there had never, in that cafe, been any fuch thing as government or political fociety, but each man, following his natural liberty, had lived in entire peace and harmony with all others. What need of pofitive law, where natural justice is, of itself, a sufficient restraint? Why create magiftrates, where there never arise any disorder or iniquity? Why abridge our native freedom, when, in every inftance, the utmost exertion of it is found innocent and beneficial? It is evident that, if government were totally useless, it never could have place, and that the SOLE foundation of the duty of ALLEGIANCE is the advantage which it procures to fociety, by preferving peace and order among mankind.

When a number of political focieties are erected, and maintain a great intercourfe together, a new set of rules are immediately discovered to be useful in that particular fituation; and accordingly take place under the title of LAWS of NATIONS. Of this kind are, the facrednefs of the perfons of ambaffadors, abstaining from poifoned arms, quarter in war, with others of that kind, which are plainly calculated for the advantage of states and kingdoms, in their intercourfe with each other.

The rules of juftice, fuch as prevail among individuals, are not entirely fufpended among political focieties. All princes pretend a regard to the rights of other princes; and fome, no doubt, without hypocrify. Alliances and treaties are every day made between independent ftates, which would only be so much waste of parchment, if they were not found by experience to have some influence and authority. But here is the difference between kingdoms and individuals: Human nature cannot, by any means, fubfift, without the affociation of individuals; and that affociation never could have place, were no regard paid to the laws of equity and juftice. Disorder, confufion, the war of all against all, are the neceffary confequences of fuch a licentious conduct.

But

But nations can fubfift without intercourfe. They may even fubfift, in fome degree, under a general war. The obfervance of justice, though useful among them, is not guarded by fo ftrong a neceffity as among individuals; and the moral obligation holds proportion with the usefulness. All politicians will allow, and moft philofophers, that REASONS of STATE may, in particular emergencies, difpenfe with the rules of justice, and invalidate any treaty or alliance, where the ftrict obfervance of it would be prejudicial, in a confiderable degree, to either of the contracting parties. But nothing less than the moft extreme neceffity, it is confeffed, can justify individuals in a breach of promife, or an invafion of the properties of others.

In a confederated commonwealth, fuch as the ACHEAN republic of old, or the Swiss Cantons and United Provinces in modern times; as the league has here a peculiar utility, the conditions of union have a peculiar facredness and authority; and a violation of them would be regarded as no less, or even as more criminal, than any private injury or injuftice.

The long and helpless infancy of man requires the combination of parents for the fubfiftence of their young; and that combination requires the virtue of CHASTITY or fidelity to the marriage-bed. Without fuch a utility, it will readily be owned, that fuch a virtue would never have been thought of*.

An infidelity of this nature is much more pernicious in women than in men. Hence the laws of chaftity are much stricter over the one fex than over the other.

Thefe rules have all a reference to generation; and yet women paft child-bearing are no more fuppofed to be exempted from them than thofe in the flower of their youth and beauty, General rules are often extended beyond the principle whence they

* See NOTE [X].

firft

firft arife; and in all matters of tafte and fentiment, It is a vulgar ftory at PARIS, that, during the rage of the MISSISSIPPI, a hump-backed fellow went every day into the RUE DE QUINCEMPOIX, where the ftockjobbers met in great crowds, and was well paid for allowing them to make ufe of his hump as a desk, in order to fign their contracts upon it. Would the fortune, which he raifed by this expedient, make him a handsome fellow; though it be confeffed, that perfonal beauty arifes very much from ideas of utility? The imagination is influenced by affociations of ideas; which, though they arise at first from the judgment, are not easily altered by every particular exception that occurs to us. To which we may add, in the prefent cafe of chastity, that the example of the old would be pernicious to the young; and that women, continually foreseeing that a certain time would bring them the liberty of indulgence, would naturally advance that period, and think more lightly of this whole duty, fo requifite to fociety.

Those who live in the fame family have fuch frequent opportunities of licence of this kind, that nothing could preserve purity of manners, were marriage allowed, among the nearest relations, or any intercourfe of love between them ratified by law and cuftom. INCEST, therefore, being pernicious in a fuperior degree, has alfo a fuperior turpitude and moral deformity annexed to it.

What is the reafon, why, by the ATHENIAN laws, one might marry a half-fifter by the father, but not by the mother? Plainly this: the manners of the ATHENIANS were fo referved, that a man was never permitted to approach the womens apartment, even in the fame family, unlefs where he vifited his own mother. His ftep-nther and her children were as much fhut up from him as the women of any other family, and there was as little danger of any crimi nal correfpondence between them. Uncles and nieces, for a like reafon, might marry at ATHENS; but neither thefe,

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thefe, nor half-bothers and fifters, could contract that alliance at ROME, where the intercourfe was more open between the fexes. Public utility is the cause of all these variations.

To repeat, to a man's prejudice, any thing that escaped him in private converfation, or to make any fuch use of his private letters, is highly blamed. The free and focial intercourfe of minds must be extremely checked, where no fuch rules of fidelity are established.

Even in repeating ftories, whence we can forefee no ill confequences to refult, the giving of one's author is regarded as a piece of indifcretion, if not of immorality. These ftories, in paffing from hand to hand, and receiving all the ufual variations, frequently come about to the perfons concerned, and produce animofities and quarrels among people,

whofe intentions are the most innocent and inoffenfive.

To pry into fecrets, to open or even read the letters of others, to play the fpy upon their words and looks and actions; what habits more inconvenient in fociety? What habits, of confequence, more blameable?

This principle is alfo the foundation of moft of the laws of good manners; a kind of leffer morality, calculated for the ease of company and conversation. Too much or too little ceremony are both blamed; and every thing which promotes ease without an indecent familiarity, is ufeful and laudable.

Conftancy in friendships, attachments, and familiarities, is commendable, and is requifite to fupport truft and good correfpondence in fociety. But in places of general though cafual concourse, where the purfuit of health and pleasure brings people promifcuously together, public conveniency has difpenfed with this maxim; and custom there promotes an unreserved conversation for the time, by indulging the privilege of dropping afterwards every indifferent acquaintance,

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acquaintance, without breach of civility or good

manners.

Even in focieties which are established on principles the most immoral, and the moft deftructive to the interests of the general fociety, there are required certain rules, which a fpecies of falfe honour, as well as private intereft, engages the members to obferve. Robbers and pirates, it has often been remarked, could not maintain their pernicious confederacy, did they not establish a new diftributive juftice among themselves, and recal thofe laws of equity which they have violated with the reft of mankind.

I hate a drinking companion, fays the GREEK proverb, who never forgets. The follies of the last debauch fhould be buried in eternal oblivion, in order to give full scope to the follies of the next.

Among nations, where an immoral gallantry, if covered with a thin veil of myftery, is, in fome degree, authorised by cuftom, there immediately arise a set of rules, calculated for the conveniency of that attachment. The famous court or parliament of love in PROVENCE formerly decided all difficult cafes of this nature.

In focieties for play, there are laws required for the conduct of the game; and these laws are different in each game. The foundation, I own, of fuch focieties is frivolous; and the laws are, in a great meafure, though not altogether, capricious and arbitrary. So far is there a material difference between them and the rules of juftice, fidelity, and loyalty. The general focieties of men are abfolutely requifite for the fubfiftence of the fpecies; and the public conveniency which regulates morals, is inviolably established in the nature of man, and of the world, in which he lives. The comparison, therefore, in these respects, is very imperfect. We may only learn from it the neceflity of rules, wherever men have any intercourse with each other.

They