thority of the parents arises from their duty to provide for the child and to take care of it whilst it is unable to govern and direct itself; this authority therefore must necessarily cease, when the duty ceases upon which it is founded; after the child is able to think and to judge for itself, it is no longer the duty of the parents to think and to judge for it; and consequently the will of the child is no longer under the absolute control of their will.

However, in this part of its life they have a demand upon it of gratitude, esteem and reverence; it is still bound to honour them, by showing them all marks of respect, and more particularly by paying a deference to their advice and direction; for as they, from their longer experience, are more likely to judge rightly than the child is; so their former care of it may convince it, that they are disposed to contrive for its welfare. But notwithstanding the child owes them this duty of honour, they have not, as its parents, such authority over it as will make void any acts which it does without their consent, or even against their commands; because the obligations to these duties are of the imperfect sort; the person who transgresses them does not use his liberty agreeably to the law of nature, but the law does not suppose him void of such a power of acting, as is sufficient to give a validity to what he does. If a man's parents have any more authority over him than what has been described, it is an authority which arises from his own consent, as a member of that family or community wherein he continues, and of which his parents are the head.

Honour due to pa- VI. In the third part of childhood, when the child rents in the third has not only arrived at maturity of judgment, but has part of childhood. either joined itself to another family, or is become the head of a family of its own, the obligations of gratitude, deference and esteem still continue, as long as its parents live; for the reasons, upon which these duties are founded, are perpetual. But as in the second part of childhood, so much more in this, no acts of the child, however wrong they may be for want of the parents' consent, will upon that account be invalid.

it.

Variations in paVII. Grotius allows that these variations which we rental authority have been mentioning are incidental to parental authority. show the origin of And such variations are easily accounted for, provided this authority arises immediately from the duty of the parents, and remotely only from generation; because as the duty of the parents, in the first part of childhood, is different from their duty in the second and third part of it, an authority arising from that duty and depending upon it, will naturally vary with the duty. Whereas, upon his own principle, that generation is the immediate cause of parental authority, it will be difficult to find out any reasons upon which these variations can be explained; because a relation, which arises from a personal act of the parents, cannot be changed, and consequently an authority which depends upon this relation as its immediate cause, must be uniform or continue always the same, as long as the person continues, from whose act the relation arose.

Natural minority, VIII. The law of nature cannot be supposed to fix any precise age at which the absolute authority of pa

what.

Grot. Lib. II. Cap. V. § VI.

† Ibid. Lib. II. Cap. XI. § V.

rents shall in all cases cease, and all persons universally shall be looked upon to be capable of acting for themselves. Persons are then arrived at maturity, when they come to the use of their reason. But this happens at different times of life in different countries: in some climates the mind ripens faster and attains to the use of reason sooner than it does in others. In the same country, too, it happens at different times of life to different persons; all who live in the same climate, do not come to maturity of judgment at the same age. No particular person, therefore, can be said naturally to have arrived at years of discretion, or to be capable of acting for himself, till we have observed how that particular person behaves in common life; when he shows by his behaviour that he has the use of his reason, then, and not till then, he is past his natural minority.

Civil laws do, indeed, usually fix some certain age as the limit of minority for all the subjects. But if these laws are intended to copy nature as nearly as general rules can copy it, in a point where there is naturally so much uncertainty, a different age must be fixed in different climates. Nor can the properest time be settled in the same climate till long experience and many observations have shown at what age the judgment of men in that climate is usually ripe. And since in the same elimate some few arrive at the use of reason much sooner, and some few are much longer before they arrive at it, than the generality of the inhabitants, the laws of each country will copy nature the closest, if they fix the limit of minority neither at the earliest nor at the latest age, when any person has ever been known to arrive at maturity of judg ment, but at the middle age between those extremes, at the age when the generality have been found to arrive at it. Extraordinary instances are not the proper measure of nature; they are not the standards whereby to fix a general rule, but are rather to be looked upon as exceptions from such a rule.

