53. Again, it was held that in a state of nature men were 'free and equal.' This is maintained by Hobbes as much as by the founders of American independence. But if freedom is to be understood in the sense in which most of these writers seem to understand it, as a power of executing, of giving effect to, one's will, the amount of freedom possessed in a state of nature, if that was a state of detachment and collision between individuals, must have been very small. Men must have been constantly thwarting each other, and (in the absence of that 'jus in naturam,' as Spinoza calls it, which combination gives) thwarted by powers of nature. In such a state those only could be free, in the sense supposed, who were _not_ equal to the rest; who, in virtue of superior power, could use the rest. But whether we suppose an even balance of weaknesses, in subjection to the crushing forces of nature, or a dominion of few over many by means of superior strength, in such a state of nature no general pact would be possible. No equality in freedom is possible except for members of a society of whom each recognises a good of the whole which is also his own, and to which the free co-operation of all is necessary. But if such society is supposed in the state of nature--and otherwise the 'pact' establishing political society would be impossible--it is already in principle the same as political society. 54. It is not always certain whether the writers in question considered men to be actually free and equal in the state of nature, or only so according to the 'law of nature,' which might or might not be observed. (Hobbes represents the freedom and equality in the state of nature as actual, and this state as being for that reason 'bellum omnium contra omnes.') They all, however, implicitly assume a _consciousness_ of the law of nature in the state of nature. It is thus not a law of nature in the sense in which we commonly use the term. It is not a law according to which the agents subject to it act necessarily but without consciousness of the law. It is a law of which the agent subject to it has a consciousness, but one according to which he may or may not act; i.e. one according to which he _ought_ to act. It is from it that the obligation to submission to civil government, according to all these writers, is derived. But in regard to such a law, two questions have to be asked: firstly, how can the consciousness of obligation arise without recognition by the individual of claims on the part of others--social claims in some form or other--which may be opposed to his momentary inclinations? and secondly, given a society of men capable of such a consciousness of obligation, constituting a law according to which the members of the society are free and equal, in what does it differ from a political society? If these questions had been fairly considered, it must have been seen that the distinction between a political