[218] Of Civil Government, ch. xiii.  See also ch. xi.  “This legislative is not only the supreme power of the commonwealth, but sacred and unalterable in the hands where the community have once placed it; nor can any edict of anybody else, in what form soever conceived, or by what power soever backed, have the force and obligation of a law, which has not its sanction from that legislative which the public has chosen and appointed; for without this the law could not have that which is absolutely necessary to its being a law—­the consent of the society; over whom nobody can have a power to make laws, but by their own consent, and by authority received from them.”  If Rousseau had found no neater expression for his doctrine than this, the Social Contract would assuredly have been no explosive.

[219] See especially ch. viii.

[220] Hence the antipathy of the clergy, catholic, episcopalian, and presbyterian, to which, as Austin has pointed out (Syst. of Jurisprudence, i. 288, n.), Hobbes mainly owes his bad repute.

[221] See Diderot’s article on Hobbisme in the Encyclopaedia, Oeuv., xv. 122.

[222] Esprit des Lois, I. i.

[223] Cont.  Soc., II. vi. 50.

[224] Goguet has the merit of seeing distinctly that command is the essence of law.

[225] Cont.  Soc., II. vi. 51-53.  See Austin’s Jurisprudence, i. 95, etc.; also Lettres ecrites de la Montagne, I. vi. 380, 381.

[226] See, for instance, letter to Mirabeau (l’ami des hommes), July 26, 1767. Corr., v. 179.  The same letter contains his criticism on the good despot of the Economists.

[227] L’Ordre Naturel et Essentiel des Societes Politiques (1767).  By Mercier de la Riviere.  One episode in the life of Mercier de la Riviere is worth recounting, as closely connected with the subject we are discussing.  Just as Corsicans and Poles applied to Rousseau, Catherine of Russia, in consequence of her admiration for Riviere’s book, summoned him to Russia to assist her in making laws.  “Sir,” said the Czarina, “could you point out to me the best means for the good government of a state?” “Madame, there is only one way, and that is being just; in other words, in keeping order and exacting obedience to the laws.”  “But on what base is it best to make the laws of an empire repose?” “There is only one base, Madame:  the nature of things and of men.”  “Just so; but when you wish to give laws to a people, what are the rules which indicate most surely such laws as are most suitable?” “To give or make laws, Madame, is a task that God has left to none.  Ah, who is the man that should think himself capable of dictating laws for beings that he does not know, or knows so ill?  And by what right can he impose laws on beings whom God has never placed in his hands?” “To what, then, do you reduce the science of government?” “To studying carefully; recognising