and Florence,* and is now deposited as a sacred relict in the ancient palace of the republic.‡ It is the first care of a reformer to prevent any future reformation. To maintain the text of the Pandects, the Institutes, and the Code, the use of ciphers and abbreviations was rigorously proscribed; and as Justinian recollected, that the perpetual edict had been buried under the weight of commentators, he denounced the punishment of forgery against the rash civilians who should presume to interpret or pervert the will of their sovereign. The scholars of Accursius, of Bartolus, of Cujacius, should blush for their accumulated guilt, unless they dare to dispute his right of binding the authority of his successors, and the native freedom of the mind. But the emperor was unable to fix his own inconstancy; and while he boasted of renewing the exchange of Diomede, of transmuting brass into gold,§ he discovered the necessity of purifying his gold from the mixture of baser alloy. Six years had not elapsed from the publi obscurity in which they had been reposing, are questions between which there is but a shadowy difference. The re-organization of society was commencing, and of this, the security of property was perceived to be a necessary element. The want of " more extensive and accurate code of written laws" was therefore felt. Up to that period, the greater part of Western Europe had only "the compilation from the Theodosian Code, made by order of Alaric, king of the Visigoths, about the year 500." The insufficiency of this directed the attention of lawyers to Justinian's system of jurisprudence, and the re-introduc tion of the Pandects was tantamount to a discovery of them. (Middle Ages, vol. ii, p. 513-515.)-ED.] * Pisa was taken by the Florentines in the year 1406; and in 1411 the Pandects were transported to the capital. These events are authentic and famous. They were new bound in purple, deposited in a rich casket, and shewn to curious travellers by the monks and magistrates bareheaded, and with lighted tapers. (Brenckman, 1. 1, c. 10-12, p. 62-93.) After the collations of Politian, Bologninus, and Antoninus Augustinus, and the splendid edition of the Pandects by Taurellus (in 1551), Henry Brenckman, a Dutchman, undertook a pilgrimage to Florence, where he employed several years in the study of a single manuscript. His Historia Pandectarum Florentinorum (Utrecht, 1722, in quarto), though a monument of industry, is a small portion of his original design. § Χρύσεα χαλκείων, ἑκατόμβοι ̓ ἐννεαβοίων, apud Homerum patrem omnis virtutis (1st Præfat. ad Pandect.). A line of Milton or Tasso would surprise us in an act of parliament. Quæ omnia obtinere saneimus in omne ævum. Of the first code, he says, (2d Præfat.) in æternum valiturum. Man, and for ever! cation of the Code, before he condemned the imperfect attempt, by a new and more accurate edition of the same work, which he enriched with two hundred of his own laws, and fifty decisions of the darkest and most intricate points of jurisprudence. Every year, or according to Procopius, each day of his long reign, was marked by some legal innovation. Many of his acts were rescinded by himself; many were rejected by his successors, many have been obliterated by time; but the number of sixteen EDICTS, and one hundred and sixty-eight NOVELS,* has been admitted into the authentic body of the civil jurisprudence. In the opinion of a philosopher, superior to the prejudices of his profession, these incessant, and for the most part trifling, alterations, can be only explained by the venal spirit of a prince, who sold without shame his judgments and his laws.t The charge of the secret historian is indeed explicit and vehement; but the sole instance which he produces may be ascribed to the devotion as well as to the avarice of Justinian. A wealthy bigot had bequeathed his inheritance to the church of Emesa; and its value was enhanced by the dexterity of an artist, whe subscribed confessions of debt and promises of payment with the names of the richest Syrians. They pleaded the established prescription of thirty or forty years; but their defence was overruled by a retrospective edict, which extended the claims of the church to the term of a century; an edict so pregnant with injustice and disorder, that after serving this occasional purpose, it was prudently abolished in the same reign. If candour will acquit the emperor himself, and transfer the corruption to his wife and favourites, the suspicion of so foul a vice must still degrade the majesty of his laws: and the advocates of Justinian may acknowledge, that such levity, whatsoever be the motive, is unworthy of a legislator and a man. * Novellæ is a classic adjective, but a barbarous substantive (Ludwig. p. 245). Justinian never collected them himself: the nine collations, the legal standard of modern tribunals, consist of ninety-eight novels; but the number was increased by the diligence of Julian, Halo. ander, and Contius. (Ludwig, p. 249. 