Section 3
Original German
3 Das Recht ist positiv überhaupt a) durch die Form, in einem Staate Gültigkeit zu haben, und diese gesetzliche Autorität ist das Princip für die Kenntniß desselben, die positive Rechtswissenschaft. b) Dem Inhalte nach erhält dieß Recht ein positives Element α) durch den besondern Nationalcharakter eines Volkes, die Stufe seiner geschichtlichen Entwickelung und den Zusammenhang aller der Verhältnisse, die der Naturnothwendigkeit angehören, β) durch die Nothwendigkeit, daß ein System eines gesetzlichen Rechts die Anwendung des allgemeinen Begriffes auf die besondere von Außen sich gebende Beschaffenheit der Gegenstände und Fälle enthalten muß, — eine Anwendung, die nicht mehr speculatives Denken und Entwickelung des Begriffes, sondern Subsumtion des Verstandes ist; γ) durch die für die Entscheidung in der Wirklichkeit erforderlichen letzten Bestimmungen.
Wenn dem positiven Rechte und den Gesetzen das Gefühl des Herzens, Neigung und Willkühr entgegengesetzt wird, so kann es wenigstens nicht die Philosophie seyn, welche solche Autoritäten anerkennt. — Daß Gewalt und Tyranney ein Element des positiven Rechts seyn kann, ist demselben zufällig und geht seine Natur nicht an. Es wird späterhin §. 211 — 214. die Stelle aufgezeigt werden, wo das Recht positiv werden muß. Hier sind die daselbst sich ergeben werdenden Bestimmungen nur angeführt worden, um die Grenze des philosophischen Rechts zu bezeichnen, und um sogleich die etwaige Vorstellung oder gar Forderung zu beseitigen, als ob durch dessen systematische Entwicklung ein positives Gesetzbuch, d. i. ein solches, wie der wirkliche Staat eines bedarf, herauskommen solle. — Daß das Naturrecht oder das philosophische Recht vom positiven verschieden ist, dieß darein zu verkehren, daß sie einander entgegengesetzt und widerstreitend sind, wäre ein großes Mißverständniß; jenes ist zu diesem vielmehr im Verhältniß von Institutionen zu Pandecten. — In Ansehung des im §. zuerst genannten geschichtlichen Elements im positiven Rechte hat Montesquieu die wahrhafte historische Ansicht, den ächt philosophischen Standpunct, angegeben, die Gesetzgebung überhaupt und ihre besondern Bestimmungen nicht isolirt und abstract zu betrachten, sondern vielmehr als abhängiges Moment Einer Totalität, im Zusammenhange mit allen übrigen Bestimmungen, welche den Character einer Nation und einer Zeit ausmachen; in diesem Zusammenhange erhalten sie ihre wahrhafte Bedeutung, so wie damit ihre Rechtfertigung. — Das in der Zeit erscheinende Hervortreten und Entwickeln von Rechtsbestimmungen zu betrachten, — diese rein geschichtliche Bemühung, so wie die Erkenntniß ihrer verständigen Consequenz, die aus der Vergleichung derselben mit bereits vorhandenen Rechtsverhältnissen hervorgeht, hat in ihrer eigenen Sphäre ihr Verdienst und ihre Würdigung und steht außer dem Verhältniß mit der philosophischen Betrachtung, insofern nehmlich die Entwicklung aus historischen Gründen sich nicht selbst verwechselt mit der Entwicklung aus dem Begriffe, und die geschichtliche Erklärung und Rechtfertigung nicht zur Bedeutung einer an und für sich gültigen Rechtfertigung ausgedehnt wird. Dieser Unterschied, der sehr wichtig und wohl festzuhalten ist, ist zugleich sehr einleuchtend; eine Rechtsbestimmung kann sich aus den Umständen und vorhandenen Rechts-Institutionen als vollkommen gegründet und consequent zeigen lassen und doch an und für sich unrechtlich und unvernünftig seyn, wie eine Menge der Bestimmungen des römischen Privatrechts, die aus solchen Institutionen, als die römische väterliche Gewalt, der römische Ehestand, ganz consequent flossen. Es seyen aber auch die Rechtsbestimmungen rechtlich und vernünftig, so ist es etwas ganz anderes, dieß von ihnen aufzuzeigen, was allein durch den Begriff wahrhaftig geschehen kann, und ein anderes, das Geschichtliche ihres Hervortretens