is was Jurisprudence.

=The Praetor's Edict.=--To apply the sacred rules of law a supreme
magistrate was needed at Rome. Only a consul or a praetor could direct
a tribunal and, according to the Roman expression, "say the law." The
consuls engaged especially with the army ordinarily left this care to
the praetors.

There were always at Rome at least two praetors as judges: one
adjudicated matters between citizens and was called the praetor of the
city (praetor urbanus); the other judged cases between citizens and
aliens and was called praetor of the aliens (praetor peregrinus), or,
more exactly, praetor between aliens and citizens. There was need of at
least two tribunals, since an alien could not be admitted to the
tribunal of the citizens. These praetors, thanks to their absolute
power, adjusted cases according to their sense of equity; the praetor
of the aliens was bound by no law, for the Roman laws were made only
for Roman citizens. And yet, since each praetor was to sit and judge
for a year, on entering upon his office he promulgated a decree in
which he indicated the rules that he expected to follow in his
tribunal; this was the Praetor's Edict. At the end of the year, when
the praeter left his office, his ordinance was no longer in force, and
his successor had the right to make an entirely different one. But it
came to be the custom for each praetor to preserve the edicts of his
predecessors, making a few changes and some additions. Thus
accumulated for centuries the ordinances of the magistrates. At last
the emperor Hadrian in the second century had the Praetorian Edict
codified and gave it the force of law.

=Civil Law and the Law of Nations.=--As there were two separate
tribunals, there developed two systems of rules, two different laws.
The rules applied to the affairs of citizens by the praetor of the city
formed the Civil Law--that is to say, the law of the city. The rules
followed by the praetor of aliens constituted the Law of Nations--that
is to say, of the peoples (alien to Rome). It was then perceived that
of these two laws the more human, the more sensible, the simpler--in a
word, the better, was the law of aliens. The law of citizens, derived
from the superstitious and strict rules of the old Romans, had
preserved from this rude origin troublesome formulas and barbarous
regulations. The Law of Nations, on the contrary, had for its
foundation the dealings of merchants and of men established in Rome