for it is impossible to steal where everything is free.

"It will be well for you to understand how happily we have solved this
question of property, but of course we could not have found such a
solution until we had first reached a high spiritual plane and learned the
lesson of true brotherhood. From your words I know just about the point in
our development which corresponds with the present state of your race, and
therefore I know something of the nature of the struggle through which the
earth is now passing. I warn you that the unrestricted right of private
ownership is a menace to your civilization, all the greater because its
evil is probably not clearly seen. We are assured by our historians, who
try to point out the causes for all the great convulsions in our career,
that excessive individualism in property rights, with its selfish
disregard of others, was a potent factor in the downfall of many of the
enlightened nations of our antiquity. We have noticed that even our
animals have the instinct of possession, and it is certain that the love
of ownership and accumulation has been one of the hardest evils to
eradicate from our naturally selfish nature. If you should ever return to
the earth, do not neglect to signal for this danger."

"But what is the remedy?" asked the doctor. "The system of which you have
been speaking might be called the mainspring of our society. I can hardly
imagine what we should be without it. With our note of warning, what
message of help will you send?" "Doctor," answered Thorwald, "it pleases
me to hear you ask that question, and I am rejoiced also that I have so
good an answer for you. The remedy is to be found in the law of love.
Follow that law as closely as possible. The way will be hard, the progress
slow, but every step taken will be a solid advance. It is the only safe
road, and you will find that every other will lead to disappointment and
disaster."