John Locke discusses slavery in his "Second Treatise of Government". He rejects the idea that a person could voluntarily consent to enslavement, saying "a man, not having the power of his own life, "cannot", by compact or by his own consent, "enslave himself" to any one, nor put himself under the absolute, arbitrary power of another" (emphasis in original). However, he goes on to argue that enslavement of those who are guilty of capital offences is permissible. He also defends the enslavement of those captured in war: "This is the perfect condition of "slavery", which is nothing else, but "the state of war continued, between a lawful conqueror and a captive"" (emphasis in original).