Tratado de las Leyes y de Dios Legislador.

by Padra Francisco Surez; Don Jaime Torrubiano

Ripoll
Review by: Herbert F. Wright
The American Journal of International Law, Vol. 14, No. 1/2 (Jan. - Apr., 1920), pp. 307-312
Published by: American Society of International Law
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 BOOK REVIEWS 307

Tratado de las Leyes y de Dios Legislador. Por el Padre Francisco

Suarez. Translated into Spanish by Don Jaime Torrubiano
Ripoll. (Clkasicosjuridicos, Vol. I.) Madrid: Hijos de Reus.
1918, pp. lxiv, 320.
James Lorimer,in his "Institutes of the Law of Nations,' calls
attentionto "the extremeinjustice of the manner iu which,down to
our own time,it has been customaryto speak of the scholasticjurists,"
and a little fartheron he continues: "The fact is, that ever since
the Reformationthe prejudices of Protestantsagainst Roman Cath-
olics have been so vehementas to deprivethemof the power of form-
ing a dispassionateopinion of theirworks,even if they had been ac-
quainted with them,which they rarely were." The same author,in
a footnote,gives expressionto the belief "that no more valuable con-
tributioncould be made to the literature of jurisprudence at the
present time than a collection and translation of the portions of
these workswhich have referenceto generaJjurisprudenceand inter-
national law." But these statementswere made nearly fortyyears
ago, and the injustice and prejudice, on the one hand, have largely
disappeared, while interestin popularizing the translationsof rele-
vant portions of the works mentionedhas long since been aroused
by Prof. Ernest Nys and by the "Classics of International Law"
being publishedby the Carnegie Endowmentfor InternationalPeace,
under the general editorshipof Dr. James Brown Scott, and now by
a new series of Clasicos juridicos inaugurated by the publishing
house of Reus with the present volume.
The selectionof the Spanish Jesuit,Francisco Suarez, as the first
author in the series is a .most happy one, for the echoes of his ter-
centenarycelebrationhave not yet entirelydied away. Attention
which had hithertobeen confinedto a few historiansof international
law such as Ward, who calls him "a writerof great perspicuityand
comprehensionof mind,21 and Hallam, who regards him as "by far
the greatestman in the departmentof moral philosophy,whom the
order of Loyola produced in this age, or perhaps in any other,''3 was
I James Lorimer,"The Institutesof the Law of Nations" (London, 1883),
Vol. I, p. 71.
2 RobertWard, "An EnquiryInto the Foundationand Historyof the Law of
Nations in Europe" (London,1795), Vol. I, p. 16.
3 HenryHallam, "Introductionto the Literatureof Europe in the Fifteenth,
Sixteenthand SeventeenthCenturies"(London,n. d.), p. 524.

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308 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW

now more popularly centeredupon him,and especially did his native

countryhastento make tardy amends for the oblivioninto which one
of the purest glories of its historyhad been allowed to fall.
This newlyaroused interest,however,should by no means be per-
mittedto be local, for Suarez should be universallyrecognizedas one
of the truly great foundersof internationallaw, second perhaps only
to the great Grotius,if indeed to him. In fact,thereis little or noth-
ing new in Grotius's general treatmentof his subject; his systemis
fundamentallyidenticalwith the ideas outlinedby Suarez.4 It is true
that Grotiusadvanced far beyond all his predecessorsin the detailed
elaborationof his principles,but the fact neverthelessremains that
"Suarez has put on record with a master's hand the existenceof a
necessaryhumuansocietytranseendingthe boundaries of states,5the
indispensablenessof rules for that society,the insufficiencyof reason
to provide with demonstrativeforce all the rules required, and the
right of human societyto supply the deficiencyby custom enforeed
as law, such custombeing suitable to nature."6 And therefore"it
is rather remarkable," as Ward notes, "that in his survey of the
writerswho preceded him,he [Grotius] makes no mentionof Suarez,
the clearest of all those who had attemptedto discuss the law of
nature, and the differencebetweenit and the Law of Nations,''7 al-
thoughit is true that Grotiuselsewhere8recognizesin him one of the
greatesttheologiansand a profoundphilosopher.
Francisco Suarez was born at Granada on January 5, 1548, not
quite a year and a half afterthe death of that otherscholasticglory
of Spain, Franciscus de Victoria. In 1564 he enteredthe Society of
Jesus at Salamanca, where he studied philosophyand theologyfrom
1565 to 1570. Ordained to the priesthoodin 1572, he taught succes-
sively and most successfully at Avila, Segovia, Valladolid, Rome
(1580-1585), Aleala (1585-1592), Salamanca (1592-1597), and finally
Coimbra (1597-1616). He died on September25, 1617, but in the
short space of twenty-three years (1590-1613), he wrote and pub-
lished twelve extensive and important works on theological and
4 Cf. ThomasAlfredWalker,"A Historyof the Law of Nations" (Cambridge,
1899), Vol. I, p. 330.
5 Cf. ibid., p. 156.
6 JohnWestlake,"Chapterson the Principlesof InternationalLaw" (Cam-
bridge,1894), pp. 27-28.
7 Ward, op. cit.,Vol. II, p. 614.
8 Hugo Grotius,Ep. 154,J. Cordesio.

