In other words, our philosopher propounds "sure," that is "absolute," principles which are, at once ethically and politically, sufficient rules of conduct, and that I understand to be the precise object of all who have followed in his track. It was said of the Genevese theorist, "Le genre humain avait perdu ses titres; Jean-Jacques les a retrouvés" (the human race had lost its title-deeds; Jean-Jacques found them again); just as his intellectual progeny declare that the nation ought to "resume" the landed property of which it has, unfortunately, lost the title-deeds.
We are now in a position to consider what the chief of these principles of the gospel according to Jean-Jacques are:
1. All men are born free, politically equal, and good, and in the "state of nature" remain so; consequently it is their natural right to be free, equal, and (presumably, their duty to be) good.[1]
2. All men being equal by natural right, none can have any right to encroach on another's equal right. Hence no man can appropriate any part of the common means of subsistence—that is to say, the land or anything which the land produces—without the unanimous consent of all other men. Under any other circumstances, property is usurpation, or, in plain terms, robbery."Discours," pp. 257, 258-276. How many wild sermons have been preached on this text: "Ignorez-vous qu'une multitude de vos frères périt ou souffre du besoin de ce que vous avez de trop, et qu'il vous fallait un consentement exprès et unanime du genre humain pour vous approprier sur la subsistance commune tout ce qui alloit au-delà de la vôtre?" (Don't you know that a multitude of your brothers are perishing or suffering for the need of what you have too much of, and that you ought to have an express and unanimous consent of the human race before you appropriate to yourself from the common subsistence any more than you need for your own?)
3. Political rights, therefore, are based upon contract; the so-called right of conquest is no right, and property which has been acquired by force may rightfully be taken away by force.[2]
- ↑ "Contrat Social," v, pp. 98, 99. The references here given are to the volumes and pages of Mussay Pathay's edition (1826). "Discours," passim; see especially p. 268.
- ↑ "Discours," pp. 276, 280; "Contrat," chap. iii.: "Telle fut ou dut être" (charming alternative!) "l'origine de la société et des lois, qui donnèrent de nouvelles entraves au foible et de nouvelles forces au riche, détruisirent sans retour la liberté naturelle, fixèrent pour jamais la loi de la propriété et de l'inégalité, d'une adroite usurpation firent un droit irrévocable, et, pour le profit de quelques ambitieux, assujettirent désormais tout le genre humain au travail, à la servitude et à la misere." (Such was or must have been the origin of society and of the laws which imposed new shackles on the weak man and gave new forces to the rich one, destroyed natural liberty without requital, established forever the law of property and inequality, made an irrevocable law of an adroit usurpation, and
and themselves with contradictions. To reduce this doctrine to the rules and infallibility of reason there is no way, but, first, put such principles down for a foundation, as passion, not mistrusting, may not seek to displace; and afterward to build thereon the truth of cases in the law of nature (which hitherto have been built in the air) by degrees, till the whole have been inexpugnable." However, it must be recollected that Hobbes does not start from a priori principles of ethics, but from the practical necessities of men in society.
