For instance, a patentee, or one to whom the government has
issued a certain instrument, and who in fact has made a
patentable invention.
[246] But what are the rights of ownership? They are
substantially the same as those incident to possession. Within
the limits prescribed by policy, the owner is allowed to exercise
his natural powers over the subject-matter uninterfered with, and
is more or less protected in excluding other people from such
interference. The owner is allowed to exclude all, and is
accountable to no one. The possessor is allowed to exclude all
but one, and is accountable to no one but him. The great body of
questions which have made the subject of property so large and
important are questions of conveyancing, not necessarily or
generally dependent on ownership as distinguished from
possession. They are questions of the effect of not having an
independent and original title, but of coming in under a title
already in existence, or of the modes in which an original title
can be cut up among those who come in under it. These questions
will be dealt with and explained where they belong, in the
Lectures on Successions.
[247] LECTURE VII.
CONTRACT. -- I. HISTORY.
The doctrine of contract has been so thoroughly remodelled to
meet the needs of modern times, that there is less here than
elsewhere for historical research.
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