POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY state ‘Men’, he tells us, ‘are governed by many factors: climate, religion, law, the precepts of government, the examples of the past, customs, manners; and from the combination of such inXuences there arises a general spirit.’ The general spirit of a particular society Wnds its expression in the laws appropriate for it; it creates ‘the spirit of the laws’, which was the title of Montesquieu’s political treatise Montesquieu believed that there were fundamental laws of justice established by God, which preceded actual human legislation in the same way as the properties of triangles preceded their codiWcation by geometers But these universal principles were not in themselves suYcient to determine the appropriate structure for particular societies It is not possible to single out a particular set of social institutions as suitable for all times and places: the government should be Wtted to the climate, the wealth, and the national character of a country Aristotle had studied a wide variety of constitutions and classiWed them into three kinds: monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy.4 Montesquieu, likewise, after his sociological inquiries, comes up with a threefold classiWcation, but his types are republican, monarchical, and despotic (With a bow to Aristotle, he divides republics into democratic and aristocratic republics (EL II.1).) Each type of state is marked by a dominant characteristic: virtue, honour, and fear, respectively Such are the principles of the three governments; which does not mean that in a certain republic people are virtuous, but that they ought to be This does not prove that in a certain monarchy people have a sense of honour, and that in particular despotic states people have a sense of fear, but that they ought to have it Without these qualities a government will be imperfect (EL III.2) In a despotic state, rule is by the decree of the ruler, backed up not by law but by religion or custom In a monarchy, government is carried on by a hierarchy of oYcials of varied rank and status In a republic, all the citizens need to be educated in civic values and trained to carry out public tasks Republics, we are told, suit cold climates and small states; despotism suits large states and hot climates A constitution suitable for Sicilians would not suit Scotsmen, since, inter alia, sea-girt islands diVer from mountainous See vol I, p 82V 294