Montesquieu: Of Laws in the Relation They Bear to the Number of Inhabitants

The Spirit of Laws (1751)Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu

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Of Laws in the Relation They Bear to the Number of Inhabitants1. Of Men and Animals with respect to the Multiplication of their Species.2. Of Marriage.3. Of the Condition of Children.4. Of Families.5. Of the several Orders of lawful Wives.6. Of Bastards in different Governments.7. Of the Father's Consent to Marriage.8. The same Subject continued.9. Of young Women.10. What it is that determines Marriage.11. Of the Severity of Government.12. Of the Number of Males and Females in different Countries.13. Of Seaport Towns.14. Of the Productions of the Earth which require a greater or less Number of Men.15. Of the Number of Inhabitants with relation to the Arts.16. The Concern of the Legislator in the Propagation of the Species.17. Of Greece and the Number of its Inhabitants.18. Of the State and Number of People before the Romans.19. Of the Depopulation of the Globe.20. That the Romans were under the Necessity of making Laws to encourage the Propagation of the Species.21. Of the Laws of the Romans relating to the Propagation of the Species.22. Of the Exposing of Children.23. Of the State of the World after the Destruction of the Romans.24. The Changes which happened in Europe with regard to the Number of the Inhabitants.25. The same Subject continued.26. Consequences.27. Of the Law made in France to encourage the Propagation of the Species.28. By what means we may remedy a Depopulation.29. Of Hospitals. FOOTNOTES
   1. Dryden, Lucr.
   2. The Garamantes.
   3. Book i. 8.
   4. Pater est quem nuptiæ demonstrant.
   5. For this reason, among nations that have slaves, the child almost always follows the station or condition of the mother.
   6. Father Du Halde, i, p. 165.
   7. Ibid, ii, p. 121.
   8. Aristotle, Politics, vi. 4.
   9. Ibid., iii. 5.
   10. Thomas Gage, A New Survey of the West Indies, p. 345, 3rd ed.
   11. Ibid., p. 97, 3rd ed.
   12. Book xvi. 4.
   13. See Kempfer, who gives a computation of the people of Meaco.
   14. Collection of Voyages that Contributed to the Establishment of the East India Company, i, p. 347.
   15. Japan is composed of a number of isles, where there are many banks, and the sea is there extremely full of fish.
   16. China abounds in rivers.
   17. See Father Du Halde, ii, pp. 139, 142. ff.
   18. The greatest number of the proprietors of land, says Bishop Burnet, finding more profit in selling their wool than their corn, inclosed their estates; the commons, ready to perish with hunger, rose up in arms; they insisted on a division of the lands; the young king even wrote on this subject. And proclamations were made against those who inclosed their lands. Abridgment of the History of the Reformation, pp. 44. 83.
   19. Dampier, Voyages, ii, p. 41.
   20. Ibid., p. 167.
   21. See the Collection of Voyages that Contributed to the Establishment of the East India Company, v, part I, pp. 182, 188.
   22. In valour, discipline, and military exercises.
   23. The Gauls, who were in the same circumstances, acted in the same manner.
   24. Laws, v.
   25. Republic, v.
   26. Politics, vii. 16.
   27. Ibid.
   28. Ibid., iii. 5.
   29. Sixty pounds sterling.
   30. Book vi. 12.
   31. Book vii, p. 496.
   32. I have treated of this in the Considerations on the Causes of the Rise and Declension of the Roman Grandeur, 13.
   33. Book lvi.
   34. Book ii.
   35. In the year of Rome 277.
   36. See what was done in this respect in Livy, xlv; the Epitome of Livy, lix; Aulus Gellius, i. 6; Valerius Maximus, ii. 9.
   37. It is in Aulus Gellius, i. 6.
   38. See what I have said in Book v. 19.
   39. Cæsar, after the Civil War, having made a survey of the Roman citizens, found there were no more than one hundred and fifty thousand heads of families. -- Florus, Epitome of Livy, dec. 12.
   40. See Dio, xliii., and Xiphilinus in August.
   41. Dio, lib. xliii.; Suetonius, Life of Cæsar, 22; Appian, On the Civil War, ii.
   42. Eusebius, Chronicle.
   43. Dio, liv. 16.
   44. In the year of Rome 736.
   45. Julias rogationes. -- Annals, iii. 25.
   46. In the year of Rome 762. -- Dio, lvi. i.
   47. I have abridged this speech, which is of tedious length; it is to be found in Dio, lvi.
   48. Marcus Papius Mutilus and Q. Poppæus Sabinus. -- Dio, lvi.
   49. Ibid.
   50. Ulpian, Fragment, tit. 14, distinguishes very rightly between the Julian and the Papian law.
   51. James Godfrey has made a collection of these.
   52. The 35th is cited in Leg. 19, ff. de ritu nuptiarum.
   53. Book ii. 15.
   54. Dionysius Halicarnassus.
   55. The deputies of Rome, who were sent to search into the laws of Greece, went to Athens, and to the cities of Italy.
   56. Aulus Gellius, ii. 15.
   57. Suetonius, Life of Augustus, 44.
   58. Tacitus, ii. 51: Ut numerus liberorum in candidatis præpolleret, quod lex jubebat.
   59. Aulus Gellius, ii. 15.
   60. Tacitus, Annals, xv. 19.
   61. See Leg. 6, °5, De Decurion.
   62. See Leg. 2, ff. de minorib.
   63. Leg. i, °3, Leg. 2, ff. de vacatione et excusat. munerum.
   64. Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 29, °3.
