[284] CHAPTER XXV.

Of the Causes of going to War for others.

I. 1 WHEN we above spoke of those who make war, it was said and proved by us that, by Natural Law, not only each person has an executive power to assert his own right, but also the rights of others. Whence it follows, that the causes which justify him whose interest is concerned, do also justify those who help him.

2 The first and closest of such relations is, the care which we are bound to exercise for those who are under us, whether as members of a family or of our civil community; for these are, in a way, a part of him who is at the head of the body, as we there said. Thus the Gibeonites having put themselves under the Jewish people, that people took up arms for them, with Joshua for their leader. Our ancestors, says Cicero, often undertook war, because merchants and sailors belonging to them were treated with injury. And elsewhere, How many wars did our ancestors undertake because Roman citizens were injured, their navigators detained, their merchants despoiled! The same Romans, though they would not take up arms for their allies, yet when the same peoples had become their subjects, thought it necessary to do so. The Campanians say to the Romans, Since you will not allow us to defend our property against force and injury by our own just force, you will certainly defend it by yours. Florus, as ambassador of the Campanians, says that the league which existed before had become more sacred by the surrender of all his countrymen. It was considered a point of good faith, says Livy, not to desert those who had surrendered to us.

II. But yet it is not always, even if the cause of a subject be just, that it obliges the rulers to enter upon a war; but then only, if it can be done without the damage of all, or the greater part, of the subjects. For the office of the ruler is concerned more with the whole than with the parts; and in proportion as the part is greater, it approaches nearer to the nature of the whole.

IlI. 1 Therefore if one citizen, though innocent, be demanded by the many, in order to be put to death, it is not doubtful that he may 285be given up^*, if it appear that the state of which the demand is made is much too weak to contend. Vasquius disputes against this opinion; but if we look, not so much at his words, as at his purport, he seems to come to this, that such a citizen is not lightly to be deserted, when there is a hope that he may be defended. For he adduces the history of the Italic infantry, which deserted Pompey when his cause was not yet desperate, being assured of their safety by Cæsar; which he blames, and deservedly.

2 Whether an innocent citizen may be delivered into the hands of the enemy to avoid the otherwise imminent destruction of the city, the learned dispute, and the dispute existed also in ancient times; as when Demosthenes narrated the clever fable of the wolves requiring the sheep to give up their dogs for the sake of peace. That it is not lawful to do so, is maintained not by Vasquius only, but Sotus also, whose opinion Vasquius condemns as approaching to perfidy. Yet Sotus holds that such a citizen is bound to surrender himself to the enemy: this Vasquius denies, because the nature of civil society which every one enters into for his own advantage, does not require such a step.

3 But from this, nothing follows but that a citizen is not bound to this step, by any law properly so called; but it does not follow that charity allows him to do otherwise. For there are many duties, not of justice properly so called, but of good will, which it is not only laudable to perform, but which it is blameable to omit. And of such nature appears this to be, that each person should prefer the life of an innocent multitude to his own. So Euripides. And so Phocion exhorted Demosthenes and others that they should rather submit to death, after the example of the daughters of Leos and the Hyacinthids, than bring an irreparable calamity on their country. Cicero, pleading for Sextius, says, that if he were in a ship attacked by pirates who demanded him in particular, and would destroy the ship if he were not given up, he would rather throw himself into the sea than bring upon all the rest, not only certain death, but even extreme danger of death. And again, he says that a wise and good man will rather consult the safety of all than of any one in particular, even of himself. In Livy we read: I have often heard of men who would die for their country, but I never heard of any who thought it reasonable that their country should perish for them.

4 But, this being assumed, there remains this doubt, whether, 286what they are thus bound to do, they can be compelled to do. Sotus denies this, adducing the example of a rich man who is bound to give alms to a needy man by the rule of mercy, but cannot be compelled to do so. But it is to be remarked that the relation of such parties is different from that of superiors compared with subjects. For an equal cannot compel an equal, except to that which he has a right to, speaking strictly. But a superior can compel him to other things also which any virtue prescribes; because in the peculiar right of a superior as superior, this is comprehended. Thus in a great scarcity of corn, the citizens may be compelled to contribute to the common stock what each one has; and thus, in this question before us, it seems to be sound doctrine that the citizen may be compelled to do that which charity requires^*. And thus Phocion, whom I have already mentioned, pointed out a very intimate friend of his, Nicocles by name, and said that matters were come to such a miserable condition that if Alexander demanded him, he would be of opinion that he ought to be given up.

IV. As parties whom we are bound to defend, next to our subjects, come our allies. This is comprehended in our engagement with them, whether they have put themselves under the authority and protection of others, or have contracted for mutual aid. He who does not repel an injury for an ally, if he can, is in the wrong as much as he who does the injury, says Ambrose. That such contracts are not to be extended to wars, where there is no just cause for the war, we have elsewhere said. And this is the reason why the Lacedæmonians, before they began their war with the Athenians, put the matter to the judgment of all their allies; as also the Romans did with regard to the Greeks, respecting the war with Nabis. We will further add, that even in such a case, the ally is not bound, if there be no hope of a good result. For such alliances are contracted, not for the sake of evil results, but of good. An ally however is to be defended even against another confederate, except there be some special stipulation to the contrary in some previous convention. Thus the Corcyreans, if their cause was good, might have received defensive aid from the Athenians, even against the Corinthians, who were their old allies.

