Whatsoever, then,
he removes out of the state that Nature hath provided and left it
in, he hath mixed his labour with it, 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 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.
27. He that is nourished by the acorns he picked up under an oak, or
the apples he gathered from the trees in the wood, has certainly
appropriated them to himself. Nobody can deny but the nourishment is
his. I ask, then, when did they begin to be his? when he digested?
or when he ate? or when he boiled? or when he brought them home? or
when he picked them up? And it is plain, if the first gathering made
them not his, nothing else could. That labour put a distinction
between them and common. That added something to them more than
Nature, the common mother of all, had done, and so they became his
private right.
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