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Eulogy for President Montesquieu ^†

(Eloge de M. le Président de Montesquieu)

Though twenty-eight years his junior, d’Alembert, the author of this entry, had become not only an admirer but a friend of Montesquieu’s. He was present at Montesquieu’s deathbed in February 1755. Diderot, for his part, was the only member of the philosophic community to attend his funeral. The editors then took the unusual step of beginning the next volume of the work, volume 5, which appeared in November of that year, with a lengthy eulogy with a title set in a large typeface. The eulogy contains both an appreciation of Montesquieu’s life and career and an editorial summary of the doctrine contained in his Spirit of the Laws—a work that would loom so large in the political articles of the dictionary throughout its publication history that it seemed appropriate for inclusion in this anthology. The eulogy provides a revealing glimpse into how the Encyclopedists viewed the place of Montesquieu and his work in the encyclopedic project itself, and into their perceptions of the kind of criticism then being made of Montesquieu’s powerful but complex new doctrine. It appeared in English translation for the first time in the London, 1777, edition of Montesquieu’s works published by T. Evans, though we have offered a new translation here. Most of the merely biographical information in it has been omitted. It should also be noted that the summary of The Spirit of the Laws appears in the Encyclopédie as a note, but for the sake of convenience it is reproduced here as text.

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EULOGY FOR PRESIDENT MONTESQUIEU

The interest that good citizens take in the Encyclopédie, and the great number of men of letters who devote their works to it, would seem to allow us to regard it as one of the most appropriate monuments to serve as depositories of the sentiments of the Country, and of the homage that it owes to the celebrated men who have honored it. Convinced, nonetheless, that M. Montesquieu had the right to expect panegyrists other than ourselves and that the public grief would have merited more eloquent spokesmen, we would have contained within ourselves the just regrets and respect that we have for his memory. But the acknowledgment of what we owe him is too precious for us to leave responsibility for it to others. Benefactor of humanity by his writings, he deigned also to be a benefactor of this work, and our gratitude wishes only to trace some lines at the foot of his statue.

[A summary of Montesquieu’s life and early writings follows; at 5:viii, d’Alembert appends a lengthy footnote discussing The Spirit of the Laws; its translation follows here.]

Since most men of letters who have spoken of The Spirit of the Laws have been more fond of criticizing it than of providing an accurate notion of it, we are going to attempt to fulfill what they ought to have done and to unfold its plan, character, and purpose. Those who find the analysis too long will perhaps consider, after reading it, that this was the only means of enabling one to grasp the author’s method. One should remember, moreover, that the history of celebrated writers is only the history of their thoughts and their works, and that that part of their eulogy is the most essential and the most useful part, especially at the head of a work such as the Encyclopédie.

Men in the state of nature—abstracted of all religion, knowing no other law [loi] in the disagreements they may have except that of the animals, the right of the stronger—one should regard the establishment of societies as a kind of treaty against this unjust law [droit], a treaty designed to establish among the different parts of the human race a sort of scale. But with natural equilibrium as with moral, it is rare for it to be perfect and durable, and the treaties of the human race are like the treaties among our princes—a constant seed of divisions. Interest, need, and pleasure have brought men

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closer together, but those same motives constantly push them to want to enjoy the advantages of society without bearing its burdens. It is in this sense that one may say with the author that men, as soon as they are in society, are in a state of war. For war assumes in those who wage it, if not equality of strength, at least the opinion of that equality, whence arises the desire and mutual expectation of defeating each other. Now in the social state, if the balance is never perfect among men, it is not too unequal, either. On the contrary, they would either have no conflicts in the state of nature, or, if necessity drove them to it, one would find weakness fleeing before strength, oppressors without combat, and the oppressed without resistance.

