The earth, and all that is
therein, is given to men for the support and comfort of their
being. And tho' all the fruits it naturally produces, and beasts
it feeds, belong to mankind in common, as they are produced by
the spontaneous hand of nature; and no body has originally a
private dominion, exclusive of the rest of mankind, in any of
them, as they are thus in their natural state: yet being given
for the use of men, there must of necessity be a means to
appropriate them some way or other, before they can be of any
use, or at all beneficial to any particular man. The fruit, or
venison, which nourishes the wild Indian, who knows no
enclosure, and is still a tenant in common, must be his, and so
his, i.e. a part of him, that another can no longer have any
right to it, before it can do him any good for the support of his
life.
Sec. 27. Though the earth, and all inferior creatures, be
common to all men, yet every man has a property in his own
person: this no body has any right to but himself. The
labour of his body, and the work of his hands, we may say,
are properly his. Whatsoever then he removes out of the state
that nature hath provided, and left it in, he hath mixed his
labour with, and joined to it something that is his own, and
thereby makes it his property. It being by him removed from
the common state nature hath placed it in, it hath by this
labour something annexed to it, that excludes the common right
of other men: for this labour being the unquestionable property
of the labourer, no man but he can have a right to what that is
once joined to, at least where there is enough, and as good, left
in common for others.
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