Page:Montesquieu - The spirit of laws.djvu/488

436 process with extraordinary dispatch, administering only the oath on every accusation. But says the same Plato, when a people are not religious, we should never have recourse to an oath, except he who swears is entirely disinterested, as in the case of a judge and a witness.

T the time when the manners of the Romans were pure, they had no particular law against the embezzlement of the public money. When this crime began to appear, it was thought so infamous, that to be condemned to restore what they had taken, was considered as a sufficient disgrace: for a proof of this, see the sentence of L. Scipio.

HE laws which gave the right of tutelage to the mother, were most attentive to the preservation of the infant's person; those which gave it to the next heir, were most attentive to the preservation of the estate. When the manners of a people are corrupted, it is much better to give the tutelage to the mother. Amongst those whose laws confide in the manners of the subjects, the guardianship is given either to the next heir, or to the mother, and sometimes to both. Rh