Government is an Artificial Invention

Those philosophers, who assert justice to be a natural virtue antecedent to human conventions, can reasonably: resolve all civil allegiance into the obligation of a promise, and assert that it is our own consent alone, which binds us to any submission to magistracy. All government is plainly an invention of men. The origin of most governments is known in history. If our political duties had any natural moral obligation, we would need to mount higher to find their source. These philosophers quickly observe that: society is as ancient as the human species, and those three fundamental laws of nature are as ancient as society. Those philosophers take advantage of the antiquity and the obscure origin of these laws. They first deny them to be men’s artificial and voluntary inventions. They then seek to ingraft other more artificial duties on these laws. But after we are undeceived and find that natural and civil justice derives its origin from human conventions, we quickly perceive how fruitless it is to: resolve the one into the other, and seek a stronger foundation in the laws of nature for our political duties than interest and human conventions. These duties themselves are built on interest and human conventions. Whichever side we turn this subject, we shall find that natural and artificial duties: are exactly on the same footing, and have the same source of their first invention and moral obligation. They are contrived to: remedy similar inconveniences, and acquire their moral sanction from their remedying those inconveniences. We shall prove these two points.

Men invented the three fundamental laws of nature when they:
    observed the necessity of society, and
    found that it was impossible to maintain correspondence without some restraint on their natural appetites.
The same self-love which renders men so incommodious to each other:
    takes a new and more convenient direction,
    produces the rules of justice, and
    is the first motive of the observance of those rules.
But when it is impossible for men to observe those rules in large and polished societies, they invent government to:
    attain their ends,
    preserve the old, or
    procure new advantages by a stricter execution of justice.
So far, our civil duties are connected with our natural duties.
    Our civil duties are invented chiefly for the sake of our natural duties.
    The principal object of government is to constrain men to observe the laws of nature.
        However, that law of nature on the performance of promises is only comprised along with the rest.
        Its exact observance is an effect of the institution of government.
        The obedience to government is not an effect of the obligation of a promise.
    The object of our civil duties is the enforcement of our natural duties.
        Yet the initial motive of the invention of government and the performance of both is self-interest.
        Since there is a separate interest in the obedience to government from the interest in the performance of promises, we must allow a separate obligation.
Obeying the civil magistrate is needed to preserve order and concord in society.
Performing promises is needed to beget mutual trust and confidence in life.
The ends and the means are perfectly distinct.
    The one is not subordinate to the other.

People will often promise to perform what they have been interested to perform.
    This is in the same way that they give others a fuller security by adding a new obligation of interest to their old obligation.
    Besides its moral obligation, the interest in the performance of promises is general, avowed, and of the last consequence in life.
    Other interests may be more particular and doubtful.
We suspect that people may indulge their humour or passion, in acting contrary to them.
    Here, promises:
        come naturally in play, and
        are often required for fuller satisfaction and security.
    But if those other interests were as general and avowed as the interest in the performance of a promise:
        they would be on the same footing, and
        people would give the same confidence to them.
This is exactly the case with regard to our civil duties, or obedience to the magistrate.
    Without our civil duties:
        no government could subsist, nor
        no peace or order could be maintained in large societies where there are:
            so many possessions on the one hand, and
            so many real or imaginary wants on the other.
    Our civil duties, therefore, must soon:
        detach themselves from our promises, and
        acquire a separate force and influence.
The interest in civil duties and promises is of the very same kind.
    It is general, avowed, and prevails in all times and places.
    There is, then, no reason to found one on the other, while each of them has a foundation peculiar to itself.
    We might as well resolve the obligation to abstain from the possessions of others, into the obligation of a promise, as that of allegiance.
The interests are not more distinct in the one case than the other.
    A regard to property is not more necessary to a savage society, than obedience is to a civil society.
    The savage society is not more necessary to mankind's survival, than civil society is to mankind's happiness.
In short, if the performance of promises is advantageous, then so is obedience to government.
    If the former interest be general, so is the latter.
    If the one interest be obvious and avowed, so is the other.
These two rules are founded on like obligations of interest.
    Each of them must have a peculiar authority, independent of the other.