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 BOOK REVIEWS 309

philosophicalquestions,as well as composedseven otherworks pub-

lished posthumously,the last at late as 1859.
Althoughthereis much of interestfromthe point of view of inter-
national law in the otherworksof Suarez, such as his De bello9which
constitutesDisputation XIII of the posthumoustreatiseDe charitate,
his completelegal systemis to be found in the De legibus ac Deo
legislatore,published in 1612 (five years beforethe author's death)
at Coimbra,where he held the chair of theologyin the university.
The work is divided into ten books, of which only the firstappears
in this volume,and, as the publisherssay, for'the firsttime in Span-
ish. It is presumed that the other nine books are to follow. An
idea of the comprehensivenessof the entire work may be gleaned
fromthe followingtitles of the ten books:
Book I-On law in general, its nature, causes and effects.
Book II-On eternal law and natural law and the law of nations.
Book III-On positive human law in itself, and as it can be considered
in the pure nature of man, which law is also called civil law.
Book IV-On positive canon law.
Book V-On the variety of human laws, and especially on adverse law.
Book VI-On the interpretation,cessation and mutation of laws.
Book VII-On unwritten law, which is called custom.
Book VIII-On favorable human law, or that which grants privilege.
Book IX-On the old positive divine law.
Book X-On the new divine law.

The translationof the book appearing in the presentvolume was

begun on January17, 1918; the printingwas begun on April 1, 1918,
and the volume issued from the press the latter part of September
of the same year. The rapidity of preparation and execution may
possibly account in some measure for such minor defects as will be
noted below,but on the whole the book leaves little to be desired. A
brief but interestingpreface from the facile pen of Don Rafael
Conde y Luque, Associate of the Institut de Droit International,
Rector and Professorof InternationalLaw at the Universidad Cen-
tral de Espania,is followedby some importantremarksand bio-biblio-
graphical notes of the translator.
In his remarksthe translator indicates two possible systemsof
translation: first,a free translationof the idea in good stylisticver-
nacular, and second, as literal a translation as is consistentwith
9 This work and relevant portions of the De legbhus will appear in text and
English translation in the Classics of International Law.

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 310 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OP INTERNATIONAL LAW

grammaticalcorrectnessof vernacular. After weighingthe advan-

tages and disadvantages of both systems,he inclines-and we think
very wisely so-to the second method as the ideal for works of a
"rigorously scientificcharacter," such as the presentwork, although
not for works of a purely literary character. He tells us that he
has already testedthe second methodin his translationof Franciscus
de Victoria, but that Suarez presents additional difficultiesbecause
of his more obscure style and the highly technical language which
accompanieshis profoundreasoning. Consequently,it may be neces-
sary for the reader to go over some passages two or three times
before securinga proper understanding. "I have undertaken," he
says, "to write for savants and students,surely not for the curious;
and so I have preferredto hide my shortcomingsbehind the rough
scholastic formsof the great master to running the risk of having
the reader distrustthe fidelityof my translation,which is desirable
in this class of works above all other embellishmentsand above first
clearness,that is, the clearness of the firstreading or at firstsight."
The editiontranslatedis that printed at Naples in 1872, although
it mighthave been wiser to have selected as the basis of translation
the last editionknownto have come under the scrutinyof the author,
with the correctionof only the manifesterrors. The motive of the
translator,however,may have been to select a good modern edition
fairly accessible to the prospectivereaders of his translation. For
the purpose of facilitatingthe proof of the translator's accuracy,
the numberof the page and column of the correspondingpart of the
original text is insertedin the upper left hand corner of each page
of the presentvolume.
As a test of the accuracy of the translation,the reviewercarefully
checked up the firsttwentypages, word for word, with the Latin
text as published at Mainz in 1619, and is happy to state that he
found the translationextremelysmoothand intelligibleand noticed
no error of importance.10 Several omissions have been noticed
throughoutthe book-for example,on pp. 2, 16, 17, 32 and 151-but
this may be in keeping with a statementin the Preface, that "in
lo In the last line on p. 3, it mightbe morein keepingwith the spiritof the
syllogisticargumentto have pero in place of y. On p. 15, in the quotationfrom
Romans,ch. ii, v. 13, the translationforthe wordjustificabunturis.missing. On
the bottomof p. 16, thereis a slightlytwistedtranslationof a sentencewhich
would appear in Englishsomewhatas follows: "The rules of correctspeechare
wontto be called laws of grammar,"etc. On p. 19, line 19, naturalmente should
be moralmente.Eight lines fartheron, y shouldbe deleted.

