"protecting themfelves. Natural allegiance "is therefore a debt of gratitude which cannot "be forfeited, cancelled or altered by any "change of time, place or circumftance, nor

by any thing but the united concurrence of "the Legislature. It is a principle of univer"fal law, that the natural-born subject of one "Prince cannot by any act of his own, no not

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by fwearing allegiance to another, put off or "discharge his natural allegiance to the former. "For this natural allegiance was intrinsic and "primitive and antecedent to the other, and "cannot be divefted without the concurrent "act of that Prince to whom it was firft due." The principle here recited may have been a principle of univerfal law in the feudal fyftem; out it is not (f) a principle of universal jus

tice.

(f) If I fhould be thought to treat this "principle of uni"verfal law" with but little ceremony, I would beg leave to obferve, that the learned Judge himfelf from whom I have transcribed it can see it deliberately violated and contradicted on more than one occafion without expreffing the fmalleft difapprobation, and without appearing even to fufpect that there was any thing wrong in the proceeding. He fays, p. 372, 373, that in confequence of this general

principle

D

tice. To affirm that the mere circumftance of an infant's being born within the territories of any Monarch does of itself give that Monarch a right to govern the infant when grown up, would be confeffed to be the height of abfurdity. And there is no more reafon for maintaining fuch a right to have accrued to him from the further circumftance of the child's being nurtured and protected within his realm from birth to manhood. The debt thereby in

curred

principle of law, that "every man owes natural allegiance "where he is born, a particular Act of Parliament became "neceffary after the Reftoration for the naturalization of "children of his Majesty's English subjects born in foreign "countries during the troubles." And, "by several mo"dern ftatutes, all children born out of the King's ligeance, "whose fathers (or grandfathers by the father's fide) were "natural-born fubjects, are now deemed to be natural-born "fubjects themselves to all intents and purposes, unless their faid "ancestors were attainted, &c." and being thus admitted to a full participation of the common rights of Englishmen, are confequently deemed to be bound to their common duties. Surely then this deservedly celebrated reafoner, who in a preceding page held fuch high language refpecting the obligation of natural allegiance, affirming it to be " per

petual, and incapable of being forfeited, cancelled, or al"tered by any change of time, place, or circumstance, or

curred is, as Sir William Blackstone rightly terms it, a debt of gratitude. But the conclufion which he wished to establish, required him to have proved it a debt of juftice. The payment of the latter, if refused, may be exacted by force the discharge of the former (g) cannot be demanded compulforily; it must flow from fpontaneous fentiments of thankfulness on the part of him who has received the benefit. Were I to find on the public road a traveller thrown from his horse, with broken limbs, in a

"by any thing but the concurrence of that Prince to "whom it was first due," ought to have ftigmatized these Acts of Parliament in the strongest terms of reprobation, as direct and premeditated breaches of juftice; as immediately flying in the face of his favourite axiom of univer fal law; and as aiming to deprive the foreign Princes, in whofe kingdoms these children of English parents chanced first to fee the light, of their natural-born fubjects. As no record of the confent of thofe Princes to the acts in question has yet been produced, ought he not to have pronounced them void from the beginning; and to have charged the British Nation to restore to each of thofe potentates "their own men" of whom we are defrauding them?

(g) "By our exactions of gratitude, and our frequent proposals to enforce its obfervance, we only fhew that we "have mistaken its nature." Ferguson's Hiftory of Civil Society, 5th edit. p. 146.

ftate

per

state of infenfibility, and on the point of expiring: were I to convey him to quiet lodgings, to provide the best medical attendance, and with a great degree of perfonal trouble and fonal expence to effect his cure: I might conceive him to have incurred a debt of gratitude; but I should have no right to exact an indemnification. I do not say that, if he were able to return to me what had been expended on his account, he would be innocent in the fight of God, fhould he refuse to make me amends, were I to think it reasonable to defire it. Neither do I affirm that a perfon born and educated in Great Britain would be guiltless in the eye of his Maker, if when arrived at years of discretion he fhould quit the country on flender grounds, and decline to enrol himself among the fubjects of the State. But he would at that period become invested with a right to freedom of action in this refpect; and would be entitled on the principles of natural justice to decide according to his own judgment, and to choose in what part of the globe he would fix himself, and to what power he would pay allegiance in return for protection. The former is the price of the latter; and every man has a

right, until he enters into an agreement to the contrary, to purchase whatever he wants at that market, which offers it to him on the terms which he deems it the most eligible to accept.

The only juft foundation on which the claim of allegiance can be refted is the voluntary act of the fubject, whereby he takes the obligation upon himself. And fince all British subjects have spontaneously incurred this obligation; fome in the most folemn manner by taking the oath, and the reft no less effectually by accepting the protection and the civil rights which are granted by the laws on the condition of allegiance; I shall confider all as bound to the performance of the duties impofed (b) by the oath, and shall proceed to enquire into the nature and extent of their obligation.

The terms of the oath are thefe,

(b) The oath of allegiance may be tendered to all perfons above the age of twelve years, whether natives, denizens, or aliens, either in the Court-leet of the manor, or in the Sheriff's Court. Blackftone, vol. i. p. 368.