Full Idea
The establisher of a people is in a position to change human nature, to transform each individual into a part of a larger whole from which the individual receives his life and being, to substitute a partial and moral existence for natural independence.
Gist of Idea
Human nature changes among a people, into a moral and partial existence
Source
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], II.07)
Book Reference
Rousseau,Jean-Jacques: 'The Basic Political Writings', ed/tr. Cress,Donald A. [Hackett 1987], p.163
A Reaction
The 'partial' part is obvious, in the compromises of society, but he says we only become moral in a people, and even more so when that people constitute a state. In the state of nature, morality seems to be unneeded, rather than absent.