MELCHIORE, an eminent Italian writer on political economy, was born at Teramo in the Abruzzi in 1744, and educated at Naples. His life and writings were dedicated to the improvement of the jurisprudence of his native country, and his labours were appreciated under all its dynasties. His first publication was rather moral than economic, being a curious and eloquent vindication of matrimony against the too prevalent customs of a loose age. It appeared in 1774. But from that time to 1795 his talents were devoted to the composition of several treatises, which being generally addressed to the king of Naples, and directed to the amelioration of the institutions of his country, were productive of great advantage to the state. This was especially the case with his Memorie sul Tribunale della Grazia e sulle Legge Economiche nelle Provincie confinate del Regno. To these Memorie the Neapolitans owe the abolition of the most vexatious and absurd restrictions on the sale and exportation of agricultural produce. A similar effect followed his two Memorie on kindred topics, devoted like their predecessors to the advocacy of free measures whenever they might safely be allowed to come into operation, and followed, as had been anticipated, with the best effects. These were published in the years 1787-88. Equally beneficial was the adoption of the principles developed in his Riflessioni sulla Vendita dei Feudi Decoluti, in 1790, and his Lettera al Duca di antatugo sui Feudi Decoluti, in 1795, which were so powerfully reasoned that a law was promulgated for the sale of all feudalties reverting to the crown as free estates.
His merits were recognized by Joseph Bonaparte during his short reign at Naples; and Melchiorre was made a councillor of state, and employed in the formation of the new judicial organization of Naples. He was employed in a similar manner under Murat; and when Ferdinand was restored in 1815, Delfico was made president of the commission of the archives; an office which he filled until 1823, when he tendered his resignation on account of his advanced age. His sovereign acknowledged his eminently patriotic services by the grant of a large pension for life. Soon after, he retired to his native town, where he died in 1835 at the advanced age of ninety-one.
Besides the works we have noticed, on which his Neapolitan fame may be said chiefly to rest, we owe to him several general works of no mean reputation, especially Ricerche sul vero Carattere della Giurisprudenza Romana, e di sue Cultore, 1750, and Pensieri sulla Storia, e sull' Incertezza ed Inutilità della Medesima, 1806. In this last he has anticipated the scepticism of Niebuhr on the early history of Rome, and disabused us on many of its fables; but he has fallen into the opposite extravagance, of denying to the Romans before the second Punic war all arts but that of agriculture, and making war on their neighbours.
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