NATURAL CHILDREN. In the phraseology of the English or American law, natural children are children born out of wedlock¹, or bastards², and are distinguished³ from legitimate⁴ children; but in the language of the civil law, natural are distinguished from adoptive children, that is, they are the children of the parents spoken of, by natural procreation. See Inst. lib. 3, tit. 1, §2.√

2. In Louisiana, illegitimate children who have been acknowledged by their father, are called natural children; and those whose fathers are unknown are contradistinguished by the appellation⁵ of bastards. Civ. Code of Lo. art. 220. The acknowledgment of an illegitimate child shall be made by a declaration executed before a notary⁶ public, in the presenee of two witnesses, whenever it shall not have been made in the registering of the birth or baptism of such child. Id. art. 221. Such acknowledgment shall not be made in favor of the children produced by an incestuous or adulterous connexion. Id. art. 222.

3. Fathers and mothers owe alimony to their natural children, when they are in need. Id. art. 256, 913. In some cases natural children are entitled to the legal succession, of their natural fathers or mothers. Id. art. 911 to 927.

4. Natural children owe alimony to their father or mother, if they are in need, and if they themselves have the means of providing it. Id. art. 256.

5. The father is of right the tutor of his natural children acknowledged by him; the mother is of right the tutrix of her natural child not acknowledged by the father. The natural child, acknowledged by both, has for tutor, first the father; in default of him, the mother. Id. art. 274. See 1 Bouv. Inst. n. 319, et seq.

NATURAL EQUITY⁷. That which is founded in natural justice, in honesty and right, and which arises ex aequo et bono. It corresponds precisely⁸ with the definition of justice or natural law, which is a constant and perpetual. will to give to every man what is his. This kind of equity embraces so wide a range, that human tribunals have never attempted to enforce it. Every code of laws has left many matters of natural justice or equity wholly unprovided for, from the difficulty of framing general rules to meet them, from the almost impossibility of enforcing them, and from the doubtful nature of the policy of attempting to give a legal sanction to duties of imperfect obligation, such as charity, gratitude⁹, or kindness. 4 Bouv. Inst. n. 3720.

NATURAL OBLIGATION, Civil law. One which in honor and conscience binds¹⁰ the person who has contracted it, but which cannot be enforeed in a court of justice. Poth. n. 173, and n. 191. See Obligation.