doubtless the just notion of equality in human affairs consists with
unlikeness.  Our purpose is to note some of the tendencies of the dogma
as it is at present understood by a considerable portion of mankind. 

We regard the formulated doctrine as modern.  It would be too much to say
that some notion of the "equality of men" did not underlie the
socialistic and communistic ideas which prevailed from time to time in
the ancient world, and broke out with volcanic violence in the Grecian
and Roman communities.  But those popular movements seem to us rather
blind struggles against physical evils, and to be distinguished from
those more intelligent actions based upon the theory which began to stir
Europe prior to the Reformation. 

It is sufficient for our purpose to take the well-defined theory of
modern times.  Whether the ideal republic of Plato was merely a
convenient form for philosophical speculation, or whether, as the
greatest authority on political economy in Germany, Dr.  William Roscher,
thinks, it "was no mere fancy"; whether Plato's notion of the identity of
man and the State is compatible with the theory of equality, or whether
it is, as many communists say, indispensable to it, we need not here