For this reason education has a less difficult task in a monarchy than in a republic: it need only heighten our ambitions and our sense of our own worth, provide us with an ideal of honor worth aspiring to, and cultivate in us the politeness needed to live with others whose sense of their worth matches our own.
The chief task of the laws in a monarchy is to protect the subordinate institutions that distinguish monarchy from despotism. To this end, they should make it easy to preserve large estates undivided, protect the rights and privileges of the nobility, and promote the rule of law. They should also encourage the proliferation of distinctions and of rewards for honorable conduct, including luxuries.
A monarchy is corrupted when the monarch either destroys the subordinate institutions that constrain his will, or decides to rule arbitrarily, without regard to the basic laws of his country, or debases the honors at which his citizens might aim, so that "men are capable of being loaded at the very same time with infamy and with dignities" SL 8. The first two forms of corruption destroy the checks on the sovereign's will that separate monarchy from despotism; the third severs the connection between honorable conduct and its proper rewards.
In a functioning monarchy, personal ambition and a sense of honor work together. This is monarchy's great strength and the source of its extraordinary stability: whether its citizens act from genuine virtue, a sense of their own worth, a desire to serve their king, or personal ambition, they will be led to act in ways that serve their country. A monarch who rules arbitrarily, or who rewards servility and ignoble conduct instead of genuine honor, severs this connection and corrupts his government.
In despotic states "a single person directs everything by his own will and caprice" SL 2. Without laws to check him, and with no need to attend to anyone who does not agree with him, a despot can do whatever he likes, however ill-advised or reprehensible.
His subjects are no better than slaves, and he can dispose of them as he sees fit. The principle of despotism is fear. This fear is easily maintained, since the situation of a despot's subjects is genuinely terrifying. Education is unnecessary in a despotism; if it exists at all, it should be designed to debase the mind and break the spirit.
Such ideas as honor and virtue should not occur to a despot's subjects, since "persons capable of setting a value on themselves would be likely to create disturbances. Fear must therefore depress their spirits, and extinguish even the least sense of ambition" SL 3.
Their "portion here, like that of beasts, is instinct, compliance, and punishment" SL 3. Montesquieu writes that "the principle of despotic government is subject to a continual corruption, because it is even in its nature corrupt" SL 8. This is true in several senses. First, despotic governments undermine themselves. Because property is not secure in a despotic state, commerce will not flourish, and the state will be poor. The people must be kept in a state of fear by the threat of punishment; however, over time the punishments needed to keep them in line will tend to become more and more severe, until further threats lose their force.
Most importantly, however, the despot's character is likely to prevent him from ruling effectively. Since a despot's every whim is granted, he "has no occasion to deliberate, to doubt, to reason; he has only to will" SL 4. For this reason he is never forced to develop anything like intelligence, character, or resolution. Instead, he is "naturally lazy, voluptuous, and ignorant" SL 2. He will therefore choose a vizier to govern for him, and retire to his seraglio to pursue pleasure.
In his absence, however, intrigues against him will multiply, especially since his rule is necessarily odious to his subjects, and since they have so little to lose if their plots against him fail.
He cannot rely on his army to protect him, since the more power they have, the greater the likelihood that his generals will themselves try to seize power. For this reason the ruler in a despotic state has no more security than his people. Second, monarchical and republican governments involve specific governmental structures, and require that their citizens have specific sorts of motivation.
When these structures crumble, or these motivations fail, monarchical and republican governments are corrupted, and the result of their corruption is that they fall into despotism. But when a particular despotic government falls, it is not generally replaced by a monarchy or a republic. The creation of a stable monarchy or republic is extremely difficult: "a masterpiece of legislation, rarely produced by hazard, and seldom attained by prudence" SL 5.
It is particularly difficult when those who would have both to frame the laws of such a government and to live by them have previously been brutalized and degraded by despotism. Producing a despotic government, by contrast, is relatively straightforward. A despotism requires no powers to be carefully balanced against one another, no institutions to be created and maintained in existence, no complicated motivations to be fostered, and no restraints on power to be kept in place. One need only terrify one's fellow citizens enough to allow one to impose one's will on them; and this, Montesquieu claims, "is what every capacity may reach" SL 5.
