Page:Montesquieu - The spirit of laws.djvu/94

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HE law s of education are the first impressions we receive; and as they prepare us for civil life, each particular family ought to be governed pursuant to the plan of the great family which comprehends them all.

If the people in general have a principle, their constituent parts, that is, the several families, will have one also. The laws of education will be therefore different in each species of government; in monarchies they will have honor for their object; in republics, virtue; in despotic governments, fear.

N monarchies the principal branch of education is not taught in colleges or academies. It in sbme measure commences, when we set out in the world: for this is the school of what we call honor, that universal preceptor which ought every where to be our guide.

Here it is that we constantly see and hear three things, that we should have a certain nobleness in Rh