regarding those who are considered good men, on account of their observance of duties; but those who measure all things by profit and advantage, and who do not consider that those things are outweighed by virtue, are accustomed, in deliberating, to compare virtue with that which they think profitable; good men are not so accustomed. Therefore, I think that Panatius, when he said that men were accustomed to deliberate on this comparison, meant this very thing which he expressed,—only that it was their custom, not that it was also their duty. For not only to think more of what seems profitable than what is virtuous, but even to compare them one with the other, and to hesitate between them, is most shameful. What is it, then, that is accustomed at times to raise a doubt, and seems necessary to be considered ? I believe, whenever a doubt arises, it is what the character of that action may be about which one is considering. For oftentimes it happens, that what is accustomed to be generally considered disreputable, may be found not to be disreputable. For the sake of example, let a case be supposed which has a wide application. What can be greater wickedness than to slay not only a man, but even an intimate friend? Has he then involved himself in guilt, who slays a tyrant, however intimate? He does not appear so to the Roman people at least, who of all great exploits deem that the most honourable. "Tyrannicide, or the assassination of usurpers and oppressive princes, was highly extolled in ancient times, because it both freed mankind from many of these monsters, and seemed to keep the others in awe whom the sword or poniard could not reach. But history and experience having since convinced us that this practice increases the jealousy and cruelty of princes, 8 TIMOLEON and a BRUTUS, though treated with indulgence on account of the prejudices of their times, are now considered as very improper models for imitation."-Hume's " Dissertation on the Passions.' "The arguments in favour of tyranniciue are built upon a very obvious principle. Justice ought universally to be administered. Crimes of an inferior description are restrained, or pretended to be restrained, by the ordinary operations of jurisprudence. But criminals, by whom the welfare of the whole is attacked, and who overturn the liberties of mankind, are out of the reach of this restraint. If justice he partially administered in subordinate cases, and the rich man be able to oppress the poor with impunity, it must be admitted that a few examples of this sort are insufficient to authorize the last appeal of human beings; but no man will deny that the case of the usurper and the despot is of the most atrocious nature. In this instance, all the provisions of civil policy being superseded, and justice poi Has expediency, then, overcome virtue? Nay, rather, expediency has followed virtue. Therefore, that we may be able to decide without any mistake, if ever that which we call expediency (utile) shall appear to be at variance with that which we understand to be virtuous (honestum), a certain rule ought to be established, which if we will follow in comparing such cases, we shall never fail in our duty. But this rule will be one conformable to the reasoning and discipline of the Stoics chiefly, which, indeed, we are following in these books, because, though both by the ancient Academicians and by your Peripatetics, who formerly were the same sect, things which are virtuous are preferred to those which seem expedient; nevertheless, those subjects are more nobly treated of by those* to whom whatever is virtuous seems also expedient, and nothing expedient which is not virtuous, than by those according to soned at the source, every man is left to execute for himself the decrees of immutable equity.' It may, however, be doubted, whether the destruction of a tyrant be, in any respect, a case of exception from the rules proper to be observed upon ordinary occasions. The tyrant has, indeed, no particular security annexed to his person, and may be killed with as little scruple as any other man, when the object is that of repelling personal assault. In all other cases, the extirpation of the offender by self-appointed authority, does not appear to be the appropriate mode of counteracting injustice. For, first, either the nation, whose tyrant you would destroy, is ripe for the assertion and maintenance of its liberty, or it is not. If it be, the tyrant ought to be deposed with every appearance of publicity. Nothing can be more improper, than for an affair, interesting to the general weal, to be conducted as if it were an act of darkness and shame. It is an ill lesson we read to mankind, when a proceeding, built upon the broad basis of general justice, is permitted to shrink from public scrutiny. The pistol and the dagger may as easily be made the auxiliaries of vice as of virtue. To proscribe all violence, and neglect no means of information and impartiality, is the most effectual security we can have for an issue conformable to reason and truth. If, on the other hand, the nation be not ripe for a state of freedon, the man who assumes to himself the right of interposing violence, may indeed show the fervour of his conception, and gain a certain noteriety; but he will not fail to be the author of new calamities to his country. The consequences of tyrannicide are well known. If the attempt prove abortive, it renders the tyrant ten times more bloody, ferocious, and cruel than before. If it succeed, and the tyranny be restored, it produces the same effect upon his successors. In the climate of despotism some solitary virtues may spring up; but in the midst of plots and conspiracies, there is neither truth, nor confidence, nor love, nor humanity."-Godwin's "Political Justice," book iv. chap. iv. The Stoics. whom that may be virtuous which is not expedient, and that expedient which is not virtuous. But to us, our Academic sect gives this great licence, that we, whatever may seem most probable, by our privilege are at liberty to maintain. But I return to my rule. V. To take away wrongfully, then, from another, and for one man to advance his own interest by the disadvantage of another man, is more contrary to nature than death, than poverty, than pain, than any other evils which can befall either our bodies or external circumstances. For, in the first place, it destroys human intercourse and society; for if we will be so disposed that each for his own gain shall despoil or offer violence to another, the inevitable consequence is, that the society of the human race, which is most consistent with nature, will be broken asunder. As, supposing each member of the body was so disposed as to think it could be well if it should draw to itself the health of the adjacent member, it is inevitable that the whole body would be debilitated and would perish; so if each of us should seize for himself the interests of another, and wrest whatever he could from each for the sake of his own emolument, the necessary consequence is, that human society and community would be overturned. It is indeed allowed, nature not opposing, that each should rather acquire for himself than for another, whatever pertains to the enjoyment of life; but nature does not allow this, that by the spoliation of others we should increase our own means, resources, and opulence. Nor indeed is this forbidden by nature alone—that is, by the law of nations-but it is also in the same manner enacted by the municipal laws of countries, by which government is supported in individual states, that it should not be lawful to injure another man for the sake of one's own advantage.