but it is not due to the children to have the right to make a claim. But if bequest is allowed, surely the principles of inheritance in case of intestacy ought to be decided according to the customs prevalent in the society, and the sense of public spirit will have to be much more highly developed before it becomes a general practice to leave property to the state in preference to children, or even remote relatives. At present, if a man left his fortune. towards the payment of the national debt, his will would probably be contested, on the ground that he was of unsound mind. The only tenable conclusion thus appears to be that, if freedom of bequest is allowed, we must also allow inheritance on recognised customary lines in the ac cidental case of intestacy. But then the question arises: Are no limitations to be placed upon freedom of bequest, and is freedom of bequest an essential part of the institution of private property? In the following section an attempt is made to answer this question on economic grounds, which may, of course, be supplemented or controverted by other considerations.

§ 3. Bequest. The fundamental economic reason for allowing freedom of bequest as the general principle is found in the stimulus that is given to labour and saving. People will not toil and accumulate wealth for the pur-| pose of enriching the state. The attempt to impose suc-, cession duties approaching a hundred per cent would be the greatest possible encouragement to wasteful extravagance.1 It would be especially injurious where production is carried on on a large scale. Or, as usually happens with excesses of governmental interference, if an enactment of this kind was not mischievous, it would be useless. It would be evaded by gift under certain conditions, and we may be certain that trusts and legal fictions would give effect to the common sense morality or prevailing custom of the country.

1 Compare the treatment of graduated taxation, Art. "Taxation," Encyclopædia Britannica.

But, although the general principle is admitted, it is quite possible that certain limitations or exceptions may be justified on purely economic grounds. Some of these are indeed obvious, and have been verified by experience.

(1) The interests of the public must not be sacrificed to satisfy the caprices of individuals. Thus, to lay down the order of descent for an indefinite period, as in entails in the strictest sense of the term, is plainly against the public interest.1 Nor can such excessive freedom be justified by an appeal to the stimulus of accumulation; a man's interest in his descendants of the nth degree becomes smaller as n becomes larger.

(2) Similarly, it may be advisable to limit bequests to corporations of various kinds. Adam Smith was of opinion that, on the whole, endowments given for education had not been beneficial. At any rate, it will be admitted that after the lapse of a certain time the state should have the right of revision. Again, special restraints may be imposed on the bequest of certain kinds of property to corporations. Take, for instance, the case of land, which is obviously limited. It is said that at one time the mediaval church held more than a third of the land of England, and unless prevented by legislation the process of absorption might have continued indefinitely.

(3) These exceptions are obvious, but in most countries bequest is limited in favour of the children. In France, as is well known, the parental power of testamentary disposition over property is limited to a part equal to one child's share, the remainder being divided equally among the children. Apart from special objections to the inconvenience of dividing certain forms of property, especially land, there are objections derived from general economic principles. The limitation will not probably much affect the stimulus to accumulation on the part of the parents, but it may lessen the incentives to industry on the part of the children. As Dr. Johnson tersely remarked, the great 1 The special arguments are given below.

advantage of primogeniture is that it makes but one fool in a family. Another objection is that undue limits are placed on parental control. It might well happen that one son, owing to special aptitudes for some business or profession, might with advantage obtain a larger share than the others, or, conversely, if one had succeeded and another had failed, an adjustment might be made on the death of the parent. The example of France also serves to show that the limitation in question may lead to an injurious restraint of population. On the other hand, under certain conditions such restraint might be desirable, and it is possible that the idea of providing a small competency for the children may lead to a rise in the standard of comfort.

Usually, however, the limitation is defended, on the ground that it leads to greater equality in the distribution of wealth. There can be little doubt that such must be the tendency, and, on utilitarian principles, this argument would have much weight. For the reasons given in the preceding chapters, I cannot regard equality as of such economic importance. Taking, as I have done, the productive organisation of society as the guiding principle of distribution, freedom must take the place of happiness; and freedom is likely to cause a certain degree of inequality.

Mill's desire to treat the question in a broad, philosophical manner, and not to confine himself to purely economic considerations, has again led him into a fantastical conclusion. He approves of the promotion of equality contemplated by the French law, but he objects to the means. Accordingly, he proposes that the state should limit directly the amount received by any person, including the children, either by bequest or inheritance. But, in the present constitution of society, this is to abandon altogether the right of freedom of bequest, and, but for the eminence of the writer who makes the proposal, it is hardly worth serious consideration.

§ 1. Mill's Views on Property in Land. Opinion, it has been observed, in social, political, and economic affairs, is an active force, and public opinion on various questions connected with land has been formed, to a great extent, on the principles laid down in Mill's treatise. To Mill, for example, may be traced the germs of various proposals for land nationalisation, for the establishment of peasant proprietors, for access to mountains, and for dealing with Irish land by peculiar methods.

It is true that Mill introduces many qualifications which, in the process of popular simplification, have been allowed to drop out of sight, but even with these qualifications some of his views appear to require modification.

His argument runs as follows. Since the fundamental conception of property is the right to enjoy the fruits of one's own labour and saving, this cannot apply directly to land considered as the raw material of the earth; land as such is neither made nor saved. Mill, as usual, lays stress on the moral aspects of the question, and appeals to natural ideas of justice. His position, however, may be best maintained on purely economic grounds. So far as the "original and indestructible" powers of the soil are concerned, the economic stimulus is not required for their creation or preservation, they are so far different from other forms of capital.

But we now pass to an important distinction. Mill points out that the use of land must be exclusive for the

time, a position which is supported on purely economic grounds. Exclusive use, however, does not necessarily imply private ownership. We might have periodical or even annual division, either by village communities or by the state, or the state might be the universal landlord, with tenants holding from it under various conditions. These methods, as will be shown presently, have all been more or less exemplified in different stages of development; private property in land, as we understand it, is of comparatively modern origin. Whether we consider land, for agricultural or building purposes, some kind of exclusiveness is necessary; but the essential point is that occupation is not ownership. So far, then, Mill seems to countenance the extreme view that private property in land ought to be abolished.

At once, however, he introduces important qualifications. Though land in itself, he proceeds, is not the product of industry, most of its valuable qualities are, and, therefore, so far land must be placed on the same footing as other forms of property. Some of these qualities have only been attained by the labour of generations, as, for example, the drainage of fens, the embankment and diversion of rivers, the clearance of forests, and the gradual improvement of the soil itself by good tillage. So far the land is the result of labour and of saving, and we may even regard it, without much straining of language, as manufactured.

The logical conclusion then is reached, that, so far as the original qualities are concerned, property in land is not justified by the fundamental economic bases, but as regards the derivative qualities, the same principles are applicable as to movables.

But the next stage in the argument does not attain the same degree of cogency. "These are the reasons," Mill continues, "which form the justification in an economical point of view of property in land. It is seen that they are only valid in so far as the proprietor of land is its improver. Whenever in any country the proprietor, gener