xiii. 5), separated and enlarged their pasture where it best
liked them. And for the same reason, Esau went from his father and his
brother, and planted in Mount Seir (Gen. 36. 6).
39. And thus, without supposing any private dominion and property in
Adam over all the world, exclusive of all other men, which can no
way be proved, nor any one's property be made out from it, but
supposing the world, given as it was to the children of men in common,
we see how labour could make men distinct titles to several parcels of
it for their private uses, wherein there could be no doubt of right,
no room for quarrel.
40. Nor is it so strange as, perhaps, before consideration, it may
appear, that the property of labour should be able to overbalance
the community of land, for it is labour indeed that puts the
difference of value on everything; and let any one consider what the
difference is between an acre of land planted with tobacco or sugar,
sown with wheat or barley, and an acre of the same land lying in
common without any husbandry upon it, and he will find that the
improvement of labour makes the far greater part of the value. I think
it will be but a very modest computation to say, that of the
products of the earth useful to the life of man, nine-tenths are the
effects of labour.
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