But the legend remains to show that the legislator should be so
superior to his own passions and to the passions of his people, that, as
legislator, he should make laws before which, as a man, he should stand
in awe.

This moderation, in the sense in which we use the term, has sometimes
led the legislator to suggest or insinuate laws rather than impose them.
This is not always possible, but it is so occasionally. Montesquieu
tells us the following of St. Louis: "Seeing the manifold abuses of
justice in his time he endeavoured to make them unpopular. He made many
regulations for the courts in his own domain, and in those of his
barons, and he was so successful, that only a short time after his death
his methods were adopted in the courts by many of his nobles. Thus this
prince attained his object, although his regulations were not
promulgated as a general law for the whole kingdom, but merely as an
example which any one might follow in his own interest. He got rid of an
evil by making patent the better way. When men saw in his courts and in
those of his nobles more reasonable and natural forms of procedure, more
conformable to religion and morality, more favourable to public
tranquillity and to the security of persons and property, they adopted
the substance and abandoned the shadow. _To suggest where you cannot
compel, to guide where you cannot demand, that is the supreme form of
skill._"

Montesquieu adds with some optimism though no doubt the idea is
encouraging: "Reason has a natural empire, we resist it, but it triumphs
over our resistance; we persist in error for a time but we always have
to return to it."

The instance above quoted is very remote, and can hardly be applied to
anything in our day. But consider, for instance, the law of Sunday
observance which has been revived from the ecclesiastical law. It was a
mistake to include it in the Code because it was antagonistic to many
French customs, and, in many ways, to the national temperament. The
result is what might have been expected, namely, that it has only been
carried out in rare instances, and with an infinity of trouble. It might
have been made the subject of an edict without being included in the
Code. The State might have given a holiday on Sunday to all its
officials, employees and workmen. It might have been made quite clear
simply by a circular from the Minister of Justice that a workman would
not be punished for breach of contract by refusing to