§. 138. Thirdly, the supreme power cannot take from any man any part of his
property without his own consent. For the preservation of property being the
end of government, and that for which men enter into society, it necessarily
supposes and requires that the people should have property, without which they
must be supposed to lose that by entering into society which was the end for
which they entered into it; too gross an absurdity for any man to own. Men,
therefore, in society having property, they have such a right to the goods,
which by the law of the community are theirs, that nobody hath a right to take
them, or any part of them, from them without their own consent; without this
they have no property at all. For I have truly no property in that which
another can by right take from me when he pleases against my consent. Hence it
is a mistake to think that the supreme or legislative power of any commonwealth
can do what it will, and dispose of the estates of the subject arbitrarily, or
take any part of them at pleasure. This is not much to be feared in governments
where the legislative consists wholly or in part in assemblies which are
variable, whose members upon the dissolution of the assembly are subjects under
the common laws of their country, equally with the rest. But in governments
where the legislative is in one lasting assembly, always in being, or in one
man as in absolute monarchies, there is danger still, that they will think
themselves to have a distinct interest from the rest of the community, and so
will be apt to increase their own riches and power by taking what they think
fit from the people. For a man's property is not at all secure, though there be
good and equitable laws to set the bounds of it between him and his
fellow-subjects, if he who commands those subjects have power to take from any
private man what part he pleases of his property, and use and dispose of it as
he thinks good.
