and can never possibly have a right.

Normal desires, or such as have an instinctive rise, and are in accord with the general order of nature, impel toward the fulfillment of the appropriate functions of the man in a world of persons and things. This consideration of its terms brings into clear view the truth of the principle: A man has a right to gratify his normal desires.1

Every volition or act of the will is immediately conditioned on desire; that is to say, no exercise of the will can occur except by virtue of an antecedent desire which as a motive impels it to action. But notwithstanding this dependence, the will is to be regarded as central in the personality, since it has the function to control, modify, suppress or arouse the

1 Principle, a beginning, a fundamental truth or law, a tenet, a settled rule of action. From Fr. principe, from Lat. principium, from princeps, chief. - SKEAT. Cicero says: 66 Principio autem nulla est origo, nam ex principio oriuntur omnia; ipsum autem nulla ex re alia nasci potest; nec enim esset id principium quod gigneretur aliunde." - Tusc. Disp. bk. i, ch. 23, § 54. Aristotle distinguishes seven different senses of the word άpxń, a beginning or first principle, then adds: “Common to all first principles is the being the original from whence a thing either is, or is produced, or is known."- Metaphysics, bk. iv, ch. 1. The term ȧpxý was introduced into philosophy by Anaximander. - UEBERWEG, Hist. Phil., § 13.

A principle is also a designation of order; a principle of nature is a designation of natural order, physical or psychical; a moral principle is a principle of nature which, in view of possible alternatives, takes imperative form, enjoining one, forbidding the other.

From Lat. normalis, from
Gk. уvúpiμos, fem. yvwplun,

Normal, according to rule. A late word. norma, a carpenter's square, rule, pattern; well-known; cf. yvwμwv, an index; all from the root gna, to know. - SKEAT. A thing is normal when strictly conformed to those principles of its constitution which make it what it is.

Let it be here observed in anticipation of subsequent matter that a man's malevolent desires, as anger, envy, jealousy, misanthropy, are in general abnormal in kind, since they do not conform to the normal principles of the human constitution; and that his benevolent desires or affections, which are normal in kind, may in general become abnormal in degree, either by inanity or by excess, temporary or permanent, and need to be invigorated or restrained.

activity of all other powers, including even its conditioning desires. Freedom consists in the possibility of this voluntary exercise of one's powers, and without freedom it is evident that their normal functions cannot be fulfilled, or that freedom is necessary to the natural working and development of the entire personality in its existing relations. These considerations bring to light the truth of the principle: A man has a right to a free use of his native powers.1

The two statements are not to be taken as distinct principles. Together they constitute the mutually dependent and complementary parts of the consistent whole: A man has a right to a free use of his native powers in the gratification of his normal desires.

This principle is the basis of Ethics. It is axiomatic, selfevidently true, not needing or admitting any logical proof; for the intuitive, synthetic à priori judgment involved in the pure notion of a right, finds its immediate application to the desires and volitions. At first view it may appear thoroughly egoistic or selfish in character, but the outcome of a patient and thorough scrutiny of its bearings will reverse this primary impression. Likewise its formal universality may seem to sanction unbounded license, but the close inspection to which we shall submit it will discover very stringent limitations, not arbitrarily imposed, but arising from the matter of its constituent terms, and leading to a disclosure of our varied obligations. Thus there is no need to look beyond the natural and original constitution of man, despite its

1 "Not only will all these [principles] be found in the enacted laws (vbuois), but nature herself has marked them out in her unwritten laws (voμíμois), and in the moral constitutions of men. 99 - DEMOSTHENES, De Corona, § 275, Teubner.

"Selbstverständlich ist das ursprüngliche Recht der Freiheit, d. h. des freien Gebrauchs seiner Kräfte und der freien Wahl der Ziele, worauf sie gerichtet werden. In der Gesellschaft unterliegt dies Recht, wie jedes, Beschränkungen." - LOTZE, Grundzüge der praktischen Philosophie, § 42.

weakness, perversion and distortion, to discern the prolific principle of morality.1

1 See supra, § 21. "In Plato's Republic, as in Butler's Sermons, the human soul is represented as a system, a constitution, an organized whole, in which the different elements have not merely their places side by side, but their places above and below each other, with their appointed offices; and virtue or moral rightness consists in the due operation of this constitution, the actual realization of the organized subordination. We may notice, too, that Plato, like Butler, is remarkable among moralists for the lucid and forcible manner in which he has singled out from men's springs of action the irascible element (his Ovμocidés ; Butler's Resentment;) and taught its true place and office in a moral scheme." — WHEWELL, Preface to Butler's Sermons, p. xxxiv.

