Royales, vol. ii. p. 412, vol. iii. p. 226, vol. iv. p. 199, vol. v. pp. 339, 410, vol. vi. p. 94; Relat. des Ambassad. Venit. vol. i. p. 96; Mably, Observations, vol. iii. pp. 355, 356; Boulainvilliers, Ancien Gouvernement, vol. iii. p. 109; Le Vassor, Hist. de Louis XIII, vol. ii. p. 29; Mém. d'Omer Talon, vol. ii. pp. 103, 369; Mem. de Montglat, vol. i. p. 82; Tocqueville, Règne de Louis XV, vol. i. pp. 87, 332; Euvres de Turgot, vol. i. p. 372, vol. iv. pp. 58, 59, 74, 75, 242, 278, vol. v. pp. 226, 242, vol. vi. p. 144, vol. viii. pp. 152, 280.

So deeply rooted were these feelings, that, even in 1789, the very year the Revolution broke out, it was deemed a great concession that the nobles "will consent, indeed, to equal taxation." See a letter from Jefferson to Jay, dated, Paris, May 9th, 1789, in Jefferson's Corresp. vol. ii. pp. 462, 463. Compare Mercier sur Rousseau, vol. i. p. 136.

51 "Les nobles, qui avaient le privilége exclusif des grandes dignités et des gros bénéfices." Mém. de Rivarol, p. 97 : see also Mém, de Bouillé, vol. i. p. 56; Lemontey,

ing the army as officers was confined to them ;52 and they alone possessed a prescriptive right to belong to the cavalry. At the same time, and to avoid the least chance of confusion, an equal vigilance was displayed in the most trifling matters, and care was taken to prevent any similarity, even in the amusements of the two classes. To such a pitch was this brought, that, in many parts of France, the right of having an aviary or a dovecote depended entirely on a man's rank; and no Frenchman, whatever his wealth might be, could keep pigeons, unless he were a noble; it being considered that these recreations were too elevated for persons of plebeian origin.54

Circumstances like these are valuable, as evidence of the state of society to which they belong; and their importance will become peculiarly obvious, when we compare them with the opposite condition of England.

For in England, neither these nor any similar distinctions have ever been known. The spirit of which our yeomanry, copyholders, and free burgesses were the representatives, proved far too strong for those protective and monopolizing principles, of which the aristocracy are the guardians in politics, and the clergy in religion. And it is to the successful opposition made by these feelings of individual independence, that we owe our two greatest national acts-our Reformation in the sixteenth, and our Rebellion in the seventeenth century. Before, however, tracing the steps taken in these matters, there is one other point of view to which I wish to call attention, as a further illustration of the early and radical difference between France and England.

In the eleventh century there arose the celebrated institution of chivalry,55 which was to manners what feudalism was to poli

Etablissement Monarchique, p. 337; Daniel, Hist. de la Milice Françoise, vol. ii. p. 556; Campan, Mém. sur Marie Antoinette, vol. i. pp. 238, 239.

62 "L'ancien régime n'avait admis que des nobles pour officiers." Mém. de Roland, vol. i. p. 398. Ségur mentions that, early in the reign of Louis XVI., “les nobles seuls avaient le droit d'entrer au service comme sous-lieutenans." Mém. de Ségur, vol. i. p. 65. Compare pp. 117, 265-271, with Mém. de Genlis, vol. iii. p. 74, and De Stäel, Consid. sur la Rev. vol. i. p. 123.

63 Thus, De Thou says of Henry III., "il remet sous l'ancien pied la cavalerie ordinaire, qui n'étoit composée que de la noblesse." Hist. Univ. vol. ix. pp. 202, 203; and see vol. x. pp. 504, 505, vol. xiii. p. 22; and an imperfect statement of the same fact in Boullier, Hist. des divers Corps de la Maison Militaire des Rois de France, Paris, 1818, p. 58, a superficial work on an uninteresting subject.

M. Tocqueville (L'Ancien Régime, p. 448) mentions, among other regulations still in force late in the eighteenth century, that "en Dauphiné, en Bretagne, en Normandie, il est prohibé à tout roturier d'avoir des colombiers, fuies et volière; il n'y a que les nobles qui puissent avoir des pigeons."

55"Dès la fin du onzième siècle à l'époque même où commencèrent les croisades, on trouve la chevalerie établie." Koch, Tab. des Révolutions, vol. i. p. 143: see also Sainte-Palaye, Mém. sur le Chevalerie, vol. i. pp. 42, 68. M. Guizot (Civilis, en France, vol. iii. pp. 349-354) has attempted to trace it back to an earlier period; but

tics. This connexion is clear, not only from the testimony of contemporaries, but also from two general considerations. In the first place, chivalry was so highly aristocratic, that no one could even receive knighthood unless he were of noble birth ;56 and the preliminary education which was held to be necessary was carried on either in schools appointed by the nobles, or else in their own baronial castles. In the second place, it was essentially a protective, and not at all a reforming institution. It was contrived with a view to remedy certain oppressions, as they successively arose; opposed in this respect to the reforming spirit, which, being remedial rather than palliative, strikes at the root of an evil by humbling the class from which the evil proceeds, passing over individual cases in order to direct its attention to general causes. But chivalry, so far from doing this, was in fact a fusion of the aristocratic and the ecclesiastical forms of the protective spirit.58 For, by introducing among the nobles the principle of knighthood, which, being personal, could never be bequeathed, it presented a point at which the ecclesiastical doctrine of celibacy could coalesce with the aristocratic doctrine of hereditary descent. Out of this coalition sprung results of great moment. It is to this that Europe owes those orders, half aristocratic, half religious, the Knights Templars, the Knights of St. James, the Knights of St. John, the Knights

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60

he appears to have failed, though of course its germs may be easily found. According to some writers it originated in Northern Europe; according to others in Arabia! Mallet's Northern Antiquities, p. 202; Journal of Asiat. Soc. vol. ii. p. 11.

