"[F]or nothing is to be accounted hostile force, but where it leaves not the remedy of such an appeal; and it is such force alone, that puts him that uses it into a state of war, and makes it lawful to resist him. A man with a sword in his hand demands my purse in the high-way, when perhaps I have not twelve pence in my pocket: this man I may lawfully kill. To another I deliver 100 pounds to hold only whilst I alight, which he refuses to restore me, when I am got up again, but draws his sword to defend the possession of it by force, if I endeavour to retake it. The mischief this man does me is a hundred, or possibly a thousand times more than the other perhaps intended me (whom I killed before he really did me any); and yet I might lawfully kill the one, and cannot so much as hurt the other lawfully. The reason whereof is plain; because the one using force, which threatened my life, I could not have time to appeal to the law to secure it: and when it was gone, it was too late to appeal. The law could not restore life to my dead carcass: the loss was irreparable; which to prevent, the law of nature gave me a right to destroy him, who had put himself into a state of war with me, and threatened my destruction. But in the other case, my life not being in danger, I may have the benefit of appealing to the law, and have reparation for my 100 pounds that way."
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John Locke (more quotes by John Locke or books by/about John Locke) |
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(1632-1704) English philosopher and political theorist |
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"An Essay Concerning the True Original Extent and End of Civil Government", Chapter 18 "Of Tyranny", #207, originally published in England, 1690
http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/l/locke/john/l81s/chapter18.html |
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Categories: |
Crime, Defense, Guns, Justice, Law, Reason, Redress, Responsibility, Restraint |
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