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 III

The Rights of Masters and Servants.

I. When mankind were considerably multiplied, there would be many who had no other fund of support than their labours; and others of greater opulence, who for their ease would need much of the labours and services of others. And hence the relation of master and servant would arise, founded on some contract.1 Nor is it of consequence whether such contracts at first were for life, or only for a certain term: since excepting the point of duration, the rights and obligations were the very same.2 The points following are of more consequence.

1. The labours <and services> of any person sound in body and mind, are of much more value than the bare simple food and clothing of a servant; as we plainly see that such can purchase all this by their labours, and something further for the support of a family, and even for some pleasure and ornament. If any one therefor has incautiously insisted for no more in his contract; yet as the contract is plainly onerous, he has a right to have this inequality redressed.*

2. Where the labours were not specified, the servant is deemed to have engaged only for such as men of humanity in such stations commonly exact from their servants; and to have submitted only to such coercion of his master as is necessary for the good order of a family, if he should neglect his work or misbehave. But he retains all other natural or acquired rights.

3. If indeed the custom is known to have obtained, that <separate> heads of families assume a sort of civil power over their domesticks; the servant is justly deemed to have consented to this also, as far as it is managed consistently with humanity. The servant is <justly> bound to perform his work; but retains all the rights of subjects under civil government; particularly all such as are naturally unalienable: and may justly defend them, even by violence, against any invasions of them by his master.

4. Where the services have been specified in the contract, the servant is bound to no other. Nay tho’ they were not, and the contract was perpetual or for life, yet the master cannot transfer him to another without his own consent; since ’tis of high importance to the servant what master he is subjected to, and in what family.3 And for the children of such servants they are all born free.4

II. Hitherto we have treated of service founded on contract. But there is a far worse kind, to wit, of those who for some great damage done, which they can no other way repair; or on account of some great crime, are adjudged by way of punishment unto perpetual labours to others.

And yet even in these cases, they don’t lose all the rights of mankind, but only such as are naturally fit to compensate the damage, or are necessary to give security to the publick against like injuries for the future. If the lives even of the worst criminals are spared; after they have endured all such publick punishments as the safety of society may require, ’tis unjust to treat them with any further cruelty; provided they are willing to perform the labours they are condemned to. And they have a right to defend themselves even by violence, against {new injuries, or} violations of any rights still remaining to them.5 But as slavery of this kind is constituted solely for the behoof of others; the master may transfer to another such a slave without his own consent. But no cause whatsoever can degrade a rational creature from the class of men into that of brutes or inanimate things, so as to become {wholly the property of another,} without any rights of his own.

<In times past> Nations in other respects not barbarous, condemned all captives in war into this most miserable condition; establishing an inhuman law even against themselves, and strangely conspiring to subject themselves and their posterity, upon many very possible contingencies, to the most miserable and ignominious treatment. Upon which subject the following maxims seem just.

1. Whoever makes war without a just cause acquired no right by such violence, over either persons or goods taken, which he can use with a good conscience, tho’ he may detain them with external impunity, <granted by some external right> as we shall shew hereafter.*

2. One who has a just cause, yet should set just bounds to his demands: nor can he demand any thing from the conquered except either under the name of punishment, reparation of damage done, or precaution against future injuries.†

3. None are punishable but such as either by some action or omission, contrary to their duty, have occasioned and contributed toward {these injuries done to us by} the war. {And ’tis plain,} this is seldom ever the case of the far greater part of the adult subjects of any state{, who are capable of a share in publick affairs}; not to speak of women and children, who make <two or> three fourths of every people, and ought to be deemed joint proprietors with the heads of families in their private properties. And tho’ all heads of families payed tributes toward maintaining the war: this can’t be deemed a crime in them, as they were under the immediate distress of their governors, who would otherways have levied these taxes by force{, and punished the refractory}. Grant they had consented to the war, following some specious reasons published by their governors; their ignorance generally was invincible: nor was their consent of such importance as to cause the war, nor would their dissent have prevented it. Nor can we ever suppose that any political union <is so close that it> can transfer the guilt of one person upon another who did not concur with him.6

4. Nay the very soldiers, all such at least as had no share of or influence in the publick councils, as they enlisted upon presumption of being employed only in just causes{, or persuaded by such reasons as their governors publish}; they are excusable entirely, both on account of ignorance and necessity. To men once enlisted ’tis a capital crime to disobey orders.7 It must therefor be exceedingly inhuman to inflict any thing severe upon them by way of punishment, provided we can be secured against further dangers from them: and this we always may be from captives, by keeping them in our own country, and mixing them with our citizens or our colonies, without depriving them any way of their liberty. All this not only humanity will recommend, but a consideration of the uncertain accidents of war, and the <greatest> inconstancy of fortune <in war>.

