15. We are freed from covenants two ways, either by performing, or by being forgiven. By performing, for beyond that we obliged not ourselves. By being forgiven, because he whom we obliged ourselves to, by forgiving is conceived to return us that right which we passed over to him. For forgiving implies giving, that is, by the fourth article of this chapter, a conveyance of right to him to whom the gift is made. [Sidenote: Promises forced from us through fear of death, are valid in the state of nature.] 16. It is a usual question, whether compacts extorted from us through fear, do oblige or not. For example, if, to redeem my life from the power of a robber, I promise to pay him 100_l._ next day, and that I will do no act whereby to apprehend and bring him to justice: whether I am tied to keep promise or not. But though such a promise must sometimes be judged to be of no effect, yet it is not to be accounted so because it proceedeth from fear. For then it would follow, that those promises which reduced men to a civil life, and by which laws were made, might likewise be of none effect; (for it proceeds from fear of mutual slaughter, that one man submits himself to the dominion of another); and he should play the fool finely, who should trust his captive covenanting with the price of his redemption. It holds universally true, that promises do oblige, when there is some benefit received, and when the promise, and the thing promised, be lawful. But it is lawful, for the redemption of my life, both to promise and to give what I will of mine own to any man, even to a thief. We are obliged, therefore, by promises proceeding from fear, except the civil law forbid them; by virtue whereof, that which is promised becomes unlawful. [Sidenote: A latter compact contradicting the former, is invalid.] 17. Whosoever shall contract with one to do or omit somewhat, and shall after covenant the contrary with another, he maketh not the former, but the latter contract unlawful. For he hath no longer right to do or to omit aught, who by former contracts hath conveyed it to another. Wherefore he can convey no right by latter contracts, and what is promised is promised without right. He is therefore tied only to his first contract, to break which is unlawful. [Sidenote: A promise not to resist him that prejudices my body is invalid.]