M. Melon have furnished me, and a scant few sentences are left to me in this article, and even those are drawn from a work that one can find praised in the Journal de Trevoux, Feb. 1746.26 Despite these authorities, I would not be surprised
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if it were to find critics and opponents. But it might also happen that, just as at the Council of Trent, it was (it is said) the young ecclesiastics who most doggedly rejected the proposal for priestly marriage, it may be those among the celibate who most need women, and who have least read the authors I have just cited, who will criticize their principles most openly.
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For other entries on early manufacturing, see INDUSTRY, INNOVATION, INVENTION, and MASTERSHIPS, below.
*MASTERPIECE (Arts, Crafts), one of the most difficult works in a profession, executed by candidates wishing to join a guild or corporation, after completing a period as an apprentice and journeyman, according to the rules of the guild. Each corporation has its own masterpiece, which is carried out in the presence of doyens, syndics, senior members, and other officers and dignitaries of the corporation. It is presented to the guild’s members, who examine it before it is registered. Some corporations allow the aspiring master craftsman to choose between several different masterpieces, while others ask for more than one. See the rules of these corporations concerning the prevailing norm for the reception of master craftsmen. The masterpiece in architecture is a classic exercise, such as designing a slanting arch, the top and sides of which hold up a cylindrical ceiling; the carpenters’ masterpiece is a curved stair stringer; silk weavers, whether to be received as companions or as masters, must restore a loom to its working order, after the masters and syndics have brought about whatever changes to it they see fit, as, for example, untying the strings or breaking the threads of the
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chain at irregular intervals. It is hard to see the utility of the masterpiece. If the candidate can do his job well, then it is a waste of time examining him. If he cannot do his job well, then it should not stop him from joining a corporation, since he will only be harming himself. A reputation as a bad worker will soon force him to give up a job in which he will inevitably face ruin if he finds no work. To be convinced of the truth of these remarks, one needs only know a little of what happens at examinations. Nobody can be a candidate who has not passed through the preliminaries, and it is impossible for anyone not to have learned something of the trade in the four or five years that the preliminaries last. If the candidate is the master’s son, he is generally exempted from doing a masterpiece. Everyone else, even the town’s most skillful workers, will find it hard to produce a masterpiece that is acceptable to the guild, if ever they are disliked by the guild.1 If they are liked, on the other hand, or if they have money, even if they know nothing whatsoever about the job, then they can either bribe the people supervising them during the execution of the masterpiece, carry out a poor piece of work that will be received as a masterpiece or present an excellent piece of work done by someone else. It is clear that such practices do away with any advantages that can be claimed for the masterpiece or for guilds, and yet guilds and corporate bodies for manufacturing continue to exist all the same.
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Citizen †
*CITIZEN (Ancient and modern history, Public law) is someone who is a member of a free association1 of many families, who shares in the rights of this association, and who benefits from its liberties.2 See SOCIÉTÉ [Society or Association], CITÉ [City], VILLE FRANCHE [Free Town], FRANCHISES [Liberties]. Someone who resides in such a society for certain business, and who has to go away after his business is done is not a citizen of this society; he is only a temporary subject. Someone who makes it his usual abode, but who plays no role in these rights and liberties, is also not a citizen. Someone who has been divested of these rights and liberties has ceased to be a citizen. Strictly speaking, one only accords this title to women, young children, and servants as family members of a citizen, but they are not truly citizens.
One may identify two types of citizens, the originary and the naturalized. The originary are those who are born citizens. The naturalized are those to whom society allows participation in these rights and liberties, even though they were not born among them.
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The Athenians were very cautious about according the title of citizen of their city to foreigners; they invested much more dignity in this than did the Romans. With them, the title of citizen never came to be held in contempt; but from their high opinion of it, they have not reaped what is perhaps its greatest benefit, namely, that of growing by means of all those who have aspired to it. There were not many citizens in Athens who were not born to parents who were citizens. When a young man had reached the age of twenty, he was registered in the ληξιαρχικον γραμματειον;3 the state counted him among its members. In an adoption ceremony, they made him recite, while facing the sky, the following oath: Arma non dehonestabo; nec adstantem, quisquis ille fuerit, socium relinquam; pugnabo quoque pro focis et aris, solus et cum multis; patriam nec turbabo, nec prodam; navigabo contrà quamcumque destinatus fuero regionem; solemnitates perpetuas observabo; receptis consuetudinibus parebo, et quascumque adhuc populus prudenter statuerit, amplectar; et si quis leges susceptas sustulerit, nisi comprobaverit, non permittam; tuebor denique, solus et cum reliquis omnibus, atque patria sacra colam. Dii Cognitores, Agrauli, Enyalius, Mars, Jupiter, Floreo, Augesco duci. Plut. In peric.4 Notice a prudenter [a prudent man] who, in abandoning judgment on the new laws to each individual, was capable of causing much trouble. Otherwise, this oath is very noble and very wise.
One became a citizen of Athens, however, through adoption by a citizen, and through the consent of the people: but this benefit was not widespread.
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If one was not judged to be a citizen before twenty years of age, one was considered to no longer be one when advanced age prevented him from attending to public functions. It was the same for the exiles and the banished, unless they had become so through ostracism; those who had suffered that judgment were only sent away.
To constitute a true Roman citizen, three things were needed: to have one’s residence in Rome, to be a member of one of the thirty-five tribes, and to be able to attain the honors of the republic. Those who through concession but not birth possessed some of the rights of a citizen were strictly speaking only honorary. See CITÉ [City], JURISPRUDENCE.
When people say that there were more than four million Roman citizens in the
