◆¹ The man’s personal share, then, would be _twenty-two shillings_ a week, and the woman’s _sixteen shillings_; and they could increase their income in no way except by marrying. As many of their expenses would be greatly diminished by being shared, they would by this arrangement both be substantial gainers: but if the principle of equality were properly carried out, they would gain very little further by the appearance of children; for though we must assume that a certain suitable sum would be paid them by the State for the maintenance of each child, that would have to be spent for the child’s benefit. We may, therefore, say that the utmost results which could possibly be secured to the individual by a general confiscation and a general redistribution of wealth, would be represented by the condition of a childless man and wife, with _thirty-eight shillings_ a week, which they could spend entirely on themselves: for all the wealth of the nation that was not absorbed in supplying such incomes to men and women who were childless, would be absorbed in supporting the children of those who had them; thus merely equalising the conditions of large and of small families, and enabling the couple with ten or a dozen children to be personally as well off as the couple with none. Could such a condition of wellbeing be made universal, many of the darkest evils of civilisation would no doubt disappear: but it is well for a man who imagines that the masses of this country are kept by unjust laws out of the possession of some enormous heritage, to see how limited would be the result, if the laws were to give them everything; and to reflect that the largest income that would thus be assigned to any woman, would be less than the income enjoyed at the present moment by multitudes of unmarried girls who work in our Midland mills—girls whose wages amount to _seventeen shillings_ a week, who pay their parents _a shilling_ a day for board, and who spend the remainder, with a most charming taste, on dress. He will have to reflect also that such a result as has been just described could be produced only by an equality that would be absolutely grotesque in its completeness—by every male being treated as equal to every other male of the same age, and by every female being treated similarly. The prime minister, the commander-in-chief, the most important State official, would thus, if they were unmarried, be poorer than many a factory-girl is at present; whilst if they were married, they and their wives together would have but _four shillings_ a week more than is at present earned by a mason, and _six shillings_ a week less than is earned by an overlooker in a cotton-mill. [Sidenote ◆1 Absolute pecuniary equality, however, is not thought possible by anybody;] [Sidenote ◆2 As the salaries asked for Members of Parliament by the Labour Party show.]