Page:The Production of Security.pdf/18



n order to define and delimit the function of government, it is first necessary to investigate the essence and object of society itself. What natural impulse do men obey when they combine into society? They are obeying the impulse, or, to speak more exactly, the instinct of sociability. The human race is essentially sociable. Like beavers and the higher animal species in general, men have an instinctive inclination to live in society.

Why did this instinct come into being?

Man experiences a multitude of needs, on whose satisfaction his happiness depends, and whose non-satisfaction entails suffering. Alone and isolated, he could only provide in an incomplete, insufficient manner for these incessant 17