Chapter V. Natural rights are antecedent to society, such as the right to life, to liberty, to private judgment, to marriage, &c. They are of two kinds--perfect and imperfect.
Chapter VI. Adventitious rights are divided into Real and Personal (a distinction chiefly of legal value.) He also examines into the nature and foundation of private property.
Chapter VII. treats of the Acquisition of property, Hutcheson, as is usual with moralists, taking the _occupatio_ of the Roman Law as a basis of ownership. Property involves the right of (1) use, (2) exclusive use, (3) alienation.
Chapter VIII. Rights drawn from property are such as mortgages, servitudes, &c., being rights of what may be called partial or imperfect ownership.
Chapter IX. discusses the subject of contracts, with the general conditions required for a valid contract.
Chapter X. Of Veracity. Like most writers on morals, Hutcheson breaks in upon the strict rule of veracity by various necessary, but ill-defined, exceptions. Expressions of courtesy and etiquette are exempted, so also artifices in war, answers extorted by unjust violence, and some cases of peculiar necessity, as when a man tells a lie to save thousands of lives.
Chapter XII. belongs rather to Political Economy. Its subject is the values of goods in commerce, and the nature of coin.
Chapter XIII. enumerates the various classes of contracts, following the Roman Law, taking up _Mandatum, Depositum_, Letting to Hire, Sale, &c.
Chapter XIV. adds the Roman _quasi-contracts_.
Chapter XV. Rights arising from injuries or wrongs _(torts)_. He condemns duelling, but admits that, where it is established, a man may, in some cases, be justified in sending or accepting a challenge.
Chapter XVI. Rights belonging to society as against the individual. The perfect rights of society are such as the following:--(1) To prevent suicide; (2) To require the producing and rearing of offspring, at least so far as to tax and discourage bachelors; (3) To compel men, though not without compensation, to divulge useful inventions; (4) To compel to some industry, &c.
Chapter XVII. takes up some cases where the ordinary rights of property or person are set aside by some overbearing necessity.