We need but think of that constant, stubborn tendency of men to increase their well-being, which guides the men of our time, to become convinced that the prerogatives of the rich over the poor could not and cannot be maintained in any other way.
There may be oppressions, assaults, prisons, executions, which have not for their purpose the preservation of the prerogatives of the wealthy classes (though this is very rare), but we may boldly say that in our society, for each well-to-do, comfortably living man, there are ten who are exhausted by labor, who are envious and greedy, and who frequently suffer with their whole families—all the prerogatives of the rich, all their luxury, all that superfluity which the rich enjoy above the average laborer, all that is acquired and supported only by tortures, incarcerations, and executions.