book. <( payS your labours ; and what before might admit of fome
—i— * g excufe, from this moment becomes a crime.” She has con-
fiderably increafed the expences o f the crown in each, government
jfc without increafing the taxes ; which fhe has
been enabled to perform by introducing a more regular order
into the finances.
To thefe regulations mult be added the abolition o f torture
; the fettling, o f the proper boundaries between the fe-
veral governments, which has prevented many diflentions
and law-fuits ; the appointment o f regular phyficians and
furgeons ftationed in various diftrifts at the crown’s expence;
the foundation o f fchools for the education o f the nobility,
others for children o f perfons o f inferior rank ; the
eilabliffiment or augmentation o f new feminaries for thofe
intended for holy orders ; the erection o f new bodies corporate
with additional immunities ;, the grant o f freedom
to numberlefs vaflals o f the crown ; ' and. facilitating the
means of giving liberty to the peafants. '
Such are the outlines o f thefe excellent inftitutions. How
far, or in what degree, they may operate upon a people fo
widely difperfed, and o f fuch different manners and culloms,
can only be proved by time and experience. But though,
they may fail in producing «// thofe advantages which from
their intrinfick excellence the fpeculative reafoner might expert,
yet they mull be attended with the moil beneficial effects
; as indeed fufficiently appears from the flouriihing
flate o f thofe provinces in which they have been already
admitted.
I f it be allowed that many evils are reformed, and many
improvements have been introduced, it cannot at the fame
* T h e expences o f the go ve rnmen t o f T v e r amount to £24 ,000 p e r an n um ; and the
revenues to £ 17 5 ,0 0 0 .
6 time
time be fuppofed that the national manners ihould be fud- c^ p-
denly changed ; or that even the moll abfolute fovereign c a n u . .^
venture to lliake thofe fundamental culloms which have been
landtioned by ages, and which oppofe any violation even o f
thofe rights that infringe the common principles of. humanity.
It is.furely fufficient i f the abufes are remedied, as
much as can be expected in a country, where the vail disproportion
of rank and fortune, and the abfolute. vaflalage
o f the peafants render it extremely difficult, i f not impoffible,
to eltablilh at once an impartial and incorrupt adminiftration
o f jultice.
Ruffia, with.refpedt to the vail mafs o f its people, is nearly
in the fame Hate in which the greateft part o f Europe, was
plunged in the i ith and 12th centuries; when the feudal
fyltem was gradually declining ;. when the unbounded authority
o f the land-holders over their llaves was beginning
to be counterbalanced by the introduction of. an intermediate
order o f merchants; when new towns were continually
eredling, and endowed with increafing immunities ; and-
vyhen the crown began to give freedom to many o f its vaflals.
C H A P.