1. Everything has a law built into its nature.

2. The nature of the rock is that it will sink if thrown into a pond; if a man
does not eat, he will become hungry and may die; it is necessary to plant
before we can reap; your car needs fuel in order to run.
3. Natural law is a rule of reason, instilled by God in man's nature, whereby
man can discern how he should act.
4. The natural law is promulgated by the very fact that God instilled it into
man's mind so as to be known by him naturally.
5. The beginnings of the concept of natural law was intertwined with the
notion of the law of nature in accordance with which everything happens as
they should.
6. Heraclitus (540-475 B.C.) referred to natural law as the rational harmony
and order of divergent things and events, including human relations.
7. Sophocles, a Greek writer, considered natural law as a "higher law"
enjoying primacy over human conduct and order.
8. In his play, "Antigone", Antigone made an impassioned appeal to Creon to
respect the "immutable unwritten law" so that she will be able to bury his
brother, Polyneikes whom Creon has killed in battle. Her pleas were not able
to move Creon and when Antigone defied Creon's command she was buried
alive.
9. It was Plato (437-370 B.C.) who straightened the way for natural law as a
discipline to which human conduct and relationship must conform to realize
both the individual and the common good.
10. It was Plato who first distinguished between what is just by natural law
and what is just by positive law.
11. The Stoics taught that men must live consistently with nature in order to
gain a life of discipline and calmness.
12. A familiar maxim of the Stoics is: All men are equal by divine right since
all men are of divine origin.
13. Epictetus viewed natural law as a discipline engraved as it were, in the
heart and minds of human beings.
14. Having attached the natural law to the moral nature of human beings,
the natural law became the participation of human kind in the divine law.
15. St. Paul, apostle and theologian, spoke of "persons who have no
knowledge of the law act in accordance with it by the light of nature, they

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show that they have the law in themselves for they demonstrate the effects
of the law operating in their hearts, their own conscience endorse the
existence of such law, for there is something which condemns or commends
their actions".
16. For St Paul, conscience must not be guided by customs and traditions but
by love and reason.
17. St. Augustine expressed the view that good faith is present in all human
beings, not excluding the perverted and the depraved, without regard to
race, creed and station in life.
18. For St. Augustine, no one can really plead ignorance of the natural law
because his innate good faith and moral nature are never silenced.
19. Natural Law is not a Catholic dogma or doctrine. It is not even a Christian
invention.
20. The first, self-evident precept of the natural law is righteousness, the
virtue of doing what is right.
21. Man knows that "good is to be done and pursued and evil is to be
avoided" not in reference to any positive law but only through reason.
22. The good is in accord with the nature of man, evil is contrary to his
nature.
23. The nature of man is unalterable because it is a reflection of the
unchanging divine essence.
24. All those things to which man has a natural inclination are naturally
apprehended by reason as being good, and consequently as objects of
pursuit, and their contraries as evil and objects of avoidance.
25. The basic inclinations of man are five: a) to seek the good, including the
highest good, which is eternal happiness with God; b) to preserve himself in
existence; c) to preserve the species - that is, to unite sexually; d) to live in
community with other men; e) to use his intellect and will - that is, to know
the truth and make his own decisions.
26. The natural law provides an objective standard of right and wrong; right
and wrong are objective realities.
27. Individual culpability is subjective and may depend on the surrounding
circumstances.
28. The second self-evident precept of Natural Law is justice.
29. Justice, simply defined, is giving to someone what is due to him.