   65. Plutarch, Numa.
   66. See the Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, which compose one of the most valuable pieces of the ancient civil law of the Romans.
   67. Sozomenus, i. 9. They could receive from their relatives. -- Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 16, °i.
   68. Sozomenus, i. 9; and Leg. unic., Cod. Theod. de infirm, poenis cælib. et orbit.
   69. Of the Love of Fathers towards their Children.
   70. See a more particular account of this in Ulpian. Fragment., tit. 15, 16.
   71. Ibid., tit. 16, °1.
   72. Ibid., tit. 14. It seems the first Julian laws allowed three years. -- Speech of Augustus, in Dio, lvi; Suetonius, Life of Augustus, 34. Other Julian laws granted but one year: the Papian law gave two. -- Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 14. These laws were not agreeable to the people; Augustus, therefore, softened or strengthened them as they were more or less disposed to comply with them.
   73. This was the 35th head of the Papian law. -- Leg. 19, ff.de ritu nuptiarum.
   74. See Dio, liv, year 736; Suetonius, in Octavio, 34.
   75. Dio, liv; and in the same Dio, the speech of Augustus, lvi.
   76. Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 16, and Leg. 27, Cod. de nuptiis.
   77. Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 16, °3.
   78. See Suetonius, Life of Claudius, 23.
   79. Ibid., 23, and Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 16, °3.
   80. Dio, liv; Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 13.
   81. Augustus's speech, in Dio, lvi.
   82. Ulpian, Fragment., 13, and the Leg. 44. ff. de ritu nuptiarum.
   83. Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 13 and 16.
   84. See Leg. 1, Cod. de nat. lib.
   85. Nov. 117.
   86. Leg. 37. °7, ff. de operib. libertorum, °7; Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 16, °2.
   87. Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 16, °2.
   88. See book xxvi. 13.
   89. Except in certain cases. See the Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 18, and the only law in Cod. de Caduc. tollend.
   90. Relatum de moderanda Papia Poppæa. -- Tacitus,Annals, iii. 25.
   91. He reduced them to the fourth part. -- Suetonius, Life of Nero, 10.
   92. See Pliny, Panegyric.
   93. Severus extended even to twenty-five years for the males, and to twenty for the females, the time fixed by the Papian law, as we see by comparing Ulpian, Fragment., tit. 16, with what Tertullian says, Apol., 4.
   94. P. Scipio, the censor, complains, in his speech to the people, of the abuses which were already introduced, that they received the same privileges for adopted as for natural children. -- Aulus Gellius, v. 19.
   95. See the Leg. 31, ff. de ritu nuptiarum.
   96. Augustus in the Papian law gave them the privilege of mothers. See Dio, lvi. Numa had granted them the ancient privilege of women who had three children, that is, of having no guardian. -- Plutarch, Numa.
   97. This was granted them by Claudius. -- Dio, lx.
   98. Leg. apud eum, ff. de manumissionib. °1.
   99. Dio, lvi.
100. See, in Cicero, Offices, i, his sentiments on the spirit of speculation.
101. Nazarius, in panegyrico Constantini, 321.
102. See Leg. 1, 2, 3, Cod. Theod. de bonis maternis, maternique generis, &c., and Leg. unic., Cod. Theod. de bonis quæ filiis famil. acquiruntur.
103. Sozomenus, i. 9.
104. Leg. 2, 3, Cod. Theod. de jur. liber.
105. Leg. Sancimus, Cod. de nuptiis.
106. Nov. 127, cap. iii; Nov. 118, cap. v.
107. Leg. 54 ff. de condit. et demonst.
108. Leg. 5, °4, de jure patronatus.
109. Paulus, Sentences, iii. tit. 4, °15.
110. Antiquities of Rome, ii.
111. Ibid.
112. Book ix.
113. De Leg., iii. 19.
114. De Moribus Germanorum, 19.
115. There is no title on this subject in the Digest; the title of the Code says nothing of it, any more than the Novels.
116. Mahometan countries surround it almost on every side.
117. The edict of 1666 in favour of marriages.
118. See Sir John Chardin, Travels through Persia, viii.
119. See Burnet, History of the Reformation.