520 POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS. 



ancestors had framed, with a just regard for the welfare of 

 the king and of his people.&quot; And how persistent is this 

 authority of the sanctified past over the not-yet-sanctified 

 present, we see among ourselves, in the fact that every legi&amp;gt; 

 lator has to bind himself by oath to maintain certain political 

 arrangements which our ancestors thought good for us. 



While the unchangeableness of law, due to its supposed 

 sacred origin, greatly conduces to social order during those 

 early stages in which strong restraints are most needed, there 

 of course results an unadaptiveness which impedes progress 

 when there arise new conditions to be met. Hence come into 

 use those &quot; legal fictions,&quot; by the aid of which nominal 

 obedience is reconciled with actual disobedience. Alike in 

 Roman law and in English law, as pointed out by Sir Henry 

 Maine, legal fictions have been the means of modifying 

 statutes which were transmitted as immutable ; and so fitting 

 them to new requirements : thus uniting stability with that 

 plasticity which allows of gradual transformation. 



532. Such being the origin and nature of laws, it becomes 

 manifest that the cardinal injunction must be obedience. 

 Conformity to each particular direction pre-supposes allegiance 

 to the authority giving it ; and therefore the imperativeness 

 of subordination to this authority is primary. 



That direct acts of insubordination, shown in treason and 

 rebellion, stand first in degree of criminality, evidently fol 

 lows. This truth is seen at the present time in South 

 Africa. &quot; According to a horrible law of the Zulu despots, 

 when a chief is put to death they exterminate also his sub 

 jects.&quot; It was illustrated by the ancient Peruvians, among 

 whom &quot; a rebellious city or province was laid waste, and its 

 inhabitants exterminated ; &quot; and again by the ancient Mexi 

 cans, by whom one guilty of treachery to the king &quot; was put 

 to death, with all his relations to the fourth degree.&quot; A 

 like extension of punishment occurred in past times in Japan, 

 where, when &quot; the offence is committed against the state, 



