l. 2. c. 23. “He did not think that possessions of fifty years should be disturbed, because in so long time many things in inheritances, purchases and portions, might be held without an injury to any.” 3. Now from the nature of property acquired by prescription, i.e. by the effect of time regulated by law, and the reasons upon which the utility, or rather necessity of it is founded, it is plain on the one hand, that whatever is not subject of commerce, cannot be the object of prescription, such as liberty; so prime, so essential a blessing; a blessing so much dearer than life, that none can ever be presumed so much as tacitely to have consented to be a slave! Liberty, a blessing, a right in the nature of things unalienable; or to renounce which is contrary to nature, and the will of the author of nature, who made all men free! Public places, goods belonging to the public, &c. So, on the other hand, whatever is the object of commerce may be the object of prescription, i.e. property in it may be acquired by the effect of time. As every man who is otherwise capable of acquiring dominion, is likewise capable of prescribing; so by this right of prescription we may acquire dominion over both sorts of things, moveable and immoveable, unless they are particularly excepted by the laws. But moveable things may pass into prescription sooner than immoveable, for this reason, that immoveables are judged a much greater loss than moveables; that they are not so frequently made the subject of commerce between man and man; that it is not so easy to acquire the possession of them, without knowing whether the party that conveys them be the true proprietor or the false; and consequently, that they are likely to occasion fewer controversies and suits. Plato’s rules for the prescription of moveables are these: “If a thing of this kind be used openly in the city, let it pass into prescription in one year; if in the country in five years: if it be used privately in the city, the prescription shall not be compleated in less than three years. If it be thus held with privacy in the country, the person that lost it shall have ten years allowed him to put in his claim, de leg. l. 12.”3 As for the prescription of immoveables, the constitution of Plato’s commonwealth was not acquainted with it. It is proper to observe here, that by the civil law prescription has not only respect to property; but it destroys other rights and actions when men are not careful to maintain them, and preserve the use of them during the time limited by the law. Thus a creditor loses his debt for having omitted to demand it within the time limited for prescription, and the debtor is discharged from it by the long silence of his creditor. Thus other rights are acquired by a long enjoyment, and are lost for want of exercising them. 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;
