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The mere statement of these hypotheses should be a sufficient refutation of them to every man at all acquainted with any department of science, for all science bears conclusive testimony that everything is governed, amply and perfectly, by natural laws. Men have no confidence in natural laws, simply because their existence, as well as their effects, are unknown to them. They believe natural laws entirely insufficient to govern humanity, unless aided by laws of their own making. As if the fallible could be necessary to the efficient action of the Infallible! Nothing can exceed the vanity of ignorance!

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If man, like everything else, is fully and perfectly governed by natural laws or forces, it follows, that no human law can be beneficial, unless it be in perfect accordance with natural laws; and then it becomes a work of supererogation. But human laws and Governments are only necessary, and therefore only resorted to, when it is desired to insure actions which men are disinclined to make. Now, why are men disinclined to any particular action required of them? Is it not invariably because they think the required action either injurious or not beneficial to themselves? And are they not the best judges of what is really beneficial or necessary to themselves; and ought they not to be allowed to control freely, not only their own actions and those of their children, but also all property legitimately acquired by them, so long as they do not by these means infringe the equal rights of their fellow-beings? +

But it is constantly asserted that it is natural for the individual to steal, to commit murder, to invade the rights of others, etc. Yes, these are natural impulses, but only of the ignorant, of the inexperienced. Each of these actions produces, as its natural consequences, such terrible evils, such severe penalties, that it requires but little experience to induce men to cease to resort to them as means of obtaining the ob

*Man appears to believe that matter alone is governed by immutable laws that regulate its movements and its conservation, as if the Creator had left his works imperfect, and had less occupied himself with the stability of the moral than of the physical world. (Quetelet, Système Social, p. 103.)

Every proprietor has a right to make what use he pleases of his own substance, and to dispose of it in such a manner as he pleases, when the property of a third person is not injured by it.-(Vattel, Law of Nations, 254, p. 104.)

ject of their desires-enjoyment, happiness, and well-being.* Governments have at all times far more aided theft and the invasion of the rights of individuals, than repressed them; for Governments have been, from time immemorial, mainly occupied in robbing the industrious classes of a portion of the results of their labor, and in carrying on war, that gigantic source of theft, devastation, and murder.† Human laws and Governments have perpetuated every evil from which humanity has suffered, far beyond the time during which it would have existed, had men been left entirely free to follow their natural impulses; for human laws and Governments annul or overpower man's natural means of resisting the aggressions of those favored by Governments.

But is there any truth in the idea that men, if left to their natural impulses, would produce anarchy and destroy society? Evidently not. And even if it were true that the natural impulses of man are destructive to his own happiness and well-being, how could it be possible to secure these desired results by the action of Government, which can only be carried on by men endowed with the same impulses, subject to the same errors and passions, as those whom they are placed to control? Are men made better or more perfect by the possession and exercise of power? On the contrary, does not the possession or exercise of power, invariably increase

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The duties of humanity are based on the nature of man himself. Nature rewards the observation of her laws, and severely punishes their infractions. Happiness, abundance, the tranquillity of society and of each of its members, are the consequences of submission to the laws of Nature; misfortune, distress, discord, vice, crime, destruction, are the terrible punishments inflicted on those who refuse to conform to them.-(La Politique Naturelle, by Baron d'Holbach, vol. i., p. 15.)

+ Philo speaks of men "who commit great robberies, and under the venerable name of Government conceal what is, more truly and in fact, theft and roguery."(Grotius, book ii., ch. i., p. 4.)

The law of Nature every way obliges nations to seek and cultivate peace. This divine law has no other end than the welfare of mankind. To this all its rules and all its precepts tend; they are all deducible from this principle -that men should seek their own felicity, morality being no more than the science of acquiring happiness. As this is true of individuals, it is equally so of nations.-(Vattel, Law of Nations, book iv., p. 114.)

No people can be happy unless governed according to the laws of Nature, which always lead to virtue.-(La Politique Naturelle, by Baron d'Holbach, Preface, p. 7.)

the evil passions and impulses of men?* If men cannot beneficially govern themselves, they certainly cannot beneficially govern others. Many persons, however, suppose that the interests of the individual and those of the community are different, but it has never been demonstrated how national interests can be other than the aggregate interests of the individuals who compose the nation. The only individuals whose interests may be different from those of the community, are the Government officials, to whom iudividual interests are so confidingly, though so mistakenly, intrusted, and those who, through class legislation and Government favoritism, obtain special privileges at the expense of the other members of the community.

The State is constantly appealed to, because it is supposed to be a disinterested party. But is this so? Are not the Government functionaries more or less interested in nearly every action of Government? Do they not profit by each increase of governmental power, and by each increase of governmental expenditures? and, being a party in interest—in fact, the only party having an interest adverse to that of the community, can it be beneficial and proper to delegate to them, authority which can be exercised by the individual?