darzustellen, die Umstände, Fälle, Bedürfnisse und Begebenheiten, welche ihre Feststellung herbeygeführt haben. Ein solches Aufzeigen und (pragmatisches) Erkennen aus den nähern oder entferntern geschichtlichen Ursachen heißt man häufig: Erklären oder noch lieber Begreifen, in der Meynung, als ob durch dieses Aufzeigen des Geschichtlichen alles oder vielmehr das Wesentliche, worauf es allein ankomme, geschehe, um das Gesetz oder Rechts-Institution zu begreifen; während vielmehr das wahrhaft Wesentliche, der Begriff der Sache, dabey gar nicht zur Sprache gekommen ist. — Man pflegt so auch von den römischen, germanischen Rechtsbegriffen, von Rechtsbegriffen, wie sie in diesem oder jenem Gesetzbuche bestimmt seyen, zu sprechen, während dabey nichts von Begriffen, sondern allein allgemeine Rechtsbestimmungen, Verstandessätze, Grundsätze, Gesetze und dergl. vorkommen. — Durch Hintansetzung jenes Unterschiedes gelingt es, den Standpunct zu verrücken und die Frage nach der wahrhaften Rechtfertigung in eine Rechtfertigung aus Umständen, Consequenz aus Voraussetzungen, die für sich etwa eben so wenig taugen u. s. f. hinüber zu spielen und überhaupt das Relative an die Stelle des Absoluten, die äußerliche Erscheinung an die Stelle der Natur der Sache zu setzen. Es geschieht der geschichtlichen Rechtfertigung, wenn sie das äußerliche Entstehen mit dem Entstehen aus dem Begriffe verwechselt, daß sie dann bewußtlos das Gegentheil dessen thut, was sie beabsichtigt. Wenn das Entstehen einer Institution unter ihren bestimmten Umständen sich vollkommen zweckmäßig und nothwendig erweißt und hiemit das geleistet ist, was der historische Standpunkt erfodert, so folgt, wenn dieß für eine allgemeine Rechtfertigung der Sache selbst gelten soll, vielmehr das Gegentheil, daß nehmlich, weil solche Umstände nicht mehr vorhanden sind, die Institution hiemit vielmehr ihren Sinn und ihr Recht verloren hat. So, wenn z. B. für Aufrechthaltung der Klöster ihr Verdienst um Urbarmachung und Bevölkerung von Wüsteneyen, um Erhaltung der Gelehrsamkeit durch Unterricht und Abschreiben u. s. f. geltend gemacht und dieß Verdienst als Grund und Bestimmung für ihr Fortbestehen angesehen worden ist, so folgt aus demselben vielmehr, daß sie unter den ganz veränderten Umständen, in so weit wenigstens, überflüßig und unzweckmäßig geworden sind. — Indem nun die geschichtliche Bedeutung, das geschichtliche Aufzeigen und Begreiflichmachen des Entstehens, und die philosophische Ansicht gleichfalls des Entstehens und Begriffes der Sache in verschiedenen Sphären zu Hause sind, so können sie in so fern eine gleichgültige Stellung gegen einander behalten. Indem sie aber, auch im Wissenschaftlichen, diese ruhige Stellung nicht immer behalten, so führe ich noch etwas diese Berührung Betreffendes an, wie es in Herrn Hugo's Lehrbuch der Geschichte des römischen Rechts erscheint, woraus zugleich eine weitere Erläuterung jener Manier des Gegensatzes hervorgehen kann. Herr Hugo führt daselbst (3te Auflage §. 53.) an, „daß Cicero die zwölf Tafeln, mit einem Seitenblicke auf die Philosophen, lobe,“ „der Philosoph Phavorinus aber sie ganz eben so behandle, wie seitdem schon mancher große Philosoph das positive Recht behandelt habe.“ Herr Hugo spricht ebendas. die ein für allemal fertige Erwiderung auf solche Behandlung in dem Grunde aus, „weil Phavorinus die zwölf Tafeln ebensowenig, als diese Philosophen das positive Recht verstanden.