Thus, there you have men, brought together and armed all at the same time—embracing each other on the one hand, if one may speak in this way, and looking to do mutual harm on the other. The laws are the more or less efficacious bonds designed to suspend or restrain their blows. But since the vast expanse of the globe we inhabit and the natural differences in the regions of the earth and in the peoples who cover it do not permit all men to live under one and the same government, the human race has had to distribute itself into a certain number of States, distinguished by the differences in the laws they obey. A single government would have made of the human race but one body, languishing and attenuated, extended without vigor over the surface of the earth. The different States are so many agile and robust bodies which, extending their hands to each other, form but one, whose reciprocal action everywhere fosters movement and life.

One may distinguish three sorts of government: the republican, the monarchical, the despotic. In the republican, the people as a body have sovereign power; in the monarchical, one person governs by fundamental laws; in the despotic, no other law is known but the will of the master, or rather of the tyrant. This is not to say that there are only these three types of States in the world; it is not even to say that there are States that belong solely and rigorously to one or another of these forms. Most are, so to speak, half and half, or shaded blends of these forms: here monarchy inclines to despotism; there, monarchical government is combined with republican; elsewhere, it is not the whole people, it is a part of the people who make the laws. But the foregoing division is nonetheless exact and precise. The three species of government that it includes are distinguished in such a way that they have,

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properly speaking, nothing in common, and yet all States that we know of partake of one or the other of them. It was thus necessary to form particular classes out of these three species and to apply oneself to determining the laws appropriate to them. It will be easy afterward to modify these laws in their application to whatever government it may be, according to whether it belongs more or less to these different forms.

In the various States, the laws should be relative to their nature, that is, to what constitutes them, and to their principle, that is, what supports them and gives them their activity—an important distinction, the key to countless laws, and the author derives many conclusions from it.

The principal laws relative to the nature of democracy are that the people be in some respects the monarch and in others the subject, that they elect and judge their magistrates, and that the magistrates make the decisions on certain occasions. The nature of monarchy demands that there be many intermediate powers and ranks between the monarch and the people, and a body that is depository of the laws and mediator between the subjects and the prince. The nature of despotism demands that the tyrant exercise his authority either by himself alone or through one person who represents him.

As for the principle of the three governments, that of democracy is love of the republic, that is, of equality; in monarchies, where one alone is the dispenser of distinctions and rewards, and where people are accustomed to confuse the State with this one man, the principle is honor—that is, ambition and love of esteem; under despotism, finally, it is fear. The more vigorous these principles are, the more stable the government; the more they are altered and corrupted, the more the government tends toward its destruction. When the author speaks of equality in democracies, he does not mean an equality that is extreme, absolute, and therefore chimerical; he means that happy equilibrium that makes all citizens equally subject to the laws, and with an equal interest in observing them.

In each government, the laws of education should be relative to the principle. What is meant here by education is the one received on entering the world, not the one given by parents and masters, which is often contrary to it, especially in certain States. In monarchies, education should have as its object urbanity and reciprocal esteem; in despotic States, terror and abasement of spirits. In republics, one needs all the power of education; it should

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inspire a noble but painful sentiment: self-renunciation, whence is born love of Country.

The laws that the legislator enacts should be in conformity with the principle of each government: in a republic, to maintain equality and frugality; in a monarchy, to support nobility without crushing the people; under despotic government, to keep all estates equally silent. One must not accuse M. de Montesquieu here of tracing out for sovereigns the principles of arbitrary power, whose very name is so odious to just princes, and all the more so to the wise and virtuous citizen. To show what has to be done to preserve such power is to work toward annihilating it. The perfection of this government is its ruin. And the exact code of tyranny, such as the author presents it, is simultaneously the satire and the most fearsome scourge of tyrants. As for the other governments, they each have their advantages: the republican is more appropriate for small States, the monarchical for large ones; the republican is more subject to excesses, the monarchical to abuses; the republican brings more maturity into the execution of the laws, the monarchical more dispatch.

