has taught all animals; a law not
peculiar to the human race, but shared by all living creatures, whether
denizens of the air, the dry land, or the sea. Hence comes the union
of male and female, which we call marriage; hence the procreation and
rearing of children, for this is a law by the knowledge of which we see
even the lower animals are distinguished. The civil law of Rome, and
the law of all nations, differ from each other thus. The laws of every
people governed by statutes and customs are partly peculiar to itself,
partly common to all mankind. Those rules which a state enacts for its
own members are peculiar to itself, and are called civil law: those
rules prescribed by natural reason for all men are observed by all
peoples alike, and are called the law of nations. Thus the laws of
the Roman people are partly peculiar to itself, partly common to all
nations; a distinction of which we shall take notice as occasion offers.

2 Civil law takes its name from the state wherein it binds; for
instance, the civil law of Athens, it being quite correct to speak thus
of the enactments of Solon or Draco. So too we call the law of the Roman
people the civil law of the Romans, or the law of the Quirites; the law,
that is to say, which they observe, the Romans being called Quirites
after Quirinus. Whenever we speak, however, of civil law, without any
qualification, we mean our own; exactly as, when 'the poet' is spoken
of, without addition or qualification, the Greeks understand the great
Homer, and we understand Vergil. But the law of nations is common to the
whole human race; for nations have settled certain things for themselves
as occasion and the necessities of human life required. For instance,
wars arose, and then followed captivity and slavery, which are contrary
to the law of nature; for by the law of nature all men from the
beginning were born free. The law of nations again is the source of
almost all contracts; for instance, sale, hire, partnership, deposit,
loan for consumption, and very many others.

3 Our law is partly written, partly unwritten, as among the Greeks.
The written law consists of statutes, plebiscites, senatusconsults,
enactments of the Emperors, edicts of the magistrates, and answers of
those learned in the law.

4 A statute is an enactment of the Roman people, which it used to make
on the motion of a senatorial magistrate, as for instance a consul. A
plebiscite is an enactment of the commonalty,