“ — Was die Zurechtweisung des Philosophen Phavorinus durch den Rechtsgelehrten Sextus Cäcilius bey Gellius noct. Attic. XX. 1. betrifft, so spricht sie zunächst das bleibende und wahrhafte Princip der Rechtfertigung des seinem Gehalte nach blos Positiven aus. Non ignoras, sagt Cäcilius sehr gut zu Phavorinus, legum opportunitates et medelas pro temporum moribus et pro rerum publicarum generibus, ac pro utilitatum praesentium rationibus, proque vitiorum, quibus medendum est, fervoribus, mutari ac flecti, neque uno statu consistere, quin, ut facies coeli et maris, ita rerum atque fortunae tempestatibus varientur. Quid salubrius visum est rogatione illa Stolonis etc. quid utilius plebiscito Voconio etc. quid tam necessarium existimatum est, quam lex Licinia etc.? Omnia tamen haec obliterata et operta sunt civitatis opulentia etc. — Diese Gesetze sind in so fern positiv, als sie ihre Bedeutung und Zweckmäßigkeit in den Umständen, somit nur einen historischen Werth überhaupt haben, deswegen sind sie auch vergänglicher Natur. Die Weisheit der Gesetzgeber und Regierungen in dem, was sie für vorhandene Umstände gethan und für Zeitverhältnisse festgesetzt haben, ist eine Sache für sich und gehört der Würdigung der Geschichte an, von der sie um so tiefer anerkannt werden wird, je mehr eine solche Würdigung von philosophischen Gesichtspunkten unterstützt ist. — Von den fernern Rechtfertigungen der zwölf Tafeln gegen den Phavorinus aber will ich ein Beyspiel anführen, weil Cäcilius dabey den unsterblichen Betrug der Methode des Verstandes und seines Räsonnirens anbringt, nehmlich für eine schlechte Sache einen guten Grund anzugeben und zu meynen, sie damit gerechtfertiget zu haben. Für das abscheuliche Gesetz, welches dem Gläubiger nach den verlaufenen Fristen das Recht gab, den Schuldner zu tödten oder ihn als Sclaven zu verkaufen, ja wenn der Gläubiger mehrere waren, von ihm sich Stücke abzuschneiden und ihn so unter sich zu theilen, und zwar so, daß, wenn einer zu viel oder zu wenig abgeschnitten hätte, ihm kein Rechtsnachtheil daraus entstehen sollte, (eine Clausel, welche Shakespeare's Shylok, im Kaufmann von Venedig, zu Gute gekommen und von ihm dankbarst acceptirt worden wäre) — führt Cäcilius den guten Grund an, daß Treu und Glauben dadurch um so mehr gesichert und es eben, um der Abscheulichkeit des Gesetzes willen, nie zur Anwendung desselben habe kommen sollen. Seiner Gedankenlosigkeit entgeht dabey nicht bloß die Reflexion, daß eben durch diese Bestimmung jene Absicht, die Sicherung der Treu und Glaubens, vernichtet wird, sondern daß er selbst unmittelbar darauf ein Beyspiel von der durch seine unmäßige Strafe verfehlten Wirkung des Gesetzes über die falschen Zeugnisse anführe. — Was aber Herr Hugo damit will, daß Phavorinus das Gesetz nicht verstanden habe, ist nicht abzusehen; jeder Schulknabe ist wohl fähig, es zu verstehen und am besten würde der genannte Shylok auch noch die angeführte für ihn so vortheilhafte Clausel verstanden haben; — unter Verstehen müßte Herr Hugo nur diejenige Bildung des Verstandes meynen, welche sich bey einem solchen Gesetze durch einen guten Grund beruhigt. — Ein anderes ebendaselbst dem Phavorinus vom Cäcilius nachgewiesenes Nichtverstehen kann übrigens ein Philosoph schon, ohne eben schaamroth zu werden, eingestehen, — daß nehmlich jumentum, welches nur „und nicht eine arcera,“ nach dem Gesetze einem Kranken, um ihn als Zeugen vor Gericht zu bringen, zu leisten sey, nicht nur ein Pferd, sondern auch eine Kutsche oder Wagen bedeutet haben soll. Cäcilius konnte aus dieser gesetzlichen Bestimmung einen weitern Beweis von der Vortrefflichkeit und Genauigkeit der alten Gesetze ziehen, daß sie sich nehmlich sogar darauf einließen, für die Sistirung eines kranken Zeugen vor Gericht die Bestimmung nicht bloß bis zum Unterschiede von einem Pferde und einem Wagen, sondern von Wagen und Wagen, einem bedeckten und ausgefütterten, wie Cäcilius erläutert, und einem, der nicht so bequem ist, — zu treiben. Man hätte hiermit die Wahl zwischen der Härte jenes Gesetzes oder zwischen der Unbedeutenheit solcher Bestimmungen, — aber die Unbedeutenheit, von solchen Sachen und vollends von den gelehrten Erläuterungen derselben auszusagen, würde einer der größten Verstöße gegen diese und andere Gelehrsamkeit seyn.
