118. The nations are destined by nature to unite under a new and more extended form of society. -- The nations, finding themselves in contact with one another, are obliged to aspire to a common good, which consists in order; it is, therefore, the design of nature that they form a universal society. The same conclusion is drawn from the need which nations experience of associating for their material, intellectual, and moral development.
119. The universal society of nations, far from injuring their independence, is its surest guarantee. -- As civil society is the most powerful protection of the domestic order, so the universal society of nations is destined to assure the national independence and upright government of each of the associated peoples.
120. The authority destined to rule this universal society is naturally polyarchical, but it may also be monarchical. -- Nations are in themselves equal, therefore they all naturally share the authority in the person of their representatives who are united in a general assembly. Yet it depends on their will to delegate the whole power to one, as happened in the empire of the middle ages.
121. The associated nations should apply themselves to the gradual formation of a government endowed in the highest degree with unity and efficacy; and this government should have threefold power, legislative, executive, and judiciary. -- The government of this universal society should possess the conditions of all government. The more it is one and efficacious, the more will harmony reign among the nations. If all international controversies and all the abuses of power by those who govern could legitimately be summoned to its tribunal, there would soon be an end of all international or civil war.