Ouvriers Européens (p. 4), "The social rank of the different classes of workmen is determined by the degree of development in them of the feeling of prudence." If the Flemish communes were so rich and powerful in the Middle Ages, it was because all the manly virtues of the labourer prevailed among them, assiduity, conscientious workmanship, the spirit of economy, intelligence, carefulness, a feeling of brotherhood among the members of the corporation, and, finally, courage to defend their liberties and privileges. In his Survey of Political Economy Mr. Macdonell makes the following very just remarks: "Wherever there is a great store of wealth there must be a people living under moral restraint and possessed of a code of duty, and a land dotted with bursting stackyards, mapped out into well-tilled fields, and noisy with the hum of looms and clang of hammers, is evidence that there is at hand no small portion of the stuff out of which martyrs and heroes are formed. Though fine names may not be given to the qualifications of a busy people, skilled in many crafts and trades, producing articles cheaply and well, it is patience and sobriety, and faithfulness and honesty, that have gained for them eminence' (ch. v. p. 57). § 8. The Influence of Justice on the "Seek first justice, and all things else shall be added to you." The truth of this quotation from the Gospel can be clearly demonstrated. Distributive justice consists in treating every man according to his deserts, rewarding the well-doer, punishing the ill. This principle, in the economical order, leads to the maxim "To every man according to his work." For this maxim to be applied the law must assure to every one the full enjoyment of the fruits of his labour. Let him who sows, reap, and let him who plants the tree, eat of its fruit. You have performed your task with intelligence, zeal and care; you are entitled to good lodgment, good food, and a provision for your old age. You have been idle and careless; want and famine shall be your punishment. Such is the will of justice. It is the fable of the grasshopper and the ant. Men have not been wrong when, in confidence in the power of right, they have pronounced the celebrated phrase, Fiat justitia, pereat mundus ("Let justice be done, though the world perish "), or when at the time of the French Revolution, in reference to the abolition of slavery, they exclaimed, "Rather perish our colonies than our principle." What is absolutely opposed to justice can never be favourable to the well-being even of those who seem to profit by the wrong. Thus it was slavery which was the main cause of the decline of the Roman power. In the early days of the Republic the earth was tilled by freemen, and everywhere there reigned a prosperity which, if simple, was real and sound. By dint of constant wars this race of well-to-do, brave and vigorous peasants, gradually disappeared. The aristocracy invaded their little homesteads, as well as the Ager publicus, or public land, and formed vast estates, which they cultivated by means of slaves. Livy records this depopulation in an expressive sentence: Innumerabilem multitudinem liberorum capitum in eis fuisse locis, quæ nunc, vix seminario exiguo militum relicto, servitia Romana ab solitudine vindicant. ("Vast numbers of free used to live in these regions, which now remain a nursery for scarce a handful of soldiers, and are only saved from absolute solitude by the Roman slave gangs.") Tiberius Gracchus, when on his way to Spain, saw with grief the deserted condition of the fields, and afterwards, in his harangues to the people, painted it in flaming colours: "The wild beasts of Italy have their lairs to which they can retreat, the brave men who shed their blood in her cause have nothing left but light and the air they breathe; without houses, without any fixed abode, they wander from place to place with their wives and children. They fight and die to advance the wealth and luxury of the great. They are called masters of the world, and have not a foot of ground in their possession." In spite of the laws of Licinius and the Gracchi, and of all the attempts made to re-establish the class of small proprietors, the process of depopulation did not stop. Rome was supported by the plunder and ruin of the provinces by its proconsuls, and the trial of Verres shows us the hateful brigandage with which these were effected. It was under the weight of the iniquities by which she lived that Rome fell. In the words of Juvenal: Savior armis luxuria incubuit, victumque ulciscitur orbem, (Sat. vi. 292). ("A luxury more ruthless than the sword settled upon Rome and avenged the world she had enslaved.") When the barbarians arrived they found the empire almost depopulated. In the United States the curse of slavery was only extirpated at the price of the most frightful civil war known to history, the death of half a million of men, and the loss of five hundred millions (sterling) of money. When the injustice of laws reaches such a point that the hopes of most people are set on robbery, and the most utterly wretched are resorting to crime, the society is advancing towards its ruin. The greater the exactness with which the economic organisation insures the application of justice, the more eagerly will men, who naturally make wellbeing their aim, betake themselves to labour. To cite a single example: it is to insure this result that patents are granted to inventors, and authors allowed the copyright of their books. Besides just laws, there must be just judges to apply them. This point is of the first importance. How often do we read in works of history that "justice caused the kingdom to flourish." "Le royaume multiplie tellement par la bonne droiture," writes the chronicler Joinville, "que le domaine, censive, rentes et revenus du Roy croissent tous les ans de moitié." I borrow from Destutt de Tracy this wise remark: "Among sensitive beings, whose interests often clash, justice is the greatest of blessings; it alone can pacify them without leaving to any a cause of complaint." § 9. Civil Laws, especially those as to Property, in their Relation to the Productiveness of Labour. Civil laws should be applications of the principles of justice. They must, therefore, assure to every one the enjoyment of that which lawfully belongs to him: cuique suum-" to each man his own." Such is, in reality, the formula of justice. From this principle by a direct deduction we reach the most important of all civil institutions, that of property, which we define as the exclusive right to use an article within the limits of reason and law, or, in the admirable phrase of the Roman code, usque patitur ratio juris. Aristotle (Politics, i. 3) well characterised property as "an external instrument necessary to man's exist |