Of the Law of Nature and Nations

Pufendorf, Samuel von. [Barbeyrac, Jean]. Of the Law of Nature and Nations. Eight Books. Written in Latin by the Baron Puffendorf. Done Into English by Basil Kennet. Carefully Corrected, with Two Tables. To Which Are Added All the Large Notes of Mr. Barbeyrac, Translated From the Best Edition; Together with Large Tables to the Whole. The Fourth Edition, Carefully Corrected. To Which is Now Prefixed Mr. Barbeyrac's Prefatory Discourse, Containing an Historical and Critical Account of the Science of Morality, and the Progress It has Made in the World, From the Earliest Times Down to the Publication of This Work. Done Into English by Mr. Carew. London: Printed for J. Walthoe, R. Wilkin, [et. al.], 1729. [xxviii] 88, 878, [22] pp. Reprint available July 2004 by The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd. ISBN 1-58477-394-4. Cloth. $195. * Reprint of the fourth English edition of De Jure Naturae et Gentium. In 1662 Samuel Pufendorf [1632-1694] was appointed to the first modern professorship in natural law (at the University of Heidelberg). In 1670 he became professor of natural law at the University of Lund in Sweden. First published in 1672, this is his principal work and a landmark in the history of natural and international law. It proposed a thorough system of private, public, and international law based on natural law. Beginning with a consideration of fundamental legal ideas and their various divisions, Pufendorf proceeded to a discussion of the validity of customs, the doctrines of necessity and innate human reason. The work is significant in part because it developed principles introduced by Grotius and Hobbes. Unlike Hobbes, Pufendorf argued that peace, not war, was the state of nature, and he proposed that international law was not restricted to Christendom.