XI THE PRINCIPLES OF MOEALS 231 



praise, the answer will certainly contain a large 

 reference to the utility of that virtue to society ; 

 and as for justice, the very existence of the virtue 

 implies that of society; public utility is its sole 

 origin; and the measure of its usefulness is also 

 the standard of its merit. If every man possessed 

 everything he wanted, and no one had the power 

 to interfere with such possession; or if no man 

 desired that which could damage his fellow-man, 

 justice would have no part to play in the universe. 

 But as Hume observes : 



" In the present disposition of the human heart, it would 

 perhaps be difficult to find complete instances of such enlarged 

 affections ; but still we may observe that the case of families 

 approaches towards it ; and the stronger the mutual benevolence 

 is among the individuals, the nearer it approaches, till all dis- 

 tinction of property be in a great measure lost and confounded 

 among them. Between married persons, the cement of friend- 

 ship is by the laws supposed so strong, as to abolish all division 

 of possessions, and has often, in reality, the force assigned to it 1 

 And it is observable that, during the ardour of new enthusiasms, 

 when every principle is inflamed into extravagance, the com- 

 munity of goods has frequently been attempted ; and nothing 

 but experience of its inconveniences, from the returning or 

 disguised selfishness of men, could make the imprudent fanatics 

 adopt anew the ideas of justice and separate property. So true 

 is it that this virtue derives its existence entirely from its 

 necessary use to the intercourse and social state of mankind. " l 

 (IV. p. 256.) 



" Were the human species so framed by nature as that each 



1 Family affection in the eighteenth century may have been 

 stronger than in the nineteenth ; but Hume's bachelor inexpe- 

 rience can surely alone explain his strange account of the sup- 

 positions of the marriage law of that day, and their effects. The 

 law certainly abolished all division of possessions, but it did so 

 by making the husband sole proprietor. 



