be sworn to amount to at least twenty pounds; though,
by the annual mutiny acts, a soldier may be arrested for a debt which
extends to half that value, but not to a less amount.

[Footnote t: Stat. 1 Geo. II. st. 2. c. 14.]

CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH.

OF MASTER AND SERVANT.

HAVING thus commented on the rights and duties of persons, as standing
in the _public_ relations of magistrates and people; the method I have
marked out now leads me to consider their rights and duties in
_private_ oeconomical relations.

THE three great relations in private life are, 1. That of _master and
servant_; which is founded in convenience, whereby a man is directed
to call in the assistance of others, where his own skill and labour
will not be sufficient to answer the cares incumbent upon him. 2. That
of _husband and wife_; which is founded in nature, but modified by
civil society: the one directing man to continue and multiply his
species, the other prescribing the manner in which that natural
impulse must be confined and regulated. 3. That of _parent and child_,
which is consequential to that of marriage, being it's principal end
and design: and it is by virtue of this relation that infants are
protected, maintained, and educated. But, since the parents, on whom
this care is primarily incumbent, may be snatched away by death or
otherwise, before they have completed their duty, the law has
therefore provided a fourth relation; 4. That of _guardian and ward_,
which is a kind of artificial parentage, in order to supply the
deficiency, whenever it happens, of the natural. Of all these
relations in their order.

IN discussing the relation of _master and servant_, I shall, first,
consider the several sorts of servants, and how this relation is
created and destroyed: secondly, the effects of this relation with
regard to the parties themselves: and, lastly, it's effect with regard
to other persons.

I. AS to the several sorts of servants: I have formerly observed[a]
that pure and proper slavery does not, nay cannot, subsist in England;
such I mean, whereby an absolute and unlimited power is given to the
master over the life and fortune of the slave. And indeed it is
repugnant to reason, and the principles of natural law, that such a
state should subsist any where. The three origins of the right of
slavery assigned by Justinian[b], are all of them built upon false
foundations. As, first, slavery is held to arise "_jure gentium_,"