John Macdonell

“ It was not pleasing to many jurists to be told that a few lectures on the laws of the Persians and Chinese would do more to awaken a true judicial sense than minute disquisitions on the Roman law of intestacy observations the full effect of which Thibaut himself did not perhaps conceive. The essay was as much a condemnation of the entire state of jurisprudence as an argument for codification; it was a challenge to civilians to justify their very existence. ”

“ The existence of great states is always in a sense unnatural; it implies a warm life only at one point, a constant repression of individuals for a common object, and no real unity between the rulers and the subjects. In a land of small states, on the other hand, the peculiarity of each has full play; there is development of variety, and the unity of princes and people is deeper and more living." The only unity practicable and needful in Thibaut's judgment was one of law; and for such all the German Governments should labour. His review of the state of jurisprudence in Germany is severe ”

“ His class was large, his influence great; and, except Hugo and Savigny, no civilian of his time was so well known. In the work of the university he took an active part; and he cultivated with rare devotion his favourite art. In 1814 appeared his Civilistische Abhandlungen, of which the prin cipal was his famous essay, the parent of so much litera ture, on the necessity of a national code for Germany. He had no wish to enter into official or practical life. " I am Professor Thibaut, and wish to be nobody else." ”