Page:The history of medieval Europe.djvu/67

 THE ROMAN EMPIRE 31 the Roman law became both technically and practically the greatest legal system that the world had known. Third, equity and humanity were guiding ideals of the Roman law, and for their sake it gradually rejected old cus- toms, forms, and precedents. The Roman jurist was not contented with logical reasoning if it led to an unfair deci- sion. In such a case he went back and reexamined his premises. He was not satisfied to apply an old law or judi- cial decision in its original meaning if the social and eco- nomic conditions to which it would have to be applied had altered since. In such a case he would ask himself, what would the maker of this law or the judge who rendered this decision have said had he lived under present conditions? And he would proceed to interpret the statute or precedent accordingly. The jurists had learned from the philosophers the conception of a single universe, which, if not itself a living whole and animated by reason, at least was subject to one law, the law of nature. Aristotle had spoken of ''natural justice"; the Stoics taught man to order his life after nature and reason, to try to put himself into harmony with the universe of which he was a part, to serve, not merely the city in which he lived, but mankind at large. Humanity thus became an ideal. Even the slave was a part of nature as much as his, master, and was a man like him. The Roman Empire, breaking down the barriers between city-states and between races, giving peace within its borders, forbidding such practices as piracy upon the inhabitants of another city than one's own, and ultimately in 212 a.d. making citi- zens of all freemen in the Empire, helped on this ideal of world-citizenship and the brotherhood of man. The law- yers, however, would usually resort to the ideal principles of natural law only when there was no ordinary law in exist- ence upon the case in question ; and they did not refuse to recognize slavery as legal, although they did not think it sanctioned by the law of nature. But as the Empire wore on, slaves were more humanely treated. Women also secured a much more favorable position before the law. The old ar- bitrary power of the head of the family over its members