Natural law recognizes the validity of all contracts which men have a _natural_ right to make, and which justice requires to be fulfilled: such, for example, as contracts that render equivalent for equivalent, and are at the same time consistent with morality, the natural rights of men, and those rights of property, privilege, &c., which men have a natural right to acquire by labor and contract. Natural law, therefore, inasmuch as it recognizes the natural right of men to enter into obligatory contracts, permits the formation of government, founded on contract, as all our governments profess to be. But in order that the contract of government may be valid and lawful, it must purport to authorize nothing inconsistent with natural justice, and men's natural rights. It cannot lawfully authorize government to destroy or take from men their natural rights: for natural rights are inalienable, and can no more be surrendered to government--which is but an association of individuals--than to a single individual. They are a necessary attribute of man's nature; and he can no more part with them--to government or any body else--than with his nature itself. But the contract of government may lawfully authorize the adoption of means--not inconsistent with natural justice--for the better protection of men's natural rights. And this is the legitimate and true object of government. And rules and statutes, not inconsistent with natural justice and men's natural rights, if enacted by such government, are binding, on the ground of contract, upon those who are parties to the contract, which creates the government, and authorizes it to pass rules and statutes to carry out its objects.[1]