The Rights of War and Peace

Of War—Definition of War—Right, of Governors and of the governed, and of equals—Right as a Quality divided into Faculty and Fitness—Faculty denoting Power, Property, and Credit—Divided into Private and Superior—Right as a Rule, natural and voluntary—Law of Nature divided—Proofs of the Law of Nature—Division of Rights into human and divine—Human explained—Divine stated—Mosaic Law not binding upon Christians.

I. The disputes arising among those who are held together by no common bond of civil laws to decide their dissensions, like the ancient Patriarchs, who formed no national community, or the numerous, unconnected communities, whether under the direction of individuals, or kings, or persons invested with Sovereign power, as the leading men in an aristocracy, and the body of the people in a republican government; the disputes, arising among any of these, all bear a relation to the circumstances of war or peace. But because war is undertaken for the sake of peace, and there is no dispute, which may not give rise to war, it will be proper to treat all such quarrels, as commonly happen, between nations, as an article in the rights of war: and then war itself will lead us to peace, as to its proper end.