relate only to such foreigners as unite those two characters, BOOK II. of Protestants and artisans. But if it is evident that this CHAP. XVII. prince wants to people his country, and that, although he would prefer Protestant subjects to others, he has in particular so great a want of artisans, that he would gladly receive them, of whatever religion they be,-his words should be taken in a disjunctive sense, so that it will be sufficient to be either a Protestant or an artisan, in order to enjoy the promised advantages. a sufficient reason for To avoid tedious and complex circumlocution, we shall make § 289. What use of the term, "sufficient reason for an act of the will," to constitutes express whatever has produced that act,-whatever has determined the will on a particular occasion, whether the will an act of the has been determined by a single reason, or by many concur- will. rent reasons. That sufficient reason, then, will be sometimes. found to consist in a combination of many different reasons, so that, where a single one of those reasons is wanting, the sufficient reason no longer exists: and in those cases where we say that many motives, many reasons, have concurred to determine the will, yet so as that each in particular would have been alone capable of producing the same effect, there will then be many sufficient reasons for producing one single act of the will. Of this we see daily instances. A prince, for example, declares war for three or four injuries received, each of which would have been sufficient to have produced the declaration of war. founded on The consideration of the reason of a law or promise not § 290. Exonly serves to explain the obscure or ambiguous expressions tensive inwhich occur in the piece, but also to exterd or restrict its terpretation several provisions independently of the expressions, and in the reaso conformity to the intention and views of the legislature or the of the act. contracting parties, rather than to their words. For, accord- [ 258 ] ing to the remark of Cicero,* the language, invented to explain the will, ought not to hinder its effect. When the sufficient and only reason of a provision, either in a law or a promise, is perfectly certain and well understood, we extend that provision to cases to which the same reason is applicable, although they be not comprised within the signification of the terms. This is what is called extensive interpretation. It is commonly said, that we ought to adhere rather to the spirit than to the letter. Thus, the Mohammedans justly extend the prohibition of wine, in the Koran, to all intoxicating liquors; that dangerous quality being the only reason that could induce their legislator to prohibit the use of wine. Thus, also, if, at the time when there were no other fortifications than walls, it was agreed not to enclose a certain town with walls, * Quid? verbis satis hoc cautum erat? Minime. Quæ res igitur valuit? Voluntas: quæ si, tacitis nobis, intelligi posset, verbis omnino non utere mur. Quia non potest, verba reperta BOOK II. it would not be allowable to fortify it with fosses and ramCHAP. XVII. parts, since the only view of the treaty evidently was, to prevent its being converted into a fortified place. ? 291. Frauds tending to elude laws or promises. But we should here observe the same caution above recommended (§ 287), and even still greater, since the question relates to an application in no wise authorized by the terms of the deed. We ought to be thoroughly convinced that we know the true and only reason of the law or the promise, and that the author has taken it in the same latitude which must be given to it in order to make it reach the case to which we mean to extend the law or promise in question. As to the rest, I do not here forget what I have said above (§ 268), that the true sense of a promise is not only that which the person promising had in his mind, but also that which has been sufficiently declared,-that which both the contracting parties must reasonably have understood. In like manner, the true reason of a promise is that which the contract, the nature of the things in question, and other circumstances, sufficiently indicate: it would be useless and ridiculous to allege any by-views which the person might have secretly entertained in his own mind. The rule just laid down serves also to defeat the pretexts and pitiful evasions of those who endeavour to elude laws or treaties. Good-faith adheres to the intention: fraud insists on the terms, when it thinks that they can furnish a cloak for its prevarications. The isle of Pharos near Alexandria was, with other islands, tributary to the Rhodians. The latter having sent collectors to levy the tribute, the queen of Egypt amused them for some time at her court, using in the mean while every possible exertion to join Pharos to the main land by means of moles: after which she laughed at the Rhodians, and sent them a message, intimating that it was very unreasonable in them to pretend to levy on the main land a tribute which they had no title to demand except from the islands.* [259] There existed a law which forbade the Corinthians to give vessels to the Athenians:-they sold them a number at five drachmæ each. The following was an expedient worthy of Tiberius: custom not permitting him to cause a virgin to be strangled, he ordered the executioner first to deflower the young daughter of Sejanus, and then to strangle her. To violate the spirit of the law while we pretend to respect the letter, is a fraud no less criminal than an open violation of it it is equally repugnant to the intention of the law-maker, and only evinces a more artful and deliberate villany in the person who is guilty of it. Restrictive interpretation, which is the reverse of extensive * Puffendorf, lib. v. cap. xii. ? 