They all therefore conceive the idea of increasing it; if they are free, they all attempt it, but all do not succeed in the same manner.

The legislature, it is true, no longer grants privileges, but they are bestowed by nature.

As natural inequality is very great, fortunes become unequal as soon as every man exerts all his faculties to get rich.

The law of descent prevents the establishment of wealthy families; but it does not prevent the existence of wealthy individuals.

It constantly brings back the members of the community to a common level, from which they as constantly escape: and the inequality of fortunes augments in proportion as knowledge is diffused and liberty increased.
A sect which arose in our time, and was celebrated for its talents and its extravagance, proposed to concentrate all property into the hands of a central power, whose function it should afterwards be to parcel it out to individuals, according to their capacity.