Selected
excerpts from
Jean-Jacques
Rousseau’s
A
DISSERTATION
ON THE ORIGIN AND FOUNDATION OF
THE INEQUALITY OF MANKIND
IMPORTANT as it may be, in order to judge
rightly of the natural state of man, to consider him from his origin, and to
examine him, as it were, in the embryo of his species; I shall not follow his
organisation through its successive developments, nor shall I stay to inquire
what his animal system must have been at the beginning, in order to become at
length what it actually is. ... I shall suppose his conformation to have been
at all times what it appears to us at this day; that he always walked on two
legs, made use of his hands as we do, directed his looks over all nature, and
measured with his eyes the vast expanse of Heaven.
If we strip this being, thus constituted, of all
the supernatural gifts he may have received, and all the artificial faculties
he can have acquired only by a long process; if we consider him, in a word,
just as he must have come from the hands of nature, we behold in him an animal
weaker than some, and less agile than others; but, taking him all round, the
most advantageously organised of any. I see him satisfying his hunger at the
first oak, and slaking his thirst at the first brook; finding his bed at the
foot of the tree which afforded him a repast; and, with that, all his wants
supplied.
While the earth was left to its natural fertility
and covered with immense forests, whose trees were never mutilated by the axe,
it would present on every side both sustenance and shelter for every species of
animal. Men, dispersed up and down among the rest, would observe and imitate
their industry, and thus attain even to the instinct of the beasts, with the
advantage that, whereas every species of brutes was confined to one particular
instinct, man, who perhaps has not any one peculiar to himself, would
appropriate them all, and live upon most of those different foods which other
animals shared among themselves; and thus would find his subsistence much more
easily than any of the rest.
Accustomed from their infancy to the inclemencies
of the weather and the rigour of the seasons, inured to fatigue, and forced,
naked and unarmed, to defend themselves and their prey from other ferocious
animals, or to escape them by flight, men would acquire a robust and almost
unalterable constitution. The children, bringing with them into the world the
excellent constitution of their parents, and fortifying it by the very
exercises which first produced it, would thus acquire all the vigour of which
the human frame is capable. ...
The body of a savage man being the only instrument
he understands, he uses it for various purposes, of which ours, for want of
practice, are incapable: for our industry deprives us of that force and agility,
which necessity obliges him to acquire. If he had had an axe, would he have
been able with his naked arm to break so large a branch from a tree? If he had
had a sling, would he have been able to throw a stone with so great velocity?
If he had had a ladder, would he have been so nimble in climbing a tree? If he
had had a horse, would he have been himself so swift of foot? Give civilised
man time to gather all his machines about him, and he will no doubt easily beat
the savage; but if you would see a still more unequal contest, set them
together naked and unarmed, and you will soon see the advantage of having all
our forces constantly at our disposal, of being always prepared for every
event, and of carrying one's self, as it were, perpetually whole and entire
about one.
Hobbes [an earlier English philosopher whose
vision of the “state of nature” is pretty much the opposite of Rousseau’s]
contends that man is naturally intrepid, and is intent only upon attacking and
fighting. Another illustrious philosopher holds the opposite ... that nothing
is more timid and fearful than man in the state of nature; that he is always in
a tremble, and ready to fly at the least noise or the slightest movement. This
may be true of things he does not know; and I do not doubt his being terrified
by every novelty that presents itself, when he neither knows the physical good
or evil he may expect from it, nor can make a comparison between his own
strength and the dangers he is about to encounter. Such circumstances, however,
rarely occur in a state of nature, in which all things proceed in a uniform
manner, and the face of the earth is not subject to those sudden and continual
changes which arise from the passions and caprices of bodies of men living
together. But savage man, living dispersed among other animals, and finding
himself betimes in a situation to measure his strength with theirs, soon comes
to compare himself with them; and, perceiving that he surpasses them more in
adroitness than they surpass him in strength, learns to be no longer afraid of
them. Set a bear, or a wolf, against a robust, agile, and resolute savage, as
they all are, armed with stones and a good cudgel, and you will see that the
danger will be at least on both sides, and that, after a few trials of this kind,
wild beasts, which are not fond of attacking each other, will not be at all
ready to attack man, whom they will have found to be as wild and ferocious as
themselves. ...
