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See Domat’s civil law, &c. T. 1. book. 3. t. 7. §4. 1. and the Roman laws there quoted. And all the long reasonings in Thomasius de perpetuitate debitorum pecuniariorum, and in Titius’s observations on Lauterbach, obs. 1033, and elsewhere, quoted by the very learned Barbeyrac on Pufendorff, of the law of nature <246> and nations, book 4. cap. 12. 1.4 to shew how far prescription is of natural right, and what civil law adds to it, do not prove, that the law of nature does not permit, nay require, that a time should be limited, even for claiming rights, upon the elapsing of which, rights and actions, and what the lawyers call incorporeal things, are prescribed. No one ever pretended, that the law of nature fixed a time which gave a title by prescription with regard to things corporeal or incorporeal. But if security of property and commerce require, that such a time should be fixed, where there is property and commerce, then the law of nature or right reason requires that a time prescribing be fixed so far as security of property and commerce, and quiet possession by honest industry require it, whether with respect to corporeal or incorporeal things. Let me just add upon this head, that whereas it was said above, that things out of commerce cannot be prescribed, yet by the civil law one may acquire or lose by prescription, certain things which are not of commerce; but it is when they are connected with others, of which one may have the property. They are acquired by their connection with such other things. See Domat ibidem. Now, if here also it be said, that the law of nature knows no such distinction: the answer is, that the law of nature or right reason acknowledges every distinction which the public utility of a state requires, in order to prevent confusion and quarrels, and to render honest industry secure in the enjoyment of its just acquisitions. For, 4. whatever distinctions moral writers have made about belonging or being reducible into the law of nature, directly or indirectly, immediately, remotely, or abusively; this is plain, that in order to determine what the law of nature or right reason says about a case, the circumstances of the case must be put. For in the science of the law of nature, as well as other sciences, however general the rules or canons may be, yet in this sense they are particular, that they only extend to such or such cases, such or such circumstances. Now, if we apply this general position to the present question, it will appear that prescription is of the law of nature, in the same sense that testamentary succession, or succession to intestates is of the law of nature, viz. That right reason is able to determine with regard to prescription, in like manner as with regard to the others, some general rules which equity and public, common security require to be settled about them, where any number of men live in commerce, and property is established, that industry may have due liberty and security. Testamentary succession, and succession to intestates, as we have found them to be regulated by right reason, may be detrimental in some cases to the public, because in some cases, it may be more the interest of the public that any other should succeed to an estate than the heirs according to these general rules with regard to succession, by or without testament. But notwithstanding such detriment that may in some cases happen to the public, general rules about succession are necessary; and none are fitter to be such than those which most encourage in-<247>dustry, by best securing the possessor in his right of disposing of his own, the great motive to industry; and those which determine succession in the way it is properest for the general good, that men’s affections should operate towards others. In like manner, whatever detriment may arise in certain cases from the general rule, that time should give a title by prescription; yet the general rule ought to obtain, because it is the best general rule that can be conceived, the least inconvenient, or rather the best for the security of commerce and property, being the best encouragement to honest industry, by giving the securest possession of its honest acquisitions. In fine, if we ask what the law of nature says about succession, or prescription, or any thing else, we must put a case or enumerate the circumstances; and therefore, we must either ask what it requires about them where men are in a state of nature, or where men are under civil government. If we confine the questions of the law of nature to the former case (tho’ there be distinctions to be made even in that case, as will appear afterwards) yet we limit the science too much, and render it almost useless: But if we extend it to what right reason requires under civil government, we must, in order to proceed distinctly, define the principal end of the civil constitution, and its nature, before we can answer the question; which will then be twofold. Either, 1. What that particular constitution requires, in consistency with its end and frame, with regard to prescription, for instance, or any other thing? Or, 2. Whether the end and frame of that constitution requiring such and such rules about prescription for instance, or succession, or any other thing, be a good end, and a good frame, i.e. whether all the parts of it, considered as making a particular constitution, do make one consonant to the great general end of all government, public happiness? Thus, if we attend to the necessity of thus stating the meaning of what is called determination by natural law, we will easily see that what is urged from the laws in the Jewish commonwealth against prescription, does not prove that right reason does not require that every state should make some regulation with regard to the effect of time, as to security in possession. For tho’ the divine law, which prohibited perpetual alienations for several reasons, abolished by that means prescription, yet the letter of this law being no longer in force, where alienations which transfer the property for ever are allowed, the use of prescription is wholly natural in such a state and condition, and so necessary, that without this remedy every purchaser and every possessor being liable to be troubled to all eternity, there would never be any perfect assurance of a sure and peaceable possession. And even those who should chance to have the oldest possession, would have most reason to be afraid, if together with their possession they had not preserved their titles. See Domat’s civil laws, &c. T. 1. p. 483. God, for reasons arising from the constitution of the Jewish republic, forbad the perpetual alienation of their immoveable estates (and not of their goods in general, as some objectors against prescription urge) but all their <248> laws concerning usury, conveyances, and other things, were necessarily connected together, and with their Agrarian law, (as we shall see afterwards). And therefore there is nothing in the law of Moses that condemns prescription as an unjust establishment; and we can no more infer it from hence to be such (as Barbeyrac well observes, ibidem)5 than we may conclude that the perpetual alienation of lands is odious, and not conformable to natural right. But not to insist longer on this head, it is not only evident that the law of nature for the security of property and the encouragement of industry requires, that a time should be regulated for the effect of possession as to prescribing, in all states which admit of alienations and commerce; but that it requires that this time should be the most equal that can be fixed upon, all the circumstances of a particular state being considered, with regard to the non-disturbance of honest industry, i.e. the properest to prevent unjust dispossession on either side, i.e. either with respect to the first or the last possessor. And therefore, 5. There is no difficulty with regard to the following general maxims about it. 1. That prescription may affectually proceed, ’tis requisite that the party receiving the thing at the hands of a false proprietor, do obtain this possession by a just title; and consequently, that he act in this matter bona fide, with fair and honest intention. For this is necessary to just possession. “A man doth not become a just possessor of a thing barely by taking it to himself, but by holding it innocently.” Detaining is otherwise, as Tacitus expresses it, diutina licentia, a long continued injustice. Upon this head Pufendorff observes, that according to the civil law, ’tis enough if a man had this uprightness of intention at his first entring on the possession, though he happens afterwards to discover, that the person who conveyed it to him was not the just proprietor. But the canon law requires the same integrity throughout the whole term of years, on which the prescription is built. But Barbeyrac justly takes notice in his notes, “That the maxim in the civil law is better grounded than that of the canon law. And the artifice of the clergy consists not so much in this, that the determinations of the Popes require a perpetual good intention in him that prescribes, as in this, that they will have the goods of the church look’d upon as not capable of being alienated, either absolutely, or under such conditions as will make all prescriptions void.”6 2. Another necessary condition is, that it be founded on constant possession, such as hath not been interrupted, either naturally, as if the thing hath returned in the mean while to the former owner, or hath at any time lain abandoned or forsaken: or civilly, as if the owner had been actually engaged at law with the possessor for the recovery of what he lost; or at least by solemn protestations hath put in a salvo to his right. 3. That the space of time during which the prime possessor holds the thing, shall be reckoned
