DUTIES. In its most enlarged sense, this word is nearly equivalent to taxes, embracing all impositions or charges levied¹ on persons or things; in its more restrained sense, it is often used as equivalent to customs, (q. v.) or imposts. (q. v.) Story, Const. §949. Vide, for the rate of duties payable² on goods and merchandise, Gord. Dig. B. 7, t. 1, c. 1; Story's L. U. S. Index, h. t.

DUTY, natural law. A human action which is, exactly conformable to the laws which require us to obey them.

2. It differs from a legal obligation, because a duty cannot always be enforeed by the law; it is our duty, for example, to be temperate³ in eating, but we are under no legal obligation to be so; we ought to love our neighbors, but no law obliges us to love them.

3. Duties may be considered in the relation of man towards God, towards himself, and towards mankind. 1. We are bound to obey the will of God as far as we are able to discover it, because he is the sovereign Lord of the universe who made and governs all things by his almighty⁴ power, and infinite wisdom. The general name of this duty is piety⁵: which consists in entertaining just opinions concerning him, and partly in such affections towards him, and such, worship of him, as is suitable to these opinions.

4. - 2. A man has a duty to perform towards himself; he is bound by the law of nature to protect his life and his limbs; it is his duty, too, to avoid all intemperance⁶ in eating and drinking, and in the unlawful gratification of all his other appetites.

5. - 3. He has duties to perform towards others. He is bound to do to others the same justice which he would have a right to expect them to do to him.

DWELLING⁷: HOUSE. A building inhabited by man. A mansion⁸. (q. v.)

2. A part of a house is, in one sense, a dwelling house; for example, where two or more persons rent of the owner different parts of a house, so as to have among them the whole house, and the owner does not reserve or occupy any part, the separate portion of each will, in cases of burglary, be considered the dwelling house of each. 1 Mood. Cr. bas. 23.

3. At common law, in cases of burglary, under the term dwelling house are included the out-houses within the curtilage or common fence with the dwelling house. 3 Inst. 64; 4 Bl. Com. 225; and vide Russ & Ry. Cr. Cas. 170; Id. 186; 16 Mass. 105; 16 John. 203; 18 John. 115; 4 Call, 109; 1 Moody⁹, Cr. Cas. 274; Burglary; Door; House; Jail; Mansion.

DYING DECLARATIONS. When a man has received a mortal wound or other injury, by which he is in imminent¹⁰ danger of dying, and believes that he must die, and afterwards does die, the statements he makes as to the manner in which he received such injury, and the person who committed it, are called his dying declarations.

2. These declarations are received in evidence against the person thus accused, on the ground that the party making them can have no motive¹¹ but to tell the truth. The following lines have been put into the mouth of such a man:

		 Have I not hideous12 Death before my view,
		 Retaining but a quantity of life,
		 Which bleeds away, even as a form of wax
		 Resolveth from his figure 'gainst the fire ?
		 What in the world should make me now deceive,
		 Since I must lose the use of all deceit?
		 Why then should I be false, since it is true
		 That I must die here, and live hence by truth.

See Death; Deathbed or dying declarations; Declarations.