The Political Economy of Juan de Mariana - Ludwig von Mises Institute

ORIGIN OF THE STATE
and injustice can never become legitimate even through
subsequent legislation.
This is Mariana's theory of the origin and end of the
State. He has deduced it, he believes, from primitive history
of the human race. We see, of course, that many of
his assumptions are arbitrary and partly contradictory. A
strictly logical examination would have revealed to the
famous historian the weakness of his assumptions.
To substantially the same conclusions as Mariana held
his brother in religion, Francisco Suarez, the greatest Spanish
Jesuit scholastic, also arrived. Suarez follows a strictly
logical method. He finds the necessity of the State in the
insufficiency of the individual and of the family to supply
all the wants of life. His arguments are: (1) A political
society is necessary because no family is self-sufficing. (2)
If divisions existed between the various families, there
could be no peace. Therefore, they must be united into
one society. And since man needs a political society he
also needs a political power, because a society without such
a power could not accomplish its end. 1
Suarez foresees objections to his argument. Some will
say: Man is by nature free and subject to no one. The
answer is, man is at least subjicibilis, i.e., it is not contrary
to his nature to be subject to a human power. Others
will say that there can be no true or legitimate political
1 dicendum est primo, magistratum civilem cum potestate temporali ad regendos homines,
justum esse et humanae naturae valde consentaneum.... Imo inde sumitur argumentum,
talem modum potestatis esse consentaneum ipsi naturae quatetius ad conveniens regimen
humane communitatis necessaria est. ... Primum est hominem esse animal sociale, et
naturaliter, recteque appetere, in communitate vivere.... Haec autem communitas (scI.
domestica) ... non est sibi sufficiens, et ideo ex natura rei necessaria ulterius est in
genere humano communitas politica, quae civitatem saltem constituat, et ex pluribus
familiis coalescat; quia nulla familia potest in se habere omnia ministeria, et omnes artes
necessarias ad vitam humanam, et multo minus potest sufficere ad assequendam omnium
rerum necessariarum cognitionem. Item quia si singulae familiae essent inter se divisae,
vix posset pax inter homines conservari, neque injuriae possent ordinate propulsari, aut
vindicari, ... Haec autem communitas ulterius augeri potest in regnum vel principatum
per societatem plurittm civitatum, quae etiam est valde conveniens humano generi, saltern
ad melius esse, propter easdem rationes cum proportione applicatas, quamvis necessitas non
sit omnino aequalis. De Legibus ac Deo Le(fislatore, Lib. III, cap. 1, nn. 1-3.
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