632 CITATIONS FROM WRITINGS OF JURISTS AND ECONOMISTS. 



sides, it it just and natural that the actual possessor should be pre- 

 ferred, for to take possession away from him there should be a stronger 

 right than his own. 



Tims the right of occupation is a title of legitimate preference 

 founded on nature. 



See. 66. The existence of this primitive state of negative community 

 is incontestable; proofs of the same are found in Genesis, the most 

 ancient of all books, and tlie most venerable even when considering it 

 only from an historical point of view 1 . The poets, in picturing the 

 golden age, have left us ornamented but inaccurate works. The 

 ancient historians have transmitted to us tradition; and, finally, 

 examples thereof were found again in the habits of the savage tribes 

 of America when that continent was discovered. 



See. 67. Tims, following a comparison of Cicero, the world was like 

 a vast theatre belonging to the public, of which each seat became the 

 property of the first occupant as long as it suited him to remain therein, 

 but which he could not prevent another from occupvinu after he had 

 left it. 



See. 68. But how could this preference, acquired by occupation, have 

 become a stable and permanent ownership, that would continue to 

 subsist and could be reclaimed after the first occupant had ceased to 

 be in possession? 



It was agriculture that gave birth to the idea of and made felt the 

 necessity for permanent property. In measure as the number of men 

 increased, it became more difficult to find new uninhabited lands; and 

 on the other hand continued habitation of the same place engendered 

 a too rapid consumption of the natural fruits of the earth for them to 

 suffice for the subsistence of all the inhabitants and of their flocks, 

 without changing locality or without providing therefor by cultivation 

 in a constant and regular manner. 



Thus agriculture was the natural result of the increase of the human 

 species; agriculture in turn favored population, and rendered necessary 

 the establishment of permanent property. For who would give himself 

 the trouble to labor and to sow if he had not the certainty of reaping '.' 



The field that I have cleared and sown should belong to me, at least 

 until I have gathered the fruits that my labor has produced. I have 

 the right to employ force to repulse the unjust person who would wish 

 to dispossess me of it, and to drive away him who should have seized 

 it during my absence. I am regarded as continuing to occupy the field 

 from the first tilth to the harvest, though, in the interval, I do not 

 perform each moment exterior acts of occupation or of possession, 

 because one cannot suppose that I have cleared, cultivated and sown 

 without intention to reap. 



Sec. 69. This habitual occupation, which results from cultivation, pre- 

 serves therefore the right of preference which 1 had acquired by first 

 occupation. It is this habitual occupation which civil law (le Droit 

 Civil) extended and applied as a means to preserve possession, in estab- 

 lishing as maxim that possession is preserved by sole intention, nudo 

 ((it into. 



Cultivation forms a stronger and more lasting tie than single occu- 

 pation; it gives a perfect right to the harvest. But how maintain a 

 right (Droit) other than by doubtful contest, before the foundation of 

 the civil state? 



Sec. 70. Moreover the right which cultivation gives and the effects 

 of occupation which are derived therefrom, cease with the harvest, if 



1 Genesis I, 28 and 29. 



