sed in terms most disgraceful and
afflicting to the dignity of human nature. The example of the poor, who
purchased life by the sacrifice of all that can render life desirable,
was gradually imitated by the feeble and the devout, who, in times of
public disorder, pusillanimously crowded to shelter themselves under
the battlements of a powerful chief, and around the shrine of a popular
saint. Their submission was accepted by these temporal or spiritual
patrons; and the hasty transaction irrecoverably fixed their own
condition, and that of their latest posterity. From the reign of Clovis,
during five successive centuries, the laws and manners of Gaul uniformly
tended to promote the increase, and to confirm the duration, of personal
servitude. Time and violence almost obliterated the intermediate ranks
of society; and left an obscure and narrow interval between the noble
and the slave. This arbitrary and recent division has been transformed
by pride and prejudice into a _national_ distinction, universally
established by the arms and the laws of the Merovingians. The nobles,
who claimed their genuine or fabulous descent from the independent and
victorious Franks, have asserted and abused the indefeasible right of
conquest over a prostrate crowd of slaves and plebeians, to whom they
imputed the imaginary disgrace of Gallic or Roman extraction.

The general state and revolutions of _France_, a name which was imposed
by the conquerors, may be illustrated by the particular example of
a province, a diocese, or a senatorial family. Auvergne had formerly
maintained a just preeminence among the independent states and cities
of Gaul. The brave and numerous inhabitants displayed a singular trophy;
the sword of Caesar himself, which he had lost when he was repulsed
before the walls of Gergovia. As the common offspring of Troy, they
claimed a fraternal alliance with the Romans; and if each province had
imitated the courage and loyalty of Auvergne, the fall of the Western
empire might have been prevented or delayed. They firmly maintained the
fidelity which they had reluctantly sworn to the Visigoths, out
when their bravest nobles had fallen in the battle of Poitiers, they
accepted, without resistance, a victorious and Catholic sovereign. This
easy and valuable conquest was achieved and possessed by Theodoric, the
eldest son of Clovis: but the remote province was separated from his
Austrasian dominions, by the intermediate kingdoms of So