It
tends to over-divide property; it is unequal in operation, and can be
eluded by people limiting their families; it makes the children, however
ill they may behave, independent of the parent. To be sure, Mr.
Mill[486] and others have shown that a law of bequest fixing the
maximum, whether of land or money, which any one individual may take by
bequest or inheritance, but in other respects leaving the testator quite
free, has none of the inconveniences of the French law, and is in every
way preferable. But evidently these are not questions of practical
politics. Just imagine Lord Hartington[487] going down to Glasgow, and
meeting his Scotch Liberals there, and saying to them: "You are ill at
ease, and you are calling for change, and very justly. But the cause of
your being ill at ease is not what you suppose. The cause of your being
ill at ease is the profound imperfectness of your social civilization.
Your social civilization is, indeed, such as I forbear to characterize.
But the remedy is not disestablishment.
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