though they should have foreseen it,
they disregarded it; the present want occupied their whole attention,
and, as ordinarily happens in such cases, the disadvantages were at
first scarcely perceptible, and they passed unnoticed.

They did not foresee, these ingenuous legislators, that if property is
retainable by intent alone--_nudo animo_--it carries with it the right
to let, to lease, to loan at interest, to profit by exchange, to settle
annuities, and to levy a tax on a field which intent reserves, while the
body is busy elsewhere.

They did not foresee, these fathers of our jurisprudence, that, if
the right of inheritance is any thing other than Nature's method of
preserving equality of wealth, families will soon become victims of the
most disastrous exclusions; and society, pierced to the heart by one of
its most sacred principles, will come to its death through opulence and
misery. [12]

Under whatever form of government we live, it can always be said that
_le mort saisit le vif;_ that is, that inheritance and succession will
last for ever, whoever may be the recognized heir. But the St. Simonians
wish the heir to be designated by the magistrate; others wish him to
be chosen by the deceased, or assumed by the law to be so chosen: the
essential point is that Nature's wish be satisfied, so far as the law of
equality allows.

To-day the real controller of inheritance is chance or caprice; now, in
matters of legislation, chance and caprice cannot be accepted as guides.
It is for the purpose of avoiding the manifold disturbances which
follow in the wake of chance that Nature, after having created us equal,
suggests to us the principle of heredity; which serves as a voice by
which society asks us to choose, from among all our brothers, him whom
we judge best fitted to complete our unfinished work.

They did not foresee.... But why need I go farther?

The consequences are plain enough, and this is not the time to criticise
the whole Code.

The history of property among the ancient nations is, then, simply a
matter of research and curiosity. It is a rule of jurisprudence that the
fact does not substantiate the right. Now, property is no exception to
this rule: then the universal recognition of the right of property
does not legitimate the right of property. Man is mistaken as to the
constitution of society, the nature of right, and the application of
justice; just as he was mistaken regarding the cause of mete