Herr Hugo kommt aber auch im angeführten Lehrbuche auf die Vernünftigkeit, in Ansehung des römischen Rechts zu sprechen; was mir davon aufgestoßen ist, ist folgendes. Nachdem derselbe in der Abhandlung des Zeitraums von Entstehung des Staats bis auf die zwölf Tafeln §. 38. und 39. gesagt, „daß man (in Rom) viele Bedürfnisse gehabt und genöthigt war, zu arbeiten, wobey man als Gehülfen Zug- und Lastthiere brauchte, wie sie bey uns vorkommen, daß der Boden eine Abwechselung von Hügeln und Thälern war, und die Stadt auf einem Hügel lag u. s. w. — Anführungen, durch welche vielleicht der Sinn Montesquieu's hat erfüllt seyn sollen, wodurch man aber schwerlich seinen Geist getroffen finden wird, — so führt er nun §. 40. zwar an, daß der rechtliche Zustand noch sehr weit davon entfernt war, den höchsten Forderungen der Vernunft ein Genüge zu thun,“ (ganz richtig; das römische Familienrecht, die Sclaverey u. s. f. thut auch sehr geringen Foderungen der Vernunft kein Genüge) aber bey den folgenden Zeiträumen vergißt Herr Hugo anzugeben, in welchem und ob in irgend einem derselben das römische Recht den höchsten Foderungen der Vernunft Genüge geleistet habe. Jedoch von den juristischen Classikern, in dem Zeitraume der höchsten Ausbildung des römischen Rechts, als Wissenschaft, wird §. 289. gesagt, „daß man schon lange bemerkt, daß die juristischen Classiker durch Philosophie gebildet waren;“ aber „wenige wissen, (durch die vielen Auflagen des Lehrbuchs des Herrn Hugo wissen es nun doch mehrere,) daß es keine Art von Schriftstellern giebt, die im consequenten Schließen aus Grundsätzen so sehr verdienten, den Mathematikern und in einer ganz auffallenden Eigenheit der Entwickelung der Begriffe dem neuern Schöpfer der Metaphysik an die Seite gesetzt zu werden, als gerade die römischen Rechtsgelehrten, letzteres belege der merkwürdige Umstand, daß nirgend so viele Trichotomien vorkommen, als bey den juristischen Classikern und bey Kant.“ — Jene von Leibnitz gerühmte Consequenz ist gewiß eine wesentliche Eigenschaft der Rechtswissenschaft, wie der Mathematik und jeder andern verständigen Wissenschaft; aber mit der Befriedigung der Foderungen der Vernunft und mit der philosophischen Wissenschaft hat diese Verstandes-Consequenz noch nichts zu thun. Außerdem ist aber wohl die Inconsequenz der römischen Rechtsgelehrten und der Prätoren als eine ihrer größten Tugenden zu achten, als durch welche sie von ungerechten und abscheulichen Institutionen abwichen, aber sich genöthiget sahen, callide leere Wortunterschiede, (wie das was doch auch Erbschaft war, eine Bonorum possessio zu nennen) und eine selbst alberne Ausflucht (und Albernheit ist gleichfalls eine Inconsequenz) zu ersinnen, um den Buchstaben der Tafeln zu retten, wie durch die fictio, ὑπόκρισις, eine filia sey ein filius: (Heinecc. Antiq. Rom. lib. I. tit. II. §. 24.). — Possierlich aber ist es, die juristischen Classiker wegen einiger trichotomischer Eintheilungen — vollends nach den daselbst Anmerk. 5. angeführten Beyspielen — mit Kant zusammengestellt und so etwas Entwicklung der Begriffe geheißen zu sehen.
Musean translation
Machine-assisted Musean translation made directly from Hegel's German in the Berlin Nicolai first edition, dated 1821. Complete preface, introduction and sections 1–360, including the author's remarks and notes; no later Gans additions.
3 Right is positive in general a) through the form of being valid in a state; this statutory authority is the principle for knowledge of it, the positive science of law. b) With respect to content, this right receives a positive element α) through a people’s particular national character, the stage of its historical development, and the interconnection of all the relations that belong to natural necessity; β) through the necessity that a system of statutory law contain the application of the universal concept to the particular character of objects and cases that presents itself from outside—an application that is no longer speculative thought and development of the concept, but subsumption by the understanding; γ) through the ultimate determinations required for decision in actuality.
