9. In what manner the Codes of Barbarian Laws and the Capitularies
came to be lost. The Spirit of the Laws | ||
Footnotes
M. de la Thaumassire has collected many of them. See, for instance, chapters 41, 46, and others.
Let not the bishops, says Charles the Bald, in the "Capitulary" of 844, art. 8, under pretence of the authority of making canons, oppose this constitution, or neglect the observance of it. It seems he already foresaw the fall thereof.
In the collection of canons a vast number of the decretals of the popes were inserted; they were very few in the ancient collection. Dionysius Exiguus put a great many into his; but that of Isidorus Mercator was stuffed with genuine and spurious decretals. The old collection obtained in France till Charlemagne. This prince received from the hand of Pope Adrian I the collection of Dionysius Exiguus, and caused it to be accepted. The collection of Isidorus Mercator appeared in France about the reign of Charlemagne; people grew passionately fond of it: to this succeeded what we now call the course of canon law.
9. In what manner the Codes of Barbarian Laws and the Capitularies
came to be lost. The Spirit of the Laws | ||