lightly also of Duties and Obligations; and the State will be dissolved by the destruction of all the ties which bind its members to it. Or else, such Oaths will be looked upon as a sinful profanation of true Religion; religious men will refuse to take them, and will give all their efforts to the support of their own Religious Association, which is opposed to the Religion of the State; and thus the actions of such men will tend to destroy the Religion of the State, and perhaps the State itself. It may, indeed happen, as we have just said, that there are several rival Religions in the State; and in this case, there are especial difficulties in employing Oaths for the purposes of the State, and in keeping up the religi ous convictions which give Oaths their force. In this case, if all the Religions allow that obedience to the Civil Authorities is a religious Duty, Oaths may still be employed, to promote the lower aim of the State, its own preservation; but the higher aim of the State, the moral and intellectual culture of its members, will necessarily be pursued under great disadvantages; for the moral and intellectual culture of men cannot be prosecuted without employing Religion; and Religion can be employed for such purposes, only by accepting it as true. The State therefore cannot employ, for its higher purposes, Religions which contradict each other; and in such a case as we have spoken of, the State may be prevented from pursuing its higher purposes at all; or may be much impeded in doing so. But even in such cases, the State has those Duties which all the rival Religions agree in recognizing; and has, besides, the Duty of promoting moral and intellectual culture, in conjunction with the true Religion, as far as circumstances perm.

996. Thus, in all cases, States have Duties. The Duties of States may be arranged under the same heads which we have already had before us.

Besides the Duties of Order, by which, especially, the State is the State, there are Duties of Justice, Truth, Humanity, Purity; and there is also the higher and more comprehensive Duty of moral and intellectual Self-culture. The State obtains moral and intellectual Culture for itself, by obtaining it for its members. And thus, the highest and most comprehensive Duty of the State is the moral and intellectual Education of its members. This Duty, as belonging to the State, modifies, in an especial manner, its other Duties; and must be considered in conjunction with all of them, as we shall have occasion

to see.

CHAPTER XI.

DUTIES OF THE STATE-JUSTICE AND TRUTH.

997. THE Duties of Justice and Truth, as be. longing to States, point out the same course of action which they point out for individuals: they direct the State to abstain from infringing the Property or Rights of other States; to pay its Debts; to observe its Treaties; and the like. In these instances, the Duties have analogy with the Legal Obligations, rather than with the Moral Duties of individuals; and accordingly, these Duties are the subject of an especial branch of Law or Jus; which we may term International Law, or International Jus, and which we shall treat of afterwards.

998. But the Duties of Justice and Truth, as belonging to the State, have also their Sphere of Action within the State; they require, for instance, that both the Laws, and the Administration of the Laws, be conformable to Justice and Truth. We have already stated (393) a general Maxim of

Justice, which applies especially to Legislation : namely, that Justice requires us to aim

con

stantly to remedy the inequalities which History produces. And this maxim applies to all the matters with which Law deals; to personal Rights, to Property, to Education. In these matters, Justice does not require Equality. Any Attempt to establish Equality would tend to destroy all Property, all Law, and all Right; for if Rights be permanent, their permanent subsistence will produce Inequality. But Justice aims constantly to remedy Inequality. Hence Laws should aim continually to enrich the poor, to strengthen the weak, to elevate the low, to instruct the ignorant. But they should do this, in such a manner, as not to shake at all the permanence of Rights. They should enable the poor to enrich themselves, the low to' rise, the ignorant to learn, by the use of their own Rights, and without trespassing upon the Rights of any other Class. Just Laws will not transfer Property from one Class to another, merely in order to restore equality. Just laws will not direct the poorest to be educated in the same degree as the richest. But Just Laws will not allow a condition of the community, in which any Class is condemned to a degradation, or poverty, or ignorance, from which they cannot escape. Just Laws will provide openings for the rise of the lower ranks into the place of the higher, as soon as they become fit for such a rise; and will assist such an event, by promoting, among the higher ranks also, such views as will make them regard this event, not as an evil, but as a good.

999. The regard of the State for the Duty of Truth will be shown both by the simplicity and sincerity of its own proceedings, and by its encouraging and promoting this Duty in individuals. For instances of the former kind, we may take the abolition of legal fictions and the removal of forced constres.

tions of old laws by means of improved laws. Such steps make the language spoken by the State more true. Yet in the case of States, much more than in the case of individuals, we must take account of the Conventions (394) by which words, phrases, and processes, acquire a meaning different from their obvious meaning. This is more necessary in the case of States, because it is impossible for States to accommodate their language to each case, as individuals may do. States must act by stated forms of procedure and language, in which forms a complex multitude of interests are implied; and any alteration of the forms, since it will require a consideration of all these interests, and an agreement upon the alteration by the legislating bodies, cannot take place frequently and lightly, nor ought it to do so. Legal fictions, and forced constructions of the language of old laws, cannot be altogether avoided. They have existed in all countries in which laws have long subsisted; and to attempt to avoid them entirely, would be to make the legislator instantly conform to all changes, however capricious, of language and practice. Law Language, and Law Forms, must have an antiquated cast, for this reason; that they must have in them a principle of steadiness and permanence beyond our daily speech and common manners.

1000. The State promotes and inculcates the Duty of Truth in individuals, by requiring from them a punctual and faithful performance of Contracts and other engagements. Yet here also, the consideration of other Duties comes in; and limits, in some degree, the extent to which the State insists upon the performance of Engagements. We have seen that the Roman Law did not compel the performance of a nudum pactum, a mere promise made for no reasonable consideration; and that the English Law takes the same course. The Law will not, for instance, sanction or enforce an engagement to win and lose

money according to the events of a game of chance. To insist upon the performance of such engagements, would be to encourage a reckless spirit, which loves to depend upon casual superiority, or upon mere accident, rather than on rational foresight and selfguidance. The State, in such cases, teaches its citizens that Property is a Trust of more value than the Veracity of such rash and reckless promisers. The State, in doing this, does not slight the Duty of Truth; on the contrary, it sometimes condemns the whole proceeding, by making such Gambling a crime. Besides; such engagements are so frequently and so naturally connected with Fraud, as well as Folly, that Honesty, as well as the rational use of Property, would be damaged by the legal recognition of such Engagements.

1001. In another kind of Engagements, Promises of Marriage, the Law teaches the Duty of Truth, by punishing the violation of the Promise; and sometimes, even when it has not been made in express words, but only implied in the general course of the language used between the parties. And though, here also, there may be room for Mistake or Delusion; to punish the Levity or Duplicity which can trifle with so serious a matter, is a moral lesson which it becomes the State to give.

CHAPTER XII.

DUTIES OF THE STATE-HUMANITY

1002. THE Duty of Justice on the part of the State is universally allowed that the State has a Duty of Humanity, is perhaps not so generally under. stood. But we have seen (508 and 514), in speak.