Likewise, it has the duty and the right, over those who, through extravagance, destroy the security of the subsistence of themselves and their families, to take them into tutelage, and to carry out, in their place, the purpose of society, and their own.
In Athens it was law that every citizen had to give an account of how he lived; nowadays the view prevails that this is nobody’s business. To be sure, every individual is, on the one hand, for himself, but on the other hand he is also a member of the system of civil society, and insofar as every human being has, from it, the right to demand subsistence, it must also protect him against himself. It is not starvation alone that is at issue, but the further point of view is that no rabble should arise. Because civil society is obliged to sustain individuals, it also has the right to compel them to provide for their own subsistence.
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