Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

RECONSTRUCTING THE NATURAL ORDER 399their srood. For this reason individuals remain tlm t of the State's life. We ask of itprovide for the collective mass of those belonging to itas individuals the utmost possible freedom, prosperity,d culture ; and we can never be persuaded thatduce to the perfection of the State as a whthat it is allowable, to sacrifice the essential rightand interests of individuals to its ends. To theGreek, on the contrary, the State appears as the firstand most essential ; the individual only as a portionof the commonweal. The feeling of political communityis so strong in him, the idea of personalityrecedes so entirely into the background, that it isonly in the State that he can picture to himself anexistence worthy of man. He knows of no higherfunction than the political; no more original rightthan that of the whole mass. The State, says Aristotle,is in its nature earlier than individuals. In allthis, accordingly, only so much right is allowed tothe Person as his position in the State carries with it.Strictly speaking, there are no general rights of man,but only rights of citizens; and however deeply theinterests of individuals may be violated by the State,if the interest of the State require it they cannotcomplain. The State is the sole original proprietor ofall rights, and is not bound to secure to its subjects agreater portion of them than its own interests allow.Plato also shares this point of view, and has evenpushed it to an extreme in his republic."Now why does all modern thought build up theState from below, and consider the individual beforethe mass ? Why does it acknowledge private rightsas inviolable ? Why does it treat men as men befthey are citizens ? The ground of this most thorough