CHAPTER XL. OF CIRCULATION. § 1. WITH land abounding, our early colonist possessed no wealth having none of that material capital, and little of the mental, required for directing the natural forces to his service. Nature, herself, being strong for resistance to his efforts, and he being weak, he was wholly dependent on her bounty for supplies of food. Monarch of all he surveyed, he was still her slave — being yet destitute of power resulting from combination with others like himself. The larger his territory, the less, necessarily, was the power of association, and the greater the obstacles to his acquisition of wealth and power. Discovering, at length, that he has a neighbor, he finds that instead of his wife and himself being its sole occupants, and he, himself, sole proprietor, he owns but half of it- his possessions being thus diminished. Is he, or is his neighbor, poorer than before? On the contrary, both are richer - having acquired increase of power, resulting from the ability to combine their efforts. for overcoming resistance that, thus far, had proved an overmatch for their divided efforts. Each now profits by the distinctive qualities of the other. One excelling in fishing, and the other in taking birds or rabbits, both are enabled to obtain larger supplies of food. Their sons growing up, the land is again divided, with large increase of force. Their numbers further increasing, new divisions are required land thus decreasing in its ratio to population, while wealth and power as steadily increase. Consumption now more rapidly following production, individuality becomes more and more developed-with growing power of accumulation. § 2. In the early ages of society, land is wholly valueless. Men then hunt and fish their only property consisting of bows and arrows, skins, and the little food they may have saved in summer, as provision against the wants of winter. Later, we find them in the shepherd state their flocks being numerous, and constituting their only wealth. Land being still without value, is unhesitatingly abandoned when the pasture becomes exhausted. The community being still but nature's slave, of voluntary circulation there is none - each of its members finding himself compelled to move when others move, and thus producing the extraordinary emigrations recorded in Greek and Roman history. In this condition of society it is, that centralization most exists -the few who are strong of arm, or intellect, then exercising the largest amount of influence over the floating mass of which the community is composed. Poor, and often suffering for want of food, the latter are always ready to follow in the train of men like Brennus or Vercingetorix, Tamerlane or Bajazet, Genghis Khan or Nadir Shah gladly aiding in stopping the circulation. of society among others more advanced in wealth and power than themselves. Later, they seek to obtain, by means of cultivation, increased supplies of food-land then acquiring some slight estimation, and the proportion borne by movable to fixed property, tending slightly towards diminution. Small communities then are seen appropriating land, to be temporarily divided among its occupants, as was the case in Gaul, in the days of Cæsar. So was it, too, in India. So is it now, as the reader has already seen, under the communistic system prevalent in Russia. and semi-barbarism travel thus together-giving precisely the system recently urged upon the people of France, by philosophers holding that association and individuality are opposing principles.* Communism As a rule, however, those possessed of strength of arm have constituted themselves proprietors of extensive tracts of land— * That the errors of modern Socialism are but a reproduction of those of French writers of the last century, is shown by M. de Tocqueville (L'Ancien Régime, chap. xv.) — the doctrines of "community of property, rights of labor, absolute equality, universal uniformity, mechanical regularity of individual movements, tyrannical regulations on all subjects, and the total absorption of the individual in the body politic," being as fully exhibited in Morelly's Code de la Nature, as in any of the writings of Proudhon, or Louis Blanc. compelling those who were weak of body, or of mind, to expend their labor upon them, and giving in return such portion of the product as may seem required for preserving the slave in working order. This being the barbarous condition of society, wealth consists in movables- being reckoned by the number of beasts of burden, called men, women, and children, as is now the case in Carolina, Brazil, and Cuba. Land being held in vast tracts, it finds no circulation, and has little value. Man being then held as property, he has no right of circulation among his fellow-men. At times, he is tied by law to the land becoming adscriptus glebæ. Yet earlier, he is liable to purchase and sale, apart from the land-circulating then, only in virtue of special permission granted by his master; as was the case in Norman England, and now is so, in Russia and Carolina. Population and wealth further increasing, and employments becoming diversified, with increase in the power of association, and in the development of the various faculties of man, the blacksmith, the carpenter, the shoemaker, the miller, and the trader, come together to form the nucleus of the future town; and now it is, that land begins to be divided sometimes to be held in absolute ownership, and at others, on condition of the payment of yearly contributions to its owners, as compensation for its use. The town increasing, land becomes more and more divided each new house carrying with it a right to the exclusive occupation of the