ON THE NOTIONS OF EIGHT AND 

 JUSTICE. 1693. 



PREFATORY NOTE. 



LEIBNIZ was deeply interested in the maintenance of the 

 rights of the Empire as against the pretensions of Louis XIV. 

 He observed that the French took every opportunity of obtain- 

 ing and preserving documents on which they might found 

 claims. And accordingly, on behalf of the Empire, he set 

 himself to make a collection of Treaties and State papers 

 (international and national) affecting the European nations. 

 His plan was to publish them in three volumes under the title 

 Codex Juris Gentium Diplomaticus. In 1693 the first volume 

 appeared, containing papers of date from noo to 1500 A. D. 

 The work was never finished ; but an Appendix (mantissa) to 

 the first volume was published in 1700. Writing to the Count 

 de Kinsky in 1697, .Leibniz remarks that his book l is a little 

 less in season than it was at first, for we are assured that 

 a general peace is on the point of being concluded ' (Klopp, 

 vi. 454). 



To this work Leibniz says he ' contributed only the title, the 

 preface, and the trouble of reading it over' (Klopp, vi. 

 441). The preface, however, contains the most convenient 

 summary of its author's views in an important department of 

 ethics. The whole preface is given by Dutens (iv. 287) and 

 by Klopp (vi. 457) ; but Erdmann (118) gives only the para- 

 graphs dealing with 'the eternal rights [or laws] of a rational 

 nature,' and Gerhardt includes no part of it in his edition. 

 I have translated the portion given by Erdmann, adding a few 

 sentences from the succeeding paragraphs which deal with 

 'voluntary' and 'divine' right. In the foot-notes will be 

 found translations of a number of illustrative passages from 

 the very interesting collection of papers from the Hanover 



