Now those who are entrusted with the power of appointing magistrates, are bound, from motives of public good, to chuse the properest persons, and this is what the state has a RIGHT to require of them. They are bound therefore to repair any loss which the state may sustain by the choice of improper persons. So any subject who is not disqualified, though he has no peculiar right to an office, has an equal right with others to endeavour to obtain it. In the exercise of which right, if, he is obstructed by violence or fraud, he may recover damages, not to the full value of the office which he sought, but according to the probable loss which he may reasonably be supposed to have suffered. Similar which is the right of a legatee, when a testator has been prevented by fraud or violence from making a bequest. For the capability of receiving a legacy is a kind of right, which to obstruct a testator from conferring, is undoubtedly an injury. IV. The loss or diminution of any one's possessions is not confined to injuries done to the SUBSTANCE alone of the property, but includes every thing affecting the produce of it, whether it has been gathered or not. If the owner himself had reaped it, the necessary expence of reaping, or of improving the property to raise a produce, must also be taken into the account of his loss, and form part of the damages. For it is an established maxim that no one ought to derive benefit from the loss of another. V. Damages are to be computed too, not according to any ACTUAL gain, but according to the REASONABLE expectation of it. Which in the case of a growing crop may be judged of by the general abundance or scarcity of that particular season. VI. But besides the person immediately doing an injury, others may be bound also to repair the losses of the suffering party. For as a person may be guilty of offences by negligence as well as by the commission of certain acts, so they may be done also by accessories, as well as principals. Now a principal in any crime or offence is one, that urges to the commission of it, that gives all possible consent, that aids, abets, or in any shape is a partner in the perpetration of it. VII. An accessory is one who gives his counsel, approbation, and assent. For where is the difference, says Cicero, in his second Philippic, between advising an act, and approving of it?