the right of private war is only abridged, and is not wholly taken away; as will be shown in its proper place.

Our principal inquiries at present, are contained within a narrow compass: they are only these two; first, whether, in the liberty of nature, individuals may lawfully make war upon one another; and secondly, supposing such war to be lawful, who are the persons that may lawfully engage in it.

III. What has been proved already, concerning the War is naturally right of defence, the right of recovering reparation for lawful.

damages done, and the right of inflicting punishment, will serve to show, that an injury will justify men in making use of force, both before and after it is committed. An injury justifies the use of force, before it is committed, in order to guard against it: and it justifies a like use of force, after it is committed, in order, either to recover what is lost by it, or to hinder him, who has done it, from doing the like again. Now, the use of force is war: and, consequently, the law of nature, since it allows the use of force for any of these purposes, allows of war.

IV. Though the war, which we are now speaking Who may lawfully of, is the war of individuals against each other; yet the engage in making law of nature does not hinder any number of individu- war.

als from taking part in it. The person, whose interest is immediately concerned, either to defend himself and his property, or to recover reparation of damages, or to inflict punishment, is not the only person who may lawfully make use of force for his own security. This has been proved already in the instance of inflicting punishment. For, as the right of doing this, belongs, promiscuously, to all who may suffer by the criminal, if he is not restrained; any number of persons, where any one, or some few of them, have not force sufficient to inflict the punishment, may join their force together for this purpose: what is lawful to each of them separately, is equally lawful to all of them, when they are thus united. In respect, likewise, of defence or of reparation, though it is more particularly the interest of him, who is in danger of suffering, or who actually has suffered, to guard against the injury, in one case, or to enforce the demand of reparation in the other case; yet, where he is engaged in such a lawful act, as either that of defending himself, or that of recovering damages, no rule of justice can forbid or restrain others from giving him their assistance. Nay, where his sufferings are likely to be very great, or have been very great already, and his own abilities, either to ward off the evil which threatens him, or to redress it, after it is over, are but small; benevolence would rather persuade those, who have an opportunity of being serviceable to him, not to refuse or withhold what help they are able to give him. From hence it appears, that war is lawful to two sorts of persons; either to him, whose interest is immediately concerned, or to them, who voluntarily give him assistance.

But there is still a third sort, concerning whom, it may be inquired, how far they may lawfully engage in a war: and these are such as have no interest in the occasion of it, and, if they were left to choose for themselves, would take no part in it; but being under the authority of him, whose interest is immediately concerned, they are commanded † Grot. Ibid. Cap. V.

Grot. Lib. I. Cap. II. § I.

by him to give their assistance. The case of such persons as these, will come more particularly under our consideration in the second part of this work, when we are to inquire into the effect of civil jurisdiction upon our natural rights. Only we may here observe, by the way, that as a son, who continues in his father's family, or a servant, who has bound himself by agreement for this purpose, is obliged to obey the lawful commands of the father or the master; the consequence is, that when such father or master undertakes a lawful war, the son or the servant may lawfully assist him, and are, indeed, obliged to assist him, if he commands them.

CHAPTER XX.

OF SLAVERY.

I. Perfect despotism and perfect slavery, what.-II. Difference between despotism and parental power.-III. No man is naturally a slave.IV. Causes of slavery.-V. Limitations of despotism.-VI. Slavery, how the consequence of just war.-VII. Children of slaves, why they follow the condition of their mother.

Perfect despotism I. *GROTIUS, in defining perfect slavery, calls it an and perfect slave- obligation to give all our labour for a supply of the bare

ry, what.

necessaries of life.

But the common notion of perfect slavery does not seem to be fully expressed in this definition of it. We usually understand the master or owner to have, not only a right to direct such actions of the slave as may properly be called labour, but a right, likewise, to direct all his other actions. And from this right to direct all the actions of the slave, there arises a right by gift or sale, to dispose of the slave's person; that is, to transfer the power over him. For the slave being supposed under the absolute authority and direction of his master, must, in consequence, be obliged to submit to the authority and direction of another, whenever his present master is pleased to order that it shall

be so.

Difference be

er.

