Page:Montesquieu - The spirit of laws.djvu/104

52 Those who shall attempt hereafter to introduce such institutions as these, must establish the community of goods as prescribed in Plato's republic; that high respect he required for the gods; that separation from strangers for the preservation of people's morals, and an extensive commerce carried on by the community and not by private citizens: they must give our arts without our luxury, and our wants without our desires.

They must proscribe money, the effect of which is to swell people's fortunes beyond the bounds prescribed by nature; to learn to preserve for no purpose what has been idly hoarded up; to multiply without end our desires; and to supply the sterility of nature, of whom we have received very scanty means, of inflaming our passions and of corrupting each other.

"The Epidamnians perceiving their morals depraved by conversing with barbarians, chose a magistrate for making all contracts and sales in the name and behalf of the city." Commerce then does not corrupt the constitution, and the constitution does not deprive the society of the advantages of commerce.

NSTITUTIONS of this kind may be proper in republics, because they have virtue for their principle; but to excite men to honour in monarchies, or to imprint fear in despotic governments, less pains is necessary. Rh