But man has other enemies more formidable, against
which is is not provided with such means of defence: these are the natural
infirmities of infancy, old age, and illness of every kind, melancholy proofs
of our weakness, of which the two first are common to all animals, and the last
belongs chiefly to man in a state of society. ...
With respect to sickness, I shall not repeat the
vain and false declamations which most healthy people pronounce against
medicine; but I shall ask if any solid observations have been made from which
it may be justly concluded that, in the countries where the art of medicine is
most neglected, the mean duration of man's life is less than in those where it
is most cultivated. How indeed can this be the case, if we bring on ourselves
more diseases than medicine can furnish remedies? The great inequality in manner
of living, the extreme idleness of some, and the excessive labour of others,
the easiness of exciting and gratifying our sensual appetites, the too
exquisite foods of the wealthy which overheat and fill them with indigestion,
and, on the other hand, the unwholesome food of the poor, often, bad as it is,
insufficient for their needs, which induces them, when opportunity offers, to
eat voraciously and overcharge their stomachs; all these, together with sitting
up late, and excesses of every kind, immoderate transports of every passion,
fatigue, mental exhaustion, the innumerable pains and anxieties inseparable
from every condition of life, by which the mind of man is incessantly
tormented; these are too fatal proofs that the greater part of our ills are of
our own making, and that we might have avoided them nearly all by adhering to
that simple, uniform and solitary manner of life which nature prescribed. If
she destined man to be healthy, I venture to declare that a state of reflection
is a state contrary to nature, and that a thinking man is a depraved animal.
When we think of the good constitution of the savages, at least of those whom
we have not ruined with our spirituous liquors, and reflect that they are
troubled with hardly any disorders, save wounds and old age, we are tempted to
believe that, in following the history of civil society, we shall be telling
also that of human sickness. ...
Being subject therefore to so few causes of
sickness, man, in the state of nature, can have no need of remedies, and still
less of physicians: nor is the human race in this respect worse off than other
animals, and it is easy to learn from hunters whether they meet with many
infirm animals in the course of the chase. It is certain they frequently meet
with such as carry the marks of having been considerably wounded, with many
that have had bones or even limbs broken, yet have been healed without any
other surgical assistance than that of time, or any other regimen than that of
their ordinary life. At the same time their cures seem not to have been less
perfect, for their not having been tortured by incisions, poisoned with drugs,
or wasted by fasting. In short, however useful medicine, properly administered,
may be among us, it is certain that, if the savage, when he is sick and left to
himself, has nothing to hope but from nature, he has, on the other hand,
nothing to fear but from his disease; which renders his situation often
preferable to our own.
We should beware, therefore, of confounding the
savage man with the men we have daily before our eyes. Nature treats all the
animals left to her care with a predilection that seems to show how jealous she
is of that right. The horse, the cat, the bull, and even the ass are generally
of greater stature, and always more robust, and have more vigour, strength and
courage, when they run wild in the forests than when bred in the stall. By
becoming domesticated, they lose half these advantages; and it seems as if all
our care to feed and treat them well serves only to deprave them. It is thus
with man also: as he becomes sociable and a slave, he grows weak, timid and
servile; his effeminate way of life totally enervates his strength and courage.
To this it may be added that there is still a greater difference between savage
and civilised man, than between wild and tame beasts: for men and brutes having
been treated alike by nature, the several conveniences in which men indulge
themselves still more than they do their beasts, are so many additional causes
of their deeper degeneracy.
...
Hitherto I have considered merely the physical
man; let us now take a view of him on his metaphysical and moral side.
