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Could you point me to anything in Aquinas that describes the application of law to the pagans? For example, what his reaction would be to the Indian wars in Colonial America?

In this chapter he seems to assume that both sides have if not the same religion, then at least some cultural compatibility. For example, "sovereign" means the same thing for them.

In this chapter he seems to assume that both sides have if not the same religion, then at least some cultural compatibility.

With every due respect for the perils of Babel (and the assault that is ritual deicide on the Word and language today), maybe he speaks in the same sense as Lewis does in the Abolition of Man:

I think that just as you can separate the nature of human essence (that part of being human which affords us dignity and entitled us to uniquely human rights and equal regard) from the accidents of nature whereby our sex, skin, intelligence, status, disposition, etc., the same distinctions can be made between Good and Evil and the spectrum of both.

It is irrational to suggest that truths derived to date about the nature of Good and Evil and the Consequences of indulgences either way are not already a part of our human inheritance. Again, because I'm not interested in introducing Revealed Knowledge of any sort ... these are the Right Ways of Attaining Happiness (by ... shudder recognition of duty, obligation, loyality and exercise of obedience, fidelity, courage and industry in those regards).

I'm including this whole post of Goetz_von_Berlichingen only because he never wastes words like I do. It's from one of Cornelis's threads: What's Left What's Right and What's a Value?

On the other hand, if knowledge of the true and the good is common property, why is it so few people agree on what it is? Name one value that is good and true that is a common property for everyone.

I beg to disagree. It only seems that few people agree because of the Leftist environment in which we live. It is a common tactic of the Deconstructionists to find small discrepancies among ethical systems and then emphasize them to the exclusion of the much more substantial areas of ecumenical accord. By this simple device, the Left seeks to prove that there is no objective morality.

"Almost all of the great religions of the world are based on universalistic principles:
The Bible enjoins us to 'love thy neighbor as thyself';
the Koran (or Qur'an) reminds us that 'human beings are worthy of esteem because they are human' and that the 'kindness of God . . . has now bound your hearts together so that through His goodness you may become brothers.' . . .
Buddha taught compassion and self-sacrifice; 'right conduct' was one of the stages of the Eightfold Path along which an individual could seek an end to suffering.

Morris Ginsburg, like many others, has pointed out how much most religious doctrines have in common: 'A list of virtues or duties drawn up by a Buddhist would not differ very greatly from one drawn up by a Christian, a Confucianist, a Muhammedan, or a Jew. Formally all of the ethico-religions systems are universalist in scope." (Page 199. James Q. Wilson. The Moral Sense. New York: The Free Press, 1993. )

C.S.Lewis in The Abolition of Man has extracted eight general rules for human conduct, taken purposely from a variety of different cultures. They are:

I. The Law of General Beneficence

A. Negative: "Never do to other what you would not like them to do to you." - Confucius, Analects
B. Positive: "Men were brought into existence for the sake of men that they might do one another good." - M. Tullius Cicero, De Officiis

II. The Law of Special Beneficence

"Is it only the sons of Atreus who love their wives? For every good man, who is right minded, loves and cherishes his own." - Homer, The Iliad

III. Duties to Parents, Elders, Ancestors

"Your father is an image of the Lord of Creation, you mother an image of the Earth. For him who fails to honour them, every work of piety is in vain. This is the first duty." - Laws of Manu (Hindu)

IV. Duties to Children and Posterity

"The Master said, Respect the young." - Confucius, Analects

V. The Laws of Justice

A. Sexual justice: "Thou shalt not commit adultery." - Exodus
B. Honesty: 'If the native made a "find" of any kind (e.g. a honey tree) and marked it, it was thereafter safe for him, as far as his own tribesmen were concerned, no matter how long he left it.' - Australian Aborigines (in Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics)
C. Justice in Court: "Whose takes no bribe . . . well pleasing is this to Samaš." - Babylonian (in Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics)

VI. The Law of Good Faith and Veracity

"I sought no trickery, nor swore false oaths." - Beowulf

VII. The Law of Mercy

"I have given bread to the hungry, water to the thirsty, clothes to the naked, a ferry boat to the boatless." - Egyptian (in Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics)

VIII. The Law of Magnanimity

A. "There are two kinds of injustice: the first is found in those who do an injury, the second in those who fail to protect another from an injury when they can." - M. Tullius Cicero, De Officiis

B. "We must not listen to those who advise us "being men to think human thoughts, and being mortal to think mortal thoughts," but must put on immortality as much as possible and strain every nerve to live according to that best part of us, which, being small in bulk, yet much more in its power and honour surpasses all else." - Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics

C. "Is not the love of Wisdom a practice of death?" - Plato, Phaedo

I don't think he addressed that issue, though I think the same criteria would have applied. The tribal chief would have been regarded as the sovereign. I don't think he would have approved of aggression against the Indians. He certainly wasn't a cultural relativist, and would have regarded missionary work as a good thing. But I doubt he would have condoned the wholesale taking of Indian lands. That's a thorny one.

The question that interests me is the criteria for beginning a civil war. I don't think the American Revolution met the critieria for a Just War. I'm interested in arguments pro and con.