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11. Hobbes and Rousseau go upon this maxim, which has overrun the
modern world, that no man can be bound to obedience to another without
his own consent. The maxim would be an excellent one, were men framed
like the categories of Aristotle--substance, quantity, quality,
relation, and the rest--each peering out of his own pigeon-hole, an
independent, self-sufficient entity. But men are dependent, naturally
dependent whether they will or no, every human being on certain
definite others,--the child on the parent, the citizen on the State
whose protection he enjoys, and all alike on God. These natural
dependences carry with them natural uncovenanted obediences,--to
parents, filial duty--to country, loyalty--to God, piety: all which
are embraced in the Latin term _pietas_. (See St. Thomas, 2a 2a, q.
101, art. 1, in corp.) The fatal maxim before us is the annihilation
of _pietas_. In lieu of loyal submission we get a contract, a
transaction of reasoned commercial selfishness between equal and
equal. This perverse substitution has called forth Leo XIII.'s remark
on the men of our time, "Nothing comes so amiss to them as subjection
and obedience," _Nihil tam moleste ferunt quam subesse et parere_.
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