perpetual tutelage of parents, husbands, or guardians; a sex
created to please and obey was never supposed to have attained the age
of reason and experience. Such, at least, was the stern and haughty
spirit of the ancient law, which had been insensibly mollified before
the time of Justinian.

II. The original right of property can only be justified by the accident
or merit of prior occupancy; and on this foundation it is wisely
established by the philosophy of the civilians. The savage who hollows a
tree, inserts a sharp stone into a wooden handle, or applies a string to
an elastic branch, becomes in a state of nature the just proprietor of
the canoe, the bow, or the hatchet. The materials were common to all,
the new form, the produce of his time and simple industry, belongs
solely to himself. His hungry brethren cannot, without a sense of their
own injustice, extort from the hunter the game of the forest overtaken
or slain by his personal strength and dexterity. If his provident care
preserves and multiplies the tame animals, whose nature is tractable
to the arts of education, he acquires a perpetual title to the use and
service of their numerous progeny, which derives its existence from him
alone. If he encloses and cultivates a field for their sustenance and
his own, a barren waste is converted into a fertile soil; the seed, the
manure, the labor, create a new value, and the rewards of harvest
are painfully earned by the fatigues of the revolving year. In the
successive states of society, the hunter, the shepherd, the husbandman,
may defend their possessions by two reasons which forcibly appeal to
the feelings of the human mind: that whatever they enjoy is the fruit
of their own industry; and that every man who envies their felicity,
may purchase similar acquisitions by the exercise of similar diligence.
Such, in truth, may be the freedom and plenty of a small colony cast
on a fruitful island. But the colony multiplies, while the space still
continues the same; the common rights, the equal inheritance of
mankind, are engrossed by the bold and crafty; each field and forest
is circumscribed by the landmarks of a jealous master; and it is the
peculiar praise of the Roman jurisprudence, that it asserts the claim of
the first occupant to the wild animals of the earth, the air, and the
waters. In the progress from primitive equity to final injustice, the
steps are silent, the shades are almost imperceptible, and the absolut