Sir Isaiah Berlin, the twentieth-century British philosopher, concluded that Montesquieu’s impact remains all around us, pervasive yet often unseen, in the form of modern liberal democracy. Three hundred years ago, Berlin wrote, the French philosophe advocated constitutionalism, the preservation of civil liberties, the abolition of slavery; gradualism, moderation, peace, internationalism, social and economic progress with due respect to national and local tradition. He believed in justice and the rule of law; defended freedom of opinion and association; detested all forms of extremism and
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