compacts, is called conventional right. The compacts between States are called treaties.

Treaties are equal or unequal, according as they promise equal or unequal things; personal or real, according as they relate only to certain persons, and during their lives, or as they are independent of persons and last as long as the State itself; pure and simple or conditional; in the first case the stipulations are absolute; in the second they depend on certain conditions.

There are different species of treaties according to their different objects: treaties of alliance; treaties of boundaries; treaties of cession; treaties of navigation and commerce; treaties of neutrality; treaties of peace.

121. Essential conditions of public treaties.—As a principle, the rules which govern international compacts are (with the exception of a few differences) the same as those which govern private compacts. There are three fundamental conditions: 1, the consent; 2, a licit cause; 3, the capacity of the contracting parties. (See above, 92.)

The consent should be: 1, declared; 2, free; 3, mutual.

The licit causes are those which are physically possible or morally legitimate; the illicit causes are those which are contrary to morality, as, for example, would be the establishment of slavery.

The capacity of making a compact belongs to the sovereign of the State alone; but it is necessary that this sovereign be really invested with the power. A sovereign stripped of his sovereignty has no power to make compacts, although he might have all the most legitimate rights; and, on the other hand, a usurping power can legitimately make compacts. The reason of this is, that foreign nations are not capable to decide what with another people constitutes the legitimacy or non-legitimacy of power: there is for them, therefore, only the power de facto. Yet this is but the general rule. There may be cases where a foreign government may refuse to recognize a usurper's power.

122. Observance of treaties.-The obligation to observe treaties is based on the natural law.

Whether compacts take

place between States or individuals, it matters little. The States, in respect to each other, are like private individuals. Certain publicists, particularly Machiavelli, have maintained that the obligation to observe treaties only lasts as long as these accord with our interests. As much as to say that one should not make any compacts. Besides, Machiavelli's opinion is in such disrepute that it is almost useless to discuss it. We will content ourselves with setting against it the following beautiful thought of a great politician :

Kings should be very careful in making treaties, but when once made, they must observe them religiously. I know very well that many politicians teach the contrary; but without stopping to consider what Christianity has to say regarding these maxims, I maintain that, since the loss of honor is greater than that of life, a great prince should rather risk his person, and even the loss of his State, than break his word, which he cannot break without losing his reputation, consequently, his greatest strength as a sovereign. (Cardinal de Richelieu, Testameni politique, 2° partie, ch. vi.)

CHAPTER X.

FAMILY DUTIES.

SUMMARY.

The family.-Origin and history of the family.-The family originating in the necessity of the perpetuation of the species, has gradually gained in morality until it has reached the present state, namely, monogamy, or marriage between one man and one woman: a progress so far as the dignity of woman and the equality of the sexes are concerned.

Duties of marriage.—The duties of marriage begin before marriage : to be prudent in the choice of a partner; to prefer the moral interests to the material interests.

Mutual duties of the married couple: fidelity founded: 1, on a free promise; 2, on the very idea of marriage.

Duties peculiar to the husband: protection of the family, work, etc. Celibacy and its duties.

Duties of parents toward children. Of the rights of parents.— Basis and limits of the paternal authority.—Instituted in the interest of the children, it is limited by that very interest.

Parents have not, therefore, 1, the right of life and death; 2, the right to strike and maltreat; 3, the right to sell; 4, the right to corrupt. Duties of parents.-General duty of affection without privileges or preferences.—Duty of maintenance and education.—Decrease of parental responsibility in proportion to the age of the children.—Three periods in paternal authority.

Duties of children respecting their parents and respecting each other.-Filial duty.-Fraternal duty.

Duties of masters towards their servants.

123. The family.—It is a law among all living beings to perpetuate their species. This law is among animals subject to no moral law. Yet are there certain species where between the male and female a kind of society is established; and with nearly all animals the attachment of the mother to her young,

shows itself by most striking and touching proofs. But this maternal interest does not usually last beyond the time necessary to bring up the little ones and enable them to provide for themselves. Beyond this time, the offspring separate and disperse. They live their own life; the mother knows them no longer. As to the father, he has scarcely ever known them. Such are the domestic ties among animals: and, rude as they may be, one cannot help already recognizing and admiring in them the anticipated image of the family.

The family in the human species has the same origin and the same end as in the animal species, namely, the perpetuation of the species; but in the former it is exalted and ennobled by additional sentiments: it is consecrated and sanctioned by laws of duty and right to which animals are absolutely incapable of rising.

If we consider the history of the human race, we see the family rise progressively from a certain primitive state, which is not very far from the animal promiscuity, to the condition in which we see it to-day in most civilized countries. Among savage nations, marriages have little stability and duration: they are as easily broken as formed. Female dignity and modesty are scarcely known among them: woman is more a slave than a companion, and the freedom of morals has scarcely any limits. Yet is there no society where marriages are not subject to some sacred or civil formalities, which shows that savages, ignorant as we may suppose them to be, have a presentiment of duties which, under favorable circumstances, tend to purify and elevate the relations of the sexes. Later, in other societies, marriages take a more regular form and a more fixed character; yet, admitting polygamy, more or less, as among the ancients. In short, many circumstances have presided over the legal relations of the two sexes, before, through the natural progress of morals and Christian influence, monogamy became the almost universal law of the family in civilized countries.

It has been seen, then, that as the moral sentiment became

more refined, the family, as it exists to-day, became more closely related to the State; and it will always be safer, in order to establish the legitimacy of such an institution and secure for it due respect, to depend more on sentiment than on reasoning.

Besides, the family is a natural result of the necessary relations which exist between mother, father, and child.

It is the birth of the children which is the end and raison d'être of the family.

This fact, let it be well noted, already determines between mother and child a relation of some duration. The child is altogether unable to live and develop alone. The mother owes it its nourishment; and nature, having herself prepared for the child in the breast of the mother the sources of its subsistence truly indicated thereby that they should be bound to each other by a positive and inevitable tie. It is true the same tie exists also among the families of the animals and their young (at least with mammalia); and we have seen that there exist among them some germs of family. But let us not forget that it takes only a little time for the young of the animal species to reach that degree of strength which enables it to leave its mother without danger. With the human species, on the contrary, it takes a considerable time. Before the first or second year the child is unable to walk; when it walks, it is still unable to walk alone, to find its food, to develop in any way. Imagine a child two, three, five years old, abandoned to himself in a desert island: he would die of hunger. Besides, instinct is much less strong in man than in animals, and much less certain; when an adult, man follows his own reason; in childhood he needs the reason of others. What shall I say of his moral education and intellectual development? The child needs a teacher as well as a nurse. We see that the relations between mother and child must naturally be prolonged far beyond those between animals. The first natural and necessary relations will finally create between these two beings habits of such a character that they