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CHAP. IV.: Of the Genius of the Nation in regard to the Mayors. - Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, Complete Works, vol. 2 The Spirit of Laws [1748]

Edition used:

The Complete Works of M. de Montesquieu (London: T. Evans, 1777), 4 vols. Vol. 2.

Part of: Complete Works of Montesquieu, 4 vols.

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CHAP. IV.

Of the Genius of the Nation in regard to the Mayors.

A GOVERNMENT, in which a nation that had an hereditary king, chose a person to exercise the regal authority, seems very extraordinary: but independently of the circumstances of the times, I apprehend that the notions of the Franks in regard to this article were derived from a higher source.

The Franks were descended from the Germans, of whom Tacitus says, that in the choice of their king they were determined by his noble extraction; and in that of their leader, by his valour. This gives us an idea of the kings of the first race, and of the mayors of the palace; the former were hereditary, the latter elective.

No doubt, but those princes, who stood up in the national assembly, and offered themselves as the conductors of a public enterprize to such as were willing to follow them, united, generally in their own person, both the power of the mayor, and the king’s authority. By the splendour of their descent they had attained the regal dignity; and their military abilities having recommended them to the command of armies, they rose to the power of mayor. By the regal dignity our first kings presided in the courts and assemblies, and enacted laws with the national consent; by the dignity of duke or leader, they undertook expeditions, and commanded the armies.

In order to be acquainted with the genius of the primitive Franks in this respect, we have only to cast an eye on the conduct of Argobastes, a Frank by nation, on whom Valentinian had conferred the command of the army. He confined the emperor to his own palace; where he would suffer nobody to speak to him concerning either civil or military affrirs. Argobastes did at that time what was afterwards practised by the Pepins.

[]Reges ex nobilitate, duces, ex virtute sumunt. De moribus Germanorum.

[]See Sulpicius Alexander in Gregory of Tours, book 2.