ON TEE NATURAL INEQUALITY OF MEN. 779 



the communities which made up the nation had a sort of corpo- 

 rate overlordship over any one, still more that all the rest of the 

 world had any right to complain of their " appropriation of the 

 means of subsistence," most assuredly never entered the heads of 

 our forefathers. But, alongside this corporate several ownership, 

 there is strong ground for the belief that individual ownership 

 was recognized, to a certain extent, even in these early times. 

 The inclosure around each dwelling was understood to belong to 

 the family inhabiting the dwelling ; and, for all practical pur- 

 poses, must have been as much owned by the head of it as a 

 modern entailed estate is owned by the possessor for the time 

 being. Moreover, if any member of the community chose to go 

 outside and clear and cultivate some of the waste, the reclaimed 

 land was thenceforth recognized as his that is to say, the right 

 of ownership, in virtue of labor spent, was admitted.* 



Thus it is obvious that, though the early land-holders were, to 

 a great extent, collective owners, the imaginary rights of mankind 

 to universal land-ownership, or even of that of the nation at large 

 to the whole territory occupied, were utterly ignored ; that, so far 

 from several ownership being the result of force or fraud, it was 

 the system established with universal assent ; and that, from the 

 first, in all probability, individual rights of property, under cer- 

 tain conditions, were fully recognized and respected. Rousseau 

 was, therefore, correct in suspecting that his "state of nature" 

 had never existed it never did, nor anything like it. But it may 

 be said, supposing that all this is true, and supposing that the 

 doctrine that Englishmen have no right to their appropriation of 

 English soil is nonsense ; it must, nevertheless, be admitted that, 

 at one time, the great body of the nation, consisting of these 

 numerous land-owning corporations, composed of comparatively 

 poor men, did own the land. And it must also be admitted that 

 now they do not ; but that the land is in the hands of a relatively 

 small number of actually or comparatively rich proprietors, who 

 constitute perhaps not one per cent of the population. What is 

 this but the result of robbery and cheating ? The descendants of 

 the robbers and cut-throat soldiers who came over with William 

 of Normandy have been true to their military instincts, and have 

 " conveyed " the property of the primitive corporations into their 

 own possession. No doubt, that is history made easy ; but here, 

 once more, fact and a priori speculations can not be made to fit. 



Let us look at the case dispassionately, and by the light of real 

 history. No doubt, the early system of land-tenure by collective 

 several ownership was excellently adapted to the circumstances in 

 which mankind found themselves. If it had not been so, it would 



* Rousseau himself not only admits but insists on the validity of this claim in the 

 " Contrat Social," liv. i, chap. ix. 



