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SECTION IV - Johann Gottlieb Heineccius, A Methodical System of Universal Law: Or, the Laws of Nature and Nations [1738]

Edition used:

A Methodical System of Universal Law: Or, the Laws of Nature and Nations, with Supplements and a Discourse by George Turnbull. Translated from the Latin by George Turnbull, edited with an Introduction by Thomas Albert and Peter Schröder (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2008).

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


SECTION IV

Whence this law is learned, and whence it comes.Now that all connexions of nature, of whatever kind, whether those respecting matter and motion, and mechanical powers and arts, or those respecting the consequences of our affections and actions, can only be learned from experience, by attention to the effects of different methods of operation, is too evident to be insisted upon. And therefore we shall only add upon this head, that as when speaking of the laws of nature, which are the object of natural philosophy, tho’ they are shortly called laws of matter and motion; yet by them is really meant constitutions and connexions established and taking place in consequence of the will of the Author of nature: so the moment we have found out any connexions relative to happiness or misery with regard to human affections and actions, we have found certain constitutions or connexions relative to them, established and taking place by virtue of the will and appointment of the Author of nature; so that tho’, speaking shortly, we call them natural laws, or moral laws of nature, yet in reality by them must be meant rules, laws or connexions of the Author of nature. For this must be true in general, that certain setled and fixed orders and connexions of things can only take place by virtue of the will of some mind sufficient to give them subsistence and efficiency. Laws, whether in physics or in morals, can only mean certain appointments by the will of the mind who gave being to the world, and by whom it subsists. If by laws the appointments of some supreme Being be not meant, they are words without any meaning. So that we may henceforth indifferently say, either the connexions of things relative to man, the laws of nature relative to moral ends attainable by man, or the law and will of the Author of nature with regard to the consequences and effects of human conduct. This we may certainly do without begging any thing in morality which we have not proved, since natural philosophers use or may use these phrases promiscuously; and we as yet only desire to be allowed to use those phrases in the same sense they are used by natural philosophers, when they speak of means and ends, or connexions in nature, according to which effects are produced, and human arts must operate in order to be successful.

May we not now therefore go on to enquire, if we can find out any of the more important connexions in nature relative to our good or happiness, which are the laws of our nature, or the laws of the Author of nature with regard to our conduct, that may be called moral laws, or laws relative to moral ends.