IX. The authority which parents have over their what right of punchildren, implies a power to punish or correct them, as ishment included far as such a power is necessary for obtaining the end in parental autho which that authority has in view. Since it is the duty rity.

of the parents to contrive for the good of the child, and to direct it to what is best for it, whilst it is incapable of judging and choosing for itself; as far as this end cannot be obtained without correction, they have a right to punish it, because nature cannot be supposed to enjoin an end, such for instance as the good of the child, to be pursued, without allowing such correction as is necessary for obtaining that end. But then the end, which is the good of the child, limits the right of punishing; the parents cannot upon this principle have a right to inflict any punishment but what is for the child's benefit.

From hence it follows, that the power of a parent to correct his children does not extend to the inflicting any capital punishment, because the child's good cannot be the end proposed in taking away the child's life; nor can such a punishment be in any manner consistent with the parents duty to take care of it, to bring it up, and to contrive for its benefit. Wherever parents have had any right of punishing more extensive than what has been described, in the second or third parts of

* Grot. Lib. II. Cap. V. § VI.

childhood, this right must have been derived from some other principle, and is no part of parental authority.

We may observe by the way, that as the power of parents to punish their children is limited to correction for their good during their minority, no fault of a child can justify the parents if they disinherit it so far as to deprive it of sustenance, where it is under age and unable to provide for itself; because such a disherison would in effect be a capital punishment, as it would leave the child to starve. After it is come to such an age as to be able to provide for itself, the faults which it commits may justify a disherison of this sort; not because the parent has then any more right to inflict a capital punishment than he had before, but because he is then released from the duty of maintaining the child, and may dispose of his own goods in any proper manner that he pleases. The law of nature X. *Where parents from the birth of the child, or at may in some cases any time afterwards, whilst it is under their authority, allow parents to are unable to subsist it, there seems to be no reason sell their children. against their selling it to any one who will undertake the expense and trouble of bringing it up. For nature, if it has prescribed to parents the duty of providing for the subsistence of their children, cannot disable them from making use of the only means that they have in their power of discharging this duty. Grotius, consistently with his own account of the origin of parental authority, maintains that the relation or habitude of a parent, which arises from the act whereby the parents become the authors of the child's existence, can no more be separated from the person of the parent than the personal act itself can. Yet in the mean time he contends that the child may be sold, in order to make a provision for it, when the parents themselves are unable to subsist it. But upon his principles, such a sale would be unintelligible; for unless the purchaser acquires at least the authority of the parents over the child so purchased, nothing is done by it; and it is impossible for him to acquire this or any other degree of authority, if this authority arises from a personal act of the parents, or from a relation depending upon that act, which is in its own nature inseparable from their persons. But upon the principles here laid down, the purchaser, by undertaking the duty of the parent, so far at least as to maintain the child, acquires with it the parental authority. The usual event of such a sale is the slavery of the child; which event neither is nor can be brought about by the sole act of the parent, unless some other accident intervenes. By what accident this event is brought about will hereafter be the subject of a more particular inquiry.

Adoption is differ- XI. In like manner, when a child is adopted, so that ent from purchase. the parent who adopts it does by his own voluntary act take it for his own, or engage for the care of it, he does by this act, with the consent of the natural parent, acquire a parental authority over it; for this authority goes along with parental duty, and is inseparable from it.

I have not supposed the child's consent to be necessary in adoption; because, if it is under age, its consent is included in the consent of its parents. But if it is of such an age as to have reason and a will of its own, the consent of the party adopted is necessary, and adoption cannot proceed upon the sole act of the parents.

* Grotius, Lib. II. Cap. V. § V.

It may perhaps be asked, if the consent of the parents includes that of the child in case of adoption, why might not parents upon the same principle sell their children into direct slavery, or why is any thing else necessary to make the child a slave, besides the consent of the parents, when they sell it. The difference of these two cases will readily appear, if we consider that the parents' authority over the child arises from his duty to provide for its good; and consequently, where the good of the child is not the end proposed, this authority is nothing. Now adoption is for the child's benefit, and upon that account the act of the parent is binding upon it. But if the child should be supposed to receive any benefit by slavery, which scarce can be supposed, yet this benefit is not the end designed by slavery; the good of the master is the principal point in view; the good of the slave is merely accidental.

CHAPTER XII.

OF PROMISES.

