possession of what belongs to him: Let us form rules of justice and
peace, to which all may be obliged to conform, which shall not except
persons, but may in some sort make amends for the caprice of fortune,
by submitting alike the powerful and the weak to the observance of
mutual duties. In a word, instead of turning our forces against
ourselves, let us collect them into a sovereign power, which may
govern us by wise laws, may protect and defend all the members of the
association, repel common enemies, and maintain a perpetual concord
and harmony among us."

Much fewer words of this kind were sufficient to draw in a parcel of
rustics, whom it was an easy matter to impose upon, who had besides
too many quarrels among themselves to live without arbiters, and too
much avarice and ambition to live long without masters. All offered
their necks to the yoke in hopes of securing their liberty; for though
they had sense enough to perceive the advantages of a political
constitution, they had not experience enough to see beforehand the
dangers of it; those among them, who were best qualified to foresee
abuses, were precisely those who expected to benefit by them; even the
soberest judged it requisite to sacrifice one part of their liberty to
ensure the other, as a man, dangerously wounded in any of his limbs,
readily parts with it to save the rest of his body.

Such was, or must have been, had man been left to himself, the origin
of society and of the laws, which increased the fetters of the weak,
and the strength of the rich; irretrievably destroyed natural liberty,
fixed for ever the laws of property and inequality; changed an artful
usurpation into an irrevocable title; and for the benefit of a few
ambitious individuals subjected the rest of mankind to perpetual
labour, servitude, and misery. We may easily conceive how the