dicitur, Ayala non tetigit." Whether Grotius is strictly justified in making the above remark may be open to doubt, but Ayala has very cursorily discussed in his second book the question of the justice of a war, which Gentilis has made the subject of more than one chapter; whilst Grotius has treated it still more fully and at very considerable length. The whole cohort of writers, however, commencing with Franciscus à Victoria agree in maintaining that necessity alone can justify a declaration of war; and that when war has been declared for a just cause, it should be carried on not with a view to destroy the enemy, but to secure a durable peace.

The division of the subject into three books* has been adopted by Gentilis in accordance with his division of the causes of war, the first book being assigned to the discussion of the efficient causes, the second to the exposition of the formal causes, and the third and last book to the examination of the final causes; in other words, Gentilis treats in his first book of the motives of war, in the second of its conduct, in the third of its ends or objects. The first consideration therefore with him is whether a war has been justly undertaken; the second, whether it has been justly conducted; the third and last, whether it has been justly ended. A war undertaken in the cause of religion, Gentilis considered to be just in the highest degree, but then it must be a war in defence of religion, not a war the object of which is to obtrude a religion upon others; for he says (cap. IX.), "Et quidem si religio ejus est naturæ, ut compelli ad eam invitus nullus debeat, atque nova illa dicitur et inaudita prædicatio, quæ verberibus exigit fidem, sequitur vim istam justam non esse." Hence, he condemns the wars of Ferdinand the Catholic and of the Emperor Charles V. as wars under which the lust of Empire was veiled under the pretext of zeal for religion, and he justifies the Crusaders, not on the ground of the

* Ayala's treatise is in like manner divided into three books

Saracens being infidels, but on the ground that they oppressed the Christians, and that the wars waged in those days by the Frank against the Turk were essentially defensive wars. Gentilis denies that the interests of religion can ever justify an aggressive war, "quia religionis jus hominibus cum hominibus proprie non est, itaque nec jus læditur hominum ob diversam religionem; itaque nec bellum causa religionis." On the other hand, he held the Turk equally as the Spaniard to be meditating at the time when he wrote universal conquest, and that it was justifiable for nations to unite and resist each of those powers as a common peril, before such aggressive States became too powerful. "Obsistendum igitur. Et cavere satius est, ne homines augentur nimium potentia, quam contra potentiores postea remedium quærere (cap. XIV.)." Hence, he says, the English nation justly gave aid to the people of the Low Countries against the Spaniards, even if the revolt of the Low Countries had taken place without sufficient justification, which, however, he by no means admits, since he says, quoting the words of Justus Lipsius with approval, "if that rampart of Europe were broken through, there would be no obstacle remaining to restrain the violence of Spain."*

The conduct of war forms the subject of the second book. Good faith, Gentilis says, is always to be observed. Recourse to poison and assassination he holds to be forbidden, and on this subject he expresses his surprise that Sir Thomas Moore should have advocated the opposite view in his Utopia. Truces should be strictly kept. Captives, released upon the promise of paying ransom, should return,

Gentilis, LI. c. XVI., expressly commends the policy of the Earl of Leicester in advising that aid should be given to the Belgians. His words are, "Ut heros magnus Lecestrius sapientissime defensionem Belgarum saluberrimam reipublicæ ac necessariam prævidit suscipiendamque suasit, ne si illud vallum Europa (et tu sic sapienter Juste Lipsi) Hispani perrumperent, nihil amodo superesset obicis violentiæ ipsorum."

if they fail to procure their ransom money. But Gentilis makes a remarkable exception to the obligation of good faith on the part of a captive, when he is released on a promise not to bear arms again against the same enemy. Gentilis holds such a promise to be, as it were, ultra vires of the soldier, and to be in conflict with his military duty, and therefore not binding upon him. "Sed ille mihi certus est casus, si promissum quid est contra publicum aut militare jus, ut non sit servanda promissio, quod duo illi, Hispani doctissimi, Garzias et Covarruvias, tradunt. Et in his promissis ego illud reposuerim, quum quis pollicitus est, non militare pro principe suo aut patria." L. II., c. xi. Grotius, on the other hand, does not follow in the steps of Gentilis. He observes, He observes, "Some moralists pronounce this compact void, because it is against the duty which a person owes to his country, but what is against duty is not necessarily and of course void, and in the next place it is not against duty to obtain such liberty by promising that which is already in the enemy's power, for the cause of one's country is not impaired by such an act, for he, who is a captive, has ceased to be of any value to his country." Book III., c. xxiii., s. 7. Pufendorf, in his treatment of the same question forty years later, holds to the opinion of Grotius, but he qualifies it by observing that the force of such a compact extends to aggressive wars only, and not to defensive wars, especially if the hazard of the common safety of the whole State is likely to endanger that of the individual himself. Book VIII., c. ii., s. II. These delicate shades of difference in the opinions of the leading publicists of the seventeenth century are not without interest in the present day, as in the distinction drawn by Pufendorf there will be found a justification for the conduct of a distinguished French officer during the late FrancoGerman war, which somewhat perplexed public opinion at the time, as to whether he was justified, after having been released upon his parole, in taking up arms again to defend