When the feeling of the heart, inclination, and arbitrary choice are opposed to positive right and the laws, philosophy, at least, cannot be the authority that recognizes such claims.—That force and tyranny can be an element of positive right is contingent to it and does not concern its nature. Later, in §§ 211–214, the place where right must become positive will be indicated. The determinations that emerge there have been mentioned here only to mark the limits of philosophical right, and immediately to remove any notion, or even demand, that its systematic development should produce a positive code of law—that is, one of the kind an actual state requires.—To turn the distinction between natural or philosophical right and positive right into an opposition and contradiction between them would be a great misunderstanding; their relation is rather that of the Institutes to the Pandects.—Concerning the historical element in positive right mentioned first in this section, Montesquieu stated the true historical view, the genuinely philosophical standpoint: legislation in general and its particular determinations are to be considered not in isolation and abstraction, but rather as a dependent moment of one totality, in connection with all the other determinations that constitute the character of a nation and an age. In this connection they receive their true meaning, and thereby their justification.—To consider the emergence and development of legal determinations as they appear in time—this purely historical undertaking—as well as to know the consistency they possess for the understanding, which emerges from comparing them with existing legal relations, has its merit and due recognition in its own sphere. It stands outside the relation to philosophical consideration, provided that development from historical grounds is not confused with development from the concept, and historical explanation and justification are not extended to mean a justification valid in and for itself. This distinction, very important and to be firmly maintained, is also very plain. A legal determination may be shown to be perfectly grounded and consistent in the circumstances and existing legal institutions, and yet be wrong and irrational in and for itself—as are many determinations of Roman private law that followed quite consistently from such institutions as Roman paternal authority and Roman marriage. Even where legal determinations are right and rational, however, demonstrating this—which can truly be done only through the concept—is something quite different from presenting the history of their emergence, the circumstances, cases, needs, and events that brought about their establishment. Such demonstration and pragmatic knowledge from nearer or more remote historical causes are frequently called explanation, or, more preferably, comprehension, as though this demonstration of the historical accomplished everything, or rather the essential thing that alone mattered, for comprehending the law or legal institution. Yet the truly essential thing, the concept of the matter, has not been discussed at all.—Thus people also speak of Roman or Germanic legal concepts, of legal concepts as determined in this or that code, although what occurs there is not concepts but only general legal determinations, propositions of the understanding, principles, laws, and the like.—By disregarding that distinction, it becomes possible to shift the standpoint, to turn the question of true justification into justification from circumstances, consistency from presuppositions that may in themselves be equally worthless, and so forth; in general, to put the relative in place of the absolute, the outward appearance in place of the nature of the matter. When historical justification confuses outward origination with origination from the concept, it unconsciously does the opposite of what it intends. If an institution’s emergence under its particular circumstances proves perfectly appropriate and necessary, and thus fulfills what the historical standpoint demands, then, if this is supposed to count as a universal justification of the matter itself, the opposite follows: precisely because such circumstances no longer exist, the institution has instead lost its meaning and its right. Thus, for example, when the merits of monasteries in cultivating and populating wastelands, in preserving learning through teaching and copying, and so forth, have been invoked to uphold them, and these merits have been regarded as the ground and purpose of their continued existence, it follows instead that, under wholly altered circumstances, they have become, at least to that extent, superfluous and inappropriate.—Since historical significance, the historical demonstration and explanation of an origin, and the philosophical view of the origin and concept of the matter inhabit different spheres, they can to that extent maintain an indifferent position toward one another. But since, even in scholarly work, they do not always maintain this peaceful position, I will add something concerning their encounter as it appears in Herr Hugo’s Textbook of the History of Roman Law, which may also further clarify that manner of opposition. Herr Hugo mentions there (3rd edition, § 53) “that Cicero praises the Twelve Tables, with a sidelong glance at the philosophers,” while “the philosopher Phavorinus treats them exactly as many a great philosopher has since treated positive law.” In the same place Herr Hugo states the ready-made, once-and-for-all reply to such treatment: “because Phavorinus did not understand the Twelve Tables any more than these philosophers understood positive law.”—As for the rebuke administered to the philosopher Phavorinus by the jurist Sextus Caecilius in Gellius, noct. Attic. XX. 1, it first states the enduring and true principle for justifying what is merely positive in content. “You are not unaware,” Caecilius very aptly says to Phavorinus, “that the useful provisions and remedies of laws change and bend according to the customs of the times, the kinds of commonwealths, the requirements of present advantage, and the intensity of the vices to be remedied; nor do they remain in one condition, but, like the face of sky and sea, vary with the storms of circumstances and fortune. What seemed more salutary than that proposal of Stolo, etc.; what more useful than the Voconian plebiscite, etc.; what was thought so necessary as the Licinian law, etc.? Yet all these have been effaced and buried by the wealth of the state, etc.”—These laws are positive insofar as they have their meaning and appropriateness in circumstances, and thus only a historical value in general; for that reason, too, they are transient in nature. The wisdom of legislators and governments in what they have done for existing circumstances and established for the conditions of their time is a matter on its own and belongs to the judgment of history, which will recognize it all the more deeply the more that judgment is supported by philosophical points of view.