monwealth  v.  Messinger,   1  Binn.  273;

326


CHAP.  XL.]  PEOTEGTION  TO  INDIVIDirALS.  §  582

property.  And  although  such  force,  thus  applied,  is  indictable
under  some  circumstances,  we  find  the  rule  relating  to  it  not
so  broad  as  prevails  respecting  physical  force.  Men  acquire
physical  strength  by  the  cultivation  of  the  soil,  and  by  the  vari-
ous other  active  labors  and  pleasures  of  life,  without  exercising
themselves  upon  one  another;  while  mind  is  developed  almost
solely  by  collision  with  mind.  Therefore  in  such  collision  the
government,  consulting  the  general  good,  allows  its  subjects  free
scope,  if  no  one  assumes  toward  another  what  we  have  called
unfair  ground.^     Thus, —

§  582.  Cheats  —  Breach  of  Contract  —  Enticing  Apprentice.  —
When  one  injures  his  neighbor  by  telling  him  a  falsehood,  the
common  law  says,  the  neighbor  should  not  have  believed  him ;  ^
when,  by  a  breach  of  contract,  or  of  k  duty  in  the  nature  of
contract,  the  injured  person  is  admonished  that  he  should  have
learned  better  than  to  trust  him :  ^  and  so,  in  these  and  other  like
cases,  as,  where  an  apprentice  is  enticed  from  his  master's  ser-
vice,* the  government  merely  permits  the  party  injured  to  carry
on,  in  its  courts,  a  suit  for  civil  redress,^  but  declines  itself  to
interfere  by  a  criminal  prosecution.  What  would  be  the  conse-
quence if  the  like  injuries  were  produced  by  physical  force  may
not  be  quite  plain ;  yet,  —

Robbery  —  Larceny.  —  Where  one  gets  away  the  personal  prop-
erty of  another  by  the  use,  actual  or  even  sometimes  only  threat-
ened, of  physical  force,  he  commits  robbery  or  larceny ;  ^  while,

1  Ante,  §  262,  546.  *  Reg.  v.  Daniel,  6  Mod.  182,  1  Salk.