The different principles of the three governments are bound to produce differences in the number and purposes of the laws, in the form of the sentences and the nature of the punishments. Since the constitution of monarchies is unchanging and fundamental, it requires more civil laws and tribunals so that justice may be rendered in a more uniform and less arbitrary manner. In moderate States, whether monarchies or republics, one cannot bring too many formalities to bear on the criminal laws. Punishment must be not only in proportion with the crime, but also as mild as possible, especially in a democracy; the opinion attached to punishments will often have more effect than their actual scale. In republics, one must judge according to the law, because no individual is in command of changing it. In monarchies, the sovereign’s clemency can sometimes soften the law; but crimes must never be judged except by the magistrates expressly charged with knowing about them. Finally, it is mainly in democracies that the laws should be rigorous against luxury, the relaxation of mores, and the seduction of women. The mildness of women and even their weakness renders them fit enough to govern in monarchies, and history proves that they have often worn the crown with glory.

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Having surveyed each government in particular, M. de Montesquieu next examines them in the relationship they may have with each other, but only from the most general viewpoint—that is, the viewpoint uniquely related to their nature and their principle. Envisioned in this manner, States can have no other relationships but that of defending or attacking. Confined by nature to a small State, republics cannot defend themselves without allies, but it is with other republics that they should be allied; the defensive strength of monarchy consists mainly in having frontiers out of attack range. Like men, States have the right to attack for their own preservation: from the right of war derives the right of conquest, a right that is necessary, legitimate, and unfortunate, which always leaves an immense debt to be discharged if human nature is to be repaid,¹ and whose general law is to do the least harm possible to the vanquished.² Republics are less able to conquer than monarchies; immense conquests presuppose despotism, or ensure it. One of the great principles of the spirit of conquest should be to improve the condition of the conquered people as much as possible. This simultaneously satisfies the natural law and the maxim of State. Nothing is more noble than Gelon’s peace treaty with the Carthaginians, by which he prohibited them from immolating their own children in the future.³ In conquering Peru,⁴ the Spanish ought likewise to have obliged the inhabitants to no longer immolate men to their gods, but they thought it more beneficial to immolate these very peoples. They had nothing more for a conquest than a vast desert; they were forced to depopulate their country, and they weakened themselves forever by their own victory. One may sometimes be obliged to change the laws of the defeated people; nothing can ever oblige one to take away their mores or even their customs, which are often their whole mores. But the surest means of preserving a conquest is, if possible, to put the vanquished people on the level of the conquering people, to accord them the same rights and privileges. This is the means the Romans often used; this is especially the means Caesar used with respect to the Gauls.

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In considering each government both in itself and in its relation with others, we have thus far been concerned neither with what they ought to have in common, nor with the particular circumstances drawn either from the nature of the country or from the genius of the people. This is what now needs to be explored.

The common law of all governments, at least of moderate and therefore just governments, is the political liberty that each citizen should enjoy.⁵ This liberty is not the absurd license of doing what one wants, but the power to do everything the laws permit. It can be envisioned either in its relation with the constitution, or in its relation with the citizen.⁶

In the constitution of each State, there are two sorts of powers, the legislative and the executive power. This latter has two objects, the internal affairs of the State and its external ones. The degree of perfection in a constitution’s political liberty depends on the legitimate distribution and the appropriate allocation of these different kinds of power. M. de Montesquieu brings in as evidence the constitution of the Roman republic and that of England. He finds the principle of the latter in the fundamental law of the ancient Germans’ government: that unimportant affairs were decided by the chieftains, and that great affairs were brought to the tribunal of the nation after being debated by the chieftains. M. de Montesquieu does not examine whether the English do or do not enjoy that extreme political liberty which their constitution provides them;⁷ it suffices for him to say that it is established by their laws. He is even further from intending to satirize other States.⁸ On the contrary, he believes that an excess even of good things is not always desirable, that extreme liberty has its disadvantages as does extreme servitude, and that in general, human nature adjusts better to a middling condition.⁹

