XXIV ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL JUSTICE 449 



heirs as were of age at the time of passing the Act, or 

 it might even be extended to all direct heirs living at 

 that time. In the case of a person owning many landed 

 estates in different counties, he might be given the 

 option of retaining any one or more of them up to 

 the maximum income, and that income would be 

 secured to him (and his direct heirs as above stated^ 

 in case any of the land were taken for public use. In 

 the case of fundholders, all above the maximum 

 income would be extinguished, and thus reduce 

 taxation. 



The process here sketched out — by which the con- 

 tinuous r(jbbery of the people through the systems of 

 land and fundholding, may be at first greatly reduced 

 and in the course of one or two generations completely 

 stopped, without, as I maintain, real injury to any living 

 person and for the great benefit both of existing 

 workers and of the whole nation in the future — will, of 

 course, be denounced as confiscation and robber3\ That 

 is the point of view of those who now benefit by the 

 acts of former robbers and confiscators. From another, 

 and I maintain a truer point of view, it may be de- 

 scribed as an act of just and merciful restitution. Let us, 

 therefore, consider the case a little more closely. 



Origin of Great Estates. 



Taking the inherited estates of the great landed pro- 

 prietors of England, almost all can be traced back to some 

 act of confiscation of former owners or to gifts from kings, 

 often as the reward for what we now consider to be dis- 

 graceful services or great crimes. The whole of the pro- 

 perty of the abbeys and monasteries, stolen by Henry 

 VIII. and mostly given to the worst characters among 

 the nobles of his court, was really a robbery of the people, 

 who obtained relief and protection from the former owners. 

 The successive steps by which the landlords got rid of the 

 duties attached to landholding under the feudal system, 

 and threw the main burden of defence and of the cost of 

 government on non-landholders, was another direct 



VOL. II. G G 



