Two Treatises of Government by John Locke. - HTML preview

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man also to labour, and the penury of his condition required it of him.

God and his reason commanded him to subdue the earth, i.e. improve it

for the benefit of life, and therein lay out something upon it that was

his own, his labour. He that in obedience to this command of God,

subdued, tilled and sowed any part of it, thereby annexed to it

something that was his property, which another had no title to, nor

could without injury take from him.

Sect. 33. Nor was this appropriation of any parcel of land, by improving

it, any prejudice to any other man, since there was still enough, and as

good left; and more than the yet unprovided could use.

So that, in

effect, there was never the less left for others because of his

enclosure for himself: for he that leaves as much as another can make

use of, does as good as take nothing at all. No body could think himself

injured by the drinking of another man, though he took a good draught,

who had a whole river of the same water left him to quench his thirst:

and the case of land and water, where there is enough of both, is

perfectly the same.

Sect. 34. God gave the world to men in common; but since he gave it them

for their benefit, and the greatest conveniencies of life they were

capable to draw from it, it cannot be supposed he meant it should always

remain common and uncultivated. He gave it to the use of the industrious

and rational, (and labour was to be his title to it;) not to the fancy

or covetousness of the quarrelsome and contentious. He that had as good

left for his improvement, as was already taken up, needed not complain,

ought not to meddle with what was already improved by another's labour:

if he did, it is plain he desired the benefit of another's pains, which

he had no right to, and not the ground which God had given him in common

with others to labour on, and whereof there was as good left, as that

already possessed, and more than he knew what to do with, or his

industry could reach to.

Sect. 35. It is true, in land that is common in England, or any other

country, where there is plenty of people under government, who have

money and commerce, no one can inclose or appropriate any part, without

the consent of all his fellow-commoners; because this is left common by

compact, i.e. by the law of the land, which is not to be violated. And

though it be common, in respect of some men, it is not so to all

mankind; but is the joint property of this country, or this parish.

Besides, the remainder, after such enclosure, would not be as good to

the rest of the commoners, as the whole was when they could all make use

of the whole; whereas in the beginning and first peopling of the great

common of the world, it was quite otherwise. The law man was under, was

rather for appropriating. God commanded, and his wants forced him to

labour. That was his property which could not be taken from him

where-ever he had fixed it. And hence subduing or cultivating the earth,

and having dominion, we see are joined together. The one gave title to

the other. So that God, by commanding to subdue, gave authority so far

to appropriate: and the condition of human life, which requires labour

and materials to work on, necessarily introduces private possessions.

Sect. 36. The measure of property nature has well set by the extent of

men's labour and the conveniencies of life: no man's labour could

subdue, or appropriate all; nor could his enjoyment consume more than a

small part; so that it was impossible for any man, this way, to intrench

upon the right of another, or acquire to himself a property, to the

prejudice of his neighbour, who would still have room for as good, and

as large a possession (after the other had taken out his) as before it

was appropriated. This measure did confine every man's possession to a

very moderate proportion, and such as he might appropriate to himself,

without injury to any body, in the first ages of the world, when men

were more in danger to be lost, by wandering from their company, in the

then vast wilderness of the earth, than to be straitened for want of

room to plant in. And the same measure may be allowed still without

prejudice to any body, as full as the world seems: for supposing a man,

or family, in the state they were at first peopling of the world by the

children of Adam, or Noah; let him plant in some inland, vacant places

of America, we shall find that the possessions he could make himself,

upon the measures we have given, would not be very large, nor, even to

this day, prejudice the rest of mankind, or give them reason to

complain, or think themselves injured by this man's incroachment, though

the race of men have now spread themselves to all the corners of the

world, and do infinitely exceed the small number was at the beginning.

Nay, the extent of ground is of so little value, without labour, that I

have heard it affirmed, that in Spain itself a man may be permitted to

plough, sow and reap, without being disturbed, upon land he has no other

title to, but only his making use of it. But, on the contrary, the

inhabitants think themselves beholden to him, who, by his industry on

neglected, and consequently waste land, has increased the stock of corn,

which they wanted. But be this as it will, which I lay no stress on;

this I dare boldly affirm, that the same rule of propriety, (viz.) that

every man should have as much as he could make use of, would hold still

in the world, without straitening any body; since there is land enough

in the world to suffice double the inhabitants, had not the invention of

money, and the tacit agreement of men to put a value on it, introduced

(by consent) larger possessions, and a right to them; which, how it has

done, I shall by and by shew more at large.

