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Updated: June 20, 2025
Montesquieu's De l'esprit des lois, which may claim to be the parent work of modern social science, Voltaire's Essai sur les moeurs, and Turgot's plan of a Histoire universelle begin a new era in man's vision of the past. Montesquieu was not among the apostles of the idea of Progress. It never secured any hold upon his mind.
But Charles's proved relations with Montesquieu, and Montesquieu's known habit of frequenting the society of his lady neighbours in the convent of St.
The article itself, though no more than a fragment, has all the charms of Montesquieu's delightful style; it is serious without pedantry, graceful without levity, and is rich in observations that are precise and pointed without the vice of emphasis.
If Poe had, instead of 'Narrative of A. Gordon Pym, named his story, 'Adventures of Dirk Peters, the Half-Breed, he would have sold twice as many books. My friend is about to publish his book. 'Its name? I asked him. 'There can be little choice of names for a translation of Montesquieu's "Grandeur and Decadence of the Romans," with notes by myself, he replied.
Travelling in all the principal countries of Europe, Montesquieu's assertion is now verified, that "only great nations can have large armies," the commission met everywhere proper facilities for observation.
This was the great age of that statesmanship the code of which was written by Macchiavelli as well as by Spinosa, by Hobbes as well as by Montesquieu, for the dialogue between Sylla and Eucrates contains Montesquieu's true thought, which his connection with the Encyclopedists did not permit him to develop otherwise than as he did.
Montesquieu's great reputation led to his view of the constitution of England being widely accepted as the true one; as such it was adopted by the American leaders after the War of Independence; and its influence is plainly visible in the present constitution of the United States. Such is the strange power of good writing over the affairs of men!
But in times past if not also in those present, "Letters" have been used specially perhaps in that century of letters, the eighteenth for purposes of definite instruction, argument, propaganda and so forth. There are obvious advantages in the form for certain of the lighter of these purposes as it is used in Montesquieu's Lettres Persanes or Goldsmith's Citizen of the World.
In America the principle of the division of powers has been carried farther than it ever was in England; and is, of all parts of their form of government, that from which many intelligent Americans would be most loath to part. We have seen enough of Montesquieu's attacks on the church. The most violent of them were made in his youth, and in a book avowedly satirical.
He knew his market and sold the "Montesquieu's" cargo for just five hundred thousand dollars. When yellow fever came like a blight to the city, and the grass grew in the streets, Girard gave bountifully to relieve the distress of the people. But a panic of fear was upon them. They forgot how to live and began to pray. Preachers proclaimed that the Day of Judgment was at hand.
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