—Of the further justifications of the Twelve Tables against Phavorinus, however, I will cite one example, because Caecilius introduces here the perennial deception of the method of the understanding and its ratiocination: giving a good reason for a bad thing, and believing it thereby justified. For the atrocious law that gave the creditor, after the stipulated periods had elapsed, the right to kill the debtor or sell him as a slave—and, if there were several creditors, to cut pieces off him and thus divide him among themselves, and indeed so that if one cut off too much or too little, no legal disadvantage should result (a clause that would have benefited Shakespeare’s Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, and would have been most gratefully accepted by him)—Caecilius gives the good reason that faith and trust would thereby be all the more secure, and that precisely because of the law’s atrocity it was never supposed to be applied. In his thoughtlessness he overlooks not merely the reflection that this very determination destroys its intended end, the securing of faith and trust, but also the fact that immediately afterward he himself cites an example of the failed effect of the law against false testimony because of its excessive punishment.—What Herr Hugo means by saying that Phavorinus did not understand the law, however, is impossible to see. Any schoolboy is surely capable of understanding it, and the aforesaid Shylock would have understood particularly well the clause cited above that favored him so greatly—unless by understanding Herr Hugo means only the cultivation of the understanding that rests content with a good reason for such a law.—A philosopher can, moreover, admit without blushing to another failure of understanding that Caecilius attributes to Phavorinus in the same passage: namely, that “a beast of burden,” which alone, “and not a covered carriage,” was to be provided by law for a sick man in order to bring him before the court as a witness, was supposed to mean not only a horse, but also a coach or wagon. Caecilius could draw from this statutory determination a further proof of the excellence and exactness of the ancient laws: in providing for a sick witness’s appearance in court, they carried specification not merely to the distinction between a horse and a wagon, but between wagon and wagon—one covered and padded, as Caecilius explains, and another not so comfortable. We would thus have the choice between the harshness of that law and the triviality of such determinations; but to call such matters trivial, and still more their learned explanations, would be one of the greatest offenses against this and other kinds of erudition.
Herr Hugo also discusses rationality in relation to Roman law in the textbook cited. What struck me in this regard is the following. After saying in his account of the period from the origin of the state to the Twelve Tables, §§ 38 and 39, “that people (in Rome) had many needs and were compelled to work, for which they required as helpers draft animals and beasts of burden, such as occur among us; that the terrain was an alternation of hills and valleys, and the city stood on a hill,” and so forth—statements perhaps intended to fulfill Montesquieu’s meaning, but in which his spirit will scarcely be found—he then does say, in § 40, that the legal condition “was still very far from satisfying the highest demands of reason” (quite right: Roman family law, slavery, and so forth fail to satisfy even very modest demands of reason). But in the periods that follow, Herr Hugo forgets to state in which, or whether in any, Roman law satisfied the highest demands of reason. Yet of the classical jurists, in the period of the highest development of Roman law as a science, § 289 says “that it has long been observed that the classical jurists were educated through philosophy”; but “few know” (through the many editions of Herr Hugo’s textbook, several people now do know) “that no class of writers so deserves, in consistent inference from principles, to be placed beside the mathematicians, and in a very striking peculiarity of the development of concepts beside the modern creator of metaphysics, as precisely the Roman jurists; the latter is attested by the remarkable circumstance that nowhere do so many trichotomies occur as among the classical jurists and in Kant.”—The consistency praised by Leibniz is certainly an essential property of jurisprudence, as of mathematics and every other science of the understanding. But this consistency of the understanding has as yet nothing to do with satisfying the demands of reason or with philosophical science. Moreover, the inconsistency of the Roman jurists and praetors must surely be counted among their greatest virtues: through it they departed from unjust and atrocious institutions, but saw themselves compelled to devise cunningly empty verbal distinctions—such as calling what was, after all, an inheritance “possession of the estate”—and even an absurd evasion (and absurdity is likewise an inconsistency), in order to save the letter of the Tables; for example, through the fiction, the pretense, that a daughter was a son (Heinecc., Antiq. Rom. lib. I. tit. II. § 24).—It is comical, however, to see the classical jurists placed alongside Kant on account of a few trichotomous divisions—especially on the evidence of the examples given there in note 5—and to see something like this called the development of concepts.
Plain English translation
Independent machine-assisted Plain English translation made directly from the German first-edition source, not from the Musean edition or an existing English translation. Complete preface, introduction and sections 1–360 with the author's remarks and notes.
3 Right is positive in general: a) through its form, because it has validity in a state. This legal authority is the principle for knowing it: the positive science of law. b) In its content, this right acquires a positive element: α) through a people's particular national character, the stage of its historical development, and the interconnection of all the relationships that belong to natural necessity; β) through the necessity that a system of legal right contain the application of the universal concept to the particular character of objects and cases given from outside. This application is no longer speculative thinking and development of the concept, but classification by the understanding. γ) It also acquires a positive element through the final determinations needed for decisions in actual reality.
