Natural

This adjective occurs, without much deviation from its vernacular meaning, in several somewhat technical phrases. Natural affection, or love. That love or sentiment of regard which usually accompanies physiological relationship. The phrase is used in deeds, where a conveyance, made by way of gift from a parent to a child, for instance, is said to be upon the consideration of natural af Eeotion.

Natural allegiance

That allegiance {q. ».) which is due from a person in view of his birth within a country, as distinguished from local allegiance, q. v.

Natural-born subject

This term is used, in English law-books, for a person born within the dominions of the crown; that is, within the allegiance of the king. It does not seem to mean any thing dif Eerent from " native subject," which is a preferable expression.

Natural child

In a proper use, natural should, in this connection, signify the opposite of adopted; and the phrase should mean a child begotten and born by procreation, in distinction from one taken into filial relations by agreement. And this was a use of the phrase in Roman and early English law. See Burrill. But the phrase has had a wide popular use as a euphuism for bastard, and in that sense is often employed in modern law-books.

— A natural or illegitimate child is one who comes under any of the five following categories: A child bom of a woman not actually married at the time of its birth;

— or, of a wife under such circumstances that prove her husband cannot be its father;

— or, of a husband and wife, whose marriage has since been judicially dissolved, which illegitimatizes their previously lawful issue;

— or, of a widow so long after her husband's decease as to render it absohitely impossible for it to be a child begotten by him; husband, for the second marriage is utterly void.

Wharton.

Natural day. The time between sunrise and sunset; the solar day.

Burrill.

Natural duty, or obligation. A duty or obligation is natural when it springs from the common conscience and needs of man, and is not imposed upon him by enactment or rule of positive origin: and if it thus originates, it is natural, equally whether the law recognizes and enforces it, or does not. But the want of some phrases to designate duties and obligations which rest in conscience merely, and are not enforceable in law, has led to these phi-ases being used in that sense. "Who uses them generally means that the duty or obligation is only natural.

Natural equity

That which appears equal, just, and right to the common native conscience of mankind, as distinguished from that system of jurisprudence technically known as equity, which, though founded in. justice, is largely composed of and directed by established precedents and rules. Natural fool, or, simply, a natural.

An idiot

Natural fruits. Produce of the earth, derived by the powers of nature. It does not seem to be used to signify what grows spontaneously, as opposed to what is cultivated, but to discriminate the product of the forces of nature from theoretic or artificial increase, such as interest of money. See Bouvier. Natural heir. In the Indiana act of 1855, authorizing adoption of children, and providing that an adopted child shall be entitled to all the rights in the estate of the adopted parent that it would have " if the natural heir" of such parent, the word natural is used in the sense of legitimate (procreated); it contrasts the natural mode of producing heirs with the artificial.

Barns V. Allen, 9 Am. Law Reg. 747.

Natural infancy

A period of nonresponsible life, which ends with the seventh year of a person's age.

Whartm.

Natural law. That rule of conduct which may be deduced from the common reason and conscience of mankind, as opposed, on the one hand, to a system of divine law revealed to man, and, on the other, to enacted or formulated life which terminates by natural death, as opposed to civil death.

Natural person

A man, woman, or child, as opposed to a corporation, which has a certain personality impressed upon it by law, and is called an artificial person.

Natural presumption

A probable presumption; an inclination of the mind towards belief, caused by a probability discerned in the fact; as distinguished from a rule for deciding doubtful cases, which has grown up in the courts from a basis of convenience, otherwise called a legal presumption.

Natural right

Those rights which are plainly assured by what is tei-med the law of nature are called natural rights; such as the right to life, to personal liberty, &c.