purpose, and are contrary to the common principles of human nature, which accommodate themselves to circumstances, and have no stated invariable method of operation. Nor do I perceive how I can easily be mistaken in this matter. I see evidently, that when any man imposes on himself general inflexible rules in his conduct with others, he considers certain objects as their property, which he supposes to be sacred and inviolable. But no proposition can be more evident, than that property is perfectly unintelligible without first supposing justice and injustice; and that these virtues and vices are as unintelligible, unless we have motives, independent of the morality, to impel us to just actions, and deter us from unjust ones. Let those motives, therefore, be what they will, they must accommodate themselves to circumstances, and must admit of all the variations which human affairs, in their incessant revolutions, are susceptible of. They are, consequently, a very improper foundation for such rigid inflexible rules as the laws of nature; and 'tis evident these laws can only be derived from human conventions, when men have perceived the disorders that result from following their natural and variable principles. Upon the whole, then, we are to consider this distinction betwixt justice and injustice, as having two different foundations, viz. that of _interest_, when men observe, that 'tis impossible to live in society without restraining themselves by certain rules; and that of _morality_, when this interest is once observed, and men receive a pleasure from the view of such actions as tend to the peace of society, and an uneasiness from such as are contrary to it. 'Tis the voluntary convention and artifice of men which makes the first interest take place; and therefore those laws of justice are so far to be considered as _artificial_. After that interest is once established and acknowledged, the sense of morality in the observance of these rules follows _naturally_, and of itself; though tis certain, that it is also augmented by a new _artifice_, and that the public instructions of politicians, and the private education of parents, contribute to the giving us a sense of honour and duty, in the strict regulation of our actions with regard to the properties of others. SECTION VII. OF THE ORIGIN OF GOVERNMENT.