In promises and allegiances, the two following are distinct:
    the natural obligations of interest, and
    the moral obligations of honour and conscience.
The merit or demerit of the one does not depend on the merit or demerit of the other.
We shall find this conclusion unavoidable if we consider the close connection between the natural and moral obligations.
    Our interest is always engaged on the side of obedience to magistracy.
    Only a great present advantage can lead us to rebellion, by making us overlook our remote interest in society's peace and order.
A present interest may blind us with regard to our own actions.
    But it does not take place with regard to the actions of others.
    It does not hinder them from appearing in their true colours, as highly prejudicial to:
        public interest, and
        our own interest in particular.
This naturally gives us an uneasiness in considering such seditious and disloyal actions.
    It makes us attach the idea of vice and moral deformity to them.
    The same principle causes us to disapprove:
        all kinds of private injustice, and
        particularly the breach of promises.
We blame all treachery and breach of faith.
    Because we consider that the freedom and extent of human commerce depend entirely on promises.
We blame all disloyalty to magistrates.
    Because we perceive that without submission to government, it is impossible to:
        execute justice,
        stabilize possessions,
        transfer possessions by consent, and
        perform promises.
Here, the two interests are entirely distinct.
    They must give rise to two moral obligations, equally separate and independent.
There was no such thing as a promise in the world.
    But government would still be necessary in all large and civilized societies.
    If promises had only their own proper obligation, without the separate sanction of government, they would have little efficacy in such societies.
This separates the boundaries of our public and private duties.
    It shows that the private duties are more dependent on public duties, than the public on the private.
Education, and the artifice of politicians, concur to:
    bestow a further morality on loyalty, and
    brand all rebellion with more guilt and infamy.
Politicians are very industrious in inculcating such notions, where their interest is so particularly concerned.

The obligation of submission to government is not derived from any promise of the subjects.
I have tried to establish my system on pure reason.
I have scarce ever cited the judgment of philosophers or historians on any article.
I now appeal to popular authority and oppose the sentiments of the rabble to any philosophical reasoning.
    Because men's opinions:
        carry with them a peculiar authority, and
        are infallible.
The distinction of moral good and evil is founded on the pleasure or pain resulting from the view of any sentiment or character.
    That pleasure or pain must be known to the person who feels it.
It follows: 22
    that there is just so much vice or virtue in any character, and
    that we can never be mistaken in this.
Our judgments on the origin of any vice or virtue is not so certain as those concerning their degrees.
    In this case, the question does not regard any philosophical origin of an obligation, but a plain matter of fact.
    Thus, it is not easily conceived how we can fall into an error.
A man who acknowledges himself to be bound to another for a certain sum, must certainly know:
    whether it is by his own bond or by his father's hand,
    of his mere goodwill or for money lent him,
    under what conditions, and
    why he has bound himself.
Similarly, there is a moral obligation to submit to government because everyone thinks so.
    This obligation does not arise from a promise.
        Since no one has ever yet dreamed of ascribing it to a promise.
    Magistrates nor subjects have formed this idea of our civil duties.

Footnote 22:

This proposition must hold strictly true with regard to every quality determined by sentiment.
Afterwards, we shall consider in what sense we can talk of a right or a wrong taste in morals, eloquence, or beauty.
Mankind's general sentiments are uniform
    They render such questions of small importance.

Rebellion

Magistrates do not derive their authority from a promise or original contract.
    If this were the sanction of government, our rulers would never receive it tacitly.
    Since what is given tacitly can never have such influence on mankind, as what is performed openly.
A tacit promise is where the will is signified by more diffuse signs other than those of speech.
    But there must be a will, no matter how silent or tacit.
But if you ask the people whether they had ever consented to the authority of their rulers, or promised to obey them, they would think very strangely of you.
    They would reply that it did not depend on their consent, but that they were born to such an obedience.
Because of this opinion, we frequently see the people imagine such persons to be their natural rulers.
    Their rulers might have come from that line of rulers, from a long time ago.
    But now they might be deprived of all power and authority.
    No man would voluntarily choose them today or give them any promise of obedience.
Does a government then have no authority over the people, because they never consented to it?
    Will a government see the attempt of such a free choice as arrogance and impiety?
The government punishes them very freely for treason and rebellion.
    According to this system, the government reduces itself to common injustice.
If you say that by living in its territory, they in effect consented to the established government, I answer that this can only be true where they think the affair depends on their choice.
    Besides those philosophers, few or no one has ever yet imagined this.
A rebel never waged war against the sovereign as his first act upon reaching legal age.
    As a child, he never showed that he could not be obedient.
    On the contrary, we find that civil laws punish this crime at the same legal age as any other crime without our consent.
    There should be some intermediate time for a tacit consent to be supposed in crimes of rebellion.
A man living under an absolute government would owe no allegiance to that government.
    Since the nature of the absolute government does not depend on consent.
    But as an absolute government is as natural and common a government as any, it must occasion some obligation.
        The men subjected to it always think so.
This is a clear proof that we do not commonly esteem our allegiance to be derived from our consent or promise.
    Another poof is that when we make an express promise, we always distinguish between the two obligations.
    The promise adds more force to the allegiance, than in a repetition of the same promise.
Where no promise is given, a man does not look on his allegiance as broken.
    But he keeps those two duties of honour and allegiance perfectly distinct and separate.
These philosophers thought that their unity was a very subtle invention.
    This is a convincing proof that it is not a true unity.
    Since no man can give a promise, or be restrained by its obligation that is unknown to himself.