my, and has given me just cause to
hate him? What if he be a vicious man, and deserves the hatred of all
mankind? What if he be a miser, and can make no use of what I would
deprive him of? What if he be a profligate debauchee, and would rather
receive harm than benefit from large possessions? What if I be in
necessity, and have urgent motives to acquire something to my family?
In all these cases, the original motive to justice would fail; and
consequently the justice itself, and along with it all property, tight,
and obligation.

A rich man lies under a moral obligation to communicate to those in
necessity a share of his superfluities. Were private benevolence the
original motive to justice, a man would not be obliged to leave others
in the possession of more than he is obliged to give them. At least
the difference would be very inconsiderable. Men generally fix their
affections more on what they are possessed of, than on what they never
enjoyed: For this reason, it would be greater cruelty to dispossess a
man of any thing, than not to give it him. But who will assert, that
this is the only foundation of justice?

Besides, we must consider, that the chief reason, why men attach
themselves so much to their possessions is, that they consider them
as their property, and as secured to them inviolably by the laws of
society. But this is a secondary consideration, and dependent on the
preceding notions of justice and property.

A man's property is supposed to be fenced against every mortal, in every
possible case. But private benevolence is, and ought to be, weaker in
some persons, than in others: And in many, or indeed in most persons,
must absolutely fail. Private benevolence, therefore, is not the
original motive of justice.

From all this it follows, that we have no real or universal motive for
observing the laws of equity, but the very equity and merit of that
observance; and as no action can be equitable or meritorious, where
it cannot arise from some separate motive, there is here an evident
sophistry and reasoning in a circle. Unless, therefore, we will allow,
that nature has established a sophistry, and rendered it necessary and
unavoidable, we must allow, that the sense of justice and injustice is
not derived from nature, but arises artificially, though necessarily
from education, and human conventions.

I shall add, as a corollary to this reasoning, that since no action can
be laudable or blameable, without s