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Locke on Property

 

            In chapter five of the book The Second Treatise Locke goes on to describe his interpretation of the right to private property, such that of fruits, animals, and land. He tells how the right to property came about, the limitations set on the rights of property, and how money plays an affect on private property. Locke states the right to property of ones own originated when god gave the world to men. When god created the world for man, he wanted man to make use of it to the greatest advantage of life, and convenience. What he means by that is god made this world for man, and when he made it he has given man the right to use anything in it to his/her benefit. Anything we use toward our self-preservation, Locke considers our rightful property. If we have the right to survive, we must have the right to eat, drink and clothe ourselves which requires the taking of many things on earth. In paragraph twenty-seven Locke states, "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. By this he means once a person removes something like an apple from a tree for examples out of its original state of nature that apple becomes that persons" private property. This also sounds somewhat similar to the process of homesteading, mixing one's labor with the untitled land, fencing it, and then taking ownership of it. There definitely has to be limitations to Locke's theory of property, and he states this in paragraph thirty-one, "As much as anyone can make use of to any advantage of life before it spoils Whatever is beyond .
             this is more than his share and belongs to others. Nothing was made by god for man to spoil or destroy." Letting your property spoil is unfair to someone who could put it to better use.


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