Political liberty considered in relation to the citizen consists in the security that he is sheltered by the laws, or at least he is of the opinion that he

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has that security which causes one citizen not to fear another.¹⁰ It is mainly through the nature and proportion of the punishments that this liberty is established or destroyed.¹¹ Crimes against religion should be punished by privation of the goods that religion procures; crimes against mores, by shame; crimes against public tranquility, by prison or exile; crimes against security, by corporal punishment. Writings should be less punished than actions; simple thoughts should never be punished. Nonjudicial accusations, spies, anonymous letters: all these expedients of tyranny, equally shameful to those who are their instruments and to those who use them, should be proscribed in a good monarchical government. It is not permissible to accuse except in the face of the law, which always punishes either the accused or the slanderer. In every other case, those who govern should say with Emperor Constans:¹² We cannot suspect a man who has no accuser even though he does not lack enemies. It is very good to have established a public party who is charged in the name of the State to prosecute crimes, and who has all the usefulness of the informant without having the vile interests, the disadvantages, and the infamy.¹³

The level of taxes should be in direct proportion with liberty.¹⁴ Thus, in democracies, they can be greater than elsewhere without being onerous, because every citizen regards them as a tribute¹⁵ he pays to himself, which ensures the tranquility and the lot of each member. Moreover, in a democratic State, the unfaithful use of public revenue is more difficult, because it is easier to know about and punish, since the agent owes an account, so to speak, to the first citizen who demands it.

In any government, the least onerous type of tax is the one established on merchandise, because the citizen pays without being aware of it.¹⁶ The excessive number of troops in time of peace is only a pretext to burden

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the people with taxes, a means of enervating the State, and an instrument of servitude. The direct collection¹⁷ of taxes, which brings the whole yield into the public fisc, is incomparably less burdensome to the people, and therefore more advantageous (when it can take place) than the farming of these same taxes, which always leaves a portion of State revenues in the hands of some private individuals. All is lost especially (these are the terms of the author) when the profession of tax-farmer becomes honorable,¹⁸ and it becomes honorable as soon as luxury is in force. To let a few men feed on the public sustenance in order to fleece them in their turn, as has been practiced in the past in certain States, is to remedy one injustice by another, and to do two bad things instead of one.

Let us move now, with M. Montesquieu, to the particular circumstances that are independent of the nature of the government and that are bound to modify its laws. The circumstances that come from the nature of the country are of two sorts: some are related to the climate, others to the terrain. No one doubts that climate has an influence on the customary arrangement of bodies, and therefore on characters.¹⁹ This is why the laws should be in conformity with the nature of the climate in indifferent matters, and conversely, should combat them when the effects are vicious. Thus, in countries where the use of wine is harmful, the law that prohibits it is a very good one. In countries where the heat of the climate leads to laziness, the law that encourages work is a very good one. The government may thus remedy the effects of the climate, and this suffices to safeguard The Spirit of the Laws from the very unjust criticism made of it, that it attributes everything to cold and heat. For besides the fact that heat and cold are not the only things by which climates are distinguished, it would be as absurd to deny certain effects of climate as to want to attribute everything to it.

The use of slaves, established in the warm countries of Asia and America but condemned in the temperate climates of Europe, gives the author occasion to treat of civil slavery.²⁰ Since men have no more right over the liberty than over the lives of one another, it follows that slavery, generally

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speaking, is contrary to natural law. In fact, the right of slavery cannot come from war—since then, it could be based only on the ransoming of one’s life, and there is no right over the lives of those who are no longer attacking. Nor can it come from a man’s sale of himself to another—since every citizen, being indebted to the State for his life, is all the more indebted to it for his liberty, and therefore is not in charge of selling it. Besides, what would be the price of this sale? It cannot be the money given to the seller, since the moment one turns oneself into a slave, all one’s possessions belong to the master. Now, a sale without a price is as chimerical as a contract without conditions. There has perhaps been only one just law in favor of slavery: this was the Roman law that made the debtor a slave of the creditor. In order to be equitable, even this law had to limit the servitude as to degree and time. Slavery can at most be tolerated in despotic States, where free men, too weak against the government, seek for their own utility to become the slaves of those who tyrannize the State; or else in climates whose heat so enervates the body and so weakens morale that men are brought to perform an arduous duty only by the fear of punishment.²¹

