According to the just exposition given by the au thor himselt, the true tendency of such a work is not to lessen the power of the law, but to increase its influence, inasmuch as opinion has a greater com mand over the minds of men than force. It has fre quently been repeated, indeed, that national manners must precede laws ; and, in the only allowable sense of that maxim, the same might be said, perhaps, with equal truth, of opinions. But the authority of this dictum, and the extent to which it may be fol lowed, are not unfrequently mistaken. An import ant distinction is apt to be overlooked, between those general laws, which, as they are founded in perma nent principles of our nature, admit of being drawn from the first springs, but which have been disturbed by ignorance, or a barbarous policy, or the tem porary dominion of some prevailing passion—and those or secondary arrangements, which the circumstances and stages of political society may equally render necessary in times of knowledge, and tranquillity, and civilization. It is to the latter class only that the maxim referred to can have any just application. But it may well be questioned, whe ther, in any case whatever, the popular feeling and opinion should be allowed to precede, by any con siderable interval, the act of the' legislature. It seems, on the contrary, to be a valuable secret in legislation, and one of its most important ends, to seize the proper moment for accomplishing that union. Above all, it is expedient, in those branches of the law, which are interwoven with, and derive their support from, the moral feelings, that a legislator should seek to anticipate every better tendency of public sentiment. Through want of a well-timed in terference in such cases, many advantages are relin quished, as well in the concoction and frame of the laws themselves, as in that silent influence, which a well directed systetia of jurisprudence carries into the opinions and habits of a community.
Of the prospects which Beccaria himself enter tained as to the probable influence of his work, a judgment may be formed from the sentence of Lord Bacon, which he prefixed to some of the editions. " It is not to be expected in any difficult un dertaking, of whatever kind, that the same person who sows the seed should also reap the harvest ; but there must, of necessity, be a preparation, and gra dual progress to maturity." The book was received in foreign countries with avidity, and procured for its author an immediate and high reputation. " Never," says a writer in the Biographic Universelle, ." did so small a book pro slice so great an effect." The medal given by the Academy of Bern was instantly bestowed upon Bec eerie ; and the Empress Catherine II. invited him to St Petersburgh, with the offer of an honourable sta tion at her court ; a proposal which was partly the means of procurinn. him a similar distinction at home. Of the reception which the work obtained in France, particularly among the literary societies of Paris, evidence is afforded by the correspondence of the Baron de Grimm. " This book," he writes in a let ter, dated 1st August 1765, is by M. Beccaria, a Mi lanese gentleman, who is said by some to be an Abbe, by others a lawyer, but who, I answer for it, is one of the best heads at this moment in Europe." " You will not find in the Milanese philosopher," he else where observes, " either the pitch or compass of genius which characterize the writings of the Presi dent Montesquieu ; but you will discover a mind that is luminous, profound, correct, and penetrat ing." And he justly adds, that his is one of the few precious books qui font penser. It was translated into French by the Abbe Morellet in 1766 ; and Voltaire, soon after, published a commentary upon it, under the assumed title of un Avocat de Besancon. With respect to the former production, the translator took some liberties with the method and distribution of the work, which were not altogether warrantable. Voltaire's commentary is writteh in the light style peculiar to him ; and was, evidently, intended as a vehicle for certain opinions of his own, with which the spirit and object of the original publication are entirely unconnected. But the circumstance itself sufficiently marks the impression which that publica- • tion had made, and the prominence of the views which it developed. It was rapidly translated into various other languages ; its maxims became a spe cies of current coin through a great part of Europe; and the sanction of the author's reasoning was thought not unworthy of being resorted to in British tribunals.
Although followed by many others, Beccaria's was the first work of note, in which the application of a milder and more 'sound system of penal juris prudence was explicitly enforced. Nor would it be at all extravagant to refer some of the great im provements, which, from this era, were successively introduced into the written laws of different European monarchies, to the direct influence of the opinions thus generally diffused. Many such enactments, at leak, were, from this tinge, promulgated in a tone more consonant than heretofore with the dictates of humanity and equitable rule. Of.this description were, among others, not only the urbarium, or regu lations concerning issued in 1764, by the Empress Maria Teresa, but also the more extended designs which took effect, at a somewhat later period, in the various reformed codes, published by the Em press Catherine, the Emperor Joseph II., the Grand
Duke of Tuscany, and the Danish Government under the administration of the late Count Berns torf.