5. Under pretence of repairing damages, the conqueror can demand nothing from the innocent citizens, except upon the same grounds that one demands it for damage done by another’s slaves or cattle, to wit this, “that, whoever contrives or procures any thing for his own utility, by which others without their fault receive hurt, is bound either to repair the damage, or deliver up the goods, or contrivance whatever it was, to the person injured.” The conqueror may therefor justly demand from the conquered citizens, that they abandon their unjust governors the causes of the war; or that they oblige these governors to repair the damages; or that they repair them themselves: and these three should be left to their choice. This holds most evidently as to these first citizens who at first constituted the government; or those who have great power in the state, by whose council the war was <wrongly> undertaken; or who have it in their power to restrain their princes in their unjust designs. As to others who are of no weight in publick affairs, their plea against even compensating of damages is more favourable.

6. But as soon as the defeated have repaired all damages, or the conqueror has obtained reparation to himself by force and military execution; and has also obtained security against future injuries, such as a wise arbiter judges sufficient, he has no further demand upon the innocent citizens. Now he may obtain all this in a {much easier, and} more merciful way, without depriving the innocent citizens of their liberty. The governors are in the first place bound to repair all damages, and the citizens only in the second place when their governors cannot do it, or decline it.

7. The children of slaves of any sort are all born free,* as we shewed above.

8. Whoever purchases a person for a slave, or detains him as such, is always bound to shew that this person was deprived of his liberty upon some just ground. The original proprietor of the matter in question is always at hand: since nature made every man master of himself, or of his own liberty. ’Tis plainly therefor incumbent upon the violent possessor to prove his title; and not upon the person {deforced, and} claiming his liberty, to prove {a negative8 }, that he did not lose, or forfeit his liberty. {[Without a previous inquiry of this kind no man can in this case be a fair purchaser.]}9

9. Nor is it justly pleaded here, that captives would be put to death if they could not be made slaves and sold as such: and that therefor they owe their lives and all to the purchasers. But sure no higher sort of title arises to the purchasers in this case, than to such as have done any other useful service of equal importance; such as, rescuing a fellow-citizen from robbers or murderers, ransoming them from pyrates, curing diseases or wounds which without the aid of art would have been deadly.10 All such persons should have all expences refunded to them, and a generous compensation for their labours and art. But who ever alleged that they could claim the persons they thus served as their slaves?

III. As it is the duty of servants who are justly subjected to others, to perform their work with diligence and fidelity <to heir lord or rather master>; regarding God the common master of all, who is ever present with us: so ’tis the duty of masters to exact no more from servants than what they have a right to, and to abstain from all cruelty and insolence; as it becomes those who remember that all are of one blood, and naturally allied to each other, and that fortune is inconstant, that the souls and bodies of servants are of the same stuff with our own, and of a like constitution; and that all of us must give an account of our conduct to God the common Parent and Lord of all.

[1. ]Cf. Pufendorf, De officio 2.4.1.

[2. ]Titius, cited by Carmichael, Notes on Puf., p. 139.

[* ]Book II. xii. 4. [See Book II, chapt. ix.5 and chapt. xiii.4. The section referred to by the translator is wrong.]

[3. ]See Pufendorf, De officio 2.4.3.

[4. ]Hutcheson, with Carmichael (Notes on Puf., pp. 142–44 and note) and against Pufendorf and Barbeyrac rejects the idea of the slave as property and children born by a mother-slave as her fruit. See also System 3.3.1, vol. II, pp. 199–201.

[5. ]See System 3.3.1, vol. II, p. 201.

[* ]See the following ch. ix. 4. <and 5>.

[† ]See Book II. xv. 5, 8. On this subject of slavery many just reasonings are to be found in Mr. Locke’s 2d. book on government; and Mr. Carmichael’s notes on Puffendorf, Book II. ch. iv. [In the Latin text “On this subject . . . etc” is a distinct note placed before Hutcheson’s list. So Hutcheson acknowledges that all his “maxims” (not just the second one) are based on Locke, Two Treatises 2. 16 and Carmichael’s notes on Pufendorf. Infact from Locke, Hutcheson derives the idea that even in a just war, the conquerors have not the right to enslave a nation, but only the governors and, even in that case, they cannot deprive their females and children of their land and property. From Carmichael, who quotes Locke approvingly, stem the ideas that most of the conquered are innocent, that a slave is not to be considered a property or a merchandise, that children of slave are born free.

[6. ]See System 3.3.3, vol. II, pp. 204–5.

[7. ]See System 3.3.4, vol. II, p. 208.

[* ]Book II. xiv. 3. {See Mr. Locke on govern. Book II. as also Hooker’s. Ecles. Polity, and Sidney on Government.} [Richard Hooker, Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (London, 1593); Algernon Sidney, Discourses Concerning Government (London, 1698).]

[8. ]See Carmichael, Notes on Puf., p. 141 for the same argument. See also System 3.3.6, vol. II, pp. 210–11.

[9. ]Square parenthesis in the original text.

[10. ]See System 3.3.5, vol. II, p. 210.