The Social Contract - 14zy

---Chapter xi : The Various Systems of Legislation---

IF we seek to define precisely the greatest good of all, the

necessary goal of every system of legislation, we shall find that

the main objectives are limited to two only: liberty and equality;

★★★

As regards personal power, it should not be so great as to make 

violence possible,and should be exercised only in accordance 

with根据 social position and the law;

-★★★

and as regards wealth, that no citizen should be

rich enough to be able to buy another, and none so poor that

he has to sell himself:and this depends on those of high

position exercising restraint concerning property and influence,

and ★on the common people restraining their greed and envy.

Equality, it is said, is a theorists' vision, which cannot 

exist in practice.

But if an abuse is inevitable, does it follow that it

should not at least be controlled?(是否应至少加以避免呢)

-

It is precisely because the force of things always 

tends to destroy equality that the force

of law should tend always to conserve it.

-

But these general aims for any good scheme of legislation

must be modified in every country by the relationships that

arise both from its geographical situation and from the 

character of the inhabitants,

-

and it is on the basis of these relationships that a particular 

system of laws must be devised发明/设计 for each

people, a system which may not, perhaps, be the best in itself,

but will be the best for the state for which it is intended.

-

For example, suppose that the soil is hard to work and 

barren贫瘠的, or the country too cramped for its 

inhabitants—encourage crafts and industry, the products 

of which can be exchanged for the commodities that you lack. 

-

If on the contrary you live in rich

plains and on fertile slopes, you lack people, devote 

yourself wholly to agriculture, which causes the

population to multiply, and expel排除 crafts and industry, 

since all they would do is to depopulate the country entirely.

In a word, besides the principles that apply to every

nation, there is in each people some cause why they should be

applied in a particular manner, making its legislation 

suitable for it alone.

-

Thus the Hebrews in ancient times, and the Arabs

recently, have made religion their primary concern; the 

Athenians, culture; Carthage and Tyre, trade; Rhodes, its navy;

Sparta, war; and Rome virtue. 

★★★

The constitution of a state is made truly solid and lasting if

the fitness of things is so carefully observed that natural

relationships and the laws meet at the same points, the latter

doing no more, as it were, than confirm, accompany and 

rectify改正 the former. 

-

But if the legislator mistakes his purpose and

follows some principle other than the one arising from the

natural situation; if the former should tend towards servitude

and the latter to freedom; 

-

one to wealth, the other to populousness; one to peace, 

the other to conquest: then we shall see the laws 

growing gradually weaker, the constitution will deteriorate恶化, 

and the state will suffer constant disturbances纷乱, 

until it has been either destroyed or reformed, and nature, 

which is invincible不可征服的, has reasserted再次声明 its power.