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played by Occupancy in the first stages of civilisa- 

 tion directly reverses the truth. Occupancy is the 

 advised assumption of physical possession ; and the 

 notion that an act of this description confers a title 

 to <e res nullius/' so far from being characteristic 

 of very early societies, is in all probability the 

 growth of a refined jurisprudence and of a settled 

 condition of the laws, It is only when the rights of 

 property have gained a sanction from long prac- 

 tical inviolability, and when the vast majority of 

 the objects of enjoyment have been subjected to 

 private ownership, that mere possession is allowed 

 to invest the first possessor with dominion over 

 commodities in which no prior proprietorshi p has 

 been asserted. The sentiment in which the doctrine 

 originated is absolutely irreconcilable with that 

 infrequency and uncertainty of proprietary rights 

 which distinguish the beginnings of civilisation. 

 Its true basis seems to be, not an instinctive bias 

 towards the institution of Property, but a presump- 

 tion arising out of the long continuance of that 

 institution, that every thing ought to have an owner. 

 When possession is taking of a " res nullius," that 

 is, of an object which is not, or has never been, 

 reduced to dominion, the possessor is permitted to 

 become proprietor from a feeling that all valuable 

 things are naturally the subjects of an exclusive 

 enjoyment, and that in the given case there is no 

 one to invest with the right of property except the 