Alongside civil slavery, one may place domestic servitude—that is, the servitude in which women are held in certain climes.²² It can take place in those Asian countries where they are living with men before being able to make use of their reason: nubile by the law of climate, a child by the law of nature. This subjection becomes even more necessary in countries where polygamy is established—a custom that M. Montesquieu does not pretend to justify insofar as it is contrary to religion, but which, in the places where it is accepted (and speaking only politically), can be well-founded up to a certain point, either on the nature of the country, or on the relationship between the number of women and the number of men. On this occasion, M. Montesquieu speaks of renunciation and of divorce, and he establishes on good grounds that once it is allowed, renunciation ought to be permitted to women as well as to men.²³

If climate has so much influence over domestic and civil servitude, it has no less over political servitude—that is, over the servitude that subjects

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one people to another. The peoples of the North are stronger and hardier than those of the South. Thus, the latter in general are bound to be subjugated, the former are bound to be conquerors; the latter slaves, the former free. It is also what history confirms: Asia has been conquered eleven times by the peoples of the North; Europe has suffered many fewer revolutions.²⁴

With regard to the laws in their relationship with the nature of the terrain,²⁵ it is clear that democracy is more appropriate than monarchy for sterile countries, where the earth needs all of men’s industry. Moreover, liberty is in that case a kind of compensation for the harshness of the work. More laws are needed for an agricultural people than for a people who raise flocks; more for the latter than for a hunting people; more for a people who make use of money than for those unfamiliar with money.

Finally, one should consider the particular genius of the nation.²⁶ The vanity that enlarges objects is a good resource for government; the pride that devalues them is a dangerous resource. The legislator should respect prejudices, passions, abuses up to a certain point. He should imitate Solon, who gave the Athenians not the best laws in themselves, but the best ones they could have. The gay character of those people demanded easier laws; the hard character of the Lacedemonians, more rigorous laws. The law is a bad means of changing manners and customs; it is by reward and example that one must try to achieve this end. At the same time, however, it is true that a people’s laws, when one is not bent on grossly and directly offending their mores, are bound to imperceptibly influence these mores—either to reinforce them or to change them.

After thoroughly exploring in this manner the nature and the spirit of the laws relative to the different types of country and people, the author returns anew to consider States in their relations to each other. At first, in comparing them among themselves in a general manner, he had been able to envision them only in relation to the harm they could do each other. Here, he envisions them in relation to the mutual assistance they can give

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each other; as it happens, this assistance is mainly founded on commerce.²⁷ If the spirit of commerce naturally produces a spirit of interest opposed to the sublimity of the moral virtues, it also renders a people naturally just, and it banishes laziness and brigandage. Free nations that live under moderate governments are bound to engage in more commerce than slave nations. One nation should never exclude another nation from its trade without very good reasons.²⁸ Nonetheless, liberty in this area is not an absolute faculty granted to traders to do what they want, a faculty that would often be harmful to them; it consists only in hampering traders to the benefit of trade.²⁹ In a monarchy, the nobility should not devote themselves to it, still less the prince. Finally, there are nations for which commerce is disadvantageous—not those that need nothing, but those that need everything, a paradox the author makes concrete by the example of Poland, which lacks everything except wheat, and which, through the commerce it engages in, deprives the peasants of their sustenance in order to satisfy the luxury of the lords. On the subject of the laws that commerce requires, M. Montesquieu presents the history of these different revolutions, and this part of his book is neither the least interesting nor the least curious. He compares the impoverishment of Spain by the discovery of America to the fate of that imbecilic prince of the fable—ready to die of hunger for having asked the gods that everything he touched be converted into gold.³⁰ Since the use of money is a substantial part of the topic of commerce, and its main instrument, he thus thought he should treat the operations on the currency, on exchange, on the payment of public debt, on lending at interest—upon which he defines the laws and limits, and which he in no way confuses with the so justly condemned excesses of usury.³¹

