356 NATURAL AND POLITICAL RIGHTS vm 



mere individual being, there is no reason why he 

 should not do what he pleases. But that is a very 

 harmless proposition, and neither despot nor slave- 

 owner need boggle at it. If, on the other hand, 

 the champion of freedom means, as he usually 

 does, that the natural right to freedom affords, in 

 itself, a ground for objecting to this or that 

 restraint upon the liberties of men who form a 

 polity, the argument appears to me to be as sophis- 

 tical as it is mischievous. For, as we have seen, 

 it is a necessary condition 'of social existence that 

 men should renounce some of their freedom of 

 action ; and the question of how much is one 

 that can by no possibility be determined a priori. 

 That which it would be tyranny to prevent in some 

 states of society it would be madness to permit in 

 others. The existence of a polity depends upon 

 the adjustment of the two sets of forces which 

 its component units, the individual men, obey 

 the repulsive of natural right, and the attrac- 

 tive and coactive of individual sympathy and 

 corporate dominion. Which of them ought to 

 predominate at any given time must surely 

 depend upon external and internal circumstances 

 and upon the degree of development of the polity. 

 The Duke of Wellington is said to have defined 

 martial law as "the will of the Commaiuk'r-in- 

 Chief for the time being" that is to say, it is the 

 sweeping away of all "rights," natural, civil, and 

 moral, except so far as they are sanctioned by tho 



