The proprietors, who were then for the most part free from taxation, felt that this was a very considerable contribution, and that the Physiocrats demanded a heavy price for the high honour which they had conferred upon them. Even to-day a tax of 30 per cent. on the gross revenue of landlords would cause some consternation. The Physiocrats anticipated this objection, and in reply brought forward an argument which shows that they possessed exceptionally keen economic insight. They argued that none would feel the burden, seeing that no one was really paying it. Land would now be bought at 70 per cent. of its former value, so that the 30 per cent. nominally paid by the proprietor was in reality not paid by him at all.[97] Land let at £10,000 would be valued at £200,000. But with a tax of £3000 it is really only yielding £7000, and its value will be £140,000. The buyer who pays this price, despite the fact that he has paid a tax of £3000, will enjoy all the revenue to which he has any claim, for he can only lay claim to what he has paid for, and he did not pay for that portion of the revenue which is affected by the tax. It is exactly as if he had only bought seven-tenths of the land, the remaining three-tenths being the State’s. And if at some later time this tax should be abolished, it would merely mean making him a present of £3000 a year—the equivalent of a lump sum of £60,000.[98] The reasoning was excellent for those buying land after the tax had been levied. It had, however, a much wider import than the Physiocrats thought, for it might be applied not merely to taxes on land, but also to taxes on capital. But this gave little consolation to those who were to have the honour of inaugurating the new _régime_, and the first task evidently was to convert them.[99] The sovereign’s position in the main is like that of the landed proprietors, which is in agreement with the Physiocratic conception of sovereignty. The landed proprietors and the king in reality form one class of fellow landowners, with the same rights, the same duties, and the same revenues. Hence the sovereign’s interests are completely bound up with those of his country.[100] The Physiocrats attached the greatest practical importance to their fiscal system, and were thoroughly convinced that the misery of the people was due to the unequal distribution of the burden of taxation. They thought that this was the true source of injustice—in short, that this was the social problem. To-day we ascribe misery to unequal distribution of wealth rather than to any particular fiscal system, and consequently the Physiocratic view seems to us somewhat extreme. Still, it was perhaps not so difficult to justify, in view of the frightful conditions of fiscal organisation under the old _régime_. The objections which a single tax, levied only on the landed interest, was bound to provoke were not unforeseen by the Physiocrats, nor did they neglect to answer them.