SKRZETUSKI, Wincenty — THE POLITICAL RIGHTS OF THE POLISH NATION, Volume II, Published [1784]

SKRZETUSKI, Wincenty—THE POLITICAL RIGHTS OF THE POLISH NATION, Volume II

Part of the lower section of the title page is missing.[Printed by J. K. Mci and the Republic at the XX. Scholarum Piarum, 1784 ]. Dimensions: 16.5 x 11 cm; 470 pages. Half-leather binding (scuffs, cracks on the spine). Foxing, discoloration of the paper, and some soiling. The damage to the title page is visible in the photo.

The Polish Piarist Wincenty Skrzetuski, who lived from 1745 to 1791, was a renowned historian, lawyer, political writer, teacher, and translator during the Stanisław era. Skrzetuski’s most important work, published between 1782 and 1784,* *, was *The Political Law of the Polish Nation*. In it, the Piarist popularized the image of the political system and laws of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in effect prior to the Four-Year Sejm, advocating for the necessity of further political, social, and economic reforms in the noble-ruled state. Skrzetuski based his work in part on Gotfryd Lengnich’s scholarly treatise *Ius publicum Regni Poloniae*, which he supplemented with new constitutional provisions introduced in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth after 1764. The analysis of *The Political Law of the Polish Nation* presented in this dissertation allows us to conclude that it was a solid compendium of knowledge on the political system of the noble-ruled Republic of Poland, bearing in places the characteristics of a political treatise. In his textbook, used in schools under the jurisdiction of the Commission of National Education, Skrzetuski presented a broad spectrum of issues relating to the political, social, and economic systems, as well as the judicial system. Just as for Montesquieu, for the Polish Piarist, political law was the branch of law that regulated the system of government. According to Skrzetuski, political law comprised: the manner of exercising legislative, executive, and judicial power; public deliberations; the rights and obligations of all estates; the functioning of various bodies and offices; religion; the treasury; the military; trade; the population; as well as treaties and agreements with foreign states. The analysis of *The Political Law of the Polish Nation* presented in this dissertation allows us to conclude that the Piarist presented his own assessments and proposals for reform, which were often a continuation of the views and ideas of political writers who preceded him, foremost among them Stanisław Konarski. An analysis of Skrzetuski’s views allows us to grant him a prominent place among Polish political writers of the Stanisław era, particularly those active before the Great Sejm—the proponents, and even the drafters, of certain reforms. [description from Wincenty Skrzetuski’s study “The Political Law of the Polish Nation” by Wojciech Organiściak]