Page:Montesquieu - The spirit of laws.djvu/157

Rh In proportion as the decisions of the courts of judicature are multiplied in monarchies, the law is loaded with decrees that sometimes contradict one another, either because succeeding judges are of a different way of thinking; or because the same causes are sometimes well, and at other times ill defended; or in fine, by reason of an infinite number of abuses that slip into whatever passes through the hands of man. This is a necessary evil, which the legislator redresses from time to time, as contrary even to the spirit of moderate governments. For when people are obliged to have recourse to courts of judicature, this should come from the nature of the constitution, and not from the contradictions or uncertainty of the laws.

In governments where there are necessary distinctions of persons, there mud likewise be privileges. This also diminishes the simplicity, and creates a thousand exceptions.

One of the privileges least burthensome to society, and especially to him who confers it, is that of pleading in one court preferably to another. Here new difficulties arise, when it becomes a question, before which court we should plead.

Far different is the case of people under despotic governments. In those countries I can see nothing that the legislator is able to decree, or the magistrate to judge. As the lands belong to the prince, it follows, that there are scarce any civil laws concerning the property of lands. From the right the sovereign has to succeed to estates, it follows likewise that there are none relating to inheritances. The monopolies established by the prince for himself in some countries, render Rh