* For this the laws look to, this they require, that the union of the citizens should be unimpaired; those who are for severing it they coerce by death, by banishment, by imprisonment, by fine. But what declares this much more is our natural reason, which is a law divine and human, which he who is willing to obey, (and all will obey it who are willing to live according to * "La plus sublime vertu est negative; elle nous instruit de ne jamais faire du mal a personne."--Rousseau. nature) never will suffer himself to covet what is another person's, and to assume to himself that which he shall have wrongfully taken from another.* For loftiness and greatness of mind, and likewise community of feeling, justice, and liberality, are much more in accordance with nature, than pleasure, than life, than riches-which things, even to contemn and count as nothing in comparison with the common good, is the part of a great and lofty soul. Therefore, to take away wrongfully from another for the sake of one's own advantage, is more contrary to nature than death, than pain, than other considerations of the same kind. And likewise, to undergo the greatest labours and inquietudes for the sake, if it were possible, of preserving or assisting all nationsimitating that Hercules whom the report of men, mindful of his benefits, has placed in the council of the gods †—is more in accordance with nature than to live in solitude, not only without any inquietudes, but even amidst the greatest pleasures, abounding in all manner of wealth, though you should also excel in beauty and strength. Wherefore, every man of the best and most noble disposition much prefers that life to this. From whence it is evinced, that man, obeying nature, cannot injure men. In the next place, he who injures another that he may himself attain some advantage, either thinks that he is doing nothing contrary to nature, or thinks that death, poverty, pain, the loss of children, of kindred, and of friends, are more to be avoided than doing "The word natural is commonly taken in so many senses, and is of so loose a signification, that it seems vain to dispute whether justice be natural or not. If self-love, if benevolence, be natural to man-if reason and forethought be also natural-then may the same epithet be applied to justice, order, fidelity, property, society. Men's inclination, their necessities, lead them to combine; their understanding and experience tell them that this combination is impossible, where each governs himself by no rule, and pays no regard to the possessions of others and from these passions and reflections conjoined, as soon as we observe like passions and reflections in others, the sentiment of justice, throughout all ages, has infallibly and certainly had place in some degree or other, in every individual of the human species. In so sagacious an animal, what necessarily arises from the exertion of his intellectual faculties, may justly be esteemed natural.”— Hume's "Principles of Morals." Appendix III. + Horace adopts the same illustration in the following passage: "Dignum laude virum Musa vetat mori: Cœlo Musa beat. Sic Jovis interest Optatis epulis impiger Hercules." Lib. iv. Carm. 8, ver. 28-30. injury to another. If he thinks that nothing is done contrary to nature by injuring men, what use is there in disputing with him who would altogether take away from man what is human? But if he thinks that indeed is to be shunned, but that those things, death, poverty, pain, are much worse, he errs in this, that he thinks any defect, either of body or fortune, more grievous than the defects of the mind. VI. One thing, therefore, ought to be aimed at by all men ; that the interest of each individually, and of all collectively, should be the same; for if each should grasp at his individual interest, all human society will be dissolved. And also, if nature enjoins this, that a man should desire to consult the interest of a man, whoever he is, for the very reason that he is man, it necessarily follows that, as the nature, so the interest, of all mankind, is a common one. If that be so, we are all included under one and the same law of nature; and if this too be true, we are certainly prohibited by the law of nature from injuring another. But the first is true; therefore, the last is true. For that which some say, that they would take nothing wrongfully, for the sake of their own advantage, from a parent or brother, but that the case is different with other citizens, is indeed absurd. These establish the principle that they have nothing in the way of right, no society with their fellow citizens, for the sake of the common interest—an opinion which tears asunder the whole social compact. They, again, who say that a regard ought to be had to fellow citizens, but deny that it ought to foreigners, break up the common society of the human race, which, being withdrawn, beneficence, liberality, goodness, justice, are utterly abolished. But they who tear up these things should be judged impious, even towards the immortal gods; for they overturn the society established by them among men, the closest bond of which society is, the consideration that it is more contrary to nature that man, for the sake of his own gain, should wrongfully take from man, than that he should endure all such disadvantages, either external or in the person, or even in the mind itself, as are not the effects of injustice. For that one virtue, justice, is the mistress and queen of all virtues.* "There is no virtue so truly great and godlike as justice; most of the other virtues are the virtues of created beings, or accommodated to our nature, as we are men. Justice is that which is practised by God himself, and to be practised in its perfection by none but him. Omniscience and |