Page:Montesquieu - The spirit of laws.djvu/155

Rh

onarchies do not permit of so great a simplicity of laws as despotic governments. For in monarchies there must be courts of judicature; these must give their decisions; the decisions must be preserved and learnt, taat we may judge in the same manner to day as yesterday, and that the lives and property of the citizens may be as certain and fixt as the very constitution of the state.

In monarchies, the administration of justice which decides not only in whatever belongs to life and property, but likewise to honor, demands very scrupulous inquiries. The delicacy of the judge increases in proportion to the increase of his trust, and of the importance of the interests on which he determines.

We must not therefore be surprized to find so many rules, restrictions, and extensions in the laws of those countries; rules that multiply the particular cases, and seem to make of reason itself an art. Rh