Fighting statism with myth?

We hold from God the gift which includes all others. This gift is life — physical, intellectual, and moral life.

But life cannot maintain itself alone. The Creator of life has entrusted us with the responsibility of preserving, developing, and perfecting it. In order that we may accomplish this, He has provided us with a collection of marvelous faculties. And He has put us in the midst of a variety of natural resources. By the application of our faculties to these natural resources we convert them into products, and use them. This process is necessary in order that life may run its appointed course.

Life, faculties, production — in other words, individuality, liberty, property — this is man. And in spite of the cunning of artful political leaders, these three gifts from God precede all human legislation, and are superior to it. Life, liberty, and property do not exist because men have made laws. On the contrary, it was the fact that life, liberty, and property existed beforehand that caused men to make laws in the first place.

via The Law, by Frederic Bastiat.

[Note: Bastiat is obviously writing a generic secular book.  That itself deserves some discussion but I’m going to overlook the issue in this post.  I often write the same way.  I think such things are allowable, but I probably have not dealt as seriously as I should with the dangers inherent in doing so.  Still, I won’t be dealing with the problem in this post]

After Adam and Eve, no human being on earth has ever come into being with these gifts that Bastiat lists: other than a very fragile hold on life.  They don’t even have language, which means their mental faculties could mostly be wasted unless they receive the essential gift that God gives us: other people.

Parents and relationships are bound up in every human’s origin.  In fact, one originally has no real liberty.  How in God’s name could Bastiat miss this in listing “gifts from God” that “precede all human legislation and are superior to it”?

Bastiat’s anti-statism and economics are often brilliant.  But this book is atrocious.  It is written for some other order of beings rather than for human beings.

The state is a false family.  The state inherently wants to prevent citizens from growing into a maturity, so it is a perverse family.  The state wants to sever love so that all social needs are met through payment and bureacracy rather than through real social relationships.

You don’t need this bizarre fiction about life, liberty, and property in order to critique the state.  Why is Bastiat resorting to it?

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