THIS end is never perfectly attained in any state where the unequal division of property is ad∣mitted, and where fortune is allowed to bestow distinction and rank. It is indeed difficult, by any methods whatever, to shut up this source of corruption. Of all the nations whose history is known with certainty, the design itself, and the manner of executing it, appear to have been un∣derstood in Sparta alone.THERE property was indeed acknowledged by law; but in consequence of certain regulations and practices, the most effectual, it seems, that man∣kind have hitherto found out. The manners that prevail among simple nations before the establish∣ment of property, were in some measure pre∣servedSee part 2. sect. 2.; the passion for riches was, during many ages, suppressed; and the citizen was made to con∣sider himself as the property of his country, not as the owner of a private estate.IT was held ignominious either to buy or to sell the patrimony of a citizen. Slaves were, in every family, intrusted with the care of its effects, and freemen were strangers to lucrative arts; jus∣tice was established on a contempt of the ordinary allurement to crimes; and the preservatives of civil liberty applied by the state, were the dispo∣sitions that were made to prevail in the hearts of its members.0
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