1. What obligations arise from declaring our future intentions.-II. Promises, what.-III. Promises of giving, the same in effect as promises of doing.-IV. Promises always relate to future time.-V. Promises do not affect the heirs of the promiser.-VI. No obligation from promises where there is no liberty.-VII. No promise obliges to an impossibility.-VIII. Unlawful promises not binding.—IX. A subsequent promise cannot bind, where it is contrary to a former promise.-X. Obligation of a promise may be in suspense.-XI. Promises not to be evaded by a supposed tacit condition of circumstances continuing the same.-XII. Promises of infants, ideots, and madmen do not bind.-XIII. Rash promises, in what sense binding.—XIV. Promises become binding by acceptance.-XV. Signs of consent in promises and acceptance.-XVI. Fear makes a promise void in some instances, not in others.-XVII. Erroneous promises, how made void.-XVIII. A man's agent may promise for him.-XIX. Voluntary agent does not oblige.-XX. What promises may, and what may not be recalled when they pass through a third hand.XXI. Effects of acceptance by another, either with or without commission. XXII. A man's heirs cannot accept a promise for him.

I. THE rights which we acquire by promises or con- What obligations tracts or oaths, arise from the consent of those persons arise from declarover whom such rights are acquired. And as none of ing our future inour rights are more necessary to be rightly understood tentions.

than these, it will be worth our while to consider them at large.

We may do good to other men, either by our property or by our actions; that is, either by giving them such things, or by doing them such services as will be of use to them.

When we intend to do them any good hereafter, which we either do not choose to do, or have not an opportunity of doing at present, the

three ways which *Grotius mentions of expressing ourselves concerning such future intention, may be reduced to two.

First, we may merely declare what our present intentions are, by saying, that we design to give them such or such things, or that we design to do them such or such services. Here, says Grotius, all that is required to justify our declarations of this sort, is, that we speak the truth, or that, at the time of making the declaration, we have the same intentions which our words express. For the mind of man, as our author goes on, has not only a natural power, but a right likewise to change its design. But he ought to have added, unless it is under an obligation to continue in the same design. Now such a declaration as we have been speaking of, made in my favour, does not indeed give me a perfect right over the person of him who made it, or over the thing which he designs to give me; and consequently it does not lay him under a perfect obligation either of doing me the service or of giving me the thing: but yet it lays him under such an obligation as a wise or a good man will attend to. A wise man would not willingly lay himself open to the charge of levity of forming his designs by chance, and altering them again without reason. And unless the motives which engage him to change his designs are notorious and weighty, he cannot easily escape this charge, if he does not act up to what he has declared. Besides, we are apt to alter our schemes of life, to bring the expected profit or service into our plan of happiness, and to live as if we were to receive it. A disappointment therefore does not leave us in the same condition that we should have been in, if no such hopes had been raised: our pursuits will have been changed by them; and we shall perhaps have lost sight of what might have been obtained, if we had continued to pursue it, and had not been called off to another scheme of happiness by these delusions. What is still worse, we may have been led to live more expensively, in expectation of having our fortunes bettered, or to engage in difficulties, out of which we cannot extricate ourselves, in hopes of such services as would have enabled us to surmount them. This may be said in some measure to be our own fault; we ought perhaps to look upon all future events as uncertain, and never to depend so much upon them as to be hurt if we are disappointed. But allowing this to be always the case, a good man would never, if he can avoid it, be even the innocent cause of hurt to others. However, in fact, it is not always so. There are many favours which a man is not capable of receiving without changing his way of life: what therefore is he to do, where he is made to expect such favours as these? It would be imprudent in him, if he did not qualify himself to receive them, when declarations are made that such favours are designed him: and if he does change his way of life, or his course of studies, in order to qualify himself for them, a disappointment robs him of other advantages, which he might have expected by going on in his former pursuits, or of advantages which he was sure of, if such false hopes had not been raised in him, as engaged him in expenses, that his fortunes, without the expected improvement in them, were not able to bear. A wise man, therefore, for his own sake, or out of regard to his own character, and a good man for the sake of others, or out of tenderness to their

* Grot. Lib. II. Cap. XI. § II, III, IV.