128
THE SAXONS IN ENGLAND.
[book I
ness of men : the attempt to take forcible possession
of, or to defend, accumulated property, presupposes
the accumulation. While the land and water are
more than sufficient for the support of the popula-
tion, the institutions proper to peace will prevail.
It is inconceivable, and repugnant to the very
nature of man, that such institutions should not be
established the moment that two or more separate
families become conscious of each other’s existence1:
and in respect to our Germanic forefathers, we find
such in full vigour from their very first appearance
in history.
Some of the institutions essential to the great
aim of establishing civil society at the least possible
sacrifice of individual freedom—such as the Wer-
gild, the Frank pledge, etc.—will be investigated in
their proper places: they seem to offer a nearly
perfect guarantee for society at an early period.
But for the present we must confine ourselves to
the subject of personal rank : and as the centre and
groundwork of the whole Teutonic scheme is the
individual freeman, it is with him that we must
commence our investigation.
The natural divisions into which all human society
must be distributed, with respect to the beings
that form it, are the Free and the Unfree2, those
1 The only place where I can admit of such solitary settlements is
Scandinavia, and even there they must have formed the exception,
not the rule. See Chap. II. p. 68.
2 “ Summa itaque divisio personarum hæc est, quod omnes homines
aut Iiberi sunt aut servi.” Fleta, bk. i. cap. 1. “ Est autem Iibertas,
naturalis facultas ejus, quod cuique facere libet, nisi quod de jure aut
vi prohibetur.” Ibid. cap. 2.
CH. V.]
THE FREEMAN. THE NOBLE.
129
who can protect themselves and those who must
be in the protection of others. Even in the family
this distinction must be found, and the wife and
son are unfree in relation to the husband and
the father; they are in his mund. From this mund
the son indeed may be emancipated, but not the
wife or daughter : these can only change it ; the
wife by the act of God, namely the death of the
husband ; the daughter by marriage. In both cases
the mund passes over into other hands1.
Originally the Freeman is he who possesses at
least as much land as, being tilled, will feed him,
strength and skill to labour, and arms to defend
his possession. Married to one free woman who
shares his toils, soothes his cares, and orders his
household, he becomes the founder of the family
—the first unit in the state : the son who springs
from this marriage, completes the family, and
centres in himself the blood, the civil rights and
the affections of his two progenitors. It is thus,
through the son, that the family becomes the foun-
dation of the state2.
The union of a greater or less number of free
heads of houses upon a district sufficient for their
support, in a mutual guarantee of equal civil rights,
is the state itself : for man is evidently formed by
God to live in a regulated community, by which
mode of life alone he can develcpe the highest
' See Fleta, bk. i. cap. 5, 6, 7, 9.
ɪt is probably in this sense that the Hindu Institutes assert,
men onlj is a man perfect when he consists of three persons united,
ɪs wife, himself, and his son.” Manu, ch. ix. 45.
OL. I. κ