Page:The rise, progress, and phases of human slavery.djvu/140

 labour and the rights of property, which ought to be really one and the same, are utterly irreconcilable under such a system. As long therefore as it shall prevail, so long must the rich be insecure, and the mass miserable, whatever may be the form of government, from monarchy to democracy the most pure and unlimited.

No man, not a fool or a knave, will deny that the raw materials of all wealth belong to all men alike in their natural state: to assert the contrary, would be to assert that God, like a capricious human despot, dispenses His favours regardless of justice or of the wants of His creatures. The only question is this—Can the lands, mines, turbaries, collieries, fisheries, &c., containing all materials of wealth in every country, be restored to its inhabitants without injustice or undue suffering to the present possessors, whoever they may be? If this could not be done, there might be some excuse for the present monstrous system. But no government need have the least difficulty on this point. Our own government, for instance, has only to do, in respect of landed property, for the benefit of the nation, what it does every day to promote the speculative interests of individuals and private companies. Owners of real estate are compellable now, by existing laws, to exchange such property for a money-compensation when the public interest requires such change. Does anybody consider that a wrong is done to the owners of such property so long as the money-compensation to them is sufficient to satisfy the public conscience represented by a sheriff's jury? Now, if it be right to do this for the sake of a company or a few speculating individuals, how much more justifiable is it to do it for the just benefit of millions, and to produce thereby such a reformation, materially and morally, as no pen nor tongue could adequately describe? Indeed, in order to restore its land gradually to the nation, it would not be necessary to go so far in expropriation or forcible dispossession as existing laws authorise in favour of companies chartered by parliament to make railways, canals, docks, barracks, or any other public works. There would be no need to dispossess any proprietor during his lifetime, nor even his successors, without their own consent; it would be quite sufficient for all useful national ends and purposes to buy up the land as it comes into the market in the ordinary course, either by the voluntary act of the seller or by due legal process, such as a decree of the Court of Chancery, &c., and then make the land so bought with the public money the inalienable property of the nation ever after, as it by right should be.

Unquestionably, land-usurpers and money-changers, taking both terms in their widest sense, must in foro conscientiæ be distinguished from all other sinners. We know of no great social evil in civilized life that is not clearly traceable, directly or indirectly, to these two classes. It is they that govern the world everywhere, and that have always governed it since the first dawn of civilisation; it is they that make all revolutions and counter-revolutions, all false systems of religion and education, all State-Church establishments, all standing armies of soldiers, constables, priests, and lawyers, and that impose on all peoples the burdens requisite for the maintenance