st, the emperors freely
granted the lands to whoever would cultivate them,--that is, they
abolished debts. No one, except Lycurgus, who went to the other extreme,
ever perceived that the great point was, not to release debtors by a
coup d'etat, but to prevent the contraction of debts in future.

On the contrary, the most democratic governments were always exclusively
based upon individual property; so that the social element of all these
republics was war between the citizens.

Solon decreed that a census should be taken of all fortunes, regulated
political rights by the result, granted to the larger proprietors more
influence, established the balance of powers,--in a word, inserted in
the constitution the most active leaven of discord; as if, instead of a
legislator chosen by the people, he had been their greatest enemy. Is
it not, indeed, the height of imprudence to grant equality of political
rights to men of unequal conditions? If a manufacturer, uniting all
his workmen in a joint-stock company, should give to each of them a
consultative and deliberative voice,--that is, should make all of them
masters,--would this equality of mastership secure continued inequality
of wages? That is the whole political system of Solon, reduced to its
simplest expression.

"In giving property a just preponderance," says M. Pastoret, "Solon
repaired, as far as he was able, his first official act,--the abolition
of debts.... He thought he owed it to public peace to make this great
sacrifice of acquired rights and natural equity. But the violation of
individual property and written contracts is a bad preface to a public
code."

In fact, such violations are always cruelly punished. In '89 and '93,
the possessions of the nobility and the clergy were confiscated, the
clever proletaires were enriched; and to-day the latter, having become
aristocrats, are making us pay dearly for our fathers' robbery. What,
therefore, is to be done now? It is not for us to violate right, but to
restore it. Now, it would be a violation of justice to dispossess some
and endow others, and then stop there. We must gradually lower the rate
of interest, organize industry, associate laborers and their functions,
and take a census of the large fortunes, not for the purpose of granting
privileges, but that we may effect their redemption by settling a
life-annuity upon their proprietors. We must apply on a large scale the
principle of collective production, gi