Theory of Legislation |
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Common terms and phrases
according actions advantage alarm antipathy attack authority become called cause CHAPTER circumstances civil civil law committed common considered contract crime danger desire diminish effect employed England English law enjoyment equality established everything evil example exercise exist false father favour fear force fortune founded give greater happiness honour human idea inclinations inconvenience individual injurious innocent insult interest Jansenists judge justice kind labour legislator less Lettres de Cachet liberty loss magistrate marriage means ment Montesquieu moral motives nation natural natural rights necessary object obligation offence opinion pain particular passion pathy pecuniary penal penal law perjury person pleasure political polygamy polygyny possession prevent principle of utility produce prohibition proportion punishment racter reason regard religion religious remedy render respect result sanction satisfaction sensibility sentiment slavery slaves society sophisms suffer sympathy Themistocles thing tion vidual virtue word
Popular passages
Page 112 - Property is nothing but a basis of expectation; the expectation of deriving certain advantages from a thing which we are said to possess, in consequence of the relation in which we stand towards it. There is no image, no painting, no visible trait, which can express the relation that constitutes property. It is not material, it is metaphysical; it is a mere conception of the mind.
Page 113 - Property and law are born together, and die together. Before laws were made there was no property; take away laws, and property ceases.
Page 120 - When security and equality are in conflict it will not do to hesitate a moment. Equality must yield. The first is the foundation of life ; subsistence, abundance, happiness, everything depends upon it. Equality produces only a certain portion of good. Besides, whatever we may do, it will never be perfect ; it may exist a day ; but the revolutions of the morrow will overturn it. The establishment of a perfect equality is a chimera; all we can do is to diminish inequality.
Page 103 - It is to be observed in general, that in speaking of the effect of a portion of wealth upon happiness, abstraction is always to be made of the particular sensibility of individuals, and of the exterior circumstances in which they may be placed. Differences of character are inscrutable ; and such is the diversity of circumstances, that they are never the same for two individuals. Unless we begin by dropping these two considerations, it will be impossible to announce any general proposition.
Page 112 - The idea of property consists in an established expectation; in the persuasion of being able to draw such or such an advantage from the thing possessed, according to the nature of the case.
Page 85 - ... that law cannot avail against natural rights, the word rights is employed in a sense above the law ; for, in this use of it, we acknowledge rights which attack the law ; which overturn it, which annul it. In this anti-legal sense, the word right is the greatest enemy of reason, and the most terrible destroyer of governments. There is no reasoning with fanatics, armed with natural rights...
Page 105 - ... is less likely to be disputed. Put on one side a thousand farmers, having enough to live upon, and a little more. Put on the other side a king, or, not to be encumbered with the cares of government, a prince, well portioned, himself as rich as all the farmers taken together. It is probable, I say, that his happiness is greater than the average happiness of the thousand farmers ; but it is by no means probable that it is equal to the sum total of their happiness, or, what amounts to the same thing,...
Page 265 - ... of a nature not to give the slightest inquietude to the most timid imagination ; and which can cause no regrets but to the very person who, through a sentiment of shame and pity, has refused to prolong a life begun under the auspices of misery.
Page 114 - Beccaria should have inserted, in a work dictated by the soundest philosophy, a doubt subversive of the social order. The right of property, says he, is a terrible right, and may not, perhaps, be necessary. Upon this right, tyrannical and sanguinary laws have been founded. It has been most frightfully abused; but the right itself presents only ideas of pleasure, of abundance, and of security. It...
Page 60 - But there are many acts useful to the community which legislation ought not to command. There are also many injurious actions which it ought not to forbid, although morality does so. In a word, legislation has the same centre with morals, but it has not the same circumference.