us, of whom
the present century was unworthy, but whom the future will avenge!

Listen, proprietor. Inequality of talent exists in fact; in right it is
not admissible, it goes for nothing, it is not thought of. One Newton in
a century is equal to thirty millions of men; the psychologist admires
the rarity of so fine a genius, the legislator sees only the rarity
of the function. Now, rarity of function bestows no privilege upon the
functionary; and that for several reasons, all equally forcible.

1. Rarity of genius was not, in the Creator's design, a motive to compel
society to go down on its knees before the man of superior talents,
but a providential means for the performance of all functions to the
greatest advantage of all.

2. Talent is a creation of society rather than a gift of Nature; it
is an accumulated capital, of which the receiver is only the guardian.
Without society,--without the education and powerful assistance which
it furnishes,--the finest nature would be inferior to the most ordinary
capacities in the very respect in which it ought to shine. The more
extensive a man's knowledge, the more luxuriant his imagination, the
more versatile his talent,--the more costly has his education been, the
more remarkable and numerous were his teachers and his models, and the
greater is his debt. The farmer produces from the time that he leaves
his cradle until he enters his grave: the fruits of art and science
are late and scarce; frequently the tree dies before the fruit ripens.
Society, in cultivating talent, makes a sacrifice to hope.

3. Capacities have no common standard of comparison: the conditions of
development being equal, inequality of talent is simply speciality of
talent.

4. Inequality of wages, like the right of increase, is economically
impossible. Take the most favorable case,--that where each laborer
has furnished his maximum production; that there may be an equitable
distribution of products, the share of each must be equal to the
quotient of the total production divided by the number of laborers. This
done, what remains wherewith to pay the higher wages? Nothing whatever.

Will it be said that all laborers should be taxed? But, then, their
consumption will not be equal to their production, their wages will not
pay for their productive service, they will not be able to repurchase
their product, and we shall once more be afflicted with all the
calamities of property. I do not speak of the inj