This last sentence is worthy of being linked with the immortal epigram in Lincoln’s Gettysburg address.
Other notable economic writers were Tsien Tche and Leang Tsien, but towering above them all for adaptability to the convictions and crying necessities of our day was Wang Ngan Shih, 1069 A. D., a Rooseveltian statesman of the Sung dynasty, whose capital was the present Kaifong. Remember that this statesman-author wrote when William the Conqueror was putting England under the yoke of feudalism, which hated the principles of liberty. Wang taught partly as follows:
1. The first duty of government is to secure plenty and relaxation for the common people.
2. The state should take possession of all important resources and become the main and dictating employer in commerce, industry and transportation, with the view of preventing the working classes being ground to the dust by the monopolizing rich.
3. Government tribunals should fix the local prices of provisions and merchandise.
4. The rich shall pay all taxes; the small owner shall pay nothing as long as he remains small.
5. Old age pensions.
6. The state to insure work for workmen.
7. The state to assign land, distribute seed and direct sowing, so that there shall neither be cornering of food by the rich, nor lack of food for the poor.
8. Destruction of usurers.