Sect. 37. This is certain, that in the beginning, before the desire of

having more than man needed had altered the intrinsic value of things,

which depends only on their usefulness to the life of man; or had

agreed, that a little piece of yellow metal, which would keep without

wasting or decay, should be worth a great piece of flesh, or a whole

heap of corn; though men had a right to appropriate, by their labour,

each one of himself, as much of the things of nature, as he could use:

yet this could not be much, nor to the prejudice of others, where the

same plenty was still left to those who would use the same industry. To

which let me add, that he who appropriates land to himself by his

labour, does not lessen, but increase the common stock of mankind: for

the provisions serving to the support of human life, produced by one

acre of inclosed and cultivated land, are (to speak much within compass)

ten times more than those which are yielded by an acre of land of an

equal richness lying waste in common. And therefore he that incloses

land, and has a greater plenty of the conveniencies of life from ten

acres, than he could have from an hundred left to nature, may truly be

said to give ninety acres to mankind: for his labour now supplies him

with provisions out of ten acres, which were but the product of an

hundred lying in common. I have here rated the improved land very low,

in making its product but as ten to one, when it is much nearer an

hundred to one: for I ask, whether in the wild woods and uncultivated

waste of America, left to nature, without any improvement, tillage or

husbandry, a thousand acres yield the needy and wretched inhabitants as

many conveniencies of life, as ten acres of equally fertile land do in

Devonshire, where they are well cultivated?

Before the appropriation of land, he who gathered as much of the wild

fruit, killed, caught, or tamed, as many of the beasts, as he could; he

that so imployed his pains about any of the spontaneous products of

nature, as any way to alter them from the state which nature put them

in, by placing any of his labour on them, did thereby acquire a

propriety in them: but if they perished, in his possession, without

their due use; if the fruits rotted, or the venison putrified, before he

could spend it, he offended against the common law of nature, and was

liable to be punished; he invaded his neighbour's share, for he had no

right, farther than his use called for any of them, and they might serve

to afford him conveniencies of life.

Sect. 38. The same measures governed the possession of land too:

whatsoever he tilled and reaped, laid up and made use of, before it

spoiled, that was his peculiar right; whatsoever he enclosed, and could

feed, and make use of, the cattle and product was also his. But if

either the grass of his enclosure rotted on the ground, or the fruit of

his planting perished without gathering, and laying up, this part of the

earth, notwithstanding his enclosure, was still to be looked on as

waste, and might be the possession of any other. Thus, at the beginning,

Cain might take as much ground as he could till, and make it his own

land, and yet leave enough to Abel's sheep to feed on; a few acres would

serve for both their possessions. But as families increased, and

industry inlarged their stocks, their possessions inlarged with the need

of them; but yet it was commonly without any fixed property in the

ground they made use of, till they incorporated, settled themselves

together, and built cities; and then, by consent, they came in time, to

set out the bounds of their distinct territories, and agree on limits

between them and their neighbours; and by laws within themselves,

settled the properties of those of the same society: for we see, that in

that part of the world which was first inhabited, and therefore like to

be best peopled, even as low down as Abraham's time, they wandered with

their flocks, and their herds, which was their substance, freely up and

down; and this Abraham did, in a country where he was a stranger. Whence

it is plain, that at least a great part of the land lay in common; that

the inhabitants valued it not, nor claimed property in any more than

they made use of. But when there was not room enough in the same place,

for their herds to feed together, they by consent, as Abraham and Lot

did, Gen. xiii. 5. separated and inlarged their pasture, where it best

liked them. And for the same reason Esau went from his father, and his

brother, and planted in mount Seir, Gen. xxxvi. 6.

Sect. 39. And thus, without supposing any private dominion, and property

in Adam, over all the world, exclusive of all other men, which can no

way be proved, nor any one's property be made out from it; but supposing

the world given, as it was, to the children of men in common, we see how

labour could make men distinct titles to several parcels of it, for

their private uses; wherein there could be no doubt of right, no room

for quarrel.

Sect. 40. Nor is it so strange, as perhaps before consideration it may

appear, that the property of labour should be able to over-balance the

community of land: for it is labour indeed that puts the difference of

value on every thing; and let any one consider what the difference is

between an acre of land planted with tobacco or sugar, sown with wheat

or barley, and an acre of the same land lying in common, without any

husbandry upon it, and he will find, that the improvement of labour

makes the far greater part of the value. I think it will be but a very

modest computation to say, that of the products of the earth useful to

the life of man nine tenths are the effects of labour: nay, if we will

rightly estimate things as they come to our use, and cast up the several

expences about them, what in them is purely owing to nature, and what to

labour, we shall find, that in most of them ninety-nine hundredths are

wholly to be put on the account of labour.

