Appendix 5. (917).
According to Cicero, `doing harm to another in order to help oneself is more contrary to human nature than death itself'. He proves this by showing that the opposite would destroy society, which of all things is the most in harmony with nature. His own words should be quoted here: `First (such a maxim) destroys communal living and human society' (tollit convictum hominum et societatem: this is his distinction between gregarious living which, according to us, is present also in the state of nature, and society, which is more than `gregarious living'). `The society of mankind, which is more in harmony with nature than anything else, would be destroyed if we were formed in such a way that each individual could despoil and violate another for his own advantage' (humani generis societatem: he is not speaking of domestic or civil society, nor of any special form of society, but of universal society). `For instance, if each member of the human bod y felt that it would be healthier by taking for itself the health of a neighbouring member, it would in fact be weakening and destroying the whole body. In the same way, if each of us took for himself the benefits and advantages of others, society and human community would be ruined.
`There is no opposition to nature if each one wants to acquire for himself, rather than for others, what assists his life; what is repugnant to nature is that we should increase our own faculties, ease and well-being at the expense of others. Not only nature, that is, the Right of the peoples, but the laws governing peoples and the State together, have established that it is not lawful to seek one's own advantage by damaging that of others' (here we find the Right of nature opposed to the laws of civil society; the latter lie therefore outside the former, although society in general proclaims itself as existing maxime secundum naturam). `The aim and desire of laws is to maintain unbroken the connection between the citizens by punishing with death, exile, chains and fines those who attempt to break them. The very reason of nature (ipsa naturae ratio), which is the divine and human law, requires this. Those wishing to obey these laws (and all who live acco rding to nature will obey them) never violate them by desiring and taking for themselves what belongs to others. This, and companionship, justice and freedom, are far more in harmony with dignity and greatness of spirit than greed, life and belongings. Despising these things and looking down upon them when we compare them to common utility is proper to great, noble spirits; withdrawing from others what is theirs for the sake of one's own benefit is more contrary to nature than death, pain and similar things' (De Off., 3, 5).
Although Cicero shows here and in other places that society is natural to human beings, he acknowledges elsewhere the use we make of the word `nature'. For instance, in speaking of exclusive ownership almost as though it were an essential element of civil society, he says that it is not constituted by nature, but by something done by human beings: `Nothing is private by nature. Things are possessed either by lengthy occupation on the part of those who found them empty, or by victory in war, or by law, pact, agreement or lot. 'A little later he says again that the individual who desires what is not his own `will violate the law of human society', a phrase by which he distinguishes this social right from that of nature (De Off. 1, 7).