Ancient Law | Page 5

on strong ground, but for such an analysis we have yet to wait.[4] He seems to have placed his hopes in the adoption of some kind of written constitution which, like the American prototype, would safeguard us from fundamental changes by the caprice of a single assembly. But this is not the place to pursue such highly debateable matters. Enough if we say that the man who wishes to serve an apprenticeship to an intelligent understanding of the political society of the present cannot do better than begin by a careful study of Maine's researches into the political society of the past.
J.H. MORGAN.
Note.--The reader who desires to study Maine in the light of modern criticism is recommended to read Sir F. Pollock's "Notes on Maine's Ancient Law" (published by John Murray at 2s. 6d., or, with the text, at 5s.). The best short study of Maine with which I am acquainted is the article by Professor Vinogradoff in the Law Quarterly Review for April 1904. The field of research covered by Maine in his various writings is so vast that it is impossible to refer the reader, except at great length, to anything like an adequate list of later books on the subjects of his investigation. In addition to the works on the Village Community mentioned in a previous footnote, I may, however, refer the beginner to Mr. Edward Jenks' little book on The History of Politics in Dent's Primers, to Professor Ashley's translation of a fragment of Fustel de Coulanges under the title of The Origin of Property in Land, and to Sir Frederick Pollock's brilliant little book, The Expansion of the Common Law. The reader is also recommended to study Mr. H.A.L. Fisher's succinct survey of the contributions of Maitland to legal history under the title of F.W. Maitland; an Appreciation (Cambridge University Press). One of the most brilliant and ingenious studies of the origins of European civilisation is to be found in the work of the great German jurist, Ihering, Die Vorgeschichte der Indo-Europder, translated into English under the title of The Early History of the Indo-European Races (Sonnenschein, 1897).
[1] The reader who desires to pursue the subject by reference to one of Maine's chief authorities is recommended to read the translation of the Institutes by Sandars.
[2] English literature on the subject is best studied in Maitland's Domesday Book and Beyond, Vinogradoff's The Growth of the Manor and Villeinage in England (with an excellent historical introduction), and Seebohm's English Village Community.
[3] Witness the characteristic sentence: "On the whole they [i.e. the studies of earlier society] suggest that the differences which, after ages of change, separate the civilised man from savage or barbarian, are not so great as the vulgar opinion would have them.... Like the savage, he is a man of party with a newspaper for a totem ... and like a savage he is apt to make of his totem his God."
[4] Something of the kind was done many years ago by Sir George Cornewall Lewis in his little book on the Use and Abuse of Political Terms. I have attempted to carry the task a step farther in an article which appeared in the form of a review of Lord Morley's "History and Politics" in the Nineteenth Century for March 1913.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Navis ornate atque armata in aquam deducitur (Prize Poem), 1842; The Birth of the Prince of Wales (Prize Poem), 1842; C?sar ad Rubiconem constitit (Prize Poem), 1842; Memoir of H.F. Hallam, 1851; Roman Law and Legal Education (Essay), 1856; Ancient Law: its Connection with the Early History of Society and its Relation to Modern Ideas, 1861; Short Essays and Reviews on the Educational Policy of the Government of India, 1866; Village Communities in the East and West (Lectures), 1871; The Early History of the Property of Married Women as collected from Roman and Hindoo Law (Lecture), 1873; The Effects of Observation of India on Modern European Thought (Lecture), 1875; Lectures on the Early History of Institutions, 1875; Village Communities, etc.; third ed. with other Lectures and Addresses, 1876; Dissertations on Early Law and Custom (selected from Lectures), 1883; Popular Government (four Essays), 1885; India [1837-1887] (in "The Reign of Queen Victoria," ed. by Thos. Humphry Ward, vol. i.), 1887; The Whewell Lectures: International Law, 1887, 1888; Ancient Law (ed. with introduction and notes by Sir Frederick Pollock), 1906; Ancient Law (Allahabad ed., with introduction by K.C. Banerji), 1912.
Contributions to: "Morning Chronicle," 1851; "Cornhill Magazine," 1871; "Quarterly Review," 1886; "Saturday Review," and "St. James's Gazette."
A brief memoir of the life of Sir Henry Maine, by Sir M.E. Grant Duff; with some of his Indian speeches and minutes, selected by Whitley Stokes, 1892.

PREFACE
The chief object of the following pages is to indicate some of the earliest ideas of mankind, as they are reflected in Ancient Law, and