"The foundation of Aristotle's system of ethics is deeply laid in his psychological system. Upon the nature of the human soul the whole fabric is built up, and depends for its support. According to Aristotle, we are endowed with a moral sense, aïolŋoïs, a perception of moral beauty and excellence, and with an acuteness on practical subjects, devóтns, which, when cultivated, is improved into póvnois, prudence or moral wisdom."-BROWNE, Analytical Introduction to Nic. Eth.

The doctrine of the Stoics is very similar. The supreme end of life is a life conformed to nature, όμολογουμένως τῇ φύσει ζῆν, the agreement of human conduct with the universal law of nature, of the human with the divine will. Zeno defines the ethical end to be harmony with one's own nature; Cleanthes, with the nature of the universe; Crysippus, with our own nature and that of the universe together, our nature being but a part of universal nature. The formula of Crysippus is: κατ' ἐμπειρίαν τῶν φύσει συμβαινόντων, οι ἀκολούθως τῇ φύσει ζῆν ; that is: Live according to your experience of the course of nature. This anthropological conception of the principle of morals was adhered to by the later Stoics, as in the following dictum of Clement of Alexandria, one of the latest: τέλος εἶναι τὸ ζῆν ἀκολούθως τῇ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου Kaтασ KEV; that is: The end of man is to live agreeably to the natural constitution of man. — UEBERWEG, History of Philosophy, § 55.

"The moral law is not foreign to our nature; it is not imposed upon us by a despot, as was the Continental Embargo at the beginning of this century, barring the approach to a thousand goods and pleasures. It is rather the law of our own being. Moral laws are natural laws. We may assign to them a transcendental significance or not; they are, first of all and at all events, natural laws of human life in the sense of being the conditions of its health and welfare. According to the natural course of events, their transgression will bring upon nations as well as upon individuals misfortune and destruction, while their observance is accompanied by welfare and peace." -PAULSEN, Int. to Phil., bk. i, ch. 1, § 3.

§ 26. In view of their objects it is usual to name three kinds of rights: the right to life, the right to liberty, the right to property.1 This division appears in the three fundamental verbs to be, to do, to have. But the species are not independent, for each involves the other two as complementary correlatives.

It follows that either two may be regarded as modified forms and be expressed in the terms of the third. Thus, for instance, life without some measure of liberty in the use of instrumentalities, could hardly claim the name.

Also, life and liberty are commonly spoken of as forms of property; as when one says, my life, his liberty. Indeed rights in general are viewed as forms of property in the familiar phrases, my rights, our rights, their rights. We correctly say that every man has rights, he owns them, he is their proprietor. Some rights he may dispose of at will, others are inalienable except by forfeiture; but, so long as they inhere in him, they are his possession, his own. The sense of proprietorship in rights is very strong, as seen in the tenacious retention and persistent defense of them when menaced.2

Likewise the several kinds of rights may be reduced to the right to liberty. Conscious life is an aggregate of active powers, and a power is a possibility of change. A right to

1 "All men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyments of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety."— Virginia Bill of Rights, § 1.

2 Psychologically the notion mine comes before the notion me. — - LOTZE. Even behavior is etymologically a having. To behave is a mere compound of the verb to have with the Anglo-Saxon prefix be-, to surround, to shut up, to possess. So conduct is behavior; from Lat. conductus, pp. of conducere, from con-, for cum, together, and ducere to lead; to bring together, to collect. SKEAT.

life is a right to exercise these powers, a right to self-determined change, which is liberty. Also property in external things means liberty to make use of them. To be dispossessed of any property is to be deprived of this liberty; but the thing is still one's own, and the right to its free use, though suspended, remains. Thus ownership in external things is a right to liberty.1

Of these reductions, the last, though least familiar, is most clearly real, and of widest and deepest import. Hence, while we cannot avoid using the language of possession, we shall adhere to the view that every right, in its last analysis, is a right to some phase of liberty, to the untrammeled exercise of ability. Manifestly the cardinal element in the principle already formulated is a right to liberty in this general sense, and on it our further consideration shall chiefly turn.

1 "Liberty and Right are synonymous; since the liberty of acting according to one's will would be altogether illusory if it were not protected from obstruction. There is, however, this difference between the terms. In Liberty the prominent or leading idea is the absence of legal restraint, whilst the security or protection for the enjoyment of that liberty is the secondary idea. Right, on the other hand, denotes the protection, and connotes the absence of restraint."— AUSTIN, Jurisprudence, § 445.