soil on which it stands. Wealth and power growing, property and person become more secure, with constant increase in the value of land, and in the freedom of man; and as constant decline in the value of the material property that in earlier days was held as the only wealth. Mind now gradually acquiring power over matter mental force is taking precedence of that which is purely physical and man is becoming less the slave of nature and of his fellow-man. Towns now become places of refuge men who have been held as slaves, seeking, in association with their fellow-men, the free exercise of the faculties by which they are distinguished from the brute. With every stage of progress, individuality becomes more and more developed men who have heretofore been limited to the single pursuit of tillage, now becoming carpenters and blacksmiths, masons or millers, and circulating among each other. Land being still without when the pasture becomes still but nature's slave, of each of its members finding and arrows, skins, and the little food they may have saved in summer, as provision against the wants of winter. Later, we find them in the shepherd state their flocks being numerous, and constituting their only wealth. value, is unhesitatingly abandoned exhausted. The community being voluntary circulation there is none himself compelled to move when others move, and thus producing the extraordinary emigrations recorded in Greek and Roman history. In this condition of society it is, that centralization most exists -the few who are strong of arm, or intellect, then exercising the largest amount of influence over the floating mass of which the community is composed. Poor, and often suffering for want of food, the latter are always ready to follow in the train of men like Brennus or Vercingetorix, Tamerlane or Bajazet, Genghis Khan or Nadir Shah — gladly aiding in stopping the circulation of society among others more advanced in wealth and power than themselves. Later, they seek to obtain, by means of cultivation, increased supplies of food-land then acquiring some slight estimation, and the proportion borne by movable to fixed property, tending slightly towards diminution. Small communities then are seen appropriating land, to be temporarily divided among its occupants, as was the case in Gaul, in the days of Cæsar. So was it, too, in India. So is it now, as the reader has already seen, under the communistic system prevalent in Russia. Communism and semi-barbarism travel thus together giving precisely the system recently urged upon the people of France, by philosophers holding that association and individuality are opposing principles.* As a rule, however, those possessed of strength of arm have constituted themselves proprietors of extensive tracts of land. * That the errors of modern Socialism are but a reproduction of those of French writers of the last century, is shown by M. de Tocqueville (L'Ancien Régime, chap. xv.) — the doctrines of "community of property, rights of labor, absolute equality, universal uniformity, mechanical regularity of individual movements, tyrannical regulations on all subjects, and the total absorption of the individual in the body politic," being as fully exhibited in Morelly's Code de la Nature, as in any of the writings of Proudhon, or Louis Blanc. compelling those who were weak of body, or of mind, to expend their labor upon them, and giving in return such portion of the product as may seem required for preserving the slave in working order. This being the barbarous condition of society, wealth consists in movables-being reckoned by the number of beasts of burden, called men, women, and children, as is now the case in Carolina, Brazil, and Cuba. Land being held in vast tracts, it finds no circulation, and has little value. Man being then held as property, he has no right of circulation among his fellow-men. At times, he is tied by law to the land becoming adscriptus glebæ. Yet earlier, he is liable to purchase and sale, apart from the land-circulating then, only in virtue of special permission granted by his master; as was the case in Norman England, and now is so, in Russia and Carolina. Population and wealth further increasing, and employments becoming diversified, with increase in the power of association, and in the development of the various faculties of man, the blacksmith, the carpenter, the shoemaker, the miller, and the trader, come together to form the nucleus of the future town; and now it is, that land begins to be divided sometimes to be held in absolute ownership, and at others, on condition of the payment of yearly contributions to its owners, as compensation for its use. The town increasing, land becomes more and more divided each new house carrying with it a right to the exclusive occupation of the soil on which it stands. Wealth and power growing, property and person become more secure, with constant increase in the value of land, and in the freedom of man; and as constant decline in the value of the material property that in earlier days was held as the only wealth. Mind now gradually acquiring power over matter mental force is taking precedence of that which is purely physical and man is becoming less the slave of nature and of his fellow-man. Towns now become places of refuge men who have been held as slaves, seeking, in association with their fellow-men, the free exercise of the faculties by which they are distinguished from the brute. - With every stage of progress, individuality becomes more and more developed - men who have heretofore been limited to the single pursuit of tillage, now becoming carpenters and blacksmiths, masons or millers, and circulating among each other |