checked by some monarch of stern and decided character, in the end invariably obtained the advantage. The dependence of the sovereign upon the priesthood was never lost sight of. No occasion which might remind him of the obligation he owed to the order whose suffrages had conferred, and might, with equal facility, resume possession of his crown, was suffered to pass unimproved. The anointing with holy oil, which symbolized the right of divine consecration, had already forged another link in the chain which bound the king to the Church. The anathemas denounced upon a prince for failure to execute the laws against heretics, far exceeded in virulence those to which any subject was liable. At one time, the wishes of the sovereign were anticipated by the subserviency of the prelates; at another, his prerogative was invaded and his commands disobeyed with an arrogance worthy of the imperious spirit of Julius II. or of Gregory the Great. The populace, through ignorance, prejudice, and habit, blindly devoted to the sacerdotal order, furnished a formidable body of auxiliaries, ever ready to hearken to the appeals of their ghostly advisers, a force which the dignity and assurance of the haughtiest ruler could not with impunity disregard. The turbulent and illiterate nobility, although the king was selected from their number by the voices of the assembled bishops--in which ceremony the concurrence of the palatines was admitted, in reality, only through courtesy--possessed, in the practical application of the precepts of the Gothic constitution, scarcely the shadow, still less the substance, of power. The council was the embodiment and representative of the intellect and the collective wisdom of the nation. Its canons were, for the most part, framed in strict accordance with the principles of equity, and the deliberations and conclusions of its sessions were often characterized by a breadth of understanding and a degree of impartiality which clearly indicated that its members were not deficient in the knowledge and requirements of enlightened statesmanship. The results of their labors are contained in the Gothic Code, a body of laws remarkable in many respects, when we consider the general illiteracy and ignorance of the age in which it was compiled, and its transcendent importance as the prototype of the systems of jurisprudence which now regulate the civil and criminal procedure of the courts of Europe and America. In the extraordinary minuteness of its details, in its thorough and comprehensive treatment of the manifold transactions of daily life, and in its provisions for almost every contingency which could arise in the administration of the sovereigns under whose auspices it was framed, this extraordinary work presents the modern legislator with a subject eminently worthy of his attention and study. The contact with races which had long enjoyed the blessings of civilization, and the development of the intellectual faculties consequent upon the