concours,” in other words, a strike or a lock-out; with the sacerdotal order for mediators in case of need.  But though wages are to be an affair of free contract, their standard is not to be the competition of the market, but the application of the products in equitable proportion between the wants of the labourers and the wants and dignity of the employer.  As it is one of M. Comte’s principles that a question cannot be usefully proposed without an attempt at a solution, he gives his ideas from the beginning as to what the normal income of a labouring family should be.  They are on such a scale, that until some great extension shall have taken place in the scientific resources of mankind, it is no wonder he thinks it necessary to limit as much as possible the number of those who are to be supported by what is left of the produce.  In the first place the labourer’s dwelling, which is to consist of seven rooms, is, with all that it contains, to be his own property:  it is the only landed property he is allowed to possess, but every family should be the absolute owner of all things which are destined for its exclusive use.  Lodging being thus independently provided for, and education and medical attendance being secured gratuitously by the general arrangements of society, the pay of the labourer is to consist of two portions, the one monthly, and of fixed amount, the other weekly, and proportioned to the produce of his labour.  The former M. Comte fixes at 100 francs (L4) for a month of 28 days; being L52 a year:  and the rate of piece-work should be such as to make the other part amount to an average of seven francs (5_s_. 6d.) per working day.

Agreeably to M. Comte’s rule, that every public functionary should appoint his successor, the capitalist has unlimited power of transmitting his capital by gift or bequest, after his own death or retirement.  In general it will be best bestowed entire upon one person, unless the business will advantageously admit of subdivision.  He will naturally leave it to one or more of his sons, if sufficiently qualified; and rightly so, hereditary being, in M. Comte’s opinion, preferable to acquired wealth, as being usually more generously administered.  But, merely as his sons, they have no moral right to it.  M. Comte here recognizes another of the principles, on which we believe that the constitution of regenerated society will rest.  He maintains (as others in the present generation have done) that the father owes nothing to his son, except a good education, and pecuniary aid sufficient for an advantageous start in life:  that he is entitled, and may be morally bound, to leave the bulk of his fortune to some other properly selected person or persons, whom he judges likely to make a more beneficial use of it.  This is the first of three important points, in which M. Comte’s theory of the family, wrong as we deem it in its foundations, is in advance of prevailing theories and existing institutions.  The second is the re-introduction