274 directly but without mentioning the sources. One can say that they distributed in small portions the knowledge they borrowed fromthe granaries of the great juriconsults. It is possible, however, through the study of these dissertations to sketch the structure and development of legal thought in seventeenth century Finland. According to the constitution and statutes of the university, the Professor of Jurisprudencewas required toteach and compareboth Swedish and Roman law. This simply meant that, in academic lectures and dissertations, Swedish lawwas presented within the systematic framework of Roman lawin its German-Dutch form. Lawwas conceived as a systemof different concentric spheres. Theinnermost and most valuable sphere was natural law, derived partly fromGod himself both through the Holy Bible and through the human conscience, and partly from the common idea of justice formed during centuries of human co-existence according to commonly accepted principles. The next sphere was that of Roman law, the most perfect legal systemcreated by man, which in a nearly sublime manner reflected the high principles of the innermost sphere. Last came the outermost sphere consisting of national laws, unfilled and unrefined, but each national in character and meant to serve all the subjects of respective ruler. Comparison between these national systems could be useful in the search for means of filling the gaps in the legislation of a country. As to the legal philosophy and its mainstreams during the seventeenth century, it deserves to be mentioned that the works and thought of Hugo Grotius were known in Finland from 1653 onward, when the lure hello ac pads was donated to the university library. However, not until the 1680’s were his works frequently quoted, but even then almost always in dissertations in the field of moral philosophy not of jurisprudence. Jurists discussed practical and logical problems of the positive Swedish law, while the moral philosophers compared divine lawand the formal logical conclusions drawn fromthe different existing legal customs of mankind. The orthodox Lutheran professors at Åbo held firmly to the high and fundamental priorityof divinelawin their theological and legal interpretation. As the archives of the Finnish Court of Appeal {Hovrätt) (founded 1623) have been repeatedly destroyed by fire, there is very little possibility of studying the legal thought of its judges.
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