I see nothing in any animal but an ingenious
machine, to which nature hath given senses to wind itself up, and to guard
itself, to a certain degree, against anything that might tend to disorder or
destroy it. I perceive exactly the same things in the human machine, with this
difference, that in the operations of the brute, nature is the sole agent,
whereas man has some share in his own operations, in his character as a free
agent. The one chooses and refuses by instinct, the other from an act of
free-will: hence the brute cannot deviate from the rule prescribed to it, even
when it would be advantageous for it to do so; and, on the contrary, man
frequently deviates from such rules to his own prejudice. ... Nature lays her
commands on every animal, and the brute obeys her voice. Man receives the same
impulsion, but at the same time knows himself at liberty to acquiesce or
resist: and it is particularly in his consciousness of this liberty that the
spirituality of his soul is displayed. ... there is another very specific
quality which distinguishes them ... This is the faculty of self-improvement,
which, by the help of circumstances, gradually develops all the rest of our
faculties, and is inherent in the species as in the individual: whereas a brute
is, at the end of a few months, all he will ever be during his whole life, and
his species, at the end of a thousand years, exactly what it was the first year
of that thousand. ... [I]t is this faculty, which, successively producing in
different ages his discoveries and his errors, his vices and his virtues, makes
him at length a tyrant both over himself and over nature. ...
Whatever moralists may hold, the human
understanding is greatly indebted to the passions, which, it is universally
allowed, are also much indebted to the understanding. It is by the activity of
the passions that our reason is improved; for we desire knowledge only because
we wish to enjoy; and it is impossible to conceive any reason why a person who
has neither fears nor desires should give himself the trouble of reasoning. The
passions, again, originate in our wants, and their progress depends on that of
our knowledge; for we cannot desire or fear anything, except from the idea we
have of it, or from the simple impulse of nature. Now savage man, being
destitute of every species of intelligence, can have no passions save those of
the latter kind: his desires never go beyond his physical wants. The only goods
he recognises in the universe are food, a female, and sleep: the only evils he
fears are pain and hunger. I say pain, and not death: for no animal can know
what it is to die; the knowledge of death and its terrors being one of the first
acquisitions made by man in departing from an animal state.
... His few wants are so readily supplied, and he
is so far from having the knowledge which is needful to make him want more,
that he can have neither foresight nor curiosity. ... His soul, which nothing
disturbs, is wholly wrapped up in the feeling of its present existence, without
any idea of the future, however near at hand; while his projects, as limited as
his views, hardly extend to the close of day. ...
Let it be considered how many ideas we owe to the
use of speech; how far grammar exercises the understanding and facilitates its
operations. Let us reflect on the inconceivable pains and the infinite space of
time that the first invention of languages must have cost. ...
The first [problem that] presents itself is to
conceive how language can have become necessary; for as there was no
communication among men and no need for any, we can neither conceive the
necessity of this invention, nor the possibility of it, if it was not somehow
indispensable. I might affirm, with many others, that languages arose in the
domestic intercourse between parents and their children. But this expedient
would not obviate the difficulty, and would besides involve the blunder made by
those who, in reasoning on the state of nature, always import into it ideas
gathered in a state of society. Thus they constantly consider families as
living together under one roof, and the individuals of each as observing among
themselves a union as intimate and permanent as that which exists among us,
where so many common interests unite them: whereas, in this primitive state,
men had neither houses, nor huts, nor any kind of property whatever; every one
lived where he could, seldom for more than a single night; the sexes united without
design, as accident, opportunity or inclination brought them together, nor had
they any great need of words to communicate their designs to each other; and
they parted with the same indifference. The mother gave suck to her children at
first for her own sake; and afterwards, when habit had made them dear, for
theirs: but as soon as they were strong enough to go in search of their own
food, they forsook her of their own accord; and, as they had hardly any other
method of not losing one another than that of remaining continually within
sight, they soon became quite incapable of recognising one another when they
happened to meet again. It is farther to be observed that the child, having all
his wants to explain, and of course more to say to his mother than the mother
could have to say to him, must have borne the brunt of the task of invention,
and the language he used would be of his own device, so that the number of
languages would be equal to that of the individuals speaking them, and the
variety would be increased by the vagabond and roving life they led, which
would not give time for any idiom to become constant. For to say that the
mother dictated to her child the words he was to use in asking her for one
thing or another, is an explanation of how languages already formed are taught,
but by no means explains how languages were originally formed.
