We are all robbers

For property is robbery, but then, we are all robbers or would-be robbers together, and have found it essential to organise our thieving, as we have found it necessary to organise our lust and our revenge. Property, marriage, the law; as the bed to the river, to rule and convention to the instinct; and woe to him who tampers with the banks while the flood is flowing.

Samuel Butler, Erewhon (Penguin Books, 1970) p. 120