So say, I think, Ricardo, MacCulloch, and Mill.

But if A supports as many inhabitants as it can contain,--that is, if the inhabitants of A, by our hypothesis, have only just enough land to keep them alive,--how can they pay farm-rent?
If they had gone no farther than to say that the difference in land has OCCASIONED farm-rent, instead of CAUSED it, this observation would have taught us a valuable lesson; namely, that farm-rent grew out of a desire for equality.

Indeed, if all men have an equal right to the possession of good land, no one can be forced to cultivate bad land without indemnification.

Farm-rent--according to Ricardo, MacCulloch, and Mill--would then have been a compensation for loss and hardship.

This system of practical equality is a bad one, no doubt; but it sprang from good intentions.