At one period, a storm seemed to be preparing against the Marquis in his own country, by those who probably intended, in this form, a service to the government : but it was soon dispersed by the au thority of the government itself. Beccaria had con sidered it his duty to communicate to Count Fir miani the offers which had been made to him by the Empress Catherine ; and the intelligence was trans- • mitted by the viceroy to his own court. The con duct of Prince Kaunitz-Ritsberg, on the occasion, is highly honourable to that minister, and to his so vereign. Instead of treating the communication as a matter of no account, he makes it the subject of a long dispatch, and of repeated instructions. In one of these papers, dated 27th April 1767, after requir ing particular information respecting the personal character of Beccaria, he adds, " Supposing his good qualities to preponderate, it would be desirable that the country should not lose a man whose fund of knowledge is so considerable, and who, as appears from his book, possesses a mind habituated to re flection, above all, . in our present penury of think ing and philosophical men ; besides that it would do little honour to the whole administration, to be anticipated by foreigners in the due estimation of talents."• Nor were these merely empty profes sions ; but were almost immediately followed by an imperial order, for establishing, in the Palatine Col lege at Milan, a Professorship of Public Law and Economics, under the title of Scienze Camerali. To this chair, expressly endowed for him, by a distinc tion so honourable, the Marquis was appointed on the 1st of November 1768, and comdtnced the duties of it in the month of January following. From the preliminary discourse (prolusione) which he pronounced on this occasion, and in which he brief ly sets forth the objects of the institution, and some of his own leading opinions regarding them, it ap pears that the only instructions which he received from the regency, on his appointment, consisted in an order to deliver his discourses in the vulgar tongue ; an injunction of which the motives are so honourable to that government, in common with all the circumstances attending this transaction. His lectures, which he received a special permission to deliver in his own house, attracted much notice. They were not published during his life ; but have since appeared, under the title of Elementi di Econo mia Pubblica, in the compilation of the. Scrittori Classici Italiani di Economia Politica, printed at Milan. 1 As he had, in his former work, set out with stat ing the object of municipal law to be " the greatest happiness of the greatest number," so here the same universal principle serves him for a guide ; and he assumes it as the aim of public economy " to pro vide, with peace and safety, things necessary and convenient for the whole community." He classes the objects of Political Economy under five heads ; Agriculture, Manufactures, Commerce, Finance, and Policy ; comprehending, under the latter, those laws and institutions which have a respect to the Sciences, to Education, to Police, in the modern sense of that word, and to the various means of Public Defence and Security. The design was not completed; no trace, at least, appears in the work published under the above title, relative to the subjects of Finance or Public Policy.$ In estimating the value of these speculations, it is no less necessary, than in the case of the former work, to consider them with a refer ence to the state of science at the time, rather than to the present extension of knowledge in this de partment. Under the first three divisions, he enters at considerable length into some of the most inte resting discussions which have arisen in this wide field ; particularly as to the principles of public policy in regard to Agriculture, to the Commerce of Grain and Foreign Commerce generally, and to Money and Exchange.5 In perspicuity of lan guage, and distinct and patient illustration, the style of these discourses bears a considerable resem blance to that of the Wealth of Nations; but the coincidence between the two works, in some gene ral and fundamental doctrines, is still more remark able and interesting. Beccaria does not appear to have adopted the particular theory of the French Economists, which was developed about that time; although his practical doctrines on some of - the most important points were conformable to the con clusions afforded by that system. 11 Among other inferences, to which the course of his reasoning leads him, as it were by many differ ent roads, may be noticed one, which he has him self ventured to state as a general proposition ; and which marks the caution as well as enlargement of his mind, in subjects of complicated inquiry. " Every restriction on freedom," he observes, " whether in the case of Commerce, or any other, ought to be a re sult from the necessity of preventing an actual dis order, not the effect of a purpose or aim at amelio ration." And he has repeated the same doctrine under different views, in various other passages.