commencing with the political writings of Locke, (3) which were the fruit of the Revolution of 1688, as the political writings of Hobbes, Harrington, and Sidney, were the fruit of the civil war and Protectorate. Locke was the exponent of the Whig doctrines of government, to which the Revolution had given the ascendancy. His treatise has been justly described as a philosophy of the English constitution, (3) according to the principles established at that crisis. Locke, indeed, treats the problem of government as a positive one; he does not formally inquire after the best constitution, nor does he profess to lay down principles of legislation. His argument is, however, so framed as to insinuate certain legislative principles, and certain political forms, under the guise of a positive description of the necessary constitution of a state. Whatever he condemns in government, he excludes from his definition; and represents a bad institution as no institution at all. A similar method was followed by Rousseau, whose Contrat Social (published in 1754) furnished most of the abstract principles of government which were in vogue at the beginning of the French Revolution.

The celebrated work of Montesquieu (published in 1748), is, in great measure, historical; it groups institutions under certain heads, and endeavours to account for them upon certain assumed principles. It devotes little space to the positive problem of government, and generally assumes the necessary constitution of a state to be known. Incidentally, in explaining the origin of institutions, it often lays down political maxims, and is preceptive as well as historical.(32) It may be remarked that the tendency of Montesquieu to refer complex institutions or states of society to simple causes, such as the form of government, has

(30) A full abstract of Locke's Treatises on Government is given in Buhle, Histoire de la Philosophie Moderne, tom. iv. p. 251-324.

(31) Buhle, ib. p. 323.

(32) Concerning the aim of Montesquieu's work, see Stewart, Diss. p. 95, whose estimate of Montesquieu, as compared with Grotius, appears to me far too favourable. See M. Comte's estimate of Montesquieu, Cours de Phil. Pos. tom. iv. p. 243-52.

been imitated by subsequent French writers, and has exercised a pernicious influence on political speculation in that country.

The second half of the eighteenth century, and that portion of the nineteenth century which has elapsed, have given rise to numerous writers, who employed neither the positive nor the historical method of political inquiry, but who attempted to lay down principles or canons of legislation; who professed to establish a standard for guiding the legislator; and who sought, according to Lord Bacon's phrase, to enact leges legum. Thus, Filangieri, in the plan of his work on the science of legislation, says, that whereas Montesquieu seeks after the spirit of laws, he endeavours to determine their rules; whereas Montesquieu is employed in showing the reason of what has been done, he attempts to deduce from the same facts the rules of what ought to be done.(33) Similar objects are aimed at in most of the political writings of Bentham; for whom Dumont thinks it necessary to apologise, in the preface to his Traités de Legislation, as laying down principles applicable to all governments, and as not being the exclusive advocate of a particular political form. (3) The important class of writers on political economy, though the foundations belong to the positive department of politics, yet in raising their superstructure have generally followed the same method.(35)

The literature of politics, in all its branches, becomes so copious at the period which we are now considering, that any further attempt to characterise particular works is inconsistent with the limited scope of this chapter. We will, therefore, only say that political speculation, especially in the departments of political economy and jurisprudence, was kept alive in Italy in the eighteenth century, and marked with original thought.(*)

(33) Euvres de Filangieri, tom. i. p. 10: Paris, 1840. (34) Tom. i. Discours Prél. p. xvii.-xix. Paris, 1802.

(35) See, particularly, Stewart's Life of Adam Smith, for the description of the method of inquiry pursued in his Wealth of Nations.

(36) See Pecchio, Storia della Economia Pubblica in Italia: Lugano, 1829.

History likewise received valuable contributions during this epoch from Muratori, Giannone,(7) and other Italian writers. France, also, has continued, since the celebrated names of the last century, to produce a large number of writers on every branch of politics, positive, speculative, historical, and statistical.

Germany originated that branch of descriptive politics which has received the appellation of statistics. Both the name and the separate treatment of the subject were due to Achenwall, who died in 1772.(8) History, and all its subsidiary branches— chronology, geography, archæology, and the study of languages -have likewise been cultivated during the last hundred years with great perseverance and zeal, and with important success, by the Germans. The historical exposition of the Roman law, as well as of modern international law, likewise owes much to German jurists. But Germany has produced no speculative originality in the general department of politics.

