[1089] It has always been surmised that Bodin, though not a Jew by nativity, was such by conviction. This is strongly confirmed by his Republic, wherein he quotes the Old Testament continually, and with great deference, but seldom or never the New. Several passages might be alleged in proof, but I have not noted them all down. In one place, lib. i. c. 6, he says, Paulus, Christianorum sæculi sui facile princeps, which is at least a singular mode of expression. In another he mentions the test of true religion so as to exclude all but the Mosaic. An unpublished work of Bodin, called the Heptaplomeres, is said to exist in many manuscripts, both in France and Germany; in which, after debating different religions in a series of dialogues, he gives the advantage to Deism or Judaism, for those who have seen it seem not to have determined which. No one has thought it worth while to print this production. Jugler, Hist. Literaria, p. 1740. Biogr. Univ. Niceron, xvii. 264.
Domestic servitude. 47. The patriarchal government includes the relation of master to servant, and leads to the question whether slavery should be admitted into a well-constituted commonwealth. Bodin, discussing this with many arguments on both sides, seems to think that the Jewish law, with its limitations as to time of servitude, ought to prevail, since the divine rules were not laid down for the boundaries of Palestine, but being so wise, so salutary, and of such authority, ought to be preferred above the constitutions of men. Slavery, therefore, is not to be permanently established; but where it already exists, it will be expedient that emancipations should be gradual.[1090]
[1090] A posthumous work of Bodin, published in 1596, Universæ Naturæ Theatrum, has been called by some a disguised Pantheism. This did not appear, from what I have read of it, to be the case.
Origin of commonwealths. 48. These last are the rights of persons in a state of nature, to be regulated, but not created by the law. “Before there was either city or citizen, or any form of a commonwealth amongst men (I make use in this place of Knolles’s very good translation), every master of a family was master in his own house, having power of life and death over his wife and children; but, after that force, violence, ambition, covetousness, and desire of revenge had armed one against another, the issues of wars and combats giving victory unto the one side, made the other to become unto them slaves; and amongst them that overcame he that was chosen chief and captain, under whose conduct and leading they had obtained the victory, kept them also in his power and command as his faithful and obedient servants, and the other as his slaves. Then that full and entire liberty by nature, given to every man to live as himself best pleased, was altogether taken from the vanquished, and in the vanquishers themselves in some measure also diminished in regard of the conqueror; for that now it concerned every man in private to yield his obedience unto his chief sovereign; and he that would not abate anything of his liberty, to live under the laws and commandments of another, lost all. So the words of lord and servant, of prince and subject, before unknown to the world, were first brought into use. Yea reason, and the very light of nature leadeth us to believe very force and violence to have given cause and beginning unto commonwealths.”[1091]
[1091] c. 6.
Privileges of citizens. 49. Thus, then, the patriarchal simplicity of government was overthrown by conquest, of which Nimrod seems to have been the earliest instance; and now fathers of families, once sovereign, are become citizens. A citizen is a free man under the supreme government of another.[1092] Those who enjoy more privileges than others are not citizens more than they. “It is the acknowledgment of the sovereign by his free subject, and the protection of the sovereign towards him that makes the citizen.” This is one of the fundamental principles, it may be observed by us in passing, which distinguish a monarchical from a republican spirit in constitutional jurisprudence. Wherever mere subjection, or even mere nativity, are held to give a claim to citizenship, there is an abandonment of the republican principle. This, always reposing on a real or imaginary contract, distinguishes the nation, the successors of the first community, from alien settlers, and, above all, from those who are evidently of a different race. Length of time must, of course, ingraft many of foreign origin upon the native tree; but to throw open civil privileges at random to new-comers is to convert a people into a casual aggregation of men. In a monarchy the hereditary principle maintains an unity of the commonwealth; which, though not entirely without danger, may better permit an equality of privileges among all its subjects. Thus under Caracalla, but in a period in which we should not look for good precedents, the great name, as once it had been, of Roman citizen was extended, east and west, to all the provinces of the empire.
[1092] Est civis nihil aliud quam liber homo, qui summa alterius potestate obligatur.
Nature of sovereign power. 50. Bodin comes next to the relation between patron and client, and to those alliances among states which bear an analogy to it. But he is careful to distinguish patronage or protection from vassalage. Even in unequal alliances, the inferior is still sovereign; and, if this be not reserved, the alliance must become subjection.[1093] Sovereignty, of which he treats in the following chapter, he defines a supreme and perpetual power, absolute and subject to no law.[1094] A limited prince, except so far as the limitation is confined to the laws of nature, is not sovereign. A sovereign cannot bind his successor, nor can he be bound by his own laws, unless confirmed by oath; for we must not confound the laws and contracts of princes, the former depend upon his will, but the latter oblige his conscience. It is convenient to call parliaments or meetings of states-general for advice and consent, but the king is not bound by them; the contrary notion has done much harm. Even in England, where laws made in parliament cannot be repealed without its consent, the king, as he conceives, does not hesitate to dispose of them at his pleasure.[1095] And though no taxes are imposed in England without consent of parliament, this is the case also in other countries, if necessity does not prevent the meeting of the states. He concludes, that the English parliament may have a certain authority, but that the sovereignty and legislative power is solely in the king. Whoever legislates is sovereign, for this power includes all other. Whether a vassal or tributary prince is to be called sovereign, is a question that leads Bodin into a great quantity of feudal law and history; he determines it according to his own theory.[1096]
[1093] c. 7.
[1094] Majestas est summa in cives ac subditos legibusque soluta postestas.