Which government did Baron Charles Montesquieu favor and praise the most What reasons did he give to support his argument?

Montesquieu admired England's john Locke -- the famous liberal and empiricist of a preceding generation. And he was influenced by Newton's physics and believed in a god that had made the laws that governed the physical world. But humanity, he believed had a free will and God did not direct human affairs. A god who directed people as if they were puppets, he believed, would not have produced human intelligence.

Montesquieu believed that where government was more liberal and where people thought independently, society would be less devoted to religious ritual and more devoted to morality. Pope Benedict XIV respected Montesquieu, but various bishops did not, and they placed on the Church's index of forbidden books Montesquieu's The Spirit of Laws, published in 1748. But independence of thought prevailed and the book was a success, going into 22 editions.