his invaded fatherland. According to Gentilis and Pufendorf he was so justified; not so according to Grotius.

The third book of the Treatise of Gentilis deals with the ends and objects of war. With regard to the object of all warfare, Gentilis teaches that a durable peace should in all cases be the end in view. "Præterita," he says, quoting the words of the great Perugian jurist Baldus, "ultionem respiciunt, futura pacis constitutæ firmitatem," a golden maxim indeed, which conquerors would do well to bear in mind at the moment of victory, and not impose conditions which, however excusable they may be upon a retrospect of the past, are inconsistent with the honour and the independence of the vanquished party, and contain the seeds of a future war. But, when Gentilis comes to review the conditions which the victor may of right impose upon the vanquished, he has the appearance of countenancing too absolutely the dictum of Julius Cæsar," et nihil aliud est victoria, quam subjectio repugnantium, quod cum factum erit, pax erit." We consider the treatment of this concluding part of his subject by Gentilis not to be altogether on a level with his treatment of the motives and the conduct of war. Grotius has been equally blamed by some for sanctioning many of the most savage usages of war; but then, Grotius, after he has enumerated what he considers to be the customary rules, in accordance with which wars have been carried on, dedicates a series of chapters to what he terms the "temperamenta belli." I am now going, says Grotius,* in the middle of his third book, "to retrace my footsteps, and to take away from belligerents what I have seemed to grant to them, but have not granted to them." We miss in Gentilis chapters like those, in which Grotius treats of the "temperamentum belli circa res captas," and of the "temperamentum circa acquisitionem imperii," but we must remember, that a generation of men had intervened since Gentilis wrote, and the contempor

* Legenda mihi retro vestigia et eripienda bellum gerentibus pene omnia, quæ largitus videri possum, nec tamen largitus sum. L. iii., cap. x.

aries of Grotius were disposed to welcome with avidity the application of restraints to the usages of warfare, the necessity for which had been brought home to their convictions by a protracted experience of the miseries occasioned by them.

We have touched, briefly, on a few salient topics in the treatise of Gentilis, to enable our readers, who may not be familiar with his writings, to form some idea of the value of the work, which the English Committee has now rendered readily accessible to the student of International Law. Professor Holland has executed his task of editor with admirable care, and has verified, with what must have been painful diligence, the numerous references, which Gentilis has made to other writers in many cases without citing the titles and chapters of their works. These deficiencies Professor Holland has supplied. The text has been printed after the edition published at Hanover in 1598, and from a copy preserved in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, which was a gift from the author himself to John Selden, who has inserted in it the words " Alberici munusculum," and his usual Greek motto περὶ παντὸς τὴν ἐλευθεριαν. The editor has also prefixed to the work an interesting sketch of the life of Gentilis, and of the circumstances under which the Commentationes De Jure Belli, and the subsequent and more complete work, the "Libri Tres," were composed. There is, however, a phrase to be found in the preface, which we fear may excite controversy,* unless the language of the learned editor in his inaugural lecture is borne in mind.† He classes Grotius amongst the imitators of Gentilis, the most illustrious indeed amongst them, but still, an imitator :‡ -clarissimus ille inter Alberici imitatores Hugo Grotius.

* The ashes of such a controversy are still smouldering in the Netherlands. See a notice of them from the able pen of M. G. Rolin-Jaequemyns in La Revue de Droit International, 1876-1877, p. 690.

I am by no means concerned to place Gentilis on a level with his unde. niably greater follower, or to say that his writings do not exhibit in some degree the faults, with which they are charged.-Inaugural Lecture, p. 85.

"O Imitatores, servum pecus." Horatii Epist. Lib i., Ep. xix., 1. 19.