In the modern period, the most valuable contributions to political science have come from England. Political economy, indeed, first began to assume a systematic form in the hands of the French economists; but the work of Adam Smith so far transcended all the writings of his predecessors, as to give him the fame and merits of a founder. As compared with the productions of other countries, the political writings of England have been characterised by novelty of ideas, combined with truth; they have promulgated important innovations in thought, without paradox, or strain after brilliancy of effect. (3) The AngloAmericans likewise have contributed some useful historical works, and expository treatises of law. Their federal constitution has raised many practical questions,

requiring for their solution a

(37) Muratori, born 1672, died 1750. Giannone, born 1676, died 1748. (38) Wachler, Geschichte der Historischen Forschung, vol. ii. p. 856, 1152; and see Eichhorn, Geschichte der Litteratur, vol. iii. part i. p. 577. Zachariä vom Staate, vol. i. P. 184.

(39) M. Guizot has formed a less favourable opinion of the English writers on speculative politics: Quiconque (he says) observera un peu attentivement le génie Anglais, sera frappé d'un double fait d'une part, de la sûreté du bon sens, de l'habileté pratique; d'autre part, de l'absence

refined investigation of positive politics; and has also called forth a more systematic treatment of that department of jurisprudence, which has been correctly designated by the name of private international law.

itself sensibly felt in Political observation

§ 10 On surveying the succession of writers whom we have now indicated, it will be perceived that systematic political knowledge—which we may be provisionally allowed to call political science()—has advanced, not steadily, but at intervals, since the days of Aristotle and Cicero. Practice and theory have acted reciprocally on each other. The accumulated experience of many centuries has made improving every department of politics. has become more extensive and more exact; its results have been more carefully registered, and those registers have been better preserved. The positive branch of politics, including jurisprudence, has been more systematically cultivated. In the speculative branch, new veins of inquiry have been opened; and although the methods of forming general propositions, and of converting these into preceptive rules of action, which have been followed by theorists, have often been defective, yet the circle of legislative science has been enlarged, and its foundations better established.

It will be our object, in the course of this treatise, to ascertain and enumerate the proper methods for arriving at correct results

d'idées générales et de hauteur d'esprit dans les questions théoriques. Soit qu'on ouvre un ouvrage Anglais d'histoire, ou de jurisprudence, ou sur toute autre matière, il est rare qu'on y trouve la grande raison des choses, la raison fondamentale.'-Hist. de la Civil. en Europe, leçon 14. This judgment, in a writer of M. Guizot's capacity, must not be attributed to national prejudice; still less are we entitled to suppose that he has merely echoed the common cry, which confines the English mind to subjects of immediate practical utility. I confess, however, that neither the writings of the English political speculators, beginning with Hobbes and Locke, and ending in the modern school of political economists, nor those of the English historians, beginning with Hume, Robertson, and Gibbon, and ending with some illustrious historians now living, appear to me to be characterised by the absence of general ideas, and of elevation of thought in theoretical questions.'

(40) See below, ch. xviii.

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in the different branches of politics. We will, therefore, only remark, at the close of this brief outline of the progress of political literature, that one prominent defect of the scientific writers on politics, is that each one, in succession, commences de novo, with little or no reference to his predecessors. Thus, Hobbes founds his doctrines upon general principles of human nature, without allusion to the researches of previous writers; while Locke, a few years afterwards, publishes a similar treatise, in which there is no reference to the work of Hobbes. Sometimes this silence with respect to previous writers is even mentioned with praise, as being a mark of originality and independence of judgment. Thus, Mr. Stewart alludes with satisfaction to the fact of Montesquieu never quoting Grotius :(") while Grotius himself is said, on being asked who was the best writer on politics, to have advised the inquirer to take a volume of blank paper, and record in it what he saw and heard. (42)

In fact, however, the study of preceding writers does not cramp the mind, or prevent real originality and independence of thought. Where their researches have been sound, it leads to truth, and prevents a person from taxing his powers of thought to re-discover what is already known. Where their speculations are erroneous, they may be suggestive, and may at all events serve to show what are the errors which require refutation.

Every scientific political writer should aim as much as possible at incorporating and superseding the works of his predecessors. So little has this object been hitherto borne in mind, that the early writings on politics remain, like works of art, with an individual character; their value not having been destroyed by the adoption, in subsequent treatises, of their correct results. This habit of continually taking a new departure from first principles, without assigning any reasons for relin

(41) Diss. p. 96.

(42) Hugo Grotius, de optimo politices auctore rogatus, consilium dedit ut quis volumen chartæ puræ sibi conficeret, et visa auditaque in illo notaret.'-Morhof's Polyhistor, vol. ii. p. 491.