"L'ordre de chevalerie n'étoit accordé qu'aux hommes d'un sang noble." Sismondi, Hist. des Français, vol. iv. p. 204. Compare Daniel, Hist. de la Milice, vol. i. p. 97, and Mills' Hist. of Chivalry, vol. i. p. 20.

57

"In some places there were schools appointed by the nobles of the country, but most frequently their own castles served." Mills' Hist. of Chivalry, vol. i. p. 31; and see Sainte-Palaye, Mim, sur l'Anc. Chevalerie, vol. i. pp. 30, 56, 57, on this education.

68 This combination of knighthood and religious rites is often ascribed to the crusades; but there is good evidence that it took place a little earlier, and must be referred to the latter half of the eleventh century. Compare Mills' Hist. of Chivalry, vol. i. pp. 10, 11; Daniel, Hist. de la Milice, vol. i. pp. 101, 102, 108; Boulainvilliers, Ancien Gouv. vol. i. p. 326. Sainte-Palaye (Mém. sur la Chevalerie, vol. i. pp. 119-123), who has collected some illustrations of the relation between chivalry and the church, says, p. 119, "enfin la chevalerie étoit regardée comme une ordination, un sacerdoce." The superior clergy possessed the right of conferring knighthood, and William Rufus was actually knighted by Archbishop Lanfranc: Archiepiscopus Lanfrancus, eo quòd eum nutrierat, et militem fecerat." Will. Malmes. lib. iv., in Scriptores post Bedam, p. 67. Compare Fosbroke's British Monachism, 1843, p. 101, on knighting by abbots.

The influence of this on the nobles is rather exaggerated by Mr. Mills; who, on the other hand, has not noticed how the unhereditary element was favourable to the ecclesiastical spirit. Mills' Hist. of Chivalry, vol. i. pp. 15, 389, vol. ii. p. 169; a work interesting as an assemblage of facts, but almost useless as a philosophic estimate.

60 "In their origin all the military orders, and most of the religious ones, were entirely aristocratic." Mill's' Hist. of Chivalry, vol. i. p. 336.

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of St. Michael: establishments which inflicted the greatest evils on society; and whose members, combining analogous vices, enlivened the superstition of monks with the debauchery of soldiers. As a natural consequence, an immense number of noble knights were solemnly pledged to "defend the church;" an ominous expression, the meaning of which is too well known to the readers of ecclesiastical history. Thus it was that chivalry, uniting the hostile principles of celibacy and noble birth, became the incarnation of the spirit of the two classes to which those principles belonged. Whatever benefit, therefore, this institution may have conferred upon manners, there can be no doubt that it actively contributed to keep men in a state of pupilage, and stopped the march of society by prolonging the term of its infancy.63

On this account it is evident, that whether we look at the immediate or at the remote tendency of chivalry, its strength and duration become a measure of the predominance of the protective spirit. If, with this view, we compare France and England, we shall find fresh proof of the early divergence of those countries. Tournaments, the first open expression of chivalry, are of French origin. The greatest and, indeed, the only two great describers of chivalry are Joinville and Froissart, both of

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61 Mills' Hist. of Chivalry, vol. i. pp. 148, 333. About the year 1127, St. Bernard wrote a discourse in favour of the Knights Templars, in which "he extols this order as a combination of monasticism and knighthood.. . . He describes the design of it as being to give the military order and knighthood a serious Christian direction, and to convert war into something that God might approve." Neander's Hist. of the Church, vol. vii. p. 358. To this may be added, that, early in the thirteenth century, a chivalric association was formed, and afterwards merged in the Dominican order, called the Militia of Christ: "un nouvel ordre de chevalerie destiné à poursuivre les hérétiques, sur le modèle de celui des Templiers, et sous le nom de Milice de Christ." Llorente, Hist. de l'Inquisition, vol. i. pp. 52, 133, 203. 62 Several writers ascribe to chivalry the merit of softening manners, and of increasing the influence of women. Sainte-Palaye, Mém. sur la Chevalerie, vol. i. pp. 220-223, 282, 284, vol. iii. pp. vi. vii. 159-161; Helvétius de l'Esprit, vol. ii. pp. 50, 51; Schlegel's Lectures, vol. i. p. 209. That there was such a tendency is, I think, indisputable; but it has been greatly exaggerated; and an author of considerable reading on these subjects says, "The rigid treatment shown to prisoners of war in ancient times strongly marks the ferocity and uncultivated manners of our ancestors, and that even to ladies of high rank; notwithstanding the homage said to have been paid to the fair sex in those days of chivalry." Grose's Military Antiquities, vol. ii. p. 114. Compare Manning on the Law of Nations, 1839, pp. 145, 146.

63 Mr. Hallam (Middle Ages, vol. ii. p. 464) says, "A third reproach may be made to the character of knighthood, that it widened the separation between the different classes of society, and confirmed that aristocratical spirit of high birth, by which the large mass of mankind were kept in unjust degradation."

64 Sismondi, Hist. des Français, vol. iv. pp. 370, 371, 377; Turner's Hist. of England, vol. iv. p. 478; Foncemagne de l'Origine des Armoiries, in Mém. de l'Academie des Inscriptions, vol. xx. p. 580. Koch also says (Tableau des Révolutions, vol. i. p. 139), "c'est de la France que l'usage des tournois se répandit chez les autres nations de l'Europe." They were first introduced into England in the reign of Stephen. Lingard's England, vol. ii. p. 27.