John Locke (1632-1704)

Some Considerations of the Lowering of Interest: It is in vain in a country whose great fund is land to hope to lay the public charge on anything else; there at last it will terminate. The merchant (do what you can) will not bear it, the labourer cannot, and therefore the landholder must: and whether he were best to do it by laying it directly where it will at last settle, or by letting it come to him by the sinking of his rents, which when they are fallen, everyone knows they are not easily raised again, let him consider. Whenever, in any country, the proprietor ceases to be the improver, political economy has nothing to say in defence of landed property. When the "sacredness" of property is talked of, it should be remembered that any such sacredness does not belong in the same degree to landed property. When land is not intended to be cultivated, no good reason can in general be given for its private property at all. "Principles of Political Economy" The earth belongs in usufruct to the living and is given as a common stock for men to live and Labor on. ...all the learned of his [Jesus'] country, entrenched in its power and riches were opposed to him, lest his labours should undermine their advantages.