a ee oe a 
memoir of the fame atthor. 
ni2 Proceedings of the National Inftitute, April ath, 1799: -[O@ober, 
This piece 
contains numerous and important details 
relative to the induftry of the Blacks, 
their dexterity in mechanical arts, and 
the fuccefs of fome among them. in the. 
career of letters. Among thefe laft is 
diftinguifhed a woman, named: Phillis 
Wheatley, tranfperted in 1761, trom 
Africa to America, at the age of feven 
years; brought afterwards to England, 
where, having learned very rapidly the 
Latin and Eneglith, fhe publifhed, in this 
laft language, at the ave of 19, a collection 
of poems 11 fome repute. With regard 
to the moral qualities of the Negroes, citi- 
zen Gregoire accumulates a great number 
of examples and te#imonies ; from which 
it reiults, that in the very bofem of flavery, 
which Gegrades or corrupts the mind, the 
Blacks have cultivated end prattifed with 
eclat both the mild and the heroic virtues ; 
filial piety, philanthropy, gratitude, as 
well as martial bravery and intrepidity in 
dangers. Such are the facts which citizen 
Gregoire oppoles to certain theories, little 
favourable, as 1s well known, to that part 
of mankind. The vices of the Blacks, 
concludes the auther, are the work of ty- 
rauny ; their virtues are their own. 
Citizen LEVEQUE read a firft memoir 
on the conftitution cf the republic of 
Athens. The refult_of this memoir is, 
that the Athenians, with their Archons, 
their Areopagus, and their Council of 
Five Hundred, had, neverthelefs, no idea 
of the divifion and of the equilibrium of 
powers. Among them the executive pow- 
er, diftributed every where, had no con- 
filtence any where.- All the authorities 
were refolved into judiciary authorities, 
no one poflefiing in effect a moderating 
force, conftantly capable of checking or 
fufpending the precipitate refclutions of 
the others. The affembly of the people, 
exerciing, abdicating, taking again at 
pleafure all the kinds of funétions, thofe 
of judging, and of adminiftrating, as_well 
as tho!e of making eleétions and laws, of- 
fered no other permanent charatter than its 
own ‘inconfitency, its murderous agita- 
tions, and its fatal decility to the impul- 
fion of every demagogue. - It is to thele 
profound vices of the conftitution of 
Athens that, citizen Levéque attributes 
the faults and the misfortunes of that re- 
public; as it is alfo to the wifdom, to the 
aa 5 3 
pewer of its meral in TIEULTONS, that fhe , 
owed her gveat actions, her great men, her 
fhort profperities, and her immortal clory. 
‘Some of the nations fubjugated ‘by 
Rome had obtained the maintenance of 
their antient laws; the Romans, cenquered 
in their turn, preferved in like manner their 
civil legiflation. Alarie II, one of the 
conquerors who difmembered the empire 
in the weft, caufed to be compiled in 506, 
in favour of his new Roman fubjects, a 
code of Jaws purely Roman.—This col- 
leStion, which bears the name of the Alaric 
Code, is the fubjeét. of a memoir which 
citizen BoUCHAUD has read to the clafs, 
‘and which may be divided into two parts, 
The queftion difcufled in the firft is to 
know by what lawyers this code was com- 
piled. The fecond treats of the different 
texts of which the Alaric Code 1s com- 
pofed, and of the interpretations joined to 
it. Inthe National Library are two very 
defe&tive manufcripts on the Alaric Cede, 
fome notices of which citizen Bouchaud 
has referred to the ceommiflion of manu- 
fcripts. 
Citizen ANQUETIL has read the fecond 
part of a memoir on the French manners 
and laws, from the fifth century to the 
tenth.. Inthe midft of the ufages and le- 
giflation of thofe times, we remark a 
penal Jaw againft confpiracies, fre~ 
quently renewed or applied, in the paflage 
from the firft race of kings to the feeond. ~ 
That which concerns this law, in the 
work of citizen Anquetil, is terminated 
by confiderations on political revolutions, 
and on the duration of the fhocks which 
they occafion. If one part of the firft ge- 
neration refifis, the fecond foftens, the 
third yields, and the change is confolidated 
when the fourth commences. 
A memoir read by citizen LEGRAND- 
p’ Aussi, offers the hiftory of the efta- 
blifhment of the laws of cuftoms in 
France, and contains an examen of the 
four firft works in the French language, 
which, in the courfe of the thirteenth cen- 
tury, have treated of this law. 
works are, rf, Ihe Councils, (Les Con- 
feils), by Pierre Desfontaines; 2d, The 
Abizes of Ferufalem (Les Afffes de Feru- 
falenz), attributed to Godtrey de Bouil- 
lon, but compiled in effet at Cyprus, by 
Philippe Beaumanoir. If we are not to 
feek in {uch monuments the principles of 
a foufd jurifprudence, we may at leaft 
ftudy in them the important hiftory of 
that feudal fyfem which predominated in 
France, and many cther ftdtes“of Europe, 
Thefe 
‘ 
as well as in the Afiatic provinces pof-_ 
fefled by the crufading Latins, This me- 
rnoir of citizen Legrand d’Auffi is the 
complement of that which he had read in 
the preceding quarter, on the ancient le- 
eiflature, which comprifes the Salic law, 
the law of the Vifigoths, and the law of 
the Bureundians. 
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