. Perfect despotism seems, therefore, in the common notion of it, to be an alienable right to direct all the actions of another. And, consequently, perfect slavery is an obligation to submit to be thus directed. II. The different ends to which the power of a mastween despotism ter and the power of a parent are directed, will suffiand parental pow- ciently distinguish them from one another: though both of them are absolute; and though one of them extends to all the actions of the child, as the other extends to all the actions of the slave. The good of the child is the end, to which the authority of the parent over the child is directed: and the good of the master is the end, to which the authority of the master, over the slave, is directed. The parent has no right to command the child, but in view to the benefit of the child itself: the master has a right to command the

* Grot. Lib. II. Cap. V. § XXVII.

slave to do such actions, as are for the master's benefit: so that however the slave may find his account in obeying his master's commands, this is merely accidental; since the master's right to give these commands, has another purpose principally in view.

But though the master's power is not directed to the same end, and, consequently, is not tempered by the same limitations with parental authority, yet it is subject to several other limitations. We shall best understand what these limitations are, after we have considered the original of the master's power and the slave's subjection.

III. Though it may be possible for a man to be a slave No man is natufrom his birth, yet no man is naturally a slave. They rally a slave. who are slaves from their birth, must have been made such by some accident, which happened before they were born; slavery is by no means their natural condition. Nature has, indeed, made a difference between the parts and capacities of mankind: some are better able to judge for themselves, and to pursue their own good, than others: but, though this difference of parts and capacities may have made it more convenient for some to be directed, and for others to direct; yet it cannot possibly be looked upon as a sufficient reason, why the former should be slaves, and the latter be their absolute masters. Those, who stand in need of the direction of other men, and are willing to have recourse to such direction, stand in need of it for their own benefit, and are led to have recourse to it by the hopes of advancing that benefit. But slavery is an obligation upon a man to be directed in his actions, in view to their benefit, who direct him: it cannot, therefore, be founded in that difference of parts or abilities, which makes it convenient for him to have recourse to their direction, in view to his own benefit.

As men are naturally endowed with different degrees of understanding and judgment, so are they, likewise, naturally possessed of such different degrees of bodily strength, as will make it possible for one man, who is stronger, to subdue another, who is weaker, and force him to obedience. But whatever superiority in bodily strength we may be born to, though it gives us the physical power, it does not give us the right of compelling another to obey us. The weak man's mind and his body, and, consequently, all the faculties of his mind, such as his judgment and his will, and, likewise, all the powers of his body," are as much his own, as if nature had given him greater strength, and enabled him to make a more effectual struggle in his own defence. We cannot, therefore, claim a right to dictate to him; nor can we act as if we had a right of forcing him, against his inclination, to pursue our interest in such manner as we shall direct, without doing him an injury, without doing violence to that judgment and will of his mind, and to those active powers of his body, which nature has made his own. Children are born in a natural subjection to their parents. But this subjection has been shown already to be, in its own nature, very different from slavery. And as it is distinguished from slavery by its nature, so, likewise, it is by its duration. The master's power over the slave is perpetual: the parent's authority over the child ceases, when the child is able to think and to act for itself.

But if neither superior understanding, nor superior strength, nor parental authority, is a natural foundation of despotism; we may safely

conclude, that no man is naturally a slave: for there does not appear any other condition of human nature, which can possibly be imagined to give one man such an absolute right over another, as is implied in the notion of despotism.

We may form a general argument to show, that nature gives no man a just title to despotism, upon the principles already made use of to show, that no just title to it can arise from a superiority in bodily strength. If nature has made any thing a man's own, his mind and his body are so. At least, it is evident, that whatever right one man has in his mind and body, another man must have the same right in his; that is, as far as we can judge from any appearance in nature, each man has an equal right in his own mind and body respectively. But no man's mind and body can be his own, unless the faculties of both, that is, his judgment, his will, and his powers of acting are so. Now he, who has a right in his faculties of judging, of choosing and of acting, is no slave. And since nature, which gave every man a right in his own mind and body, gave him a right likewise to these faculties; the consequence is, that nature has not placed any man in a state of slavery.

