41. A person must give to his freedom an external sphere, in order that he may reach the completeness implied in the idea. Since a person is as yet the first abstract phase of the completely existent, infinite will, the external sphere of freedom is not only distinguishable from him but directly different and separable.
Addition.— The reasonableness of property consists not in its satisfying our needs, but in its superseding and replacing the subjective phase of personality. It is in possession first of all that the person becomes rational. The first realization of my freedom in an external object is an imperfect one, it is true, but it is the only realization possible so long as the abstract personality has this firsthand relation to its object.
42. That which is defined as different from the free spirit is both in its own nature and also for this spirit the external. It is an object, something not free, impersonal and without rights.
Note.—“Thing,” like “objective,” has two opposite meanings. When we say “That is the thing or fact,” “It depends on the thing itself, not on the person,” we mean by “thing” that which is real and substantive. But it is also contrasted with person, which here includes more than a particular subject, and then it means the opposite of the real and substantive, and is something merely external.— What is external for the free spirit, which is different from mere consciousness, is absolutely external. Hence nature is to be conceived as that which is external in its very self.
Addition.— Since a thing has no subjectivity it is external not merely to a subject, but to itself. Space and time are external. I, as sensible, am external, spatial, and temporal. My faculty of sense-perception is external to itself. An animal may perceive, but the soul of the animal has as its object not itself, but something external.
43. The person in his direct conception and as a separate individual has an existence which is purely natural. This existence is something partly inalienable, partly akin in its nature to the external world.—As the individual is considered in his first abstract simplicity, reference is here made only to those features of personality with which he is directly endowed, not to those which he might proceed to acquire by voluntary effort.
Note.— Mental endowments, science, art, such matters of religion as sermons, masses, prayers, blessings of consecrated utensils, inventions also, are objects of exchange, recognized things to be bought and sold. It is possible to ask, also, if an artist or scholar is in legal possession of his art, science, or capacity to preach or read mass; and the question is put on the presumption that these objects are things. Yet one hesitates to call such gifts, knowledge, powers, mere things, because although they may be bargained for as a thing, they have an inner spiritual side. Hence the understanding becomes confused as to how they are to be regarded at law. Before the understanding always arises an exclusive disjunction, which in this case is that something must be either a thing or not a thing. It is like the disjunctive judgment that a thing must be either finite or infinite. But, though knowledge, talents, etc., are the possession of the free mind, and therefore internal to it, they may be relinquished and given an external existence. (See below.) They would then fall under the category of things. They are not direct objects at the first, but the spirit lowers its inner side to the level of the directly external.
According to the unjust and immoral finding of the Roman law, children were things for their father, and he was in legal possession of them. At the same time he was related to them ethically by the tie of love, although the value of this relation was much weakened by the legal usage. In this legal relation there occurs a completely wrong union of thing and not-thing.
The essential feature of abstract right is that its object is the person as such, with only those elements added which, belonging to the external and visible embodiment of his freedom, are directly different from him and separable. Other phases it can include only after the conscious operation of the subjective will. Mental endowments, the sciences, etc., come up for treatment only from the standpoint of legal possession. The possession of the body and the mind, which is acquired by education, study and habit, is an inward property of the spirit, and does not fall to be considered here. The process by which a mental possession passes into the external world and comes under the category of a legal property, will be taken up later, under relinquishment.
44. A person has the right to direct his will upon any object, as his real and positive end. The object thus becomes his. As it has no end in itself, it receives its meaning and soul from his will. Mankind has the absolute right to appropriate all that is a thing.
Note.—There is a philosophy which ascribes to the impersonal, to separate things, as they are directly apprehended, an independent and absolutely complete reality. There is also a philosophy which affirms that the mind cannot know what the truth or the thing in itself is. These philosophies are directly contradicted by the attitude of the free will to these things. Although the so-called external things seem to have an independent reality in consciousness as perceiving and imagining, the free will is the idealization or truth of such reality.
Addition.— A man may own anything, because he is a free will, and is therefore self-contained and self-dependent. But the mere object is of an opposite nature. Every man has the right to turn his will upon a thing or make the thing an object of his will, that is to say, to set aside the mere thing and recreate it as his own. As the thing is in its nature external, it has no purpose of its own and contains no infinite reference to itself; it is external to itself. An animal also is external to itself, and is, so far, a thing. Only the will is the unlimited and absolute, while all other things in contrast with the will are merely relative. To appropriate is at bottom only to manifest the majesty of my will towards things, by demonstrating that they are not self-complete and have no purpose of their own. This is brought about by my instilling into the object another end than that which it primarily had. When the living thing becomes my property it gets another soul than it had. I give it my will. Free will is thus the idealism which refuses to hold that things as they are can be self-complete. Realism on the other hand declares them to be absolute in their finite form. But this realistic philosophy is not shared in by the animal, which by consuming things proves that they are not absolutely independent.
45. To have something in my power, even though it be externally, is possession. The special fact that I make something my own through natural want, impulse or caprice, is the special interest of possession. But, when I as a free will am in possession of something, I get a tangible existence, and in this way first became an actual will. This is the true and legal nature of property, and constitutes its distinctive character.
