io On the ORIGIN and STRUCTURE of 



pire. N As in thofe nations, however, the feudal law was a plant 

 of foreign growth, it was feldom able to acquire the vigour it 

 poflefled in its native foil. The reftraints and forfeitures, which 

 the Lombard lawyers had ingrafted on it, were frequently 

 rejected ; its titles of honour very often remained empty names, 

 without political confequence ; and, as it was in this manner 

 employed merely for mow, or for the afcertaining of private 

 rights, much of the ancient conftitution of the government was 

 preferved unimpaired. 



IF thefe obfervations are in any meafure juft, the hiftory of 

 the conftitution of the different European nations may be much 

 elucidated by inftitutions afcertained to have exifted in their 

 fifter countries, during the correfponding periods of their pro- 

 grefs. The rife of the conftitutions of the Greek and Italian 

 ftates will derive light from what is known of the Gaulic, Ger- 

 man and Scandinavian tribes. The Norwegians, Angles, Saxons, 

 Jutes and Danes, of the feventh, eighth and ninth centuries, will 

 be found to referable the Germans of GZESAR and TACITUS. 

 The conftitutions of the Anglo-faxons, of the Franks before the 

 feus, of the Vifigoths in Spain, and of the Norwegians in Ice- 

 land, ought to be extremely fimilar. And the more modern go- 

 vernments of Denmark, Sweden, Poland and Hungary, may be 

 expected to retain more of the ancient Saxon and Scottifh confti- 

 tutions, than can be expected in the prefent Britifh government, 

 new modelled by the feudal law, and fubjected, for ages, to the 

 gradual bxit powerful influence of legiflative wifdom and nation- 

 al cultivation. 



HAVING recourfe, as occasion requires, to the ample field of 

 evidence pointed out by thefe obfervations, I fhall endeavour to 

 afcertain the form of government of the Gothic nations in their 

 original feats ; I fhall examine the alterations it underwent upon 

 their fettlement in the Roman provinces ; and I fhall attempt to 

 trace its progrefs and revolutions under the predominancy of the 



feudal fyftem *. 



PART 



* THIS laft part is not publiihed in the prefent volume, 



