MONTESQUIEU 



MONTEVIDEO 



287 



encouragement in the sciences (1725). Eager for 

 larger oliservation anil enjoyment of tlie life of 

 society, and weary of the routine of his parlia- 

 mentary <luty, he soli! his office in 1726, ami then 

 settled in Paris. Thereafter he travelled for 

 three years in order to observe and study the 

 political and social institutions of other countries. 

 He visited Vienna, where he studied the constitu- 

 tions of Hungary and Poland; Venice, where he 

 formed a close friendship witli Lord Chesterfield ; 

 ami Rome, where lie studied Italian art, and was 

 favourably received by the pope. He then passed 

 liy Switzerland and the Rhine to Holland, where 

 he again met Chesterfield, who took him to Eng- 

 land. He remained in England from October 1729 

 to August 1731, mixing with its best society, fre- 

 quenting the Houses of Parliament, studying the 

 political writings of Locke, and analysing the 

 organisation and working of the English constitu- 

 tion, whose essential principles he may lie said to 

 have discovered. After returning to France he 

 divided his time between Paris and La Brede, 

 mingling the pursuit of pleasure ami an nn- 

 o-tentatioiis charity with the preparation of his 

 great works on the science of jxmtics and law. 



His Considerations sur lea Causes lie la Grandeur 

 des Romains et de leur Decadence, the ablest, if 

 not the most important, of his works, appeared 

 in 1734. In it he surveys the vast political 

 development of ancient Rome from the rude lie- 

 ginnings of the Eternal City till the Turks 

 gathered around the walls of Constantinople, and 

 his elucidation of the causes that determined the 

 character and detail of the movement mav lie 

 regarded as the first genuine application of the 

 modern scientific spirit to history, and as an endur- 

 in_' roiitrihiition to its philosophy. His char- 

 .r-terisiiions of the great Romans, his analysis of 

 rompl'\ influences, his filiation of events, his 

 estimates of ]iolitical and social causation have 

 been generally accepted and reproduced by sub- 

 ! uncut historians. His great monumental work 

 on the spirit of laws, De l'E/tt des Lois, 

 appeared in 1748 in 2 vols. at Geneva. It was 

 th^ product of all the work of his life, and of 

 the deliberate anil concentrated effort of twenty 

 years. Although published anonymously and put 

 on the Index, the work passed through twenty- 

 two editions in less than two years ; and it soon 

 vindicated its claim to be the most original and 

 popular book ever published on the science of law. 

 Montesijuieu indicated his consciousness of its 

 originality by prefixing to it the epigraph : Prolem 

 mil' matre creatum. r'rrneh Jurists of the 16th 

 century, Cuias and others, hail led the way to 

 the historical treatment of Roman law, and Doniat 

 had written a chapter on ' the nature and spirit of 

 laws,' but the universalisation of the historical and 

 comparative method in dealing with the reason 

 and relations of all laws is Montesiiiiieu's own, and 

 he applies it more lucidly, and also more widely 

 than \ ico did. By the spirit of laws he means 

 their raison d'etre in time, their historical causa- 

 tion, or the natural and social conditions by which 

 their origination, development, and forms are deter- 

 mined. The discussion of the influence of climate 

 was the most characteristic element of the work ; 

 it advances beyond the old abstract discussions of 

 right, and, although pushed in some points too 

 exclusively, it formed the prelude to all the more 

 work of the positive and ethnological school. 

 The analysis of the forms and principles of govern- 

 ment carried the subject farther than had been 

 done by any one since Aristotle ; and the exposition 

 of the constitutional government of England, with 

 its clear distinction of the legislative and executive 

 powers, mode an advance upon Locke, and held up 

 the free English constitution to the admiration and 



imitation of all Europe. The influence of Montes- 

 quieu's great work upon political and legal thought 

 directly, and upon government and laws indirectly, 

 was immense. It came too late to save France 

 from the political errors that culminated in the 

 Revolution, but it inspired and guided its best 

 thinkers and its greatest men. In 1750 he pub- 

 lished a clever Defense de V Esprit des Lois, followed 

 afterwards by l.ysi-maqtie (1748), a striking dia- 

 logue on despotism, Arsace et Ismcnie, a romance, 

 and an essay on taste in the Encyclopedic. Severe 

 study had exhausted his energy and still further 

 weakened his eyes till he became totally blind. 