Note.— Since our wants are looked upon as primary, the possession of property appears at first to be a means to their satisfaction; but it is really the first embodiment of freedom and an independent end.
46. Since property makes objective my personal individual will, it is rightly described as a private possession. On the other hand, common property, which may be possessed by a number of separate individuals, is a mark of a loosely joined company, in which a man may or may not allow his share to remain at his own choice.
Note.— The elements of nature cannot become private property.— In the agrarian laws of Rome may be found a conflict between collective and private ownership of land. Private possession is the more reasonable, and, even at the expense of other rights, must win the victory.— Property bound up with family trusts contains an element which is opposed to the right of personality and private ownership. Yet private possession must be kept subject to the higher spheres of right, to a corporate body, e.g., or to the state, as happens when private ownership is entrusted to a socalled moral person, as in mortmain. Yet these exceptions are not to be based on chance, private caprice or personal benefit, but only on the rational organization of the state. The idea of Plato’s “Republic” does a wrong to the person, in regarding him as unable to hold property. The theory of a pious, friendly, or even compulsory brotherhood of men, who are to possess all their goods in common, and to banish the principle of private ownership, easily presents itself to one who fails to understand the nature of freedom of spirit, and the nature of right, through mistaking their definite phases. There is a moral or religious side, also. When the friends of Epicurus proposed to establish a community of goods, he dissuaded them on the ground that the plan indicated a lack of confidence in one another, and that those who mistrusted one another could not be friends (“Diog. Laërt.” 1. x. n. vi).
Addition.— In property my will is personal. But the person, it must be observed, is this particular individual, and, thus, property is the embodiment of this particular will. Since property gives visible existence to my will, it must be regarded as “this” and hence as “mine.” This is the important doctrine of the necessity of private property. If exceptions may be made by the state, the state alone can be suffered to make them. But frequently, and especially in our time, it has restored private possession. Thus, for instance, many states have rightly abolished cloisters, because persons, living together in these institutions, have ultimately no such right to property, as the person has.
47. As a person, I am an individual in only its simplest aspect; more definitely, I am alive in a particular bodily organism. My body is as to its content my universal undifferentiated external existence; it is the real possibility of all definite phases. But also as a person I have my life and body, as I have other things only in so far as they express my will.
Note.— The view that the individual, not in his actualized existence but in his direct conception, is to be taken simply as living and having a physical organism follows from the conception of that phase of life and spirit, which we know as soul. The details of this conception are found in the philosophy of nature.
I have organs and life only so far as I will. The animal cannot mutilate or kill itself, but a human being can.
Addition.— Animals do in a manner possess themselves. Their soul is in possession of their body. But they have no right to their life, because they do not will it.
48. The body, merely as it stands, is not adequate to spirit. In order to be a willing instrument and vitalized means, it must first be taken possession of by the spirit (§57). Still for others I am essentially a free being in my body, as I directly have it.
Note.— It is only because I in my living body am a free being, that my body cannot be used as a beast of burden. In so far as the I lives, the soul, which conceives and, what is more, is free, is not separated from the body. The body is the outward embodiment of freedom, and in it the I is sensible. It is an irrational and sophistic doctrine, which separates body and soul, calling the soul the thing in itself and maintaining that it is not touched or hurt when the body is wrongly treated, or when the existence of a person is subject to the power of another. I can indeed withdraw out of my existence into myself and make my existence something external. I can regard any present feeling as something apart from my real self, and may in this way be free even in chains. But that is an affair of my will. I exist for others in my body; that I am free for others is the same thing as that I am free in this outward life. If my body is treated roughly by others, I am treated roughly.
Since it is I that am sensible, violence offered to my body touches me instantly and directly. This is the difference between personal assault and injury to any external property. In property my will is not so vividly present as it is in my body.
49. In my relation to external things, the rational element is that it is I who own property. But the particular element on the other hand is concerned with ends, wants, caprices, talents, external circumstances, etc. (§45). Upon them, it is true, mere abstract possession depends, but they in this sphere of abstract personality are not yet identical with freedom. Hence what and how much I possess is from the standpoint of right a matter of indifference.
Note.— If we can speak of several persons, when as yet no distinction has been drawn between one person and another, we may say that in personality all persons are equal. But this is an empty tautological proposition, since a person abstractedly considered is not as yet separate from others, and has no distinguishing attribute. Equality is the abstract identity set up by the mere understanding. Upon this principle mere reflecting thought, or, in other words, spirit in its middle ranges, is apt to fall, when before it there arises the relation of unity to difference. This equality would be only the equality of abstract persons as such, and would exclude all reference to possession, which is the basis of inequality. Sometimes the demand is made for equality in the division of the soil of the earth, and even of other kinds of wealth. Such a claim is superficial, because differences of wealth are due not only to the accidents of external nature but also to the infinite variety and difference of mind and character. In short, the quality of an individual’s possessions depends upon his reason, developed into an organic whole. We cannot say that nature is unjust in distributing wealth and property unequally, because nature is not free and, therefore, neither just nor unjust. It is in part a moral desire that all men should have sufficient income for their wants, and when the wish is left in this indefinite form it is well-meant, although it, like everything merely well-meant, has no counterpart in reality. But, further, income is different from possession and belongs to another sphere, that of the civic community.