...
The first language of mankind, the most universal
and vivid, in a word the only language man needed, before he had occasion to
exert his eloquence to persuade assembled multitudes, was the simple cry of
nature. ...
But be the origin of language and society what
they may, it may be at least inferred, from the little care which nature has
taken to unite mankind by mutual wants, and to facilitate the use of speech,
that she has contributed little to make them sociable, and has put little of
her own into all they have done to create such bonds of union. ... I know it is
incessantly repeated that man would in such a state have been the most
miserable of creatures; ... But as I understand the word miserable, it
either has no meaning at all, or else signifies only a painful privation of
something, or a state of suffering either in body or soul. I should be glad to
have explained to me, what kind of misery a free being, whose heart is at ease
and whose body is in health, can possibly suffer. ... We see around us hardly a
creature in civil society, who does not lament his existence: we even see many
deprive themselves of as much of it as they can, and laws human and divine together
can hardly put a stop to the disorder. I ask, if it was ever known that a
savage took it into his head, when at liberty, to complain of life or to make
away with himself. ...
It appears, at first view, that men in a state of
nature, having no moral relations or determinate obligations one with another,
could not be either good or bad, virtuous or vicious; ... But without deviating
from the ordinary sense of the words, it will be proper to ... be on our guard
against our prejudices, till we have ... seen whether virtues or vices
preponderate among civilised men; and whether their virtues do them more good
than their vices do harm; till we have discovered, whether the progress of the
sciences sufficiently indemnifies them for the mischiefs they do one another,
in proportion as they are better informed of the good they ought to do; or
whether they would not be, on the whole, in a much happier condition if they
had nothing to fear or to hope from any one, ...
Above all, let us not conclude, with Hobbes, that
because man has no idea of goodness, he must be naturally wicked; that he is
vicious because he does not know virtue; that he always refuses to do his
fellow-creatures services which he does not think they have a right to demand;
or that by virtue of the right he truly claims to everything he needs, he
foolishly imagines himself the sole proprietor of the whole universe. ... it
may be justly said that savages are not bad merely because they do not know
what it is to be good: for it is neither the development of the understanding
nor the restraint of law that hinders them from doing ill; but the peacefulness
of their passions, and their ignorance of vice. ...
There is another principle which has escaped
Hobbes; ... an innate repugnance at seeing a fellow-creature suffer. I think I
need not fear contradiction in holding man to be possessed of the only natural
virtue, which could not be denied him by the most violent detractor of human
virtue. I am speaking of compassion, ... One animal never passes by the dead
body of another of its species: there are even some which give their fellows a
sort of burial; while the mournful lowings of the cattle when they enter the
slaughter-house show the impressions made on them by the horrible spectacle
which meets them. ...
Such is the pure emotion of nature, prior to all
kinds of reflection! ... But what is generosity, clemency or humanity but
compassion applied to the weak, to the guilty, or to mankind in general? Even
benevolence and friendship are, if we judge rightly, only the effects of
compassion, constantly set upon a particular object: for how is it different to
wish that another person may not suffer pain and uneasiness and to wish him
happy? ... Compassion must, in fact, be the stronger, the more the animal beholding
any kind of distress identifies himself with the animal that suffers. Now, it
is plain that such identification must have been much more perfect in a state
of nature than it is in a state of reason. It is reason that engenders
self-respect, and reflection that confirms it: it is reason which turns man's
mind back upon itself, and divides him from everything that could disturb or
afflict him. ... Uncivilised man has not this admirable talent; and for want of
reason and wisdom, is always foolishly ready to obey the first promptings of
humanity. ...
