"Those rights, then, which God and nature have established, and are therefore called natural rights, such as life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolate. On the contrary, no human legislature has power to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner shall himself commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture"
About this Quote
The subtext is a quiet threat aimed at the state. By framing rights as "established" by God and nature, Blackstone relocates authority beyond Parliament's reach. This is not democratic romanticism; it's institutional discipline. He's sketching a boundary line for legal power at a time when English constitutional thinking was negotiating sovereignty, property, and the limits of Crown and legislature. Natural rights language offered a moral vocabulary that could travel where precedent sometimes couldn't.
Yet he leaves an escape hatch: rights can be lost through "forfeiture". That's the contractual logic underwriting much 18th-century liberal thought. Your rights are inherent, but not unconditional; the system can strip them if you breach its terms. It's both protective and coercive. The quote works because it turns a philosophical premise into a practical legal standard: the state may not abridge rights, except when it decides you've behaved in a way that justifies it. The tension is the point, and it still animates modern debates over due process, punishment, and what counts as forfeiting liberty.
Quote Details
| Topic | Human Rights |
|---|---|
| Source | William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765–1769), Book I, "Of the Rights of Persons" — passage on natural rights and forfeiture (public-domain original work). |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Blackstone, William. (2026, January 11). Those rights, then, which God and nature have established, and are therefore called natural rights, such as life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolate. On the contrary, no human legislature has power to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner shall himself commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/those-rights-then-which-god-and-nature-have-173717/
Chicago Style
Blackstone, William. "Those rights, then, which God and nature have established, and are therefore called natural rights, such as life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolate. On the contrary, no human legislature has power to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner shall himself commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture." FixQuotes. January 11, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/those-rights-then-which-god-and-nature-have-173717/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Those rights, then, which God and nature have established, and are therefore called natural rights, such as life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolate. On the contrary, no human legislature has power to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner shall himself commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture." FixQuotes, 11 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/those-rights-then-which-god-and-nature-have-173717/. Accessed 20 Feb. 2026.
