"The first of these purposes, which alone can have an uninterrupted claim upon us, is sufficiently answered by an association of such an extent as to afford room for the institution of a jury, to decide upon the offences of individuals within the community, and upon the questions and controversies respecting property which may chance to arise."[75] This jury would decide not according to any system of law, but according to reason.[76]—"It might be easy indeed for an offender to escape from the limits of so petty a jurisdiction; and it might seem necessary at first that the neighboring parishes or jurisdictions should be governed in a similar manner, or at least should be willing, whatever was their form of government, to co-operate with us in the removal or reformation of an offender whose present habits were alike injurious to us and to them. But there will be no need of any express compact, and still less of any common centre of authority, for this purpose. General justice and mutual interest are found more capable of binding men than signatures and seals."[77]
The second function would present itself to us only from time to time. "However irrational might be the controversy of parish with parish in such a state of society, it would not be the less possible. Such emergencies can only be provided against by the concert of several districts, declaring and, if needful, enforcing the dictates of justice."[78] Foreign invasions too would make such a concert necessary, and would to this extent resemble those controversies.[79] Therefore it would be "necessary upon certain occasions to have recourse to national assemblies, or in other words assemblies instituted for the joint purpose of adjusting the differences between district and district, and of consulting respecting the best mode of repelling foreign invasion."[80]—But they "ought to be employed as sparingly as the nature of the case will admit."[81] For, in the first place, the decision is given by the number of votes, and "is determined, at best, by the weakest heads in the assembly, but, as it not less frequently happens, by the most corrupt and dishonorable intentions."[82] In the second place, as a rule the members are guided in their decisions by all sorts of external reasons, and not solely by the results of their free reflection.[83] In the third place, they are forced to waste their strength on petty matters, while they cannot possibly let themselves be quietly influenced by argument.[84] Therefore national assemblies should "either never be elected but upon extraordinary emergencies, like the dictator of the ancient Romans, or else sit periodically, one day for example in a year, with a power of continuing their sessions within a certain limit. The former is greatly to be preferred."[85]
But what would be the authority of these national assemblies and those juries? Mankind is so corrupted by present institutions that at first the issuing of commands, and some degree of coercion, would be necessary; but later it would be sufficient for juries to recommend a certain mode of adjusting controversies, and for national assemblies to invite their constituencies to co-operate for the common advantage.[86] "If juries might at length cease to decide and be contented to invite, if force might gradually be withdrawn and reason trusted alone, shall we not one day find that juries themselves, and every other species of public institution, may be laid aside as unnecessary? Will not the reasonings of one wise man be as effectual as those of twelve? Will not the competence of one individual to instruct his neighbors be a matter of sufficient notoriety, without the formality of an election? Will there be many vices to correct and much obstinacy to conquer? This is one of the most memorable stages of human improvement. With what delight must every well-informed friend of mankind look forward to the auspicious period, the dissolution of political government, of that brute engine, which has been the only perennial cause of the vices of mankind, and which has mischiefs of various sorts incorporated with its substance, and no otherwise to be removed than by its utter annihilation!"[87]
5.—PROPERTY
I. In consequence of his unconditional rejection of law, Godwin necessarily has to reject property also without any limitation. Nay, property, or, as he expresses himself, "the present system of property,"[88]—that is, the distribution of wealth at present established by law,—appears to him to be a legal institution that is peculiarly injurious to the general welfare. "The wisdom of law-makers and parliaments has been applied to creating the most wretched and senseless distribution of property, which mocks alike at human nature and at the principles of justice."[89]
The present system of property distributes commodities in the most unequal and most arbitrary way. "On account of the accident of birth, it piles upon a single man enormous wealth. If one who has been a beggar becomes a well-to-do man, we usually know that he has not precisely his honesty or usefulness to thank for this change. It is often hard enough for the most diligent and industrious member of society to preserve his family from starvation."[90] "And if I receive the reward of my work, they give me a hundred times more food than I can eat, and a hundred times more clothes than I can wear. Where is the justice in this? If I am the greatest benefactor of the human race, is that a reason for giving me what I do not need, especially when my superfluity might be of the greatest use to thousands?"[91]
This unequal distribution of commodities is altogether opposed to the general welfare. It hampers intellectual progress. "Accumulated property treads the powers of thought in the dust, extinguishes the sparks of genius, and reduces the great mass of mankind to be immersed in sordid cares, beside depriving the rich of the most salubrious and effectual motives to activity."[92] And the rich man can buy with his superfluity "nothing but glitter and envy, nothing but the dismal pleasure of restoring to the poor man as alms that to which reason gives him an undeniable right."[93]
But the unequal distribution of commodities is also a hindrance to moral perfection. In the rich it produces ambition, vanity, and ostentation; in the poor, oppression, servility, and fraud, and, in consequence of these, envy, malice, and revenge.[94] "The rich man stands forward as the principal object of general esteem and deference. In vain are sobriety, integrity, and industry, in vain the sublimest powers of mind and the most ardent benevolence, if their possessor be narrowed in his circumstances. To acquire wealth and to display it, is therefore the universal passion."[95] "Force would have died away as reason and civilization advanced, but accumulated property has fixed its empire."[96] "The fruitful source of crimes consists in this circumstance, one man's possessing in abundance that of which another man is destitute."[97]
II. The general welfare demands that a distribution of commodities based solely on its precepts should take the place of property. When Godwin uses the expression "property" for that portion of commodities which is assigned to an individual by these precepts, he does so only in a transferred sense; only a portion assigned by law can be designated as property in the strict sense.
Now, according to the decrees of the general welfare, every man should have the means for a good life.