re. [99] 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.

[Footnote 96: The custom of enslaving prisoners of war was totally
extinguished in the thirteenth century, by the prevailing influence of
Christianity; but it might be proved, from frequent passages of Gregory
of Tours, &c., that it was practised, without censure, under the
Merovingian race; and even Grotius himself, (de Jure Belli et Pacis
l. iii. c. 7,) as well as his commentator Barbeyrac, have labored to
reconcile it with the laws of nature and reason.]

[Footnote 97: The state, professions, &c., of the German, Italian, and
Gallic slaves, during the middle ages, are explained by Heineccius,
(Element Jur. Germ. l. i. No. 28-47,) Muratori, (Dissertat. xiv. xv.,)
Ducange, (Gloss. sub voce Servi,) and the Abbe de Mably, (Observations,
tom. ii. p. 3, &c., p. 237, &c.) Note: Compare Hallam, vol. i. p.
216.--M.]

[Footnote 98: Gregory of Tours (l. vi. c. 45, in tom. ii. p. 289)
relates a memorable example, in which Chilperic only abused the private
rights of a master. Many families which belonged to his domus fiscales
in the neighborhood of Paris, were forcibly sent away into Spain.]

[Footnote 99: Licentiam habeatis mihi qualemcunque volueritis
disci