"In the absence, then, of 'rights,' as distinct from 'powers,' the term 'morality' can have no application to a State of Nature as above considered. For morality, in at least its social aspect, has no other basis than the recognition and respect of others' rights. The same is true of the term 'justice,' by which is meant the giving to each one his proper rights.' Hence follows the truth of the thesis stated above, that in such a non-civic state there cannot arise even the sense of a moral obligation to observe covenants entered into. In fact, the mere propounding of the question, "Why should I be forced to do this or that?' implies that I claim a certain freedom that should be respected by others independently of my power to maintain it." 1

In that extremely interesting work of Mr. W. S. Lilly entitled Right and Wrong, it is said: "Unquestionably, it is society alone that gives validity to right, for man is, in Aristotle's phrase, a political animal. If we follow the historical method only, we must pronounce the birthplace of right to have been the family, from which civil polity has been developed. But if we view the matter ideally, we must say that the experience of the race is merely the occasion, not the cause; it does not create, it merely reveals right. The social organism exhibits that which lies in the nature of man, deep down in the inmost recesses of his being, but which could never have come out of him in isolation. The idea of right unfolds itself in history as the vivifying

1 The Nature of the State, pp. 106-110.

principle of those public ordinances and political institutions whereby we live as civilized men; the justification of the common might which without it would be mere brute force."

Mr. Lilly has here stated in his usual delightful style an essential truth and yet, we fear, enveloped it in some ambiguity by the use of the abstract term "right" to express two essentially different things. We may, and in fact must, grant that there does exist, apart from all human creation or control, an eternal distinction between right and wrong, and that similarly there are certain eternal canons of conduct, or criteria, in accordance with which the morality and justice of every act is to be finally determined, and that these principles may be subsumed under the abstract term "right." In this sense, society or State does not create right, but only renders more possible of realization the practical principles which are to be deduced from its recognition. But rights, that is, claims of the individual to certain spheres of activity within which he shall not be limited by other individuals, these are not only rendered possible of realization by society and the State, but they are created by society and the State, and cannot be conceived as existing either actively or potentially apart from the social and political body. They have a significance only in connection with social and political aggregates. Right, as we have defined it, may exist apart from human association; rights, never.

In the work from which I have above quoted, I

concluded my argument by declaring that "we thus find that the demand for a moral justification of the State is an unnecessary one. If political government does not render the individual less free than he would be without it, its authority does not require a moral justification. There is no presumption of unwarranted interference to be rebutted." 1

The accusation has been made by an able critic that there is a confusion of thought in at least some of the points made in the foregoing paragraphs. After quoting with approval the assertion that, paradoxical as it may seem, it is true that freedom exists only because there is restraint, this critic continues: "But because this is so, and more liberty is created than is abridged by the State, it does not follow that the problem he set out to resolve can be disposed of by saying that it was falsely stated, and that a moral justification of the State is shown to be unnecessary. The liberty that is the fruit of political organization is not that freedom of choice inherent in morality which as more or less limited by the State (so far as it is an authoritative institution) alone gives rise to any fundamental moral problem. There are really two senses of the word 'freedom.' According to

one, we are free when we can do what we will. According to the other, we are free when we can choose what we will do. The one relates rather to the act externally considered; the other to the psychological conditions antecedent to the act (neither, we may add, involving any metaphysical freedom of the

1 The Nature of the State, p. 111.

will'). Because positive or external freedom is increased by the State, it does not follow that freedom in the other sense is not abridged or, in some cases, denied. The individual does not choose what taxes he will pay, but he has to pay them. Both as to the amount and as to the paying, he is subject to an external authority, and the problem from the ethical side is, How is this authority to be justified?"1

As for the criticism that a discrimination has not been made between the two senses of freedom-freedom to do and freedom to choose-it would appear that the critic is himself confused. We admit that there is a real distinction between doing and choosing, and that morality attaches to the latter rather than to the former. But this freedom of choice, as subject to ethical estimate, can only refer to that capacity of alternative choice of ends to which we have applied the term "velleity," and over which, as we have already said, the State can have no possible control. If an act be brought about by physical force, actually and coercively applied, as where one by brute strength compels another against his will and against his physical resistance to commit a certain act, that act certainly is such a compelled act as releases the compelled one from all moral responsibility. But if the compulsion consist merely in the threat of certain penalties in case of its non-performance, there still remains a moral responsibility upon the individual, though it is a responsibility that has

1 International Journal of Ethics, October, 1896, p. 116. Review by Mr. William M. Salter of my book, The Nature of the State.

to be determined in the light of the new conditions which have been introduced by the sanction of the State and the threat of punishment in case of disobedience.

It must be admitted, however, that the assertion that there is not needed a moral justification for the control of the State was too baldly stated. Still, I think that the argument which it concluded made it sufficiently plain that what was there intended to be maintained was that the demand for an abstract or a priori justification of the right of State control, or in fact of any form of coercion, is an illegitimate one. To ask the question whether the State has a right to be, without reference to a particular State, is as little sensible as to ask whether a picture is beautiful without designating some particular one to which the judgment is to be applied.

It undoubtedly appears to most of us as beyond all serious question that all States are justified-that the existence of even the very worst of them is better than would be the anarchical condition that would result from its absence; but there is no theoretical impossibility of a State lacking such a rational basis. The existence of any given State as actually controlled has or has not a moral justification, according to whether or not its activities tend upon the whole to promote the realization of the moral ideal. The only way in which the moral element enters is as to the manner in, and the extent to, which the power of the State is exercised. The "code of morality" of a given community, as including those