130 THE DECLINE AND FALL [Chap, xxxviii forests. The Alemanni and Bavarians who had occupied the Eoman provinces of Rhaetia and Nori.cuni, to the south of the Danube, confessed themselves the humble vassals of the Franks ; and the feeble barrier of the Alps was incapable of resisting their ambition. When the last survivor of the sons of Clovis united the inheritance and conquests of the Merovingians, his kingdom extended far beyond the limits of modern France. Yet modern France, such has been the progress of arts and policy, far surpasses in wealth, populousness, and power the spacious but savage realms of Clotaire or Dagobert." 7 political The Franks, or French, are the only people of Europe who versy can deduce a perpetual succession from the conquerors of the Western empire. But their conquest of Gaul was followed by ten centuries of anarchy and ignorance. On the revival of learning, the students who had been formed in the schools of Athens and Rome disdained their Barbarian ancestors ; and a long period elapsed before patient labour could provide the requisite materials to satisfy, or rather to excite, the curiosity of more enlightened times. 68 At length the eye of criticism and philosophy was directed to the antiquities of France ; but even philosophers have been tainted by the contagion of pre- judice and passion. The most extreme and exclusive systems of the personal servitude of the Gauls, or of their voluntary and equal alliance with the Franks, have been rashly conceived and obstinately defended ; and the intemperate disputants have accused each other of conspiring against the prerogative of the crown, the dignity of the nobles, or the freedom of the people. Yet the sharp conflict has usefully exercised the adverse powers of learning and genius; and each antagonist, alternately vanquished and victorious, has extirpated some ancient errors, and established some interesting truths. An 67 M. de Foncemagne has traoed, in a correct and elegant dissertation (Mem. de l'Acad^niie, torn. viii. p. 505-528), the extent and limits of the French monarchy. 68 The Abbe" Dubos (Histoire Critique, torn. i. p. 29-36) has truly and agreeably represented the slow progress of these studies ; and he observes that Gregory of Tours was only once printed before the year 1560. According to the complaint of Heineccius (Opera, torn. iii. Sylloge iii. p. 248, &c), Germany received with indifference and contempt the codes of Barbaric laws, which were published by Heroldus, Lindenbrogius, <&c. At present those laws "(as far as they relate to Gaul), the history of Gregory of Tours, and all the monuments of the Merovingian race, appear in a pure and perfect state, in the first four volumes of the Historians of France.
