Of right considered as a faculty, and of the obligation thereto corresponding.
The word right is taken in several particular senses, which are all derived from the general notion.
I. Besides the general idea of right, such as has been now explained, considering it as the primitive rule of human actions; this term is taken in several particular significations, which we must here point out.
But, previous to every thing else, we should not forget the primitive and general notion we have given of right. For since it is from this notion, as from its principle, that the subject of this and the following chapters is deduced; if our reasonings are exact in themselves, and have a necessary connexion with the principle, this will furnish us with a new argument in its favour. But if, unexpectedly, it should turn out otherwise, we shall have at least the advantage of detecting the error in its very source, and of being better able to correct it. Such is the effect of a just method: we are convinced that a general idea is exact, <68> when the particular ideas are reducible to it as different branches to their trunk.
Definition of right, considered as a faculty.
II. In the first place, Right is frequently taken for a personal quality, for a power of acting or faculty. It is thus we say, that every man has a right to attend to his own preservation; that a parent has a right to bring up his children; that a sovereign has a right to levy troops for the defence of the state, &c.
In this sense we must define Right, a power that man hath to make use of his liberty and natural strength in a particular manner, either in regard to himself, or in respect to other men, so far as this exercise of his strength and liberty is approved by reason.
Thus, when we say that a father has a right to bring up his children, all that is meant hereby is, that reason allows a father to make use of his liberty and natural force in a manner suitable to the preservation of his children, and proper to cultivate their understandings, and to train them up in the principles of virtue. In like manner, as reason gives its approbation to the sovereign in whatever is necessary for the preservation and welfare of the state, it particularly authorises him to raise troops and bring armies into the field, in order to oppose an enemy; and in consequence hereof we say he has a right to do it. But, on the contrary, we affirm, that a prince has no right, without a particular necessity, to drag the peasant from the plough, or to force poor tradesmen from their families; that a father has no right to expose his children, or to put them to death, &c. because these things, far from being approved, are expresly condemned by reason.<69>
We must take care to distinguish between simple power and right.
III. We must not therefore confound a simple power with right. A simple power is a physical quality; it is a power of acting in the full extent of our natural strength and liberty: but the idea of right is more confined. This includes a relation of agreeableness to a rule which modifies the physical power, and directs its operations in a manner proper to conduct man to a certain end. It is for this reason we say, that right is a moral quality. It is true there are some that rank power as well as right among the number of moral qualities:* but there is nothing in this essentially opposite to our distinction. Those who rank these two ideas among moral entities, understand by power, pretty near the same thing as we understand by right; and custom seems to authorise this confusion; for we equally use, for instance, paternal power, and paternal right, &c. Be this as it will, we are not to dispute about words. The main point is to distinguish here between physical and moral; and it seems that the word right, as Puffendorf himself insinuates,† is fitter of itself than power, to express the moral idea. In short, the use of our faculties becomes a right, only so far as it is approved by reason, and is found agreeable to this primitive rule of human actions. And whatever a man can <70> reasonably perform, becomes in regard to him a right, because reason is the only means that can conduct him in a short and sure manner to the end he proposes. There is nothing therefore arbitrary in these ideas; they are borrowed from the very nature of things, and if we compare them to the foregoing principles, we shall find they flow from thence as necessary consequences.
General foundation of the rights of man.
IV. If any one should afterwards inquire, on what foundation it is that reason approves a particular exercise of our strength and liberty, in preference to another; the answer is obvious. The difference of those judgments arises from the very nature of things and their effects. Every exercise of our faculties, that tends of itself to the perfection and happiness of man, meets with the approbation of reason, which condemns whatever leads to a contrary end.
Right produces obligation.
V. Obligation answers to right, taken in the manner above explained, and considered in its effects with regard to another person.
What we have already said, in the preceding chapter, concerning obligation, is sufficient to convey a general notion of the nature of this moral quality. But in order to form a just idea of that which comes under our present examination, we are to observe, that when reason allows a man to make a particular use of his strength and liberty, or, which is the same thing, when it acknowledges he has a particular right; it is requisite, by a very natural consequence, that in order to ensure this right to man, he1 should acknowledge at the same time, that other people ought <71> not to employ their strength and liberty in resisting him in this point; but on the contrary, that they should respect his right, and assist him in the exercise of it, rather than do him any prejudice. From thence the idea of obligation naturally arises; which is nothing more2 than a restriction of natural liberty produced by reason; inasmuch as reason does not permit an opposition to be made to those who use their right, but on the contrary it obliges every body to favour and abet such as do nothing but what it authorises, rather than oppose or traverse them in the execution of their lawful designs.
Right and obligation are two relative terms.
VI. Right therefore and obligation are, as the logicians express it, two correllative terms: one of these ideas necessarily supposes the other; and we cannot conceive a right without a corresponding obligation. How, for example, could we attribute to a father the right of forming his children to wisdom and virtue by a perfect education, without acknowledging at the same time that children ought to submit to paternal direction, and that they are not only obliged not to make any resistance in this respect, but moreover they ought to concur, by their docility and obedience, to the execution of their parents views? Were it otherwise, reason would be no longer the rule of human actions: it would contradict itself, and all the rights it grants to man would become useless and of no effect; which is taking from him with one hand what it gives him with the other.
At what time man is susceptible of right and obligation.
VII. Such is the nature of right taken for a faculty, and of the obligation thereto corresponding. <72> It may be generally affirmed, that man is susceptible of these two qualities, as soon as he begins to enjoy life and sense. Yet we must make some difference here, between right and obligation, in respect to the time in which these qualities begin to unfold themselves in man.3 The obligations a person contracts as man, do not actually display their virtue till he is arrived to the age of reason and discretion. For, in order to discharge an obligation, we must be first acquainted with it, we must know what we do, and be able to square our actions by a certain rule. But as for those rights that are capable of procuring the advantage of a person without his knowing any thing of the matter, they date their origin, and are in full force from the very first moment of his existence, and lay the