The Whole Duty of Man, According to the Law of Nature

The Author's Preface

15 the author’s preface Had not the Custom which has so generally obtain’d among Learned Men, almost procured to it self the Force of a Law, it might seem altogether superfluous to premise a Word concerning the Reason of the *present Undertaking; the Thing it self plainly declaring my whole Design to be, the giving as short, and yet, if I mistake not, as plain and perspicuous a Compendium of the most material Articles of the Law of Nature, as was possible; and this, lest, if such as betake themselves to this Study should enter those vast Fields of Knowledge without having fully imbibed the Rudiments thereof, they should at first sight be terri fied and confounded by the Copiousness and Difficulty of the Matters occurring therein. And, at the same time, it seems plainly a very expedient Work for the Publick, that the Minds, of Youth especially, should be early imbu’d with that Moral Learning, for which they will have such manifest Occasion, and so frequent Use, through the whole Course of their Lives. And altho’ I have always looked upon it as a Work deserving no great Honour, † to Epitomize the larger Writings of others, and more especially one’s own; yet having thus done out of Submission to the commanding Authority of my Superiors, I hope no honest Man will blame me for having endeavoured hereby to improve the Understandings of Young Men more particularly; to whom so great Regard is to be had, that whatsoever Work is undertaken for their sakes, tho’ it may not be *Ann. 1673, published in Suedish a Year after his large Work. [Barbeyrac’s marginal note (a), p. xix.] † See Julius Rondinus praef. ad Eris. Scand. in Postscripto & Comment. ad Pullum. Ven. Lips. p. 46, 47. [Barbeyrac’s note III.1, p. xxiii (relocated).] The Author’s Design. 16 the whole duty of man capable of great Acuteness or splendid Eloquence, yet it is not to be accounted unworthy of any Man’s Pains. Beside, that no Man, in his Wits, will deny, that these Principles thus laid down are more conducive to the understanding of all Laws in general, than any Elements of the Law Civil can be. And this might have sufficed for the present; but I am minded by some, that it would not be improper to lay down some few Particulars, which will conduce much to a right Understanding of the Constitution of the Law of Nature, and for the better ascertaining its just Bounds and Limits. And this I have been the more ready to do, that I might on this occasion obviate the Pretences of some over-nice Gentlemen, who are apt to pass their squeamish Censures on this Sort of Learning, which in many Instances, is wholly separate from their Province. Now ’tis very manifest, that Men derive the Knowledge of their Duty, and what is fit to be done, or to be avoided in this Life, as it were, from three Springs, or Fountain-Heads; to wit, From the Light of Nature; From the Laws and Constitutions of Countries; And from the special Revelation of Almighty God. From the First of these proceed all those most common and ordinary Duties of a Man; more particularly those that constitute him a sociable Creature with the Rest of Mankind: From the Second are derived all the Duties of a Man, as he is a Member of any particular City or Commonwealth :2 From the Third result all the Duties of a Christian Man. 1. These marginal subheadings in the Author’s Preface appear neither in Pufendorf ’s text nor in Tooke’s original translation, having been borrowed from Barbeyrac by the editors of this edition. 2. Tooke’s struggle with Pufendorf’s political vocabulary begins here, with his choice of “City or Common-wealth” to translate civitas, which Pufendorf uses to signify the state. The republican terms “city,” “commonwealth,” and “civil society” were commonly used to translate civitas during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries , even by Hobbes. Yet in the Introduction to his Leviathan (1651), Hobbes explicitly introduces “state” as the modern equivalent for civitas, and this usage was widespread in the second half of the century. Given its evident suitability for rendering Pufendorf’s nonrepublican conception of political authority, we may conjecture that Tooke remained unhappy with the Hobbesian or absolutist connotations Three Sciences by which Men come to a knowledge of their Duty.1 [3.17.128...