258. Aleman. Not. in Anecdot. p. 98.) Montesquieu, Considérations sur la Grandeur et la Décadence des Romains, c. 20, tom. iii, p. 501, in 4to. On this occasion he throws aside the gown and cap of a president à mortier. Procopius, Anecdot. c. 28. A similar privilege was granted to Monarchs seldom condescend to become the preceptors of their subjects; and some praise is due to Justinian, by whose command an ample system was reduced to a short and elementary treatise. Among the various institutes of the Roman law,* those of Caiust were the most popular in the East and West; and their use may be considered as an evidence of their merit. They were selected by the imperial delegates, Tribonian, Theophilus, and Dorotheus; and the freedom and purity of the Antonines was incrusted with the coarser materials of a degenerate age. The same volume which introduced the youth of Rome, Constantinople, and Berytus, to the gradual study of the Code and Pandects, is still precious to the historian, the philosopher, and the magistrate. The INSTITUTES of Justinian are divided into four books they proceed, with no contemptible method, from I. Persons, to II. Things, and from things, to III. Actions; and the article IV. of Private Wrongs, is terminated by the principles of Criminal Law.‡ : I. The distinction of ranks and persons, is the firmest basis of a mixed and limited government. In France, the remains of liberty are kept alive by the spirit, the honours, and even the prejudices, of fifty thousand nobles.§ Two the church of Rome. (Novel. 9.) For the general repeal of these mischievous indulgences, see Novel. 111, and edict. 5. * Lactantius, in his Institutes of Christianity, an elegant and specious work, proposes to imitate the title and method of the civilians. Quidam prudentes et arbitri æquitatis Institutiones Civilis Juris compositas ediderunt. (Institut. Divin. 1. 1, c. 1.) Such as Ulpian, Paul, Florentinus, Marcian. The emperor Justinian calls him suum, though he died before the end of the second century. His Institutes are quoted by Servius, Boethius, Priscian, &c. and the Epitome by Arrian is still extant. (See the prolegomena and notes to the edition of Schulting, in the Jurisprudentia Ante-Justinianea, Lugd. Bat. 1717. Heineccius, Hist. J. R. No. 313. Ludwig. in Vit. Just. p. 199.) [Justinian made only three divisions of his Institutes, 1. Personal rights, as-slavery, marriage, paternal power, and guardianship. 2. The rights of property or ownership; and 3. The injuries or causes of complaint, as well on the part of individuals as of the State. Sections of the second and third parts are taken by Gibbon to make up a fourth.-HUGO.] [In this division of the Institutes, Gibbon has made the appendix of the criminal law in the last title, into a fourth and separate part.-WarnKÖNIG.] § See the Annales Politiques de l'Abbé de St. Pierre, tom. i, p. 25, who dates in the year 1735. The most ancient families claim the immemorial possession of arms and fiefs. Since the crusades, some, hundred families supply, in lineal descent, the second branch of the English legislature, which maintains, between the king and commons, the balance of the constitution.* A gradation of patricians and plebeians, of strangers and subjects, has supported the aristocracy of Genoa, Venice, and ancient Rome. The perfect equality of men is the point in which the extremes of democracy and despotism are confounded, since the majesty of the prince or people would be offended, if any heads were exalted above the level of their fellow-slaves or fellow-citizens. In the decline of the Roman empire, the proud distinctions of the republic were gradually abolished, and the reason or instinct of Justinian completed the simple form of an absolute monarchy. The emperor could not eradicate the popular reverence which always waits on the possession of hereditary wealth, or the memory of famous ancestors. He delighted