It is then certain that compassion is a natural feeling, which, by moderating the violence of love of self in each individual, contributes to the preservation of the whole species. ...
Let us conclude then that man in a state of
nature, wandering up and down the forests, without industry, without speech,
and without home, an equal stranger to war and to all ties, neither standing in
need of his fellow-creatures nor having any desire to hurt them, and perhaps even
not distinguishing them one from another; let us conclude that, being
self-sufficient and subject to so few passions, he could have no feelings or
knowledge but such as befitted his situation; that he felt only his actual
necessities, and disregarded everything he did not think himself immediately
concerned to notice, and that his understanding made no greater progress than
his vanity. If by accident he made any discovery, he was the less able to
communicate it to others, as he did not know even his own children. Every art
would necessarily perish with its inventor, where there was no kind of
education among men, and generations succeeded generations without the least
advance; when, all setting out from the same point, centuries must have elapsed
in the barbarism of the first ages; when the race was already old, and man
remained a child.
...
It is in fact easy to see that many of the
differences which distinguish men are merely the effect of habit and the
different methods of life men adopt in society. ... [I]t is easy to conceive
how much less the difference between man and man must be in a state of nature
than in a state of society, and how greatly the natural inequality of mankind
must be increased by the inequalities of social institutions.
... I hear it constantly repeated that, in such a
state, the strong would oppress the weak; but what is here meant by oppression?
Some, it is said, would violently domineer over others, who would groan under a
servile submission to their caprices. This indeed is exactly what I observe to
be the case among us; but I do not see how it can be inferred of men in a state
of nature, who could not easily be brought to conceive what we mean by dominion
and servitude. One man, it is true, might seize the fruits which another had
gathered, the game he had killed, or the cave he had chosen for shelter; but
how would he ever be able to exact obedience, and what ties of dependence could
there be among men without possessions? If, for instance, I am driven from one
tree, I can go to the next; if I am disturbed in one place, what hinders me
from going to another? ...
Having proved that the inequality of mankind is
hardly felt, and that its influence is next to nothing in a state of nature, I
must next show its origin and trace its progress in the successive developments
of the human mind. ...
THE first man who, having enclosed a piece
of ground, bethought himself of saying This is mine, and found people
simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society. From how
many crimes, wars and murders, from how many horrors and misfortunes might not
any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or filling up the ditch,
and crying to his fellows, "Beware of listening to this impostor; you are
undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and
the earth itself to nobody." ... Mankind must have made very considerable
progress, and acquired considerable knowledge and industry which they must also
have transmitted and increased from age to age, before they arrived at this
last point of the state of nature. ...
Man's first feeling was that of his own existence,
and his first care that of self-preservation. ... [D]ifficulties soon presented
themselves, and it became necessary to learn how to surmount them: the height
of the trees, which prevented him from gathering their fruits, the competition
of other animals desirous of the same fruits, and the ferocity of those who
needed them for their own preservation, all obliged him to apply himself to
bodily exercises. He had to be active, swift of foot, and vigorous in fight.
Natural weapons, stones and sticks, were easily found: he learnt to surmount
the obstacles of nature, to contend in case of necessity with other animals,
and to dispute for the means of subsistence even with other men, or to
indemnify himself for what he was forced to give up to a stronger.
In proportion as the human race grew more
numerous, men's cares increased. The difference of soils, climates and seasons,
must have introduced some differences into their manner of living. Barren
years, long and sharp winters, scorching summers which parched the fruits of
the earth, must have demanded a new industry. ...
The new intelligence which resulted from this
development increased his superiority over other animals, by making him
sensible of it. ... Thus, the first time he looked into himself, he felt the
first emotion of pride; ...