Government, even when administered by the pure and the

*Why should our passions have greater command of us (in a state of nature than in society)? If the fear of laws keeps the people to their duty, it will make a like impression upon the great ones and persons of quality, but they easily find out means to evade the laws; for those on whom the passions reign with the greatest fury, and in a manner most prejudicial to society, are, beyond contradiction, those persons in authority of which we cannot find any example in a state of nature; nor can there be any in a condition of doing so much mischief.-Barbeyrac, Note to Puffendorf, of the Law of Nature and Nations, book ii., ch. ii, 22, p. 105; London Ed., 1729.)

No frame of civil constitution can be so exactly modelled and so well guarded by laws but that, either through the negligence or the wickedness of those who bear rule, the same Government which was instituted for the security of the subjects, may turn to their prejudice and mischief. The reason of which is, because Government was first established as a defence against those evils which men were capable of bringing on each other. But, at the same time, they who were to be invested with the Government, were likewise men, and, consequently, not free from those vices which are the spurs to mutual injury.--(Puffendorf, book vii., ch. vi., 22, p. 686.)

For he that thinks absolute power purifies men's blood and corrects the baseness of human nature, need read but the history of this or any other age, to be convinced of the contrary. He that would have been insolent and injurious in the woods of America, would not probably be much better on a throne —(Locke, vol. v., p. 391.)

intelligent-those free from all selfish objects and passionsis but an attempt to govern man by the experience, the opinions, and the convictions of others, instead of by his own. Is not this slavery, to a more or less limited extent?* The general excuse for slavery is, that the slave is ignorant, indolent, incapable of directing or controlling beneficially his own actions. The excuse for Government is precisely the samethat the governed are ignorant, indolent, incapable of directing or controlling beneficially their own actions. It is claimed, in both cases, that it is necessary for the benefit of all, that the slave and the governed should be deprived of the right of controlling their own actions; of acquiring knowledge by their own experience, and enjoyment by their own efforts. Slavery and Government are not only based on precisely the same theory, and defended on precisely the same grounds, but they both act through the same means-force and compulsion-and both produce the same results. They both make men less active, less intelligent, less self-reliant, less progressive; whereas Liberty, and the non-intervention of Government, make them more active, more intelligent, more self-reliant, more progressive. Both slavery and Government diminish man's happiness, well-being, and progress, whilst liberty and the non-interference of Government increase these universally-sought objects. The only difference between the results of slavery and of Government is in degree; and this difference is in exact proportion to the extent of the interference with man's freedom of action. This is the only possible explanation of the superiority of Republican institutions over a despotism.

All Governments, whether despotic, limited, or democratic, are based on the supposition that the Government officials are better judges of the interests of the community than the individuals who compose it; that the governing classes are more pure, more intelligent, more active than the governed.+

*It would be better for man to have been entirely deprived of the faculty of reasoning, than to be obliged to regulate this faculty by the caprices of others. (La Politique Naturelle, by Baron d'Holbach, vol. ii., p. 80.)

The men who enact laws, and those who compose books, are not of a different nature from those for whom the laws and the books are made. It would be absurd to believe that the governors or the legislators of a nation, by their

Is this true? All Governments are carried on by men who act as the agents of the community, to insure the happiness and well-being of individuals. And it is supposed, by men claiming to be intelligent, that these agents will better attend to the interests of the individuals, than the individuals could or would do themselves. Now, what does experience and common sense teach us? Do we find that men, in general, act more efficiently and more beneficially for others than for themselves? Who must be the best judge of what is most conducive, most imperatively necessary, to happiness and welfare, at any given moment--the individual who has to bear the immediate, as well as the ultimate consequences of his actions? or the Government functionaries, who are only indirectly and slightly affected by the consequences of their official acts, and who, besides, can generally fully indemnify themselves, at the expense of others, against these indirect effects? Man's self-interest generally controls him, and controls him beneficially, so long as he is not aided by human laws. He is, therefore, ever more mindful of anything that affects himself directly and promptly, than of those things that affect him indirectly or at some future time. We therefore rarely find, by practical experience, that an agent performs any task or duty better than a principal; and, even in those cases where an agent attends to the interest of his principal, better than the latter could have done himself, it is very doubtful whether, on the long run, it is a real service rendered to the principal; for the errors we commit,and their natural consequences, are certain and sure means of making us active and intelligent; and it is far better that all the members of a community should possess these beneficial qualities, than that they should be possessed by only a few, to whom all the interests of the others would then have to be intrusted.

nature, have a tendency towards good, and the people towards evil (Chs. Comte, Traité de Législation, vol i., p. 149.)

The

When legislators and the people are spoken of, it would seem as if they were beings so totally distinct that they do not belong to the same nature. ones are spoken of as a species of gods, who give to all that are placed below them, motion and life. The others, on the contrary, appear to be beings deprived of the power of action, or possessed of only an irregular or disorderly action. But if we refuse to be deceived by words, we shall find that legislators and the people, are beings endowed with the same nature, subject to the same wants, the same passions, the same prejudices.-(Ibid., pp. 149, 159.)

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