If the feeling of the heart, inclination, and arbitrary choice are set against positive right and laws, philosophy, at least, cannot be what recognizes authorities of that kind.—Force and tyranny may be an element of positive right, but this is accidental to it and does not concern its nature. The point at which right must become positive will be shown later, §§ 211–214. The determinations that will emerge there have been mentioned here only to mark the limits of philosophical right. They also remove at once any idea, or even demand, that its systematic development should produce a positive legal code—the kind an actual state needs.—Natural right, or philosophical right, differs from positive right. But to turn this difference into the claim that they are opposed and in conflict would be a great misunderstanding. Their relationship is instead that of the Institutes to the Pandects.—As for the historical element mentioned first in this section, Montesquieu gave the true historical view, the genuinely philosophical standpoint. Legislation as a whole and its particular provisions should not be considered in isolation and abstraction. They should be considered as a dependent element of one totality, connected with all the other determinations that make up the character of a nation and an age. In this connection, they acquire their true meaning and, with it, their justification.—To consider how legal provisions emerge and develop as they appear in time is a purely historical undertaking. Like the knowledge of their consistency at the level of the understanding, gained by comparing them with legal relationships already present, it has merit and deserves appreciation in its own sphere. It stands outside the relationship to philosophical consideration, provided that development from historical grounds does not confuse itself with development from the concept, and that historical explanation and justification are not extended into a justification valid in and for itself. This distinction is very important and must be firmly maintained. It is also very clear. A legal provision may be shown to be perfectly well grounded and consistent in terms of the circumstances and existing legal institutions, yet be wrong and irrational in and for itself. Many provisions of Roman private law were like this: they followed quite consistently from such institutions as Roman paternal power and Roman marriage. But even if legal provisions are rightful and rational, showing that they are so—which can truly be done only through the concept—is one thing. Presenting the history of their emergence is another: the circumstances, cases, needs, and events that led to their establishment. This sort of demonstration and this pragmatic knowledge from nearer or more remote historical causes are often called explaining, or preferably comprehending. People imagine that pointing out the history does everything, or rather the essential thing, that is needed to comprehend the law or legal institution. In fact, the truly essential thing—the concept of the matter—has not been discussed at all.—People likewise speak of Roman or Germanic legal concepts, or of legal concepts as defined in this or that legal code, though they are dealing not with concepts but only with general legal determinations, propositions of the understanding, principles, laws, and the like.—By neglecting this distinction, one can shift the standpoint and sidestep the question of true justification. In its place comes justification from circumstances, consistency following from assumptions that may themselves be just as inadequate, and so forth. In general, the relative replaces the absolute, and outward appearance replaces the nature of the matter. When historical justification confuses outward emergence with emergence from the concept, it unconsciously does the opposite of what it intends. Suppose an institution's emergence under its particular circumstances proves entirely appropriate and necessary, and the historical standpoint's demand has thus been met. If this is to count as a universal justification of the matter itself, the opposite follows: since those circumstances no longer exist, the institution has instead lost its meaning and its right to exist. For example, monasteries have been defended on the grounds of their services in cultivating and populating wastelands, and in preserving learning through teaching and copying. If these services are taken as the ground and purpose of their continued existence, what follows is rather that, under completely changed circumstances, they have become, at least to that extent, unnecessary and unsuited to their purpose.—Now historical meaning—the historical demonstration and explanation of emergence—and the philosophical view of the matter's emergence and concept belong in different spheres. To that extent, they can remain indifferent to one another. But they do not always keep this peaceful relationship, even in scholarly work. So I will add something about their contact as it appears in Mr. Hugo's Textbook of the History of Roman Law. This can also further illustrate that way of setting them in opposition. Mr. Hugo states there (3rd edition, § 53) “that Cicero praises the Twelve Tables, with a sidelong glance at the philosophers,” but that “the philosopher Phavorinus treats them just as many a great philosopher has since treated positive right.” In the same place Mr. Hugo gives the ready-made, supposedly conclusive answer to this treatment: “because Phavorinus no more understood the Twelve Tables than these philosophers understood positive right.”—As for the correction of the philosopher Phavorinus by the jurist Sextus Caecilius in Gellius noct. Attic. XX. 1., it first states the lasting and true principle for justifying what is merely positive in content. “You know,” Caecilius very aptly tells Phavorinus, “that the benefits and remedies of laws change and bend according to the customs of the times, the forms of government, the requirements of present advantage, and the intensity of the faults that need a remedy. They do not remain in one condition, but vary with the storms of events and fortune, as the face of the sky and sea does. What seemed more beneficial than that proposal of Stolo, etc.? What more useful than the Voconian plebiscite, etc.? What was thought so necessary as the Licinian law, etc.? Yet all these have been effaced and buried by the state's wealth, etc.”