 He died at Pari's 10th February 1755, aged sixty- 

 six, in the calm enjoyment of his great reputation. 

 The best edition of Montesquieu's works is that of E. 

 Laboulaye (7 vols. Paris, 1875-79); that of Lalmre (3 

 vols. 1856 ) is convenient and serviceable. 1 here are 

 English and other translations of the Ltttrei Ptrmnet, 

 and a commentary by Meyer (1841). The Spirit of 

 Laws was soon translated into English by T. Nugent 

 (new ed. by Pricharil, with D'Alembcrt's Analysis, 2 

 vols. Bohn, 1878). Vian'x Histoire de Montesquieu, a 

 Vie et in fEums (2d ed. 1M7U) is the fullest biography 

 and bibliography. The smaller monograph by A. Sorel 

 (Eng. ed. by G. Masson, 1887) is excellent; that by 

 Zevort ( 1887) may also be mentioned. 



Moilteverde, CLAUDIO, composer and har- 

 monist (1508-1(543). See HARMONY, Music. 



Montevideo, the capital of the republic of 

 Uruguay, is situated on tne north shore of the La 

 Plata estuary, aliout 125 miles E. by S. of Buenos 

 Ayres. It was built originally on a low promon- 

 tory between the ocean and a horseshoe-shaped 

 bay, 2 miles across ; but its extensive suburbs now 

 stretch far into the flat country behind, and have 

 crept round the bay to the landmark which gives 

 the city its name the Cerro, a smooth, isolated 

 cone, 505 feet high, crowned with a lighthouse and 

 an old fort. At its base there are nearly a score 

 of great saladeros, or beef-salting establishments, 

 where 200,000 cattle yearly are killed ; and here, 

 too, is the largest of the city's dry -docks. The city 

 proper covers an area of about 5 square miles, the 

 old town, on the little peninsula occupying nearly 

 one square mile ; and the sea-breezes make its 

 climate both pleasant and healthy. Montevideo is 

 an attractive town, with broad streets exception- 

 ally well paved- Mulhall declares the Calle 18 de 

 Julio, which is 85 feet wide, 'incomparably the 

 finest street in South America.' The houses are 

 flat-roofed, mostly of two or three stories, and 

 often crowned with small square belvideres. High 

 alx>ve these rises the cathedral ( 133 feet), with two 

 side towers and a dome covered with green and 

 blue and yellow tiles. The next most prominent 

 building is the large opera-house ; and others are 

 the town-hall, the custom-house, the exchange, the 

 Cabildo ( law-courts and parliament house ), the 

 school of arts and trades, the university, the 

 museum, the English and Basque churches, two 

 convents, the Hospital de Caridad (330 beds) and 

 the British hospital (60 beds), the extensive public 

 markets, and several of the banks and hotels. 

 Tramcars run in all directions there are over 55 

 miles of lines ; there are local electric lighting and 

 telephone companies, and a submarine telephone 

 to Buenos Ayres ; and water is brought by a puinp- 

 ing-main from the river Santa Lucia, a distance of 

 34 miles. 



The depth of water in the bay ranges from 9 to 

 15 feet, and vessels of heavy draught are compelled 

 to anchor in the roadstead outside, which is exposed 

 and often very rough. If a proper port had been 

 constructed in the years before 1864, when the 

 Buenos Ayres trade was diverted by the Para- 

 guayan war, Montevideo might have permanently 

 taken the place now occupied by the Argentine 



