[175]. The denial of natural rights is not rendered any more defensible by the recognition of other positive rights in addition to the strictly legal rights which are created by the state; for example, rights created by international law, or by the so-called law of public opinion.
[176]. See Austin, Lect. 17.
[177]. The terms subject and object are used by different writers in a somewhat confusing variety of senses:—
(a) The subject of a right means the owner of it; the object of a right means the thing in respect of which it exists. This is the usage which has been here adopted: Windscheid, I. sect. 49.
(b) The subject of a right means its subject-matter (that is to say, its object in the previous sense). The object of a right means the act or omission to which the other party is bound (that is to say, its content): Austin, pp. 47, 712.
(c) Some writers distinguish between two kinds of subjects—active and passive. The active subject is the person entitled; the passive subject is the person bound: Baudry-Lacantinerie, Des Biens, sect. 4.
[178]. As to ownerless rights, see Windscheid, I. sect. 49, n. 3. Dernburg, Pandekten, I. sect. 49.
[179]. See as to rights to rights, Windscheid, I. sect. 48 a (Rechte an Rechten).
[180]. Musgrove v. Toy, (1891) A. C. 272.
[181]. On the distinction between liberties and rights, see Bentham’s Works, III. p. 217; Starey v. Graham, (1899) 1 Q. B. at p. 411, per Channell, J.; Allen v. Flood, (1898) A. C. at p. 29, per Cave, J.; Terry, p. 90; Brown’s Austinian Theory of Law, p. 180.