the clearing, manuring, and ploughing of a field, give the firft occupier a right in perpetuity after this cultivation and all the effects of it are ceased.

Another, and in my opinion, a better account of the first right of owner-fhip, is the following: that, as God has provided these things for the ufe of all, he has of confequence given each leave to take of them what he wants; by virtue therefore of this leave, a man may appropriate what he stands in need of to his own use, without asking or waiting for the confent of others; in like manner, as when an entertainment is provided for the freeholders of a county, each freeholder goes, and eats and drinks what he wants or chooses, without having or waiting for the confent of the other guests.

But then, this reafon juftifies property, as far as neceffaries alone, or, at the moft, as far as a competent provision for our natural exigencies. For, in the entertainment we speak of (allowing the comparison to hold in all points) although every particular freeholder may fit down and eat till he be fatisfied, without any other leave than that of the master of the feaft, or any other proof of that leave, than the general invitation, or the manifeft defign with which the entertainment is provided; yet you would hardly permit any one to fill his pockets, or his wallet, or to carry away with him a quantity of provision to be hoarded up, or wafted, or given to his dogs, or ftewed down into fauces, or converted into articles of fuperfluous luxury; efpecially, if by fo doing, he pinched the guests at the lower end of the

table.

These are the accounts that have been given of the matter by the beft writers upon the fubject; but, were these accounts perfectly unexceptionable, they would none of them, I fear, avail us in vindicating our prefent claims of property in land, unless it were more probable than it is, that our eftates were actually acquired at firft, in fome of the ways which

thefe accounts fuppofe; and that a regular regard had been paid to justice in every fucceffive tranfmiffion of them fince: for if one link in the chain fail, every title pofterior to it falls to the ground.

The real foundation of our right is, THE LAW OF

THE LAND.

It is the intention of God, that the produce of the earth be applied to the use of man; this intention cannot be fulfilled without establishing property; it is confiftent therefore with his will, that property be established. The land cannot be divided into separate property, without leaving it to the law of the country to regulate that divifion; it is confiftent therefore with the fame will, that the law should regulate the divifion; and confequently, "confiftent with the will of God," or, "right," that I fhould poffefs that share which these regulations affign me.

By whatever circuitous train of reafoning you attempt to derive this right, it must terminate at laft in the will of God; the ftraiteft, therefore, and fhortest way of arriving at this will, is the best.

Hence it appears, that my right to an eftate does not at all depend upon the manner or justice of the original acquifition; nor upon the juftice of each fubfequent change of poffeffion. It is not, for inftance, the less, nor ought it to be impeached, because the eftate was taken poffeffion of at first by a family of aboriginal Britons, who happened to be ftronger than their neighbours; nor because the British poffeffor was turned out by a Roman, or the Roman by a Saxon invader; nor becaufe itwas feized, without colour of right or reafon, by a follower of the Norman adventurer; from whom, after many interruptions of fraud and violence, it has at length devolved to me.

Nor does the owner's right depend upon the expediency of the law which gives it to him. On one fide of a brook, an eftate defcends to the eldest fon; on the other fide, to all the children alike. The

N

right of the claimants under both laws of inheritance is equal; though the expediency of fuch oppofite rules must neceffarily be different.

The principles we have laid down upon this subject apparently tend to a conclufion of which a bad ufe is apt to be made. As the right of property de pends upon the law of the land, it feems to follow, that a man has a right to keep and take every thing, which the law will allow him to keep and take; which in many cafes will authorize the moft flagitious chicanery. If a creditor upon a fimple contract neglect to demand his debt for fix years, the debtor may refuse to pay it: would it be right therefore to do fo, where he is confcious of the juftice of the debt? If a perfon, who is under twenty-one years of age, contract a bargain (other than for neceffaries) he may avoid it by pleading his minority: but would this be a fair plea, where the bargain was originally juft? The diftinction to be taken in fuch cafes is this: With the law, we acknowledge, refides the difpofal of property; fo long therefore as we keep within the defign and intention of the law, that law will juftify us, as well in foro confcientia, as in foro humano, whatever be the equity or expediency of the law it. felf. But when we convert to one purpose, a rule or expreffion of law, which is intended for another purpose; then, we plead in our juftification, not the intention of the law, but the words; that is, we plead a dead letter, which can fignify nothing; for words without meaning or intention have no force or effect in juftice, much lefs words taken contrary to the meaning and intention of the speaker or writer. To apply this diftinction to the examples juft now propofed in order to protect men against antiquated demands, from which it is not probable they fhould have preserved the evidence of their discharge, the law prescribes a limited time to certain fpecies of private fecurities, beyond which, it will not enforce them, or lend its affiftance to the recovery of the debt. If a man be ignorant, or dubious of the jus

tice of the demand upon him, he may conscientiously plead this limitation; because he applies the rule of law to the purpofe for which it was intended. But when he refuses to pay a debt, of the reality of which he is confcious, he cannot, as before, plead the inten tion of the ftatute, and the fupreme authority of law, unless he could fhew, that the law intended to interpose its supreme authority, to acquit men of debts, of the existence and justice of which they were them. felves fenfible. Again, to preferve youth from the practices and impofitions, to which their inexperience exposes them, the law compels the payment of no debts incurred within a certain age, nor the performance of any engagements, except for fuch necef, faries as are fuited to their condition and fortunes, If a young perfon therefore perceive that he has been practifed or impofed upon, he may honestly avail himself of the privilege of his non-age to defeat the circumvention. But, if he fhelter himself under this privilege, to avoid a fair obligation, or an equitable contract, he extends the privilege to a cafe, in which it is not allowed by intention of law, and in which confequently it does not, in natural justice, exift,

As property is the principal fubject of justice, or "of the determinate relative duties," we have put. down what we had to say upon it in the firft place; we now proceed to ftate thefe duties in the best order we can.

Chapter V.

PROMISES.

1. FROM whence the obligation to perform Promifes arises.

II. In what fenfe Promifes are to be interpreted.
III. In what cafes Promifes are not binding.

I. From whence the obligation to perform Promifes arifes. They who argue from innate moral principles, fuppofe a sense of the obligation of promises to be one of them; but without affuming this, or any thing else, without proof, the obligation to perform promifes may be deduced from the neceffity of fuch a conduct, to the well-being, or the existence, indeed, of human fociety.

Men act from expectation; expectation is, in most cafes, determined by the affurances and engagements which we receive from others. If no dependence could be placed upon these affurances, it would be impoffible to know what judgment to form of many future events, or how to regulate our conduct with respect to them. Confidence, therefore, in promises, is effential to the intercourse of human life; because, without it, the greatest part of our conduct would proceed upon chance. But there could be no confidence in promifes, if men were not obliged to perform them; the obligation therefore to perform promises is effential, to the fame end, and in the fame degree.

Some may imagine, that, if this obligation were fufpended, a general caution and mutual distrust would enfue, which might do as well; but this is imagined, without confidering, how every hour of our lives we truft to, and depend upon others; and how impoffible it is, to ftir a step, or, what is worse, to fit ftill a moment, without fuch truft and dependence. I am now writing at my cafe, not doubting (or rather never distrusting, and therefore never thinking about it) but that the butcher will fend in the joint of meat, which I ordered; that his servant will bring it; that my cook will drefs it; that my footman will ferve it up; and that I shall find it upon the table at one o'clock. Yet have I nothing for all this, but the promise of the butcher, and the im plied promise of his fervant and mine. And the fame holds of the most important, as well as the most familiar occurrences of focial life. In the one the