The division of that which is our own

Next in order among the causes of war is an injury actually received; and first, an injury to that which belongs to us. Some things belong to us by a right common to mankind, others by our individual right.

Let us begin with the right which is common to all men. This right holds good directly over a corporeal thing, or over certain actions. Corporeal things are either free from private ownership, or are the property of someone. Things not in private ownership are either such as cannot become subject to private ownership, or such as can. In order to understand the distinction fully, it will be necessary to know the origin of proprietorship, which jurists call the right of ownership.

The origin and development of the right of private ownership

Soon after the creation of the world, and a second time after the Flood, God conferred upon the human race a general right over things of a lower nature. … In consequence, each man could at once take whatever he wished for his own needs, and could consume whatever was capable of being consumed. The enjoyment of this universal right then served the purpose of private ownership; for whatever each had thus taken for his own needs another could not take from him except by an unjust act.