sed and appropriated by himself. Every man is a steward. But
subject to censure and remonstrance, he must be free to dispose of his
property as his own understanding shall dictate. The ideal is equality,
and all society should be what Coleridge called a Pantisocracy. It is
wrong for any one to enjoy anything, unless something similar is
accessible to all, and wrong to produce luxuries until the elementary
wants of all are satisfied. But it would be futile and wrong to attempt
to equalise property by positive enactment. It would be useless until
men are virtuous, and unnecessary when they are so. The moment
accumulation and monopoly are regarded by any society as dishonourable
and mischievous, the revolution in opinion will ensure that comforts
shall tend to a level.

Godwin objects to the plans put forward in France during the Revolution
for interfering with bequests and inheritance. He would, however, check
the incentives to accumulation by abolishing the feudal system,
primogeniture, titles and entail. Property is sacred--that good men may
be free to give it away. Reform public opinion, and a man engaged in
amassing wealth would soon hide his treasures as carefully as he now
displays them. The first step is to rob wealth of its distinction.
Wealth is acquired to-day in over-reaching our neighbours, and spent in
insulting them. Establish equality on a firm basis of rational opinion,
and you cut off for ever the great occasion of crime, remove the
constant spectacle of injustice with all its attendant demoralisation,
and liberate genius now immersed in sordid cares.

"In a state of society where men lived in the midst of plenty, and where
all shared alike the bounties of nature, the sentiments of oppression,
servility and fraud would inevitably expire. The narrow principle of
selfishness would vanish. No man being obliged to guard his little
store, or provide with anxiety and pain for his restless wants, each
would lose his individual existence in the thought of the general good.
No man would be an enemy to his neighbour, for they would have no
subject of contention, and of consequence philanthropy would resume the
empire which reason assigns her. Mind would be delivered from her
perpetual anxiety about corporal support, and freed to expatiate in the
field of thought, which is congenial to her. Each would assist the
enquiries of all."

Unnecessary tasks absorb most of our labour to-day. In the ideal
community, Godwin