II. But it will be proper to consider how far the lawfulness, which Virgil speaks of, extends. For the term lawful sometimes implies whatever is just and pious in all respects, although the pursuit of a different course may perhaps be more laudable: according to the expression of St. Paul, who says, "all things are lawful to me, but all things are not expedient." Ulpian is speaking of a seller, who, at the expiration of a certain period, is not answerable for the safety of goods, which a buyer has neglected to take away, says he, will yet think himself bound in EQUITY to preserve them with all imaginable care. On some occasions when it is said, that men may LAWFULLY do a thing, the expression only means that doing such act will not subject them to human and legal penalties, but it by no means indicates that the action is strictly conformable to the rule of religion and morality. Thus among the Lacedaemonians and Egyptians stealing was allowed: an indulgence that by no means took away the GUILT of theft. Cicero in the fifth of his Tusculan questions, speaking of Cinna, beautifully and justly points out this abuse of the word, LAWFUL. "He seems to me, _says he_, a wretched man indeed for having done those acts, and for having been in a situation, where they might be thought lawful. It can never be lawful for any man to do wrong: but we fall into a great mistake in the use of that word: for we consider a thing to be lawful, which any one may do with impunity." This is the meaning, in which the term is generally understood, as the same orator, in addressing the judges in behalf of Rabirius Posthumus, observes, "it behoves you to consider, what is becoming your character, and not what the rigour of the law allows you to inflict. For if you consult the full extent of your authority, you may make away with any citizen you please." In the same manner legislators, as it was proved in a former book of this treatise, are not accountable, in their legislative capacity, to any human tribunal, for the laws, which they make, yet they cannot, in a moral point of view, avail themselves of this transcendent power to enact a thing that is evidently unjust. In this sense we often meet with a distinction made between what is proper or right, and what is lawful. Thus Cicero, in his speech for Milo, makes the LAW OF NATURE the standard of what is RIGHT, and LEGAL AUTHORITY, the standard of what is lawful.