—These laws are positive insofar as their meaning and fitness for their purpose lie in circumstances, and they thus have only historical value in general. That is also why they are temporary by nature. The wisdom of legislators and governments in what they have done for existing circumstances and enacted for the conditions of their time is a matter of its own. It belongs to historical appraisal, which will recognize it all the more deeply the more that appraisal is supported by philosophical standpoints.—But I will give one example from the further defenses of the Twelve Tables against Phavorinus. Caecilius uses the never-dying deception of the understanding's method and its arguments: to give a good reason for a bad thing and imagine that this justifies it. There was an appalling law that allowed a creditor, after the deadlines had passed, to kill a debtor or sell him as a slave. If there were several creditors, it even allowed them to cut pieces off him and so divide him among themselves. Moreover, if anyone cut off too much or too little, he was to suffer no legal disadvantage from it. This clause would have benefited Shakespeare's Shylock in The Merchant of Venice, and he would have accepted it with the greatest thanks. Caecilius gives the good reason that good faith was secured all the more by this, and that precisely because the law was so appalling, it was never meant to be applied. His thoughtlessness misses not just the reflection that this provision itself destroys that aim of securing good faith. It also misses the fact that immediately afterward he himself gives an example of the law against false testimony failing in its effect because its punishment was excessive.—What Mr. Hugo means by saying that Phavorinus did not understand the law is impossible to see. Any schoolboy is quite capable of understanding it. And the Shylock already mentioned would have understood best of all the clause so favorable to him. By understanding, Mr. Hugo must mean only the kind of training of the understanding that rests content with a good reason when faced with a law like this.—A philosopher can also admit, without blushing, to another failure to understand that Caecilius attributes to Phavorinus in the same passage. According to the law, a sick person had to be provided with a “draft animal,” “and not a covered carriage,” to bring him to court as a witness. The term “draft animal” was supposed to mean not just a horse, but also a carriage or wagon. Caecilius could draw from this provision further proof of the old laws' excellence and precision: for bringing a sick witness to court, they even went so far as to specify not merely the difference between a horse and a wagon, but between one wagon and another—a covered and padded one, as Caecilius explains, and one less comfortable.—So we would have a choice between the harshness of the former law and the insignificance of provisions like these. But to say that such matters are insignificant, and still more to say it of their learned explanations, would be one of the greatest offenses against this and other kinds of learning.
Mr. Hugo also discusses rationality in relation to Roman law in the textbook mentioned. Here is what has struck me in this discussion. In treating the period from the origin of the state to the Twelve Tables, §§ 38 and 39, he says “that people in Rome had many needs and were forced to work, for which they needed as helpers draft animals and pack animals such as we have, that the terrain alternated between hills and valleys, and the city lay on a hill,” and so forth. Perhaps such observations were intended to fulfill Montesquieu's meaning, but one will hardly find that they capture his spirit. Then, in § 40, he does state that “the legal condition was still very far from meeting reason's highest demands.” This is quite right: Roman family law, slavery, and the like do not meet even very modest demands of reason. But for the later periods Mr. Hugo forgets to say in which, if in any, Roman law met reason's highest demands. However, speaking of the classical jurists during the period of Roman law's fullest development as a science, he says in § 289 “that it has long been noticed that the classical jurists were educated through philosophy,” but that “few know”—though the many editions of Mr. Hugo's textbook mean that several people now know it—“that no kind of writers so deserves to be placed alongside the mathematicians for consistent inference from principles, and alongside the modern creator of metaphysics for a quite striking distinctive feature in the development of concepts, as precisely the Roman jurists. The latter is proved by the remarkable circumstance that nowhere are there so many three-part divisions as among the classical jurists and in Kant.”—The consistency praised by Leibniz is certainly an essential quality of jurisprudence, as it is of mathematics and every other science of the understanding. But this consistency of the understanding still has nothing to do with satisfying reason's demands or with philosophical science. Besides, the inconsistency of the Roman jurists and praetors must surely be considered one of their greatest virtues. Through it, they departed from unjust and appalling institutions. Yet they felt forced to invent clever, empty verbal distinctions—such as calling what was, after all, also an inheritance a “possession of the estate”—and even a silly evasion, since silliness is also an inconsistency, to save the letter of the Tables. One such device was the fiction, the pretense, that a daughter was a son (Heinecc. Antiq. Rom. lib. I. tit. II. § 24).—But it is ridiculous to see the classical jurists placed alongside Kant because of a few three-part classifications, especially in view of the examples given there in note 5, and to see this sort of thing called development of concepts.
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