§. 15. To those that say there were never any men in the state of Nature, I
will not oppose the authority of the judicious Hooker (Eccl. Pol. i. 10), where
he says,
"the laws which have been hitherto mentioned" — i.e.,
the laws of Nature — "do bind men absolutely, even as they are men,
although they have never any settled fellowship, never any solemn agreement
amongst themselves what to do or not to do; but for as much as we are not by
ourselves sufficient to furnish ourselves with competent store of things
needful for such a life as our Nature doth desire, a life fit for the dignity
of man, therefore to supply those defects and imperfections which are in us, as
living single and solely by ourselves, we are naturally induced to seek
communion and fellowship with others; this was the cause of men uniting
themselves as first in politic societies."
But I, moreover, affirm that
all men are naturally in that state, and remain so till, by their own consents,
they make themselves members of some politic society, and I doubt not, in the
sequel of this discourse, to make it very clear.
