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SEIZING CAPITAL However tough the taxes that lie ahead they cannot produce hardship to compare with the past provided the machinery of industrial life runs smoothly The past is little realized by us Con ¬ scription of capital has sometimes gone startlingly far in England Edward I and his Parliament seized at one time onetenth of all the movable property in the kingdom for a war against France When Richard I was ransomed the seizure of capital was twentyfive per cent Moreover in those days the margin of capital above simple needs of existence was nothing like what it is today What the war is taking away from ourselves and our children in worldly goods Is part of the mar ¬ gin possessed by the prosperous over actual needs that has been stored up since production was in ¬ creased by the great inventions following the dis ¬ covery of the motive power of steam Leslies