to honour with titles and emoluments, his generals, magistrates, and senators; and his precarious indulgence communicated some rays of their glory to the persons of their wives and children. But in the eye of the law, all Roman citizens were equal, and all subjects of the empire were citizens of Rome. That inestimable character was degraded to an obsolete and empty name. The voice of a Roman could no longer enact his laws, or create the annual ministers of his power; his constitutional rights might have checked the arbitrary will of a master; and the bold adventurer from Germany or Arabia was admitted, with equal favour, to the civil and military command, which the citizen alone had been once entitled to assume over the conquests of his fathers. The first Cæsars had scrupulously guarded the distinction of ingenuous, and servile birth, which was decided by the condition of the the most truly respectable, have been created by the king, for merit and services. The recent and vulgar crowd is derived from the multitude of venal offices without trust or dignity, which continually ennoble the wealthy plebeians. * [The House of Peers including the episcopal bench, now consists of more than four hundred and fifty members, in addition to which, there are twenty-four Scotch and ninety-four Irish peers, who have no seats in the legislature. There is no form in which a country can so gracefully reward true merit, as by perpetuated title. But the dignity is lowered and its purity sullied, when it only ennobles mere wealth, or purchases political adherents for the minister of the day. If high hereditary rank were only given to commemorate great public services and transmit a glorious name to after times, it would be of inestimable worth.-ED.] mother; and the candour of the laws was satisfied, if her freedom could be ascertained during a single moment between the conception and the delivery. The siaves who were liberated by a generous master immediately entered into the middle class of libertines or freedmen: but they could never be enfranchised from the duties of obedience and gratitude whatever were the fruits of their industry their patron and his family inherited the third part; or even the whole of their fortune, if they died without children and without a testament. Justinian respected the rights of patrons; but his indulgence removed the badge of disgrace from the two inferior orders of freedmen: whoever ceased to be a slave, obtained without reserve or delay, the station of a citizen; and at length the dignity of an ingenuous birth, which nature had refused, was created, or supposed, by the omnipotence of the emperor. Whatever restraints of age, or forms, or numbers, had been formerly introduced to check the abuse of manumissions, and the too rapid increase of vile and indigent Romans, he finally abolished; and the spirit of his laws promoted the extinction of domestic servitude. Yet the Eastern provinces were filled, in the time of Justinian, with multitudes of slaves, either born or purchased for the use of their masters; and the price, from ten to seventy pieces of gold, was determined by their age, their strength, and their education.* But the hardships of this dependent state were continually diminished by the influence of government and religion; and the pride of a subject was no longer elated by his absolute dominion over the life and happiness of his bondsman.† * If the option of a slave was bequeathed to several legatees, they drew lots, and the losers were entitled to their share of his value; ten pieces of gold for a common servant or maid under ten years; if above that age, twenty; if they knew a trade, thirty; notaries or writers, fifty; midwives or physicians, sixty; eunuchs under ten years, thirty pieces; above, fifty; if tradesmen, seventy. (Cod. 1. 6, tit. 43, leg. 3.) These legal prices are generally below those of the market. For the state of slaves and freedmen, see Institutes, 1. 1, tit. 3-8; 1. 2, tit. 9; 1. 3, tit. 8, 9. Pandects or Digest, 1. 1, tit. 5, 6; 1. 38, tit. 1-4, and the whole of the fortieth book: Code, 1. 6, tit. 4, 5; 1. 7, tit. 1-23. Be it henceforward understood that, with the original text of the Institutes and Pandects, the correspondent articles in the Antiquities and Elements of Heineccius are implicitly quoted; and, with the twenty-seven first books of the Pandects, the learned and rational Commentaries of Gerard Noodt. (Opera, tom. ii, p. 1–590, |