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 BOOK REVIEWS 311

translatingthe language and dialogue, the text has been relieved of

many paraphrases and redundancieswhich obscure the thoughtand
embarrassthe course of the argument." This procedure,however,
has little to commendit, and is subject to very serious criticism.
Because of the abundant citations found in Suarez, due to his
erudition in matters juridical, patristic, historical,bibliographical,
theological and, philosophical,it had been the translator's original
intentionto give a bio-bibliographicalaccount of each author cited
and to run down referencesto the canon and civil law texts,as well
as to explain scholasticphrases and terminology.But he soon learned
that this would have required four or fiveadditional volumes for the
entireDe legibus,and so the last half of the book containsvery few
notes of any kind. However, there still remains in the firstpart a
valuable list of commentatorson the various parts of the Corpus
Iuris Canonici, besides good accounts of Plato, Aristotle,Clementof
Alexandria, St. John Chrysostom,St. Augustine, Isidore of Seville,
Peter Lombard, St. Thomas Aquinas, Cajetan, Alexander of Hales
and Juan de Torquemada. Citations in the text are, as a rule, left
in Latin, as most of the Latin works cited have not been translated,
and many are not likelyto be for some timeto come. There does not
seem to be any attempt at uniformityof abbreviationof citations.
The Digest is sometimescited as such, sometimesby the well-known
ff.,and there are three differentaddreviations for the Institutes.
'The various titles of the Corpus are likewisevariouslyabbreviated.
As suggested above, the hurriednessin printing the book was
probably responsible in large measure for the numerous misprints
and the great confusionin the orthographyof Latin words which
correspondto similar Spanish words.11
11 The most important misprints noted are the following: 1691-92 for
1601-02 and 1691-93 for 1601-03 (p. xliv), 1659 for 1859 (p.-li), Grescomnium
for Cresconium, gestione for gestis (p. 23), Bevicv4uls for Breviculus (p. 24),
Caterias for Categorias, Toscorum for Stoicorum, Sylbug for Sylburg (p. 26),
Heilberg for Heidelberg, Herbetus for Hervetus, WVVutzburgo for 'Wurzburgo,
Klolt for Klotz, Pentatenchi for Pentateuchi, virtutuum for virtutumr(p. 27),
Batone for Botone (p. 46), Liguano for Lignano, Aucarano for Ancarano (p. 47),
Perisiense for Parisiense (p. 89), and Panarmitano for Panormitano (p. 182).
The frequencywith which Latin words are misspelled may be judged from the
followinglist: ommnnibus,Defenssio,inteligentia, mendatium, mayor, Acoademicae,
amntitia, Lelius, juditia and cormentaria. Several instances of incorrect division
of Latin words at the ends of lines are to be found, e. g., qiuaes-tiones,appel-
lationes.

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312 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL LAW

With regard to the typographicalappearance, the book is, on the

whole, very attractive. The frontispiece,however,does not seem to
be commensuratewith the standard demanded by the subject, the
author,or the series. The summaryat the beginningof each chapter
is veryuseful,but its repetitionin the Table of Contentsor "Indice"
not only seems needless, but is destructiveof the very purpose of
such a table by expanding into nine pages what could and should
appear in two. Moreover,space could have been saved, which seems
to be badly needed in the latter part of the book, where we find
chapters beginningin the middle of pages (e.g., pp. 203, 207 and
279) instead of beginningnew pages as in the firstpart of the book.
All of these defects can easily be remedied in future volumes of
the series.
The publishers,the sponsorand the translatorare to be earnestly
congratulatedon this auspicious beginning,and if the presentvolume
may be taken as an augur for the future,they may rest assured of
the success of their undertaking. The book should lend new zest to
those who are interestedin the scholastic jurists; those who are not
yet interestedin those pioneersof pioneerswould surely be attracted
by the inspiringprefacetand "they would doubtlessbe surprisedby
the followingdeclaration of an humble religious,submittingto the
preceptof blind obedience: 'Before all I can affirm,as I shall always
affirm,that my one ambition,which I have endeavored to realize
withoutflinchingin the face of any labor or effort,has always been
to know and to make known the truth and nothingbut the truth.
A partisan spirit has never inspired,and never will inspire, any of
my opinions. I have never sought anythingmore than the truth,
and I desire that those who read my books should seek it in their
turn.' 12
HERBERT F. WRIGHT.

12 Francisco Suarez, De Verbo Inearnato, quoted in the Preface, p. xxiii.

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