Sect. 41. There cannot be a clearer demonstration of any thing, than

several nations of the Americans are of this, who are rich in land, and

poor in all the comforts of life; whom nature having furnished as

liberally as any other people, with the materials of plenty, i.e. a

fruitful soil, apt to produce in abundance, what might serve for food,

raiment, and delight; yet for want of improving it by labour, have not

one hundredth part of the conveniencies we enjoy: and a king of a large

and fruitful territory there, feeds, lodges, and is clad worse than a

day-labourer in England.

Sect. 42. To make this a little clearer, let us but trace some of the

ordinary provisions of life, through their several progresses, before

they come to our use, and see how much they receive of their value from

human industry. Bread, wine and cloth, are things of daily use, and

great plenty; yet notwithstanding, acorns, water and leaves, or skins,

must be our bread, drink and cloathing, did not labour furnish us with

these more useful commodities: for whatever bread is more worth than

acorns, wine than water, and cloth or silk, than leaves, skins or moss,

that is wholly owing to labour and industry; the one of these being the

food and raiment which unassisted nature furnishes us with; the other,

provisions which our industry and pains prepare for us, which how much

they exceed the other in value, when any one hath computed, he will then

see how much labour makes the far greatest part of the value of things

we enjoy in this world: and the ground which produces the materials, is

scarce to be reckoned in, as any, or at most, but a very small part of

it; so little, that even amongst us, land that is left wholly to nature,

that hath no improvement of pasturage, tillage, or planting, is called,

as indeed it is, waste; and we shall find the benefit of it amount to

little more than nothing.

This shews how much numbers of men are to be preferred to largeness of

dominions; and that the increase of lands, and the right employing of

them, is the great art of government: and that prince, who shall be so

wise and godlike, as by established laws of liberty to secure protection

and encouragement to the honest industry of mankind, against the

oppression of power and narrowness of party, will quickly be too hard

for his neighbours: but this by the by.

To return to the argument in hand.

Sect. 43. An acre of land, that bears here twenty bushels of wheat, and

another in America, which, with the same husbandry, would do the like,

are, without doubt, of the same natural intrinsic value: but yet the

benefit mankind receives from the one in a year, is worth 5l. and from

the other possibly not worth a penny, if all the profit an Indian

received from it were to be valued, and sold here; at least, I may truly

say, not one thousandth. It is labour then which puts the greatest part

of value upon land, without which it would scarcely be worth any thing:

it is to that we owe the greatest part of all its useful products; for

all that the straw, bran, bread, of that acre of wheat, is more worth

than the product of an acre of as good land, which lies waste, is all

the effect of labour: for it is not barely the plough-man's pains, the

reaper's and thresher's toil, and the baker's sweat, is to be counted

into the bread we eat; the labour of those who broke the oxen, who

digged and wrought the iron and stones, who felled and framed the timber

employed about the plough, mill, oven, or any other utensils, which are

a vast number, requisite to this corn, from its being feed to be sown to

its being made bread, must all be charged on the account of labour, and

received as an effect of that: nature and the earth furnished only the

almost worthless materials, as in themselves. It would be a strange

catalogue of things, that industry provided and made use of, about every

loaf of bread, before it came to our use, if we could trace them; iron,

wood, leather, bark, timber, stone, bricks, coals, lime, cloth, dying

drugs, pitch, tar, masts, ropes, and all the materials made use of in

the ship, that brought any of the commodities made use of by any of the

workmen, to any part of the work; all which it would be almost

impossible, at least too long, to reckon up.

Sect. 44. From all which it is evident, that though the things of nature

are given in common, yet man, by being master of himself, and proprietor

of his own person, and the actions or labour of it, had still in himself

the great foundation of property; and that, which made up the great part

of what he applied to the support or comfort of his being, when

invention and arts had improved the conveniencies of life, was perfectly

his own, and did not belong in common to others.

Sect. 45. Thus labour, in the beginning, gave a right of property,

wherever any one was pleased to employ it upon what was common, which

remained a long while the far greater part, and is yet more than mankind

makes use of. Men, at first, for the most part, contented themselves

with what unassisted nature offered to their necessities: and though

afterwards, in some parts of the world, (where the increase of people

and stock, with the use of money, had made land scarce, and so of some

value) the several communities settled the bounds of their distinct

territories, and by laws within themselves regulated the properties of

the private men of their society, and so, by compact and agreement,

settled the property which labour and industry began; and the leagues

that have been made between several states and kingdoms, either expresly

or tacitly disowning all claim and right to the land in the others

possession, have, by common consent, given up their pretences to their

natural common right, which originally they had to those countries, and

so have, by positive agreement, settled a property amongst themselves,

in distinct parts and parcels of the earth; yet there are still great

tracts of ground to be found, which (the inhabitants thereof not having

joined with the rest of mankind, in the consent of the use of their

common money) lie waste, and are more than the people who dwell on it

do, or can make use of, and so still lie in common; tho'

this can scarce

happen amongst that part of mankind that have consented to the use of

money.

