The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Introduction
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• General Note
• Advertisement By the Translator.
• Juventuti Academicae Salutem.
• To the Students In Universities.
• Philosophiae Moralis Institutio Compendiaria With a Short Introduction to Moral Philosophy
• Philosophiae Moralis Institutio Compendiaria
• Liber I: Ethices Elementa.
• Caput I: De Hominis Natura Ejusque Partibus.
• Caput II: De Summo Bono Et Virtute.
• Caput III: De Variis Virtutum Divisionibus.
• Caput IV: De Virtutibus Et Officiis Erga Deum.
• Caput V: De Officiis Erga Alios Homines Exercendis.
• Caput VI: De Officiis Cujusque Erga Se, Et De Animi Cultura.
• 1 {caput VII: De Virtutis Studio Excitando Et Retinendo.
• Liber II: Jurisprudentiae Naturalis Elementa.
• Caput I: De Lege Naturali.
• Caput II: De Juris Natura Et Divisionibus.
• Caput III: De Virtutum Et Vitiorum Gradibus, Inter Se Comparatis{; Iisque Quae Speciem Moralem Afficiunt}.
• Caput IV: De Jure Privato Naturali.
• Caput V: De Jure Adventitio Reali, Et Rerum Dominio.
• Caput VI: De Dominii Acquirendi Rationibus.
• Caput VII: De Jure Derivato, Ejusque Causis.
• Caput VIII: De Dominii Transferendi Rationibus, Per Contractus, Successiones, Aut Testamenta.
• Caput IX: De Contractibus.
• Caput X: De Sermocinantium Officiis.
• Caput XI: De Jurejurando Et Votis.
• Caput XII: De Rerum Pretio.
• Caput XIII: De Variis Contractuum Generibus Post Pretia Rerum Constituta.
• Caput XIV: De Obligationibus Quasi Ex Contractu Ortis.
• Caput XV: Jura Ex Damno Dato, Atque Ex Aliorum Injuriis Orta. Jura Belli.
• Caput XVI: De Jure Extraordinario Ex Necessitate, Omniumque Jure Communi.
• Caput XVII: De Juris Interitu. De Litibus In Libertate Dirimendis, Et Interpretatione.
• Liber III: Oeconomices Et Politices Elementa.
• Caput I: De Conjugio.
• Caput II: De Parentum Et Liberorum Officiis.
• Caput III: De Herorum Et Servorum Jure.
• Caput IV: De Civitatum Origine Et Causis.
• Caput V: De Interna Civitatum Structura, Et Summi Imperii Partibus.
• Caput VI: De Variis Rerumpublicarum Formis.
• Caput VII: De Summi Imperii Jure, Ejusque Acquirendi Rationibus.
• Caput VIII: De Legibus Condendis, Et De Jurisdictione.
• Caput IX: De Jure Belli.
• Caput X: De Foederibus, Legatis, Et Civitatum Interitu [deletione].
• A Short Introduction to Moral Philosophy.
• Book I: The Elements of Ethicks.
• Chapter I: Of Human Nature and Its Parts.
• Chapter II: Concerning the Supreme Good.
• Chapter III: Concerning the Chief Divisions of Virtue.
• Chapter IV: Our Duties Toward God.
• Chapter V: Our Duties Toward Mankind.
• Chapter VI: Concerning Our Duties Toward Ourselves, and the Improvement of the Mind.
• Chapter VII: Some Practical Considerations to Excite and Preserve the Study of Virtue.
• Book II: Elements of the Law of Nature.
• Chapter I: Of the Law of Nature.
• Chapter II: Of the Nature of Rights, and Their Several Divisions.
• Chapter III: Concerning the Various Degrees of Virtue and Vice, and the Circumstances On Which They Depend.
• Chapter IV: Concerning the Natural Rights of Individuals.
• Chapter V: Of Real Adventitious Rights and Property.
• Chapter VI: The Methods of Acquiring Property.
• Chapter VII: Of Derived Property.
• Chapter VIII: The Methods of Transferring Property, Contracts, Succession, Testaments.
• Chapter IX: Of Contracts In General.
• Chapter X: Our Obligations In Speech.
• Chapter XI: Of Oaths and Vows.
• Chapter XII: Concerning the Values Or Prices of Goods.
• Chapter XIII: Of the Several Sorts of Contracts.
• Chapter XIV: * Obligations Resembling Those From Contracts.
• Chapter XV: Of Rights Arising From Damage Done, and the Rights of War.
• Chapter XVI: Extraordinary Rights In Cases of Necessity, and the Common Rights of Mankind.
• Chapter XVII: How Rights and Obligations Cease: How Controversies Are to Be Decided In Natural Liberty: and the Rules of Interpretation.
• Book III: The Principles of Oeconomicks and Politicks.
• Chapter I: Concerning Marriage.
• Chapter II: The Duties of Parents and Children.
• Chapter III: The Rights of Masters and Servants.
• Chapter IV: The Original of Civil Government.
• Chapter V: The Internal Structure of States: and the Several Parts of Supreme Power.
• Chapter VI: Of the Various Plans of Government.
• Chapter VII: The Rights of the Supreme Power: and the Methods of Acquiring It.
• Chapter VIII: Of Civil Laws and Their Execution.
• Chapter IX: The Laws of War.
• Chapter X: Of Treaties and Ambassadors, and the Entire Dissolution of States.
• Bibliography of Modern Literature

CHAPTER II

The Duties of Parents and Children.

