LOCAL TAXES 79 



The principle was fully recognised in the 

 fourteenth century, which has only been 

 rediscovered in the nineteenth, that it is 

 always persons and never things that pay 

 rates and taxes. But some visible sign was 

 wanted of the ability and substance of 

 people, and in this way the occupation of 

 lands came to be the chief practical measure 

 in the country, and the occupation of houses 

 in the towns. 



The next step is that people begin to 

 think it is the lands and houses that are 

 taxed, and not the persons. At first sight 

 this might seem to be a case of a distinction 

 without a difference, but the practical 

 difference is soon of importance. Instead 

 of the maxim of equity, that the same person 

 ought not to be taxed twice for the same 

 purpose just as a man is not to be punished 

 twice for the same offence we have a maxim 

 that the same thing ought not to be taxed twice 