Taught by experience that the love of well-being
is the sole motive of human actions, he found himself in a position to
distinguish the few cases, in which mutual interest might justify him in
relying upon the assistance of his fellows; and also the still fewer cases in
which a conflict of interests might give cause to suspect them. ...
These first advances enabled men to make others
with greater rapidity. In proportion as they grew enlightened, they grew
industrious. ...This was the epoch of a first revolution, which established and
distinguished families, and introduced a kind of property, in itself the source
of a thousand quarrels and conflicts. ...
The first expansions of the human heart were the
effects of a novel situation, which united husbands and wives, fathers and
children, under one roof. The habit of living together soon gave rise to the
finest feelings known to humanity, conjugal love and paternal affection. Every
family became a little society, the more united because liberty and reciprocal
attachment were the only bonds of its union. ... From living a softer life,
both sexes also began to lose something of their strength and ferocity: but, if
individuals became to some extent less able to encounter wild beasts
separately, they found it, on the other hand, easier to assemble and resist in
common.
The simplicity and solitude of man's life in this
new condition, the paucity of his wants, and the implements he had invented to
satisfy them, left him a great deal of leisure, which he employed to furnish
himself with many conveniences unknown to his fathers: and this was the first
yoke he inadvertently imposed on himself, and the first source of the evils he
prepared for his descendants. ...
We can here see a little better how the use of
speech became established, and insensibly improved in each family... Men began
now to take the difference between objects into account, and to make
comparisons; they acquired imperceptibly the ideas of beauty and merit, which
soon gave rise to feelings of preference. In consequence of seeing each other
often, they could not do without seeing each other constantly. A tender and
pleasant feeling insinuated itself into their souls, and the least opposition
turned it into an impetuous fury: with love arose jealousy; ...
As soon as men began to value one another, ... the
first obligations of civility arose even among savages; and every intended
injury became an affront; ...
Thus, as every man punished the contempt shown him
by others, in proportion to his opinion of himself, revenge became terrible,
and men bloody and cruel. ... Morality began to appear in human actions, and
every one, before the institution of law, was the only judge and avenger of the
injuries done him, so that the goodness which was suitable in the pure state of
nature was no longer proper in the new-born state of society. Punishments had
to be made more severe, as opportunities of offending became more frequent, and
the dread of vengeance had to take the place of the rigour of the law. ...
So long as men remained content with their rustic
huts, so long as they were satisfied with clothes made of the skins of animals
and sewn together with thorns and fish-bones, ... they lived free, healthy,
honest and happy lives, so long as their nature allowed, and as they continued
to enjoy the pleasures of mutual and independent intercourse. But from the
moment one man began to stand in need of the help of another; from the moment
it appeared advantageous to any one man to have enough provisions for two,
equality disappeared, property was introduced, work became indispensable, and
vast forests became smiling fields, which man had to water with the sweat of
his brow, and where slavery and misery were soon seen to germinate and grow up
with the crops.
...
It now became the interest of men to appear what
they really were not. To be and to seem became two totally different things;
and from this distinction sprang insolent pomp and cheating trickery, with all
the numerous vices that go in their train. On the other hand, free and
independent as men were before, they were now, in consequence of a multiplicity
of new wants, brought into subjection, as it were, to all nature, and
particularly to one another; and each became in some degree a slave even in
becoming the master of other men: if rich, they stood in need of the services
of others; if poor, of their assistance; and even a middle condition did not
enable them to do without one another. Man must now, therefore, have been
perpetually employed in getting others to interest themselves in his lot, and
in making them, apparently at least, if not really, find their advantage in
promoting his own. Thus he must have been sly and artful in his behaviour to
some, and imperious and cruel to others; being under a kind of necessity to
ill-use all the persons of whom he stood in need, when he could not frighten
them into compliance, and did not judge it his interest to be useful to them.
