Deplorable pride! We know nothing of our nature, and we charge our blunders to it; and, in a fit of unaffected ignorance, cry out, "The truth is in doubt, the best definition defines nothing!" We shall know some time whether this distressing uncertainty of jurisprudence arises from the nature of its investigations, or from our prejudices; whether, to explain social phenomena, it is not enough to change our hypothesis, as did Copernicus when he reversed the system of Ptolemy.
But what will be said when I show, as I soon shall, that this same jurisprudence continually tries to base property upon equality?
What reply can be made?
% 3 .-- Civil Law as the Foundation and Sanction of Property.
Pothier seems to think that property, like royalty, exists by divine right.

He traces back its origin to God himself--ab Jove principium.

He begins in this way:-- "God is the absolute ruler of the universe and all that it contains: _Domini est terra et plenitudo ejus, orbis et universi qui habitant in eo_.

For the human race he has created the earth and all its creatures, and has given it a control over them subordinate only to his own.

'Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet,' says the Psalmist.