V. The third cause [in which we may undertake war on account of others, subjects and allies being the first two cases,] is the cause of friends, to whom we have not promised aid, but to whom it is in a manner due on the ground of friendship, if it can be given easily and without inconvenience. Thus Abraham took arms for Lot, his relative; the Romans commanded the Antiates not to exercise piracy against 287the Greeks, as being related to the Italians. The Romans too, often took up arms for their allies, not only when they were bound to do so by treaty, but also for their friends; or threatened to take up arms in such cases.

VI. The last and widest reason for taking up arms, is the connexion of men with men as such, which alone is often sufficient to induce them to give their aid. Men are made for mutual help, says Seneca, and the like; so Euripides and Ambrose.

VII. 1 Here the question is raised, whether man be bound to defend man, and people to defend people, from wrong. Plato thinks that he ought to be punished who does not repel force offered to another; and this was also provided by the laws of the Egyptians. But, in the first place, if the danger be manifest, it is certain that he is not so bound; for he may reasonably prefer his own life and possessions to those of others. And in this sense, as I conceive, we are to interpret what Cicero says, that he who does not repel and resist an injury when he can, is as much in fault as if he were to desert his parents, or his country, or his allies: when he can, we are to understand, with convenience to himself: for the same writer elsewhere says, Perhaps we cannot defend men without incurring blame. So Sallust says that when we are asked to assist allies, it is to be considered whether we may abstain from war; and then, whether what is required is sufficiently pious, safe, glorious; or on the other hand, unbecoming.

2 And the warning of Seneca is not to be despised: I am willing to help a man who is perishing, but so that I myself do not perish; except I am to be the ransom of a great man or a great cause. And even then, he will not be bound, if the person oppressed cannot be extricated without the death of the assailant. For if he may in some cases prefer the life of the assailant to his own, when he is attacked, as we have elsewhere said, he will not be wrong who either thinks or desires that another person so attacked has the same preference: especially when there is a greater danger of irreparable and eternal loss on the part of the invader.

VIII. 1 There is also another question, Whether a war for the subjects of another be just, for the purpose of defending them from injuries inflicted by their ruler. Certainly it is undoubted that ever since civil societies were formed, the rulers of each claimed some especial right over his own subjects. Euripides makes his characters say that they are sufficient to right wrongs in their own city. And Thucydides puts among the marks of empire, the supreme authority in judicial proceedings. And so Virgil, Ovid, and Euripides in the Hippolytus. This is, as Ambrose says, that peoples may not run into wars by usurping the care for those who do not belong to them. The Corinthians in Thucydides say that it is right that each state should punish its own subjects. And Perseus says that he will not plead in defense of what he did against the Dolopians, since they were under his authority and he had acted upon his right. But all this applies when 288the subjects have really violated their duty; and we may add, when the case is doubtful. For that distribution of power was introduced for that case.

2 But the case is different if the wrong be manifest. If a tyrant like Busiris, Phalaris, Diomede of Thrace, practises atrocities towards his subjects, which no just man can approve, the right of human social connexion is not cut off in such a case. So Constantine took arms against Maxentius and Licinius; and several of the Roman emperors took or threatened to take arms against the Persians, except they prevented the Christians being persecuted on account of their religion.

3 But if we should grant that subjects cannot rightly take up arms even in extreme necessity, (which, we have seen, has been doubted even by those whose purpose was to defend the royal power,) it would not follow that others may not take up arms for them. For when the impediment which exists to an action is in the person, not in the thing itself; in such cases, what is not lawful to one person may be lawful to another for him, if it be a case in which one can help another. Thus for a ward or minor, who is not capable of legal acts, the guardian or trustee sustains the suit; and for an absent person, an agent even without a special commission. Now the impediment which forbids the subject to resist, does not arise from the cause, which is the same in the subject and the non-subject; but from the quality of the person, which does not pass over to others.

4 Thus Seneca thinks that I may attack in war him who, though he is a stranger to my nation, persecutes his own; as we said when we spoke of exacting punishment: and this is often joined with the defense of innocent subjects. We know indeed, both from ancient and from modem histories, that the desire to appropriate another’s possessions often uses such a pretext as this: but that which is used by bad men does not necessarily therefore cease to be right. Pirates use navigation, but navigation is not therefore unlawful. Robbers use weapons, but weapons are not therefore unlawful^*.

IX. 1 But, as we have said, that leagues made with a view to mutual help in all wars alike, without distinction of the cause, are unlawful; so no kind of life is more disreputable than that of those who act as soldiers for pay merely, without regard to the cause; whose motto is, the right is where the best pay is: as Plato proves from Tyrteus. This is the reproach which Philip cast upon the Etolians, and Dionysius of Miletus upon the Arcadians; saying, that there was a market where the Arcadians made a profit of the misfortunes of the Greeks. As Antiphanes says, It is a wretched life to be ready to die in order to live. So Dio Prusæensis.

2 But that they sell their own lives is little, if it were not that they sell too the lives of other innocent men: and in this way they are worse than the hangman, in proportion as it is worse to kill men without a cause than for a cause: as Antisthenes says that executioners 289are more respectable than tyrants, for they kill guilty, these, innocent men. Philip of Macedon (the greater) said that for those whose gain was in a soldier’s life, peace was war, and war, peace.

3 War is not one of the arts of life. On the contrary, it is a thing so horrible, that nothing but the highest necessity or the deepest charity can make it be right: as may be understood from what we have said in the last chapter but one. Augustine says, to be a soldier is not a sin, but to be a soldier for plunder, is.

X. And not for plunder only, but for pay, if that be regarded solely or principally; though in the other case, it is allowable to receive pay. St Paul says, Whogoeth to warfare at his own charge?