18. He quotes Ammianus Marcellinus, lib. xxii. cap. xvi. Puffend. ibid. Herodotus, lib. vi. Five drachmæ amounted to little more than three shillings sterling. Tacit. Annal. lib. v. 9. interpretation, is founded on the same principle. As we ex- BOOK II. tend a clause to those cases, which, though not comprised CHAP. XVII. within the meaning of the terms, are nevertheless comprised $292. Rein the intention of that clause, and included in the reasons strictive inthat produced it,-in like manner, we restrict a law or a pro- terpretation. mise, contrary to the literal signification of the terms, our judgment being directed by the reason of that law or that promise that is to say, if a case occurs, to which the well known reason of a law or promise is utterly inapplicable, that case ought to be excepted, although, if we were barely to consider the meaning of the terms, it should seem to fall within the purview of the law or promise. It is impossible to think of every thing, to foresee every thing, and to express every thing it is sufficient to enounce certain things in such a manner as to make known our thoughts concerning things of which we do not speak: and, as Seneca the rhetorician says,* there are exceptions so clear, that it is unnecessary to express them. The law condemns to suffer death whoever strikes his father: shall we punish him who has shaken and struck his father, to recover him from a lethargic stupor? Shall we punish a young child, or a man in a delirium, who has lifted his hand against the author of his life? In the former case the reason of the law does not hold good; and to the two latter it is inapplicable. We are bound to restore what is intrusted to us: shall I restore what a robber has intrusted to me, at the time when the true proprietor makes himself known to me, and demands his property? A man has left his sword with me: shall I restore it to him, when, in a transport of fury, he demands it for the purpose of killing an innocent person ? We have recourse to restrictive interpretation, in order to § 293. Its avoid falling into absurdities (see § 282). A man bequeaths use, in order his house to one, and to another his garden, the only entrance to avoid fallinto which is through the house. It would be absurd to sup- surdities, or ing into ab pose that he had bequeathed to the latter a garden into into what is which he could not enter: we must therefore restrict the unlawful. pure and simple donation of the house, and understand that it was given only upon condition of allowing a passage to the [ 260 ] garden. The same mode of interpretation is to be adopted, whenever a case occurs, in which the law or the treaty, if interpreted according to the strict meaning of the terms, would lead to something unlawful. On such an occasion, the case in question is to be excepted, since nobody can ordain or promise what is unlawful. For this reason, though assistance has been promised to an ally in all his wars, no assistance ought to be given him when he undertakes one that is manifestly unjust. When a case arises in which it would be too severe and too * Lib. iv. Declam. xxvii. BOOK II. prejudicial to any one to interpret a law or a promise accordCHAP. XVII. ing to the rigour of the terms, a restrictive interpretation § 294. Or is then also used, and we except the case in question, agreewhat is too ably to the intention of the legislature, or of him who made severe and the promise: for the legislature intends only what is just burden some. restrict the and equitable; and, in contracts, no one can enter into such $ 295. How signification ? 296. How a change in the state we should limit the sense according as the subject requires. Let us suppose that the custom of a particular country confines the entail of fiefs to the male line properly so called: if an act of enfeoffment in that country declares that the fief is given to a person for himself and his male descendants, the sense of these last words must be restricted to the males descending from males; for the subject will not admit of our understanding them also of males who are the issue of females, though they are reckoned among the male descendants of the first possessor. The following question has been proposed and debated: "Whether promises include a tacit condition of the state of happening affairs continuing the same, or whether a change happenof things ing in the state of affairs can create an exception to the promay form mise, and even render it void?" The principle derived from the reason of the promise must solve the question. If it be certain and manifest that the consideration of the present state of things was one of the reasons which occasioned the promise, that the promise was made in consideration or in an exception. consequence of that state of things,—it depends on the pre- BOOK II. servation of things in the same state. This is evident, since CHAP. XVII. the promise was made only upon that supposition. When therefore that state of things which was essential to the promise, and without which it certainly would not have been made, happens to be changed, the promise falls to the ground when its foundation fails. And in particular cases, where things cease for a time to be in the state that has produced or concurred to produce the promise, an exception is to be made to it. An elective prince, being without issue, has promised to an ally that he will procure his appointment to the succession. He has a son born: who can doubt that the promise is made void by this event? He who in a time of peace has promised succours to an ally, is not bound to give him any when he himself has need of all his forces for the defence of his own dominions. A prince, possessed of no very formidable power, has received from his allies a promise of faithful and constant assistance, in order to his aggrandizement,-in order to enable him to obtain a neighbouring state by election or by marriage: yet those allies will have just grounds for refusing him the smallest aid or support, and even forming an alliance against him, when they see him elevated to such a height of power as to threaten the liberties of all Europe. If the great Gustavus had not been killed at Lutzen, cardinal de Richelieu, who had concluded an alliance for his master with that prince, and who had invited him into Germany, and assisted him with money, would perhaps have found himself obliged to traverse the designs of that conqueror, when become formidable,-to set bounds to his astonishing progress, and to support his humbled enemies. The statesgeneral of the United Provinces conducted themselves on these principles in 1668. In favour of Spain, which before had been their mortal enemy, they formed the triple alliance against Louis XIV. their former ally. It was necessary to raise a barrier to check the progress of a power which threatened to inundate and overwhelm all before it. But we ought to be very cautious and moderate in the application of the present rule: it would be a shameful perversion of it, to take advantage of every change that happens in the state of affairs, in order to disengage ourselves from our promises were such conduct adopted, there could be no dependence placed on any promise whatever. That state of things alone, in consideration of which the promise was made, is essential to the promise: and it is only by a change in that state, that the effect of the promise can be lawfully prevented [262] or suspended. Such is the sense in which we are to understand that maxim of the civilians, conventio omnis intelligitur rebus sic stantibus. What we say of promises, must also be understood as extending to laws. A law which relates to a certain situation |