A Theologico-Political Treatise part 4 | Page 7

thoroughly irrational commands, for they are
bound to consult their own interests, and retain their power by
consulting the public good and acting according to the dictates of
reason, as Seneca says, "violenta imperia nemo continuit diu." (52) No
one can long retain a tyrant's sway.
(16:53) In a democracy, irrational commands are still less to be feared:
for it is almost impossible that the majority of a people, especially if it
be a large one, should agree in an irrational design: and, moreover, the
basis and aim of a democracy is to avoid the desires as irrational, and to
bring men as far as possible under the control of reason, so that they
may live in peace and harmony: if this basis be removed the whole
fabric falls to ruin.
(16:54) Such being the ends in view for the sovereign power, the duty
of subjects is, as I have said, to obey its commands, and to recognize no
right save that which it sanctions.
[16:4] (55) It will, perhaps, be thought that we are turning subjects into
slaves: for slaves obey commands and free men live as they like; but

this idea is based on a misconception, for the true slave is he who is led
away by his pleasures and can neither see what is good for him nor act
accordingly: he alone is free who lives with free consent under the
entire guidance of reason.
(16:56) Action in obedience to orders does take away freedom in a
certain sense, but it does not, therefore, make a man a slave, all depends
on the object of the action. (57) If the object of the action be the good
of the state, and not the good of the agent, the latter is a slave and does
himself no good: but in a state or kingdom where the weal of the whole
people, and not that of the ruler, is the supreme law, obedience to the
sovereign power does not make a man a slave, of no use to himself, but
a subject. (58) Therefore, that state is the freest whose laws are founded
on sound reason, so that every member of it may, if he will, be free
[Endnote 27]; that is, live with full consent under the entire guidance of
reason.
(16:59) Children, though they are bound to obey all the commands of
their parents, are yet not slaves: for the commands of parents look
generally to the children's benefit.
(60) We must, therefore, acknowledge a great difference between a
slave, a son, and a subject; their positions may be thus defined. (61) A
slave is one who is bound to obey his master's orders, though they are
given solely in the master's interest: a son is one who obeys his father's
orders, given in his own interest; a subject obeys the orders of the
sovereign power, given for the common interest, wherein he is
included.
(16:62) I think I have now shown sufficiently clearly the basis of a
democracy: I have especially desired to do so, for I believe it to be of
all forms of government the most natural, and the most consonant with
individual liberty. (63) In it no one transfers his natural right so
absolutely that he has no further voice in affairs, he only hands it over
to the majority of a society, whereof he is a unit. Thus all men remain
as they were in the state of nature, equals.
(16:64) This is the only form of government which I have treated of at
length, for it is the one most akin to my purpose of showing the
benefits of freedom in a state.
(65) I may pass over the fundamental principles of other forms of
government, for we may gather from what has been said whence their

right arises without going into its origin. (66) The possessor of
sovereign power, whether he be one, or many, or the whole body politic,
has the sovereign right of imposing any commands he pleases: and he
who has either voluntarily, or under compulsion, transferred the right to
defend him to another, has, in so doing, renounced his natural right and
is therefore bound to obey, in all things, the commands of the sovereign
power; and will be bound so to do so long as the king, or nobles, or the
people preserve the sovereign power which formed the basis of the
original transfer. (67) I need add no more.
[16:5] (68) The bases and rights of dominion being thus displayed, we
shall readily be able to define private civil right, wrong, justice, and
injustice, with their relations to the state; and also to determine what
constitutes an ally, or an enemy, or the crime of treason.
(16:69) By private civil right we can only mean the