  For Rosmini, every society is simply the union of two or more people undertaken with the intention of obtaining a common advantage. ‘All the persons in this union [forming a society] together have the role of end, and the advantage expected from the association is applied equally to all (PP, vol. 2, 39). In other words, there must be in every society a moral element, an element of justice, which affects the behaviour of the members towards one another, even if collectively (as in Plato’s case of a band of robbers) they are unjust towards non-members. Hence the excellence of what Rosmini calls ‘the social bond’; where it is present and actuated, there is no injustice; injustice begins in its absence. In other words, the nature of society requires that those who form it, enjoy within it the personal dignity of end. There is, therefore, a moral element inherent in every society. Using some persons, some members, as means, even for the apparent good of the whole, is repugnant to the very nature of society. In a coherent universal society, such as that described by Cicero—‘This entire world is to be considered simply as a city common to both gods and human beings’ (quoted in PP, vol. 2, 49)—there will inevitably be a tendency to maximum justice. This means, however, that no one in any society can make one person subservient to another. All that is pertinent only to nature can be used as means; all that which is proper to person, or to which persons have extended themselves so that some thing or things have become proper to them, must be respected as end. Here again, though, a distinction must be made between that is proper to a member of a society as a person, and the modality of that which is proper. In certain cases, the government of a society may change the modality of what is proper if this is for the common good. A piece of land required for a road may, for instance, be substituted with an adequate sum of money. But those things which have no modality, such as innocent life, cannot be violated under the pretext of common good. It is clear that these principles must direct the government of every society.