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30. Aristotle believed tnat there is in nature a common principle of the just
and the unjust that all people in some way divine (discern) even if they have
no association or commerce with each other.
31. Law, according to Cicero, is the distinction between things just and
unjust, made in agreement with that primal and most ancient of all things,
Nature, and in conformity to nature's standard are framed those human laws
which inflict punishment upon the wicked but defend and protect the good.
32. For St. Thomas Aquinas, if a human law deflects from the law of nature, it
is unjust and is no longer a law but a perversion of law.
33. A law, for Aquinas, may be unjust In two ways, first, by being contrary to
the human good, either in respect of the end, as when an authority imposes
on his subjects burdensome laws, conducive, not to the conmon good, but
rather to his own cupidity or vainglory, or in respect of the author, as when a
man makes a law that goes beyond the power committed to him, or in
respect of the form, as when burdens are imposed unequally on the
community, although with a view to the common good. Secondly, laws may
be unjust through being opposed to the Divine good, such as laws of tyrants
inducing to idolatry or to anything else contrary to the Divine law.
34. For St. Augustine, a law that is not just seems to be no law at all.
35. Such laws do not bind in conscience, except perhaps in order to avoid
scandal or disturbance for which cause a man should even yield his right.
36. The third evident precept of Natural Law Is Fairness.
37. Fairness is the quality of being honest.
38. The fourth precept of Natural law is Equality.
39. Equality is the character of being impartial.
40. Natural Law has its place and function in the Legal Order.
41. The Justificatory Use of Natural Law involved its use to warrant some
legal innovation, or to support some claim to authority, or simply to vindicate
one's side of an issue or personal conviction.
42. The NLT was used by Hugo Grotius in building the structure of rules
dealing with the relations of states with one another by using principles
which could be justified by the precepts of natural law realizing that states
would not tolerate, let alone accept, any system of law based on the positive
legal system of any country.
43. John Locke used Natural Law as the basis of his doctrine of natural rights
which according to him are inherent and inalienable.

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44. He also used NL to justify and warrant the people's withdrawal of
governmental power whenever the government persistently and deliberately
fails or flouts the will of the people.
45. In more recent times, the NLT gave powerful support to the Nuremberg
concept of "crimes against humanity" and the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights of the UN.
46. The NLT has been utilized to justify innovations in the legal system.
47. In the Philippines, the Code Commission placed the precepts of justice
and equity above strict legalism or form in providing rules concerning such
legal concepts as quieting of title, reformation of instruments, estoppel,
trusts and natural obligations.
48. The Civil Code provides that when natural obligations are fulfilled by the
obligor, the obligee can retain what has been delivered or rendered even of
the allegations that they were given or done without any consideration.
49. The Opposite Use of Natural Law involved refusing to obey a law contrary
to the precept of NL not necessarily for the purpose of disobedience but to
emphasize the fact that blind obedience to authority is not good either.
50. For the advocates of NL, "nonviolent noncooperation with evil is much a
duty as is cooperation with good".
51. The Regulatory Use of Natural Law is rooted in the ancient maxim lex
injusta non est lex.
52. For Cicero, NL has definitely this function because "it is not allowable to
deviate from the natural law nor can it be altered or abrogated.
53. For legal philosophers who believe in the NLT, a statute or a regulation is
null and void when it is contrary to the suprapositive law even if it is not
consistent with superpositive norms of the constitution.
54. There are two grounds advanced by those who favor the regulatory use
of natural law. The first is that no statute can violate the precepts of the
natural law without producing an adverse reaction from the people. It is
unthinkable, for the natural law scholars, that the people would have yielded
or entrusted to their representatives the power to enact statutes which
would be contrary to the precepts of natural law.
55. For Lord Chief Justice Coke: "There are limits to the exercise of legislative
power that have been recognized since the earliest times. These are the
eternal principles of justice and equity which no government has the right to
disregard. Some acts, although not expressly forbidden, maybe against the
plain and obvious dictates of reason and void.

