That is the only foundation that exists for the patent laws of the United States, and it is the only foundation that exists for the copyright laws of the United States. It is true that a copyright when it is issued in accordance with the statute made in pursuance of that Constitution is property, but it is not property in the historic sense of property. It entirely lacks the notion of continuity. It entirely lacks the notion of permanency. It is a species of property created, and not arising out of the circumstances of civilization and human life, as property in general has always done, long preceding governments. It is a species of property created by the law-making power, and a species of property created by the law-making power in a matter not inherently subject to property right. In creating that particular property the constitutional convention was influenced by this consideration: We will not grant a permanent property right in any intellectual production, because in our judgment that would be inconsistent with the progress of civilization as a whole, but we can consistently, with the progress of civilization as a whole, grant a limited property right in an intellectual production. Therefore they did provide in the Constitution that though Congress might give to authors an exclusive right, the right must be limited in point of duration, and therefore Congress has not the slightest power to grant a permanent right in any intellectual production. Victor Herbert may hereafter, as I hope he may, rival some of the great composers of the past and produce music far better than the splendid music that he has thus far produced, but if he does it will be impossible for Congress to reward him and his heirs with a permanent absolute property right in any such intellectual production. The best we can do, Mr. Herbert, is to give you a limited right to your intellectual production. That limited right is limited not only in respect of duration, but it is limited in respect of quality, in respect of formal expression, and it is limited thus: There shall be, according to the constitutional provision, an exclusive right for a limited time and for a limited form of expression, and that limited form of expression is defined by the word "writings." Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, I have spent my laborious life as a lawyer, a scholar, an inventor, an author, and a lecturer. I have delivered hundreds of addresses that never were reduced to writing. I have delivered but few that were. In so far as I delivered those lectures that were never reduced to writing, I am not entitled, either by law or by ethical principles, to any exclusive right. I am entitled to an exclusive right to my intellectual productions only when I reduce them to writing and file them in the office of the Librarian of Congress, where they will remain a permanent monument, and can be handed down to future times and can be read and availed of by my contemporaries.