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308 Marczali : Hungary
the present day, and afterwards tracing their connexion with the past, is as
old as the days of Blackstone and De Lolme, and has never been without its
exponents among publicists down to the days of Anson, Bryce, and Redlich.
Mr. Marriott, it is needless to say, is a well-informed writer ; but he
would appear occasionally
to be unaware of some of the most recent
discussions of medieval constitutional phenomena of quite minor impor-
tance, it is true, so far as the purpose of the present work is concerned.
It would be easy
to indicate numerous topics that have been omitted,
yet there is hardly any part of the substance actually incorporated that
could be expunged without loss to the educational value of the work. Mr.
Marriott, judged by this practical test, would seem to have shown good
judgment, on the whole, in the selection of material, if we accept some
350 pages as the desirable limits of a survey designed to include brevity as
one of its chief merits. The book offers an admirable introduction to a
subject of universal interest. WM. S. M'KECHNIE.
HUNGARY IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. By Henry Marczali. With
an Introductory Essay on the Earlier History of Hungary by Harold
W. V. Temperley, M.A. Pp. Ixiv, 378, with Map. Demy 8vo.
6d. nett.
Cambridge : University Press. 1910. 75.
THIS is the first Hungarian work of original research to be translated into
English. Its author, the distinguished professor of National History in the
University of Budapest, was invited by the Hungarian Academy of Science
to write a history
of Hungary in the time of Joseph IL, emperor of
Germany and king of Hungary 178090.
Maria Teresa had been prudent, conservative, and tactful. Her son was
a reformer, conscientious, indefatigable, eager for progress, filled with the
philosophical ideas of the eighteenth century, and determined to make all
his
subjects enlightened and happy without delay, and even against their
will. But in Hungary he did not succeed. Hungary was, as she still is, a
nation the one whole nation in the Hapsburg dominions. For eight
hundred years, in spite of the incursions and conquests of Turks, Russians,
Germans, and other neighbours, she had preserved her individuality and her
language with extraordinary tenacity. In the eighteenth century her
social order, her institutions, her ways of life, were still her own, and,
alone in Europe, still largely of the Middle Ages. With a prejudiced and
ignorant patriotism she stubbornly and successfully resisted change.
Joseph wished to centralise her institutions generally, to organise the
courts of justice,
to introduce the German language, to abolish serfdom, to
extend education, even to regulate dress worst of all, to revise the register
of property, to equalise taxes, and to reform the Church. Hungary's
resistance was passive, but inflexible. Her political system was full of
abuses, but it was her own. Her officials were robbers and kept the
people miserable ;
but she said, if they had been guilty of the seven deadly
sins, she elected them herself, and preferred them to angels from heaven
nominated by the Emperor. The local governors did not refuse to obey
His Majesty's orders j they put his letters away unopened.