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56. In disposing of the issue of whether a retroactive statute may be held
void even if there are no constitutional prohibition against such kind of
statute, Chief Justice Hosmer of the Supreme Court of Connecticut in
Groshen v. Stonington said: "I would consider it a violation of the social
compact and within the control of the judiciary."
57. Justice Harlan of the US Supreme Court admitted that "the courts have
rarely, if ever, felt themselves so restrained by technical rules that they
could not find some remedy consistent with the law or acts, whether done by
the government or by private individuals, that violated natural justice".
58. The regulatory use of the natural law was pronounced in Germany during
the first decade after World War II because of the condemnation of the free
world of Anti-Semitic legislations countenanced in Germany before and
during World War II.
59. Another ground advanced by NL devotees to sustain their argument that
courts can hold statutes and regulations null and void even when they are
not contrary to the Constitution is that the people themselves may have
expressed their preference for the precepts of natural law in their
constitution. Usually, this is found in the preamble.
60. Read the cases of Rutter vs Esteban (93 Phil 68) and Luna vs.
Intermediate Appellate Court (137 SCRA 7).
61. The legal positivists, however, advance certain reasons for disagreeing
with the regulatory use of the natural law.
62. The first is that the natural law is not part of the legal system. Whether a
statute can be set aside as null and void by means of the natural law
precepts is a policy matter which falls within the exclusive competence of the
body politic. Unless there is an unmistakable policy expression on the matter
in the constitution with clear and proper parameters, courts may not use it in
the legal ordering of society.
63. The second ground is that the natural law has no place in a politically
organized society where there is no particular established religion. It makes a
great deal of difference which body in a politically established society has the
power to discover and apply the natural law.
64. The third criticism is that natural law is antithetical to a good legal order.
It advances the idea that legislations can be adjudged twice. First, by the
constitution and second, by the natural law.
65. When courts can invalidate statutes based on the precepts of the natural
law, they embark on a judicial philosophy unlimited by any fixed standard.
What will prevent the courts from invalidating provisions of the constitution

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by means of the precepts of natural law? It is not inconceivable that It could
end in a "judicial coup d' etat".
66. Justice Iredell of the US Supreme Court in the case of Calder v. Bull (3 US
386, 1 L. Ed. 648): "It is true that some speculative jurists have held that a
legislative act against natural law must itself be void but I cannot think that
under a democratic system of government any court of justice would possess
the power to declare it so... The ideal of natural justice is regulated by no
fixed standard...and all that the court can properly say, in such an event,
would be that the legislature (possessed of an equal right of opinion) has
passed an act which in the opinion of the judges is inconsistent with the
abstract principles of natural law.
67. The Interpretative Use of Natural Law involves its utilization as an
interpretive alembic or devise to express or put into effect the legislative
intention.
68. It is difficult to enact laws that cover all possible situations or cases.
There arises then the need for interpretation, that is to say, restraining a
statute so as to take in less or enlarging it so as to take in more than the
words indicate.
69. The use of the natural law theory in the construction of statutes arises
when a particular situation or condition is apparently within its spirit or
purpose. This is expressed in the familiar canon of statutory interpretation
that a thing which is within the letter of a statute is not within the statute
unless it be within the intention of the legislature. Ex. Testators can pass
their properties to their heirs or legatees at death. Obviously, an heir who
kills the testator to set the will or testament in operation, while within the
letter of the statute, is not, within its spirit and purpose.
70. The second use arises when a particular situation not apparently within
the words of a statute is nonetheless within its essence and purpose. This is
embodied in the equally familiar rule of statutory interpretation that a thing
which is within the intention of the makers of a statute is as much within the
statute as if it were within the letter. Example would be a statute which
would grant compensation to any parent or child who at the time of an
employee's injury is dependent on the earnings of such employee. The
mother of an illegitimate son who died or was injured in the course of
employment, while apparently not within the words of the statute, is no
doubt, within the spirit or purpose of the statute.
71. After the Enlightenment in the 18th Century, adherence to natural law
waned and what gained predominance is legal positivism.

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72. Legal positivism believes that the law is what the State has enacted and
what it will enforce.
73. The main criticism against the natural law is its enforceability. The main
criticism against legal positivism is its violence against reason and justice
and its non pursuit of the common good.
74. The Philippines has a very strong natural law tradition. Principles of
justice and equity are incorporated into the Constitution and in the laws
passed by the legislature. A very good example of this are the laws on
human relations embodied in the Civil Code of the Philippines.
75. It is true that the first duty of the judge is to impose the law but the
imposition of the law is subject to the demands of equity and justice.
76. In the absence of a law on the matter the judge has to decide the case
on the basis of customs, traditions and the basic principles of fairness and
equity.
77. Justice J. B. L. Reyes summed up the interplay of law, conscience and
justice when he wrote: There is no other end but justice; no other master but
law; no other guide but conscience.