Property and Justice

The ideas of justice and injustice, as well as those of property, right, and obligation immediately arise after:

• this convention concerning abstinence from the possessions of others is entered into, and
• everyone has acquired a stability in his possessions.

This is unintelligible without first understanding the abstinence. Our property is nothing but those goods, whose constant possession is established by the laws of society, by the laws of justice. Therefore, those who use the words ‘property’, ‘right’, or ‘obligation’ are guilty of a very gross fallacy and can never reason on any solid foundation if they do not: explain the origin of justice, or use ‘property’, ‘right’, or ‘obligation’ in explaining the origin of justice. A man’s property is some object related to him. This relation is not natural a relation. It is a moral relation founded on justice. It is very preposterous to imagine that we can have any idea of property without fully: comprehending the nature of justice, and showing its origin in man’s artifice. The origin of justice explains the origin of property. The same artifice gives rise to both. Our first and most natural sentiment of morals is founded on the nature of our passions. It gives the preference to ourselves and friends above strangers. It is impossible there can be naturally a fixed right or property while the opposite passions of men: impel them in contrary directions, and are not restrained by any convention or agreement.

The convention for the distinction of property and for the stability of possession is most necessary to establish human society.
    After the agreement for this rule, little or nothing remains to be done towards settling a perfect harmony and concord.
All the other passions, besides this of interest, are easily restrained or are not of such pernicious consequence, when indulged.
    Vanity, pity, and love are esteemed as:
        social passions, and
        bonds of union among men.
    Envy and revenge are pernicious.
        But they operate only by intervals and are directed against our superiors or enemies.
This avidity alone, of acquiring goods and possessions for ourselves and our nearest friends, is insatiable, perpetual, universal, and directly destructive of society.
    Everyone is actuated by it.
    Everyone has has a reason to fear it when it:
        acts unrestrained, and
        gives way to its first and most natural movements.
The difficulties in the establishment of society depend on the difficulties in regulating and restraining this avidity.

The Social, Restrained Self-Interest

No human affection has a sufficient force and proper direction to:
    counterbalance the love of gain, and
    render men fit members of society by making them abstain from the possessions of others.
Benevolence to strangers is too weak for this purpose.
    We observe that the more we have, the more we can gratify our appetites.
    The other passions rather inflame this avidity
Therefore, only self-interest is capable of controlling self-interest through a change in its direction.
    This change must happen on the smallest reflection, since self-interest is better satisfied by restraining it than by letting it free.
        We acquire possessions better in a society than in the solitary and forlorn condition.
The question on the evil or goodness of human nature does not enter the other question on the origin of society.
    Only men's sagacity or folly is to be considered in the evil or goodness of human nature.
Self-interest alone restrains self-interest, whether it is vicious or virtuous.
    If self-interest is virtuous, then men become social by their virtue.
    If self-interest is vicious, then men become social by their vice.

Self-interest restrains itself by establishing the rule for the stability of possession.
    If that rule is very obscure and difficult, then society must be:
        accidental, and
        the effect of many ages.
    If that rule is the most simple and obvious, it is impossible for men to remain in that savage condition which precedes society.
        For example, if:
            every parent establishes it to preserve peace among his children, and
            these first rudiments of justice are improved everyday as the society enlarges.
        In this case, man's very first state and situation would be social.
Human nature is composed of two principal parts requisite in all its actions:
    The affections
    The understanding
The blind motions of the affections incapacitate men for society without the direction of the understanding.
Like natural philosophers, moral philosophers should be able to consider the effects of the affections and understanding separately.
    Natural philosophers consider any motion as consisting of two separate parts.
    Though at the same time, they acknowledge it to be uncompounded and inseparable in itself.