The population and the number of inhabitants have an immediate relationship with commerce.³² Since the purpose of marriage is population, M. Montesquieu thoroughly examines that important matter here. What most

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encourages propagation is public continence; experience proves that illicit unions contribute little, and indeed are harmful. It is with justice that the consent of the father has been established for marriage; however, restrictions ought to be placed on this, for the law ought in general to encourage marriage. The law that prohibits the marriage of mothers with sons is (independent of the precepts of religion) a very good civil law. For aside from many other reasons, since the contracting parties are of very different ages, these sorts of marriages can rarely have propagation as their purpose. The law that prohibits the marriage of father and daughter is based on the same motives; however (speaking only from the perspective of civil law), it is not as indispensably necessary as the other to the purpose of population, since the capacity for procreation ends much later in men. Thus, the contrary custom has occurred among certain peoples upon whom the light of Christianity has not shone. Since nature brings itself to bear on marriage, it is a bad government that would need to encourage it. Liberty, security, moderate taxes, and proscription of luxury are the true principles and the true supports of population. Nonetheless, one may successfully enact laws to encourage marriage when, despite the corruption, there still remain resources in the people that attach them to their Country. Nothing is finer than Augustus’s laws for encouraging the propagation of the species; unfortunately, he passed these laws during the decay, or rather the fall, of the republic. The demoralized citizens must have foreseen that they would no longer be bringing anyone into the world but slaves; thus, the execution of these laws was quite weak during the entire time of the pagan emperors. Constantine in the end abolished them in becoming a Christian, as if Christianity’s purpose was to depopulate society by recommending the perfection of celibacy to a small number.

The establishment of poorhouses,³³ depending on the spirit with which it is done, can harm population or encourage it. There may, and even should be, poorhouses in a State in which most of the citizens have only their resourcefulness as an asset, because that resourcefulness may sometimes fall short through misfortune. But the assistance that these poorhouses give should be only temporary, in order not to encourage mendicancy

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and idleness. One must begin by making the people rich, and afterward build poorhouses for pressing, unforeseen needs. Woe betide the countries in which the multitude of poorhouses and of monasteries (which are only perpetual poorhouses) makes everyone comfortable except those who work.

M. Montesquieu has thus far spoken only of human laws. He now passes to the laws of religion,³⁴ which in almost all States form such an essential object of government. He everywhere praises Christianity, he shows its advantages and its greatness, he seeks to make it loved. He maintains that it is not impossible, as Bayle claimed,³⁵ for a society of perfect Christians to form a durable and coherent State. But he also thought it permissible for him to examine what the different religions (humanly speaking) might have that is in conformity with, or contrary to, the genius and situation of the peoples who profess them. It is from this point of view that one must read everything he wrote on this matter, which has been the subject of so many unjust rantings. It is especially surprising that in an age that calls so many other ages barbarous, what he said about tolerance should have been made a crime against him, as if to tolerate a religion was to approve of it, as if even the Gospel did not proscribe every other means of spreading itself but mildness and persuasion. Those in whom superstition has not extinguished every feeling of compassion and justice will be unable to read without being moved to pity the remonstrance to the inquisitors—that odious tribunal which outrages religion while appearing to avenge it.³⁶

Finally, after treating individually the different types of law that men may have, it remains only to compare them all together, and to examine them in their relationship with the things they ordain.³⁷ Men are governed by different types of law: by natural law, common to each individual; by divine law, which is that of religion; by ecclesiastical law, which is that of the administration of the religion; by civil law, which is that of the members of the same society; by political law, which is that of the government