Sect. 46. The greatest part of things really useful to the life of man,

and such as the necessity of subsisting made the first commoners of the

world look after, as it doth the Americans now, are generally things of

short duration; such as, if they are not consumed by use, will decay and

perish of themselves: gold, silver and diamonds, are things that fancy

or agreement hath put the value on, more than real use, and the

necessary support of life. Now of those good things which nature hath

provided in common, every one had a right (as hath been said) to as much

as he could use, and property in all that he could effect with his

labour; all that his industry could extend to, to alter from the state

nature had put it in, was his. He that gathered a hundred bushels of

acorns or apples, had thereby a property in them, they were his goods as

soon as gathered. He was only to look, that he used them before they

spoiled, else he took more than his share, and robbed others. And indeed

it was a foolish thing, as well as dishonest, to hoard up more than he

could make use of. If he gave away a part to any body else, so that it

perished not uselesly in his possession, these he also made use of. And

if he also bartered away plums, that would have rotted in a week, for

nuts that would last good for his eating a whole year, he did no injury;

he wasted not the common stock; destroyed no part of the portion of

goods that belonged to others, so long as nothing perished uselesly in

his hands. Again, if he would give his nuts for a piece of metal,

pleased with its colour; or exchange his sheep for shells, or wool for a

sparkling pebble or a diamond, and keep those by him all his life he

invaded not the right of others, he might heap up as much of these

durable things as he pleased; the exceeding of the bounds of his just

property not lying in the largeness of his possession, but the perishing

of any thing uselesly in it.

Sect. 47. And thus came in the use of money, some lasting thing that men

might keep without spoiling, and that by mutual consent men would take

in exchange for the truly useful, but perishable supports of life.

Sect. 48. And as different degrees of industry were apt to give men

possessions in different proportions, so this invention of money gave

them the opportunity to continue and enlarge them: for supposing an

island, separate from all possible commerce with the rest of the world,

wherein there were but an hundred families, but there were sheep, horses

and cows, with other useful animals, wholsome fruits, and land enough

for corn for a hundred thousand times as many, but nothing in the

island, either because of its commonness, or perishableness, fit to

supply the place of money; what reason could any one have there to

enlarge his possessions beyond the use of his family, and a plentiful

supply to its consumption, either in what their own industry produced,

or they could barter for like perishable, useful commodities, with

others? Where there is not some thing, both lasting and scarce, and so

valuable to be hoarded up, there men will not be apt to enlarge their

possessions of land, were it never so rich, never so free for them to

take: for I ask, what would a man value ten thousand, or an hundred

thousand acres of excellent land, ready cultivated, and well stocked too

with cattle, in the middle of the inland parts of America, where he had

no hopes of commerce with other parts of the world, to draw money to him

by the sale of the product? It would not be worth the enclosing, and we

should see him give up again to the wild common of nature, whatever was

more than would supply the conveniencies of life to be had there for him

and his family.

Sect. 49. Thus in the beginning all the world was America, and more so

than that is now; for no such thing as money was any where known. Find

out something that hath the use and value of money amongst his

neighbours, you shall see the same man will begin presently to enlarge

his possessions.

Sect. 50. But since gold and silver, being little useful to the life of

man in proportion to food, raiment, and carriage, has its value only

from the consent of men, whereof labour yet makes, in great part, the

measure, it is plain, that men have agreed to a disproportionate and

unequal possession of the earth, they having, by a tacit and voluntary

consent, found out, a way how a man may fairly possess more land than he

himself can use the product of, by receiving in exchange for the

overplus gold and silver, which may be hoarded up without injury to any

one; these metals not spoiling or decaying in the hands of the

possessor. This partage of things in an inequality of private

possessions, men have made practicable out of the bounds of society, and

without compact, only by putting a value on gold and silver, and tacitly

agreeing in the use of money: for in governments, the laws regulate the

right of property, and the possession of land is determined by positive

constitutions.

Sect. 51. And thus, I think, it is very easy to conceive, without any

difficulty, how labour could at first begin a title of property in the

common things of nature, and how the spending it upon our uses bounded

it. So that there could then be no reason of quarrelling about title,

nor any doubt about the largeness of possession it gave.

Right and

conveniency went toget