relation to the benefit which he confers
upon the world._

We have already stated that, by the law of supply and demand, the
rewards of each worker are regulated in theory even more perfectly in
accordance with our ideas of liberty than they could be on the basis of
actual benefit conferred. For it is inconceivable that people would
submit to pay for what was beneficial to them instead of what they
desired. A man who prefers to purchase wines instead of books with his
surplus money would think it a great injustice if he were prevented from
doing as he preferred with his own. But so long as every one is at
liberty to use his income in buying whatever he desires most,
_demand_--the willingness to pay money for the gratification of the
desire--will exist, and so long as demand exists it will be met by a
supply, furnished by those who are desirous of money and what it will
bring. It is inconceivable, then, that any juster arrangement than this
law of supply and demand can ever be practicable for regulating the
compensation of each individual. The man who can drive a locomotive will
receive larger wages than the man who shovels the earth to form its
pathway, because the supply of men competent to drive an engine is small
in proportion to the number of men who are wanted for that work, while
almost any man can shovel dirt. Let us state, then, for our second
principle: _The amount of wealth which any man receives should depend on
the ratio between the demand which exists for his services and the
supply of those able to render like service._ Farther than these
statements of the ideal principles governing the economical production
and equitable distribution of wealth we need not go at present.

Let us turn now to examine the result of a violation of these principles
in some of the crying evils of the present day which are wholly or in
part due to the growth of monopoly and the waste of competition.

Every candid man will acknowledge that the enormous congestion of wealth
in a few hands which exists to-day is a danger to be feared. We have had
it constantly dinned in our ears that in this free land the ups and
downs of fortune were such that the rich man of to-day was apt to be the
beggar to-morrow; also that almost invariably a rich man's sons were
reckless spendthrifts. These things, aided by the abolition of
primogeniture and entails, it was said, were to prevent the growth of a
moneyed aristocracy in this country. The propo