[Footnote 18: Hutcheson, _Essay on the Nature and Conduct of the Passions and Affections, with Illustrations on the Moral Sense_, p. 279. Clifford, _Lectures and Essays_, pp. 294, 304 _sq._ Fowler and Wilson, _Principles of Morals_, ii. 199. Alexander, _Moral Order and Progress_, p. 399.] The concept of "right," then, as implying that the opposite mode of conduct would have been wrong, ultimately derives its moral significance from moral disapproval. This may seem strange considering that "right" is commonly looked upon as positive and "wrong" as its negation. But we must remember that language and popular conceptions in these matters start {139} from the notion of a moral rule or command. It is a matter of paramount importance that such modes of conduct as are apt to arouse moral indignation should be avoided. People try to prevent them by prohibitions and injunctions, often emphasised by threats of penalties for the transgressors. The whole moral and social discipline is based upon commands; customs are rules of conduct, and so are laws. It is natural, then, that the notion of a command should figure uppermost in popular conceptions of morality. Obedience to the command is right, a breach of it is wrong. But the fact which gives birth to the command itself is the indignation called forth by the act which the command forbids, or by the omission of that which it enjoins. I have spoken here of "right" as an adjective. Used as a substantive, to denote _a right_, it also, in whatever sense it be used, expresses a concept which is rooted in the emotion of moral disapproval. To have a right to do a thing is to be allowed to do it, either by positive law, in the case of a legal right, or by the moral law, in the case of a moral right; in other words, to have a moral right to do a thing means that it is not wrong to do it. But generally the concept of "a right" means something more than this. From the fact that an act is allowable, that it is not wrong, it follows, as a rule, that it ought not to be prevented, that no hindrance ought to be put in the way of its performance; and this character of inviolability is largely included in the very concepts of rights. That a man has a right to live does not merely mean that he commits no wrong by supporting his life, but it chiefly means that it would be wrong of other people to prevent him from living, that it is their duty not to kill him, or even, as the case may be, that it is their duty to help him to live. And in order to constitute a right in him, the duty in question must be a duty _to him_. That a right belonging to A is not merely a duty incumbent on B, but a duty _to_ A incumbent on B, will become evident from an example. To kill another {140} person's slave may be condemned as an injury done to the slave himself, in which case it is a duty to the slave not to kill him; or to kill another person's slave may be condemned on account of the loss it causes to the master, in which