delicacy, and operates with the greatest force on that part of
society where, if the original intention of the custom were
preserved, there is the least real occasion for it.

When these two fundamental laws of society, the security of
property, and the institution of marriage, were once established,
inequality of conditions must necessarily follow. Those who were
born after the division of property would come into a world
already possessed. If their parents, from having too large a
family, could not give them sufficient for their support, what
are they to do in a world where everything is appropriated? We
have seen the fatal effects that would result to a society, if
every man had a valid claim to an equal share of the produce of
the earth. The members of a family which was grown too large for
the original division of land appropriated to it could not then
demand a part of the surplus produce of others, as a debt of
justice. It has appeared, that from the inevitable laws of our
nature some human beings must suffer from want. These are the
unhappy persons who, in the great lottery of life, have drawn a
blank. The number of these claimants would soon exceed the
ability of the surplus produce to supply. Moral merit is a very
difficult distinguishing criterion, except in extreme cases. The
owners of surplus produce would in general seek some more obvious
mark of distinction. And it seems both natural and just that,
except upon particular occasions, their choice should fall upon
those who were able, and professed themselves willing, to exert
their strength in procuring a further surplus produce; and thus
at once benefiting the community, and enabling these proprietors
to afford assistance to greater numbers. All who were in want of
food would be urged by imperious necessity to offer their labour