Causes of slavery. IV. But slavery, though it is not the natural state of any man, may be introduced consistently with the law of nature. First, a man may come into a state of slavery through the act of his parents. The law of nature obliges the parents to maintain their child. But it is possible for them to be in so low a condition, as to be absolutely unable to discharge this duty in their own persons, and to be under a necessity either of suffering the child to perish, or of procuring some other person to discharge it for them. In these circumstances, if civil laws had made no better provision, the law of nature seems to allow them rather to put the child into the hands of any one, who would, upon his own terms, undertake to preserve its life, than to suffer it to perish for want of common necessaries. Nature, indeed, gave the parents authority over the child, in view to the child's benefit: and he, who undertakes to maintain it and bring it up, upon condition of its being his slave, has his own benefit principally in view. It may, therefore, well be asked, whether the parents have authority to dispose of the child upon these terms. To this, it may be answered, that the parents, through want and infirmity, being under a necessity of leaving their child to starve, or of accepting these conditions, provide for its benefit, as well as they can, by delivering it up to any person who will undertake to subsist it, even upon the condition of its being bound to act for his benefit, as long as it lives. There may, however, be a farther question, how it is possible for the temporary right of the parent over the child, to produce a perpetual right in the master over it as a slave. And, undoubtedly, if there was no other cause of the master's power besides the parent's act, the slavery of the child would cease, when it comes to years of discretion. As the authority of the parent ceases at that age, the power of the master, if it was derived solely from that authority, could subsist no longer. But the master undertakes, from the first, to maintain the child, in view to his own benefit; and, consequently, its maintenance is not to be considered as a bounty bestowed upon it by the master. If then he does not give the child its maintenance, the child must be his debtor for such main

tenance: and, upon account of this debt, he claims a right to direct its future actions for his own benefit. Nor will the labour of the child, after it is grown up, discharge this debt, so as to redeem it from slavery: because its future labour will be due to its master for its future subsistence: and the original debt will, upon this account, still remain unsatisfied. This original debt may, indeed, be greater than what arises from barely maintaining the child, whilst it was unable to work: for, as the parents, though they were under a necessity of disposing of their child to some one, were at liberty to dispose of it to whom they pleased; the master may have given them money to engage them to let him have the child, rather than any other person. And whatever he has thus paid to the parents is to be placed to the child's account, and becomes a part of the debt which it owes to the master.

We may observe, by the way, that when we speak of parents selling their child into slavery, nothing more can be meant by it, than that the purchaser, as we call him, gives the parents some valuable consideration to engage them to let him, rather than any other person, acquire a right to the service of the child, by maintaining it in its infancy, whilst it is unable to earn its own living. For, certainly, as the child is not a slave to its parents, they can have no immediate right of making it a slave to any one else: nor can they, properly speaking, so sell it, as that the purchaser shall immediately by their act acquire a right to direct all the actions of the child for his own benefit. Secondly, slavery may arise from a man's own consent.

As the law of nature allows him to give another a temporary right to direct him in some of his actions by contract or agreement; so it will be difficult, if not impossible, to prove, that the same law does not allow him to make this right perpetual, and to extend it to all his actions. It is not very material to inquire whether any person has ever consented thus to part with his liberty: we are rather concerned to know what may be done of right, than what has been done in fact. And as every right which a man is possessed of, may be alienated, if no law forbids him to alienate it; we may venture to conclude, that his liberty is alienable in whole as well as in part, unless some law of nature could be produced, which, though it allows him, in numberless instances, to let out his service for hire, yet forbids him to make a slave of himself. It may, perhaps, be urged, that despotism implies a right to dispose of the life of the slave at pleasure, and to compel him to do such actions as the law of nature forbids; and that consequently, as no man has a right to dispose of his own life, or to do what is unlawful, he cannot give any one else such an authority over him, as is implied in the notion of despotism. But the ready way of answering this objection is to deny the first principle that it proceeds upon. Despotism does not imply a right either to dispose of the slave's life at pleasure, or to compel him to do what the law of nature forbids. And the reason why it does not imply such a right, is the same which the objectors here give: no man is at liberty to dispose of his own life at pleasure, or to act contrary to the law of nature; and consequently no man can put his life into the arbitrary disposal of any one else, or subject himself to be compelled to do what the law of nature forbids. But though a man cannot alienate a liberty which he has not, it does not follow, that he cannot alienate a liberty which he has. And he who has alienated all the liberty which