For these reasons despotism necessarily stands in a different relation to corruption than other forms of government: while they are liable to corruption, despotism is its embodiment.
Montesquieu is among the greatest philosophers of liberalism, but his is what Shklar has called "a liberalism of fear" Shklar, Montesquieu , p. According to Montesquieu, political liberty is "a tranquillity of mind arising from the opinion each person has of his safety" SL Liberty is not the freedom to do whatever we want: if we have the freedom to harm others, for instance, others will also have the freedom to harm us, and we will have no confidence in our own safety.
Liberty involves living under laws that protect us from harm while leaving us free to do as much as possible, and that enable us to feel the greatest possible confidence that if we obey those laws, the power of the state will not be directed against us. If it is to provide its citizens with the greatest possible liberty, a government must have certain features. First, since "constant experience shows us that every man invested with power is apt to abuse it This is achieved through the separation of the executive, legislative, and judicial powers of government.
If different persons or bodies exercise these powers, then each can check the others if they try to abuse their powers. But if one person or body holds several or all of these powers, then nothing prevents that person or body from acting tyrannically; and the people will have no confidence in their own security.
Certain arrangements make it easier for the three powers to check one another. Montesquieu argues that the legislative power alone should have the power to tax, since it can then deprive the executive of funding if the latter attempts to impose its will arbitrarily.
Likewise, the executive power should have the right to veto acts of the legislature, and the legislature should be composed of two houses, each of which can prevent acts of the other from becoming law.
The judiciary should be independent of both the legislature and the executive, and should restrict itself to applying the laws to particular cases in a fixed and consistent manner, so that "the judicial power, so terrible to mankind, … becomes, as it were, invisible", and people "fear the office, but not the magistrate" SL Liberty also requires that the laws concern only threats to public order and security, since such laws will protect us from harm while leaving us free to do as many other things as possible.
Thus, for instance, the laws should not concern offenses against God, since He does not require their protection. They should not prohibit what they do not need to prohibit: "all punishment which is not derived from necessity is tyrannical. The law is not a mere act of power; things in their own nature indifferent are not within its province" SL The laws should be constructed to make it as easy as possible for citizens to protect themselves from punishment by not committing crimes.
They should not be vague, since if they were, we might never be sure whether or not some particular action was a crime. Nor should they prohibit things we might do inadvertently, like bumping into a statue of the emperor, or involuntarily, like doubting the wisdom of one of his decrees; if such actions were crimes, no amount of effort to abide by the laws of our country would justify confidence that we would succeed, and therefore we could never feel safe from criminal prosecution.
Finally, the laws should make it as easy as possible for an innocent person to prove his or her innocence. They should concern outward conduct, not for instance our thoughts and dreams, since while we can try to prove that we did not perform some action, we cannot prove that we never had some thought.
The laws should not criminalize conduct that is inherently hard to prove, like witchcraft; and lawmakers should be cautious when dealing with crimes like sodomy, which are typically not carried out in the presence of several witnesses, lest they "open a very wide door to calumny" SL Montesquieu's emphasis on the connection between liberty and the details of the criminal law were unusual among his contemporaries, and inspired such later legal reformers as Cesare Beccaria.
Montequieu believes that climate and geography affect the temperaments and customs of a country's inhabitants.
He is not a determinist, and does not believe that these influences are irresistible. Nonetheless, he believes that the laws should take these effects into account, accommodating them when necessary, and counteracting their worst effects. According to Montesquieu, a cold climate constricts our bodies' fibers, and causes coarser juices to flow through them.
Heat, by contrast, expands our fibers, and produces more rarefied juices. These physiological changes affect our characters. Those who live in cold climates are vigorous and bold, phlegmatic, frank, and not given to suspicion or cunning.
They are relatively insensitive to pleasure and pain; Montesquieu writes that "you must flay a Muscovite alive to make him feel" SL Those who live in warm climates have stronger but less durable sensations.
They are more fearful, more amorous, and more susceptible both to the temptations of pleasure and to real or imagined pain; but they are less resolute, and less capable of sustained or decisive action. The manners of those who live in temperate climates are "inconstant", since "the climate has not a quality determinate enough to fix them" SL These differences are not hereditary: if one moves from one sort of climate to another, one's temperament will alter accordingly. A hot climate can make slavery comprehensible.
