of those who possessed neither, and as bitterly provoked the anger and alarm of those who did.  The struggle raged for some generations and ended by an appeal to the sword; in which, since the force of the State was by law in the hands of the majority, the intelligent, thrifty, careful owners of property with their adherents were signally defeated.  Universal communism was established in 3412, none being permitted to own, or even to claim, the exclusive use of any portion of the planet’s surface, or of any other property except the share of food and clothing allotted to him.  One only privilege was allowed to certain sectaries who still clung to the habits of the past, to the permanence and privacy of family life.  They were permitted to have houses or portions of houses to themselves, and to live there on the share of the public produce allotted to the several members of each household.  It had been assumed as matter of course by the majority that when every one was forced to work there would be more than enough for all; that public spirit, and if necessary coercion, would prove as effectual stimulants to exertion and industry as interest and necessity had done under the system of private ownership.

Those who relied on the refutation of this theory forgot that with poor and suffering men who look to no future, and acknowledge no law but such as is created by their own capricious will and pleasure, envy is even a more powerful passion than greed.  The Many preferred that wealth and luxury should be destroyed, rather than that they should be the exclusive possession of the Few.  The first and most visible effect of Communism was the utter disappearance of all perishable luxuries, of all food, clothing, furniture, better than that enjoyed by the poorest.  Whatever could not be produced in quantities sufficient to give each an appreciable share was not produced at all.  Next, the quarrels arising out of the apportionment of labour were bitter, constant, and savage.  Only a grinding despotism could compose them, and those who wielded such despotism for a short time excited during the period of their rule such fierce and universal hatred, that they were invariably overturned and almost invariably murdered before their very brief legal term of office had closed.  It was not only that those engaged in the same kind of labour quarrelled over the task assigned to each, whether allotted in proportion to his strength, or to the difficulty of his labour, or by lot equally to all.  Those to whom the less agreeable employments were assigned rebelled or murmured, and at last it was necessary to substitute rotation for division of labour, since no one would admit that he was best fitted for the lower or less agreeable.  Of course we thus wasted silver tools in doing the work of iron, and reduced enormously the general production of wealth.  Next, it was found that since one man’s industry or idleness could produce no appreciable effect upon the general wealth, still less upon the particular