The first man who, having enclosed a piece of ground, bethought to himself of saying “This is mine”, and found people simple enough to believe him, was the real founder of civil society. How many crimes, wars, murders; how much misery and horror the human race would have been spared if someone had pulled up the stakes and filled the ditch and cried out to his fellow men: ‘Beware of listening to this imposter. You are lost if you forget that the fruits of the earth belong to everyone and that the earth itself belongs to no one!
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, II, trans. G. D. H. Cole
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, II, trans. G. D. H. Cole
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