: The mention of these is frequent among the classics; they
were called in general _mercenarii_, from the circumstances of
their _hire_, as "quibus, non male praecipiunt, qui ita jubent uti,
ut _mercenariis_, operam exigendam, justa proebenda. Cicero de
off." But they are sometimes mentioned in the law books by the name of
_liberi_, from the circumstances of their _birth_, to distinguish
them from the _alieni_, or foreigners, as Justinian. D. 7. 8. 4.
--Id. 21. 1. 25. &c. &c. &c.]

* * * * *

CHAP. II.

The first that will be mentioned, of the _involuntary_, were
_prisoners of war_.[007] "It was a law, established from time
immemorial among the nations of antiquity, to oblige those to undergo
the severities of servitude, whom victory had thrown into their hands."
Conformably with this, we find all the Eastern nations unanimous in the
practice. The same custom prevailed among the people of the West; for as
the Helots became the slaves of the Spartans, from the right of conquest
only, so prisoners of war were reduced to the same situation by the rest
of the inhabitants of Greece. By the same principles that actuated
these, were the Romans also influenced. Their History will confirm the
fact: for how many cities are recorded to have been taken; how many
armies to have been vanquished in the field, and the wretched survivors,
in both instances, to have been doomed to servitude? It remains only now
to observe, in shewing this custom to have been universal, that all
those nations which assisted in overturning the Roman Empire, though
many and various, adopted the same measures; for we find it a general
maxim in their polity, that whoever should fall into their hands as a
prisoner of war, should immediately be reduced to the condition of a
slave.

It may here, perhaps, be not unworthy of remark, that the
_involuntary_ were of greater antiquity than the _voluntary_
slaves. The latter are first mentioned in the time of Pharaoh: they
could have arisen only in a state of society; when property, after its
division, had become so unequal, as to multiply the wants of
individuals; and when government, after its establishment, had given
security to the possessor by the punishment of crimes. Whereas the
former seem to be dated with more propriety from the days of Nimrod; who
gave rise probably to that inseparable idea of _victory_ and
_servitude_, which we find among the nations of antiquity