For it is only a conception of
the understanding that can be brought under the rational conception of
right. I may therefore say that I possess a field, although it is in
quite a different place from that on which I actually find myself. For
the question here is not concerning an intellectual relation to the
object, but I have the thing practically in my power and at my
disposal, which is a conception of possession realized by the
understanding and independent of relations of space; and it is mine,
because my will, in determining itself to any particular use of it, is
not in conflict with the law of external freedom. Now it is just in
abstraction from physical possession of the object of my free-will
in the sphere of sense, that the practical reason wills that a
rational possession of it shall be thought, according to
intellectual conceptions which are not empirical, but contain a priori
the conditions of rational possession. Hence it is in this fact,
that we found the ground of the validity of such a rational conception
of possession possessio noumenon) as a principle of a universally
valid legislation. For such a legislation is implied and contained
in the expression, "This external object is mine," because an
obligation is thereby imposed upon all others in respect of it, who
would otherwise not have been obliged to abstain from the use of
this object.
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