A. What would be the opposite of a state of nature, regarded as an origin of rights?
B. Art, convention, agreement, law.
A. Then the opposite of natural rights would be artificial, conventional, and legal rights?
B. Not the opposite exactly, but the counterpart and supplement of such rights.
A. But as to their origin only, you would say that the two origins were opposite to each other, the one being according to nature and the other not according to nature?
B. Yes, that would be a fair statement.
A. How do we learn whether anything is according to nature, so as to distinguish it from things not according to nature?
B. By observing what takes place in a state of nature.
A. So, if we saw a wolf devouring a sheep in a forest, we should say that it was the nature of wolves to kill sheep?
B. Of course.
A. But if we saw a dog guarding a flock of sheep and driving them into a sheep-fold at night, should we say that it was the nature of wolves to kill sheep, but the nature of dogs to protect them?
B. No, we should say that the dog had been trained to take care of sheep, although his ancestors had themselves been sheep-killers.
A. Why should we say this?
B. Because we know it by observation and testimony.
A. Do observation and testimony teach us that in a state of nature all men have equal rights?
B. We do not know exactly what is the state of nature applicable to man, since he has improvable faculties and is always changing, or is susceptible of change.
A. Yet the hypothesis is that equal rights are according to nature—that is, to man's nature. Are we to say that natural rights exist because there is no state of nature for man, as there is for dogs and wolves?
B. Although man has improvable faculties and is susceptible of change, and although his actual state of nature is hidden from us in the darkness of ages, before written language existed, yet it is possible to approximate toward the state of nature by observing what takes place among those tribes that are nearest to the state of nature.
A. And do we observe that among such tribes equal rights exist as to life or liberty, or any kind of property?
The colloquy would “naturally” come to an end at this point, because, in a state of nature, might makes right. The natural man takes what he wants, wherever he can find it. He takes the