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of that society; by the law of nations, which is that of societies’ relations with each other. These laws each have their distinctive objects, which must not be confused. One must never regulate by one type of law what belongs to another, so as to avoid sowing disorder and injustice in the principles that govern men. The principles that prescribe the type of law, and that circumscribe its purpose, must also prevail in the manner of drafting them.³⁸ As far as possible, the spirit of moderation must dictate all its clauses and provisions. Well-made laws will be in conformity with the spirit of the legislator, even when appearing to be opposed to it.³⁹ Such was the famous law of Solon, by which all those who took no part in an act of sedition were declared infamous. It either prevented seditions or made them useful by forcing all members of the republic to attend to its true interests. Ostracism itself was a very good law. For on the one hand, it treated the affected citizen honorably, and on the other, it made provision against the effects of ambition. Moreover, a great many votes were necessary, and banishment was only possible every five years. Often, laws that seem the same have neither the same motive nor the same effect nor the same level of equity: the form of government, the specific conjunctures, the character of the people change everything. Finally, the style of the laws should be simple and serious. They can dispense with motivating, because the motive is assumed to exist in the mind of the legislator. But when they do motivate, it should be on evident principles; they should not resemble that law which, prohibiting the blind from pleading, adduces as a reason that they cannot see the ornaments of the magistracy.⁴⁰

To show by examples the application of his principles, M. de Montesquieu chose two different peoples, the most celebrated on earth and the one whose history interests us the most: the Romans and the French.⁴¹ He devotes himself to only a part of the jurisprudence of the former, that which concerns inheritance. As for the French, he goes into the greatest detail on the origin and revolutions of their civil laws, and on the different customs, abolished or still extant, that have resulted from them. He mainly covers

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the feudal laws—that type of government which was unknown to all of antiquity, which will perhaps be unknown forever to future ages, and which did so much good and so much harm. He especially discusses these laws in their relationship to the establishment and the revolutions of the French monarchy. He proves, against Abbé Du Bos,⁴² that the Franks truly entered as conquerors into Gaul, and that it is not true, as that author claims, that they had been called by the people to succeed to the rights of the Roman emperors who were oppressing them. He does so in detail that is profound, exact, and remarkable, though it is impossible for us to follow it here, and in any case, its principal points will be found scattered throughout different parts of this dictionary, in related articles.

Such is a general analysis—though very imperfect and ill-formed—of the work of M. de Montesquieu; we have separated it from the rest of his eulogy in order not to interrupt the order of our account too much.

[D’Alembert completes his obituary, emphasizing the criticisms of The Spirit of the Laws and Montesquieu’s response; along the way, he cites a brief notice that occurred in the English newspaper the Evening Post, which it seemed appropriate to include here as it appears in d’Alembert’s text, in English. It is at 5:xvi.]

On the 10th of this month, died at Paris, universally and sincerely regretted, Charles Secondat, Baron of Montesquieu, and President a mortier of the Parliament of Bourdeaux. His virtues did honour to human nature, his writings justice. A friend to mankind, he asserted their undoubted and inalienable rights with freedom, even in his own country, whose prejudices in matters of religion and government [it must be remembered that it is an Englishman who is speaking]⁴³ he had long lamented, and endeavoured (not without some success) to remove. He well knew, and justly admired the happy constitution of this country, where fix’d and known Laws equally restrain monarchy from Tyranny, and liberty from licentiousness. His Works will illustrate his name, and

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survive him, as long as right reason, moral obligation, and the true spirit of laws, shall be understood, respected and maintained.

[D’Alembert finishes the eulogy in the following way.]

Death prevented him from giving us any further benefits. And combining our own regrets with those of all Europe, we might write on his tomb: Finis vitae ejus nobis luctuosus, Patriae tristis, extraneis etiam ignotisque non sine curâ fuit.⁴⁴