I. As human offspring remains for a long time infirm, incapable of preserving itself, needing the constant care of others, both for preservation and instruction in these arts and manners which are necessary for life; <God and> nature has plainly imposed this charge upon the parents by that singular affection implanted in them. Nature therefor must have designed that parents should assume all the power which is requisite for the discharge of this trust, and subjected children to it; while at the same time by this tender <care and> affection sufficient precaution is taken for the childrens obtaining their liberty as soon as they can safely enjoy it; since without it they cannot be happy, which is the point that parents are most solicitous about.1

The want of judgment in our immature years, and the tender <and disinterested> parental affection, the two only foundations of parental power, shew that it cannot be perpetual or during life; but must expire as soon as children grow up to mature strength of body and mind. And yet the parental affection will always remain, exciting parents to all kind offices, when their children need their assistance or counsel.

The same considerations shew that this power cannot be extended to any of the more grievous punishments, such as cannot be requisite for education in such tender years: much less can it extend to life or liberty. A parent has no right to sell his child to perpetual slavery, or to lay any burden upon it beyond the value of the necessary and prudent expences of its education.

II. This parental power belongs alike to both parents, only that in domestick affairs the power of the father is a little superior. But if he is dead or absent, it is wholly <rightly> vested in the mother.

’Tis trifling to found this power merely in generation,* or to follow <ridiculously> some law-maxims [the maxims of civilians] about <a quite different matter, as> the goods formed by our labour out of our own materials, or other accessions of things animate or inanimate, [or the young of cattle] which have no use of reason or no capacity of holding any rights.2 Both the bodies and souls of children are formed by the divine power, that they may, as they grow up, arrive at the same condition of life, and an equality of right with ourselves, tho’ for some time they must be governed by the wisdom of others. For children may have property, and other rights, quite independent of their parents; who seem to have no other power over any goods conveyed to their children by others than that of tutors or curators. Whatever parents abandon this guardianship of their children committed to them by nature, either by exposing or intirely neglecting them, forfeit also the parental power connected with it: and any one acquires the whole parental power who takes care of such children.

Parents are most sacredly obliged to provide for their children all the necessaries of life, and even to improve their condition as much as they can; and above all to form their manners to all virtue by instruction and example: for without this their lives must be miserable and infamous, tho’ in the greatest affluence.

What parents expend on children who have no stock of their own, is justly presumed to be donation: and it would be inhuman in parents, who are not in great distress, to charge food, clothing, {and necessary education}, as a debt upon their own children. But if the parents are in great distress, or if any one of their children have a stock derived from some other friend, parents may justly state such an account with their children, and exact payment from them {of all the prudent expences made upon their education}; and children in this case are bound to make such payment either by their labours or otherways.3 Altho’ therefor from the common affections of parents we justly conclude, that their private fortunes are acquired for their children as well as themselves; whence appears the right of children to succeed to the inheritances of their parents; yet children are not to look upon themselves as less bound to gratitude on this account: nay they are rather the more bound. For the more firm and disinterested any affection [friendship and benevolence] is, and the more deeply it is rooted in the person’s nature, the more it is to be valued, and the stronger is our obligation to gratitude.

III. Parents may acquire by civil law a further power over their children, as the law commits power to any magistrates. For civil power having different foundations and greater ends, extends beyond the parental. And children, as they have from their birth enjoyed protection and the other advantages of a civilized life in a society constituted for the good of all, are plainly bound to perform to the community on their part* all that’s due from good citizens; and particularly to preserve that constitution, and transmit the same to future ages.4 Minors therefor may justly be delivered as hostages <to foreigners>, or be obliged to {military} services of the greatest danger in great exigences.

IV. Children even when adult owe all reverence and gratitude to their parents, not only in return for benefits received, which scarce any duty of theirs can sufficiently compensate; but also out of regard to God <and nature>, by whose providence it was ordered, that we descended from such parents, united with them in tyes of blood and natural affection, and an habitual reverence from our cradles. They ought therefor to bear with patience any weaknesses or froward humours of aged parents, as the parents long bore their childish follies. Particularly ’tis the duty of children to consult the satisfaction of their parents in entring into marriage; since the parent is also deeply concerned in this important step; by which their children enter into a strict society for life with others, from whence must proceed grandchildren to their parents, to succeed sometimes to their names and fortunes, and always to their tenderest affections.

After the proper parental power expires, there often succeeds that of the head of a family; which is of such extent as the domesticks make it by their own consent express or tacit, by voluntarily continuing in, or entering into, a family, where they knew such a degree of power was assumed.

[1. ]See System 3.2.[1], vol. II, pp. 188–89.

[* ]This is designed against Hobbes and Filmer.

[2. ]This passage is rather implicit. Robert Filmer, quoting Grotius (De iure belli 2.5.1), derived the absolute power of father over children from begetting them. Locke (Two Treatises 1.6, 52–54) objected ironically that children are not the workmanship or artifact of parents, but—as Hutcheson says in the next sentence—are formed by the divine power. Hobbes in De cive 9, 2–3, and Leviathan, 1651, chapt. 20, 102–3, says that in the state of nature the power over the child is in the mother “as she may either nourish, or expose it.” For Hutcheson this meant treating children as “specifications” of the father (Filmer) or accessions of the mother (Hobbes). In System 3.2.2, vol. II, pp. 190–92, Hutcheson enlarges on the subject. See also Pufendorf, De officio 2.2.4.

[3. ]See System 3.2.5, vol. II, p. 197.

[* ]See Book II. ch. xiv. 2. of obligations resembling those from contracts: and the following ch. v. 2.

[4. ]See System 3.2.5, vol. II, p. 198.