In their relations with other nations, the Utopians never enter into alliances because they have observed how easily pledges are broken by their neighboring countries. It is a pity, Hythloday comments, that those remote nations cannot learn to follow the splendid examples set by the Christian nations of Europe, who are inspired by the injunctions and examples of the popes.
The leaders of those far-off, benighted countries have an unscrupulous practice of phrasing documents in terms that leave loopholes for their violation if that becomes convenient. If those same deceptive devices that are used in conducting international affairs were discovered in the actions of private citizens, they would be vehemently condemned as grossly unethical. In those countries (the neighbors of the Utopians), there are two distinct standards of justice—the one applied to ordinary people demanding a rigidly moral standard of conduct, and the second, which operates for princes and persons in high station, according to which “lawful and unlawful is only measured by pleasure and interest.”
