ABSTRACT
This chapter contains several passages that are rather similar to those found in Hugo Grotius's "On the Causes of Undertaking War on Behalf of Others." Students of the concept of erga omnes trace its antecedents to the early recognition of the right of humanitarian intervention, which they often attribute to Grotius. Alberico Gentili 's vision of the common interests of mankind was not limited to human rights. Francisco Suarez agreed that aid to a friendly country justified resort to war but "only on condition that the friend himself would be justified in waging the war, and consents thereto, either expressly or by implication." Perhaps, as Oxford Professor Thomas Erskine Holland argued in his inaugural lecture in 1874, it is only fair that Gentili share with Grotius the latter's reputation as the founder of modern international law.
