lute, the theories of property which our generation has produced.
The most exact idea of property is given us by the Roman law, faithfully followed in this particular by the ancient legists. It is the absolute, exclusive, autocratic domain of a man over a thing,—a domain which begins by usucaption, is maintained by possession, and finally, by the aid of prescription, finds its sanction in the civil law; a domain which so identifies the man with the thing, that the proprietor can say, “He who uses my field, virtually compels me to labor for him; therefore he owes me compensation.”
I pass in silence the secondary modes by which property can be acquired,—tradition, sale, exchange, inheritance, &c.,—which have nothing in common with the origin of property.
Accordingly, Pothier said the domain of property, and not simply property. And the most learned writers on jurisprudence—in imitation of the Roman prætor who recognized a right of property and a right of possession—have carefully distinguished between the domain and the right of usufruct, use, and habitation, which, reduced to its natural limits, is the very expression of justice; and which is, in my opinion, to supplant domanial property, and finally form the basis of all jurisprudence.
But, sir, admire the clumsiness of systems, or rather the fatality of logic! While the Roman law and all the savants inspired by it teach that property in its origin is the right of first occupancy sanctioned by law, the modern legists, dissatisfied with this brutal definition, claim that property is based upon labor. Immediately they infer that he who no longer labors, but makes another labor in his stead, loses his right to the earnings of the latter. It is by virtue of this
