The last passage is taken, almost word for word, from the third book of Polybius. On which we may observe that the word ALLIES may strictly mean those, who were so at the time, when the treaty was made, and, without any forced interpretation, may also be extended to embrace those, who afterwards became such. To which of these interpretations the preference is to be given may be seen from the rules above given: and according to those rules, it will be found, that alliances formed after the making of the treaty will not be comprehended in it, because it relates to the breach of a treaty, the violation of which is an odious act, and tends to deprive the Carthaginians of the liberty of redressing themselves by force against those who were supposed to have injured them; a liberty sanctioned by the law of nature, and not to be abandoned on any slight occasion. Were the Romans debarred then by this rule from making any treaty with the Saguntines, and defending them after they became allies? No! they had a right to defend them, not by virtue of any treaty, but upon principles of natural justice, which no treaty can annul. The Saguntines therefore with respect to both powers were in the same situation, as if no engagement had been made in favour of allies. In this case, it was no breach of treaty for the Carthaginians, upon just grounds, to commence hostilities against the Saguntines, nor for the Romans to defend them. Upon the same principle, in the time of Pyrrhus, it had been stipulated, by treaty, between the Carthaginians and Romans, that if either of them afterwards entered into any engagement with Pyrrhus, the party so contracting should reserve to itself the right of sending succours to the other, if attacked by that king. Though in that case the war ON BOTH SIDES could not be just, yet it would involve no infraction of any treaty. This is an example of a case in equal treaties. XIV. The case of an unequal treaty may be put, where it is agreed that one of the confederate parties shall not make war, without the consent, or by the injunction of the other, which was stipulated in the treaty between the Romans and Carthaginians, after the conclusion of the second Punic war. When the term WAR is applied to war of every description, particularly to offensive rather than defensive war; in a dubious case, it must be limited to its proper signification, lest the treaty should operate as too great a restraint upon the liberty of that power, which has engaged in the unequal treaty.