APPENDIX I.
THE ANGLO-SAXON GOVERNMENT AND MANNERS.
The government of the Germans, and that of all the northern nations who
established themselves on the ruins of Rome, was always extremely free;
and those fierce people, accustomed to independence and inured to arms,
were more guided by persuasion than authority in the submission which
they paid to their princes. The military despotism which had taken place
in the Roman empire, and which, previously to the irruption of those
conquerors, had sunk the genius of men, and destroyed every noble
principle of science and virtue, was unable to resist the vigorous
efforts of a free people; and Europe, as from a new epoch, rekindled her
ancient spirit, and shook off the base servitude to arbitrary will and
authority under which she had so long labored. The free constitutions
then established, however impaired by the encroachments of succeeding
princes, still preserve an air of independence and legal administration,
which distinguished the European nations; and if that part of the globe
maintain sentiments of liberty, honor, equity, and valor superior to the
rest of mankind, it owes these advantages chiefly to the seeds implanted
by those generous barbarians.
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