Page:Montesquieu - The spirit of laws.djvu/477

Rh liberty reigns in every station. They do not therefor so often change their manners and behaviour. Fixed and established customs have a near resemblance to laws. Thus it is here necessary that a prince or a legislator should less oppose the manners and customs of the people, than in any other country upon earth.

Their women are commonly confined, and have no influence in society. In other countries where they live with men, their desire of pleasing, and the desire men also have of giving them pleasure, produce a continual change of customs. The two sexes spoil each other, they both lose their distinctive and essential quality; what was naturally fixt becomes quite unsettled, and their customs and behaviour change every day.

UT China is the place where the customs of the country can never be changed. Besides their women being absolutely separated from the men, their customs, like their morals, are taught in the schools. A man of letters may be known by his easy address. These things being once taught by precept, and inculcated by grave doctors, become fixed, like the principles of morality, and are never changed. Rh