Insatiable ambition, the thirst of raising their respective fortunes, not so
much from real want as from the desire to surpass others, inspired all men with
a vile propensity to injure one another, and with a secret jealousy, which is
the more dangerous, as it puts on the mask of benevolence, to carry its point
with greater security. In a word, there arose rivalry and competition on the
one hand, and conflicting interests on the other, together with a secret desire
on both of profiting at the expense of others. All these evils were the first
effects of property, and the inseparable attendants of growing inequality.
... Usurpations by the rich, robbery by the poor,
and the unbridled passions of both, suppressed the cries of natural compassion
and the still feeble voice of justice, and filled men with avarice, ambition
and vice. ...The new-born state of society thus gave rise to a horrible state
of war; ...
It is impossible that men should not at length
have reflected on so wretched a situation, and on the calamities that
overwhelmed them. The rich, in particular, must have felt how much they
suffered by a constant state of war, of which they bore all the expense; and in
which, though all risked their lives, they alone risked their property. ...
[T]he rich man, thus urged by necessity, conceived at length the profoundest
plan that ever entered the mind of man: ...
"Let us join," said he, "to guard the weak from oppression, to restrain the ambitious, and secure to every man the possession of what belongs to him: let us institute rules of justice and peace, to which all without exception may be obliged to conform; rules that may in some measure make amends for the caprices of fortune, by subjecting equally the powerful and the weak to the observance of reciprocal obligations. Let us, in a word, instead of turning our forces against ourselves, collect them in a supreme power which may govern us by wise laws, protect and defend all the members of the association, repulse their common enemies, and maintain eternal harmony among us."
... All ran headlong to their chains, in hopes of
securing their liberty; for they had just wit enough to perceive the advantages
of political institutions, without experience enough to enable them to foresee
the dangers. The most capable of foreseeing the dangers were the very persons
who expected to benefit by them; and even the most prudent judged it not
inexpedient to sacrifice one part of their freedom to ensure the rest; as a
wounded man has his arm cut off to save the rest of his body.
Such was, or may well have been, the origin of
society and law, which bound new fetters on the poor, and gave new powers to
the rich; which irretrievably destroyed natural liberty, eternally fixed the
law of property and inequality, converted clever usurpation into unalterable
right, and, for the advantage of a few ambitious individuals, subjected all
mankind to perpetual labour, slavery and wretchedness. ... Societies soon
multiplied and spread over the face of the earth, till hardly a corner of the
world was left in which a man could escape the yoke, and withdraw his head from
beneath the sword which he saw perpetually hanging over him by a thread. Civil
right having thus become the common rule among the members of each community,
the law of nature maintained its place only between different communities, ...
in order to make commerce practicable, and serve as a substitute for natural
compassion, which lost, when applied to societies, almost all the influence it had
over individuals, ... Such were the first effects which we can see to have
followed the division of mankind into different communities. But let us return
to their institutions.
I know that some writers have given other
explanations of the origin of political societies, such as the conquest of the
powerful, or the association of the weak. ...
It would be as unreasonable to suppose that men at
first threw themselves irretrievably and unconditionally into the arms of an
absolute master, and that the first expedient which proud and unsubdued men hit
upon for their common security was to run headlong into slavery. For what
reason, in fact, did they take to themselves superiors, if it was not in order
that they might be defended from oppression, and have protection for their
lives, liberties and properties, which are, so to speak, the constituent
elements of their being? ...
I regard it then as certain, that government did
not begin with arbitrary power, ... I content myself with adopting the common
opinion ... and regard the establishment of the political body as a real
contract between the people and the chiefs chosen by them: a contract by which
both parties bind themselves to observe the laws therein expressed, which form
the ties of their union. ...
If we reflect with ever so little attention on
this subject, we shall find new arguments to confirm this truth, and be
convinced from the very nature of the contract that it cannot be irrevocable:
for, if there were no superior power capable of ensuring the fidelity of the
contracting parties, or compelling them to perform their reciprocal
engagements, the parties would be sole judges in their own cause, and each
would always have a right to renounce the contract, as soon as he found that
the other had violated its terms, or that they no longer suited his
convenience. ...