Montesquieu writes that "the state of slavery is in its own nature bad" SL However, on his view, there are two types of country in which slavery, while not acceptable, is less bad than it might otherwise be. In despotic countries, the situation of slaves is not that different from the situation of the despot's other subjects; for this reason, slavery in a despotic country is "more tolerable" SL In unusually hot countries, it might be that "the excess of heat enervates the body, and renders men so slothful and dispirited that nothing but the fear of chastisement can oblige them to perform any laborious duty: slavery is there more reconcilable to reason" SL However, Montesquieu writes that when work can be done by freemen motivated by the hope of gain rather than by slaves motivated by fear, the former will always work better; and that in such climates slavery is not only wrong but imprudent.
He hopes that "there is not that climate upon earth where the most laborious services might not with proper encouragement be performed by freemen" SL The quality of a country's soil also affects the form of its government. Monarchies are more common where the soil is fertile, and republics where it is barren. This is so for three reasons. First, those who live in fruitful countries are more apt to be content with their situation, and to value in a government not the liberty it bestows but its ability to provide them with enough security that they can get on with their farming.
They are therefore more willing to accept a monarchy if it can provide such security. Often it can, since monarchies can respond to threats more quickly than republics. Second, fertile countries are both more desirable than barren countries and easier to conquer: they "are always of a level surface, where the inhabitants are unable to dispute against a stronger power; they are then obliged to submit; and when they have once submitted, the spirit of liberty cannot return; the wealth of the country is a pledge of their fidelity" SL Montesquieu believes that monarchies are much more likely than republics to wage wars of conquest, and therefore that a conquering power is likely to be a monarchy.
Third, those who live where the soil is barren have to work hard in order to survive; this tends to make them "industrious, sober, inured to hardship, courageous, and fit for war" SL Those who inhabit fertile country, by contrast, favor "ease, effeminacy, and a certain fondness for the preservation of life" SL For this reason, the inhabitants of barren countries are better able to defend themselves from such attacks as might occur, and to defend their liberty against those who would destroy it.
These facts give barren countries advantages that compensate for the infertility of their soil. Since they are less likely to be invaded, they are less likely to be sacked and devastated; and they are more likely to be worked well, since "countries are not cultivated in proportion to their fertility, but to their liberty" SL This is why "the best provinces are most frequently depopulated, while the frightful countries of the North continue always inhabited, from their being almost uninhabitable" SL Montesquieu believes that the climate and geography of Asia explain why despotism flourishes there.
Asia, he thinks, has two features that distinguish it from Europe. First, Asia has virtually no temperate zone. While the mountains of Scandinavia shelter Europe from arctic winds, Asia has no such buffer; for this reason its frigid northern zone extends much further south than in Europe, and there is a relatively quick transition from it to the tropical south.
Although he had fathered two daughters and a son with his wife, he had been devoted to his work. He was regarded as genial and generous, and had a wide and international circle of admirers, from Scottish philosopher David Hume to Hegel to future American president James Madison. But Montesquieu's democratic outlook was still in part a reflection of his time. He believed women were supposedly unfit as heads of the home while fit to govern as written in The Spirit of Laws : "It is against reason and against nature for women to be mistresses in the house In the first case, their weak state does not permit them to be preeminent; in the second, their very weakness gives them more gentleness and moderation, which, rather than the harsh and ferocious virtues, can make for a good environment.
We strive for accuracy and fairness. If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us! Subscribe to the Biography newsletter to receive stories about the people who shaped our world and the stories that shaped their lives. Charles II was the monarch of England, Scotland and Ireland during much of the latter half of the 17th century, marking the Restoration era.
He was married to Marie Antoinette and was executed for treason by guillotine in He was among the most influential thinkers of the French Enlightenment. He criticized French society and especially the excesses of absolutism. His main political thesis is that despotism can only be avoided by the presence of a strong nobility, which should secure the implementation of a system of law and should act as an intermediary between the monarch and the people.
In he published his highly influential novel in letters Lettres persanes, which contains a sharp critique of French society presented through the fictional letters of a Persian notable.
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