International law; Natural law; War (International law)
of injustice in an enemy's conduct the person who supports him in such
a case, by furnishing him with succours, will be guilty not barely of
a civil injury, but his giving assistance will amount to a crime as
enormous, as it would be to rescue a criminal in the very face of the
judge. And on that account the injured power may proceed against him as
a criminal, and punish him by a confiscation of his goods.
These are the reasons, which induce belligerent powers to issue
manifestoes, as an appeal to other states, upon the justice of their
cause, and their probable hopes of ultimate success. This question has
been introduced under the article, which refers to the law of nature,
as history supplies us with no precedent to deduce its establishment
from the voluntary law of nations.
We are informed by Polybius, in his first book, that the Carthaginians
seized some of the Romans, who were carrying supplies to their enemies,
though they afterwards gave them up, upon the demand of the Romans.
Plutarch says that when Demetrius had invested Attica, and taken the
neighbouring towns of Eleusis and Rhamnus, he ordered the master and
pilot of a ship, attempting to convey provisions into Athens, to be
hanged, as he designed to reduce that city by famine: this act of
rigour deterred others from doing the same, and by that means he made
himself master of the City.
VI. Wars, for the attainment of their objects, it cannot be denied,
must employ force and terror as their most proper agents. But a doubt
is sometimes entertained, whether stratagem may be lawfully used in
war. The general sense of mankind seems to have approved of such a
mode of warfare. For Homer commends his hero, Ulysses, no less for
his ability in military stratagem, than for his wisdom. Xenophon, who
was a philosopher as well as a soldier and historian, has said, that
nothing can be more useful in war than a well-timed stratagem, with
whom Brasidas, in Thucydides agrees, declaring it to be the method from
which many great generals have derived the most brilliant reputation.
And in Plutarch, Agesilaus maintains, that deceiving an enemy is both
just and lawful. The authority of Polybius may be added to those
already named; for he thinks, that it shews greater talent in a general
to avail himself of some favourable opportunity to employ a stratagem,
than to gain an open battle. This opinion of poets, historians, and
philosophers is supported by that of Theologians. For Augustin has
said that, in the prosecution of a just war, the justice of the cause
is no way affected by the attainment of the end, whether the object
be accomplished by stratagem or open force, and Chrysostom, in his
beautiful little treatise on the priestly office, observes, that the
highest praises are bestowed on those generals, who have practised
successful stratagems. Yet there is one circumstance, upon which the
decision of this question turns more than upon any opinion even of the
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