one, if she be moderately educated, even though not clever, be able to marry. Hitherto, Beauty in the lower walks of life has been sacrificed; or, if selected, it has been for questionable honours. As Genius, the Divine child incarnate, instead of being sought for diligently, and when found assisted and preferred to its fitting place, has been neglected and smothered in poverty, so Beauty in the lower classes has been trodden in the tnud, and largely sacrificed to the passions or social necessities of the classes above. Partly from stupidity, partly from selfishness, both of these highest gifts intended by Nature to raise the human and the national type have been hitherto largely sacrificed-happily for both we can see fairer prospects in the not far-off future.

And whence, it may be asked, is to come the means for these prizes, and for all this free education? From the rich, I reply, chiefly, and by taxation, if necessary. But happily much, if not more than enough, will come voluntarily, as this fountain of beneficence has been flowing freely for some time past, and may be expected to flow still more liberally in future, when the rich get to learn there is no more certain way of doing good to others, perhaps of making reparation to classes which they by their position have unavoidably injured, or of averting envy from their own class. As in the olden feudal times remorseful and reparative gifts flowed into the Church, in future such will flow in large measure to the School, the College, the Hospital, and the Orphan Asylum, where undoubtedly they will be an equally good investment, with the spiritual security as sure. These dona

tions will be largely the property of the talented poor. The remainder, if any more be needed, can be raised by taxes, imperial or local. Evidently the funds must come chiefly from the wealthier, and justly, the object being to diminish inequality of opportunities, and to raise the best of the poorer classes. A special educational rate, or a portion of an increased tax on inheritances, which for other reasons should be increased in future, would supply any possible deficiency in the voluntary contributions.

And why are we to do all this? some may say, give our money, or suffer it to be taken, to raise new rivals, and to make the poor our equals. And the answer is, partly because it is just, partly because it is prudent to give a part in order to insure the rcmaining and larger part, and a good deal because it is necessary. Because the days are come when the people have got some political power, and a new distribution of political power requires a certain corresponding distribution of wealth, or of the means to it, amongst which education is the first to the poorer classes. Moreover, if these several suggested changes are to their advantage—as who can doubt it—and if they are also just, the labouring classes will in time organize to demand them, and perhaps something more. And be not too sure they cannot get them. They ask a share of capital, of land, of education, or to be placed in a position to help themselves to a moderate share, from which they think they are unjustly excluded. This is their reasonable minimum, which granted would secure peace in our generation; refused would throw moderate and reasonable men

into the arms of the extreme and revolutionary party, who will ask much more. And say not, "There is no danger; things will go on without concessions or bribes, which only prompt to further demands. The danger is to begin reforms or legislation which touch on property." It may indeed be dangerous, in the sense that you may have to part with something, but it would be more dangerous to delay reforms, or refuse to attempt them. Nor console yourself with the reflection that in the last resort the sword is on your side, for principles are more potent than the sword, and they are now opposed to you. Moreover, the sword in the hand of the soldier has before now dropped before them on the day of trial. No doubt for a time a reactionary Government can repress. But it would be difficult to do so long under our new democratic constitution, and the Government that tried it far would be called to account. It may be taken, therefore, that on reflection you will not oppose the needed reforms; nay, I think it likely that your representatives in Parliament will take a quite contrary course, and that a rivalry between Liberals and Tories may begin as to which can do the most for the classes beneath; that the Tory will try to befriend the artisan of the towns, while the Liberal and the Radical will champion the cause of the agricultural labourer; a species of competition, no matter what its historical origin, and however it looks like a game of cross purposes, that can only result in the general good. May it prove So. It is the most hopeful thing about our Party Government that each of our two great parties seems

anxious to take under its special protection and to work for one of the two great subjected sections of labour. And there is this finally to be said to our too apprehensive middle and upper classes. Honesty and justice in this as in other directions will be found the best policy. The partial reparation asked for will not amount to much during a single generation, while it will set the face of society in the right direction, and make social progress a reality and not a name. You will hardly feel it, and much less if you come to think rightly about it. In time you will feel glad you were called upon to make the sacrifice, which so far as voluntary will be counted to you for righteousness. You will have the satisfaction of having done your duty by your neighbour, which in our times so many know not how to do; of having been on the side of justice in your day and generation; of having thereby aided in the solution of the greatest, most perplexing, and most formidable of all problems, and of helping to keep off the chaos threatening, which might else have come. And if the case is rightly thus put, it can hardly be doubtful which of the courses you will prefer,

V.

WE come to another and a vital side of our subject, perhaps the most important side of all. Of the two chief corner-stones of our present economical and social system, interest and inheritance, interest, as already shown, could not be touched by law without producing confusion, nor abolished without immediate and universal chaos. It is other

wise as respects inheritance. Inheritance can be touched by the State both by legislation and by taxation, and it has been already touched with advantage. I believe with Mill, that the right of inheritance could be still farther restricted with much social and moral advantage, and without economical disadvantage, provided that the infringement did not too greatly run in advance of the public sentiment, which is now setting in that direction.

5

The reasons for the State restricting the right of inheritance, and reserving a portion for itself, some of them strongly urged by Mill, forty years ago, and of still greater strength to day, are of the following nature:-That part of the wealth left by rich men, though legally it belonged to them during life, was yet not morally theirs, the whole being far more than their services were worth, even rating them highly and rewarding them liberally; that of the million or halfmillion, supposing it all to have been "made," as the phrase runs (and not inherited), part was the result of mere luck, part of business genius, or of good business qualities and skilful audacity combined, which last makes the great and successful financier and speculator, though even into honest production and distribution the speculative element increasingly enters, so that chance as well as skill, in consequence, is represented in the pecuniary results. In the case of both producing and distributing capitalists, still more in the case of the financing ones, those who leave large fortunes are the successful survivors of Political Economy, Book ii., Chapter ii. § 4.