Addition. — Since wealth depends upon application, equality in the distribution of goods would, if introduced, soon be disturbed again. What does not permit of being carried out, ought not to be attempted. Men are equal, it is true, but only as persons, that is, only with reference to the source of possession. Accordingly every one must have property. This is the only kind of equality which it is possible to consider. Beyond this is found the region of particular persons, and the question for the first time comes up, How much do I possess? Here the assertion that the property of every man ought in justice to be equal to that of every other is false, since justice demands merely that every one should have property. Indeed, amongst persons variously endowed inequality must occur, and equality would be wrong. It is quite true that men often desire the goods of others; but this desire is wrong, for right is unconcerned about differences in individuals.
50. It is a self-evident and, indeed, almost superfluous remark that an object belongs to him who is accidentally first in possession of it. A second person cannot take into possession what is already the property of another.
Addition.— So far we have been chiefly concerned with the proposition that personality must find an embodiment in property. From what has been said, it follows that he who is first in possession is likewise owner. He is rightful owner, not because he is first, but because he is a free will. He is not first till some one comes after him.
51. In order to fix property as the outward symbol of my personality, it is not enough that I represent it as name and internally will it to be mine; I must also take it over into my possession. The embodiment of my will can then be recognized by others as mine. That the object, of which I take possession be unowned is a self-evident, negative condition (§50). Rather it is more than a bare negative, since it anticipates a relation to others.
Addition.— A person’s putting his will into an object is the conception of property, and the next step is the realizing of it. The inner act of my will, which says that something is mine, must be made recognizable for others. When I make an object mine, I give it a predicate, which must be manifested in its outer form, and not remain merely in my inner will. Children often affirm this earlier act of will against the real possessing of a thing by others. But for adults such a will is not enough. The form of subjectivity must be removed by working itself out into something objective.
52. Active possession makes the material of an object my property, since the material is not independently its own.
Note.— The material opposes itself to me. Indeed its very nature is to furnish opposition to me. It exhibits its abstract independence to my abstract or sentient consciousness. The sentient imagination, it may be said in passing, puts the truth upside down when it regards the sentient side of mind as concrete, and the rational as abstract. In reference therefore to the will and property this absolute independence of the material has no truth. Active possession, viewed as an external activity, by which the universal right of appropriating natural things becomes actualized, is allied to physical strength, cunning, skill, all the means, in short, by which one is able to take hold corporeally of a thing. Owing to the qualitative differences of natural objects, the mastery over and possession of them has an infinitely diversified meaning, and a corresponding limitation and contingency. Moreover, no one kind of matter, such as an element, can be wholly possessed by any number of separate persons. In order to become a possible object of possession, it must be taken in separate parts, as a breath of air or draught of water. The impossibility of owning one kind of matter, or an element, depends finally, not upon external physical incapacity, but upon the fact that the person, as will, is not only individual, but directly individual, and that the external exists for him, therefore, only as a collection of particulars. (§13, note to §43.)
The process, by which we become master and external owner, is in a sense infinite, and must remain more or less undetermined and incomplete. None the less, however, has the material an essential form, because of which alone it is anything. The more I appropriate this form, so much the more do I come into real possession of the object. The consumption of food is a through-andthrough change of its quality. The cultivation of skill in my body, and the education of my mind, are also more or less an active possession by means of thorough-going modification. Mind or spirit is above all that which I can make my own. But this possession is different from property. Property is completed in its relation to the free will. In the external relation of active possession something of externality remains as a residue, but with regard to the free will the owned object has reserved nothing. A matter without qualities, a something which in property is supposed to remain outside of me, and to belong wholly to the object, is an empty abstraction, which thought must expose and defeat.
Addition.— Fichte has raised the question, whether, if I have fashioned an object, its material is also mine. According to his view, if I have made a cup out of gold, any one may take the gold, provided that he does no injury to my handiwork. Though we may imagine that form and substance are separable in that way, the distinction is an empty subtlety. If I take possession of a field, and plough it, not only is the furrow mine, but also the ground which belongs to it. It is my will to take possession of the material, even the whole object. Hence the material is not masterless; it is not its own. Even if the material remains outside of the form which I give the object, the form is a sign that the object is to be mine. Hence the thing does not stay outside of my will or purpose. There is consequently nothing in it which can be taken hold of by another.
53. Property has its more direct phases in the relation of the will to the object. This relation is (a) direct and active taking of possession, in so far as the will is embodied in the object as in something positive. (b) In so far as this object is negative towards the will, the will is visibly embodied in it as something to be negated. This is use. (g) The return of the will into itself out of the object